שופטים, פרק כ״א, פסוק י״ב

Following the devastating military strike against the city of Jabesh-gilead, the victorious Israelites return with captives. Among the survivors, four hundred young women are carefully selected to be brought back to the main camp.

To ensure that only unmarried, untouched women were taken, a specific identification process was used. According to tradition, the young women were seated over barrels of wine. This physical test relied on the scent of the wine; if a woman had previously been intimate, the scent would pass through and be detected, whereas it would not for a virgin [רש"י ומצודת דוד]. To leave no doubt about their status, the narrative explicitly emphasizes that these young women had never experienced any physical intimacy [מצודת דוד].

The captives are then transported back to the Israelite base [ביאור שטיינזלץ]. The specific mention of this camp being located in Shiloh resolves a geographical detail from earlier events, revealing that the location previously referred to as Bethel is actually Shiloh. This is the exact site where the Israelites had recently wept before God, constructed an altar to Him, and launched their military campaign against Jabesh-gilead [רד"ק]. Curiously, the location is further described as being in the land of Canaan. Since Shiloh's location within Canaan was already common knowledge, this additional geographic marker remains a puzzling detail with no obvious explanation [רד"ק].