According to the Book of Joshua 18:1, it was at Shiloh that the "whole congregation of the children of Israel assembled...and set up the tabernacle of the congregation...", being the tent which housed the ark. Later on, the portable tent seems to have been enclosed within a compound or replaced with a standing structure with "doors" (1 Samuel 3:15) a precursor to the Temple, that survived until the time of Samuel, continue...