 "Aviv" is Hebrew for "spring", symbolizing renewal, and "tel" is a man-made mound accumulating layers of civilization built one over the other and symbolizing the ancient.Although founded in 1909 as a small settlement on the sand dunes north of Jaffa, Tel Aviv was envisaged as a future city from the start.Its founders hoped that in contrast to what they perceived as the squalid and unsanitary conditions of neighbouring Arab towns, Tel Aviv was to be a clean and modern city, inspired by the European cities of Warsaw and Odessa.