BiblePlaces Newsletter
Vol 8, #6 - December 8, 2009


I have two favorite CDs in the American Colony photo collection: Jerusalem and Traditional Life and Customs.  I think the reason I like Jerusalem so much is because the modern city is very familiar to me, and the photos reveal such profound changes that have occurred in such a short span of time.

The Traditional Life and Customs photos, however, have long defined the entire collection for me.  When someone would ask what I was working on, I'd smile and tell them about the photos in this set.  If nothing else, the American Colony collection had to see the light of day because these were photos that I could never take myself, in any shape or form.  With Jerusalem, you can still get a photo of the Kidron Valley, even if it is covered with buildings.  But the only fishermen I see today on the Sea of Galilee are in motorboats and they are wearing plastic green coveralls.  I have trouble imagining Jesus and the disciples with this picture.

Shepherds still roam the Judean hills with their flocks, but I hesitate to include them in any photo because they're wearing a windbreaker and Levis.  The grain harvest usually includes a combine, and cooking is over an electric stove.  When a locust plague threatens, the authorities are quick to react to prevent the insects from devouring the crops.  That's good for the farmers, but bad for the photographers.  This new volume has all of this and much more.

A reader last month commented that he wanted to unsubscribe because this newsletter is too commercial.  My hope is that readers will enjoy the free information and photos (see below, and the PowerPoint download) and feel no obligation, now or ever, to purchase.  For a period of five years (Nov 2004 - Aug 2009), this newsletter featured only two new collections - one for free (Aerials of Israel 2005) and one for sale (Views That Have Vanished).  But now that we've finished this huge project, we're happy to "show it off."  That's why we're releasing one CD a month.  That also gives you the opportunity to enjoy one free set of photos each month. 

We wish you a merry Christmas and a happy Hanukkah!

Todd Bolen
Editor, BiblePlaces.com

 

 


New Release:
Traditional Life and Customs
Volume 6 of The American Colony and Eric Matson Collection

Before I am accused of being unable to count, let me explain that we have released volume 6 before volume 5 because we think that volume 6 may be useful for Christmas (both for illustrating the story as well as being a great gift).

Just what does Traditional Life and Customs include?

Agricultural Life: Plowing, Sowing, Water, Vineyards, Locust Plague, Grain Harvest and Olive Harvest (185 photos total)

Biblical Stories: Christmas, Ruth, and Psalm 23 (75 photos total)

Psalm 23:2

Home Life: Food Preparation, Women at Work, and Weddings (100 photos total)

Religious Life: Christian, Jewish, Muslim, and Samaritan (110 photos total)

Work Life: Clothes Making, Fishing, Pottery Making, Shepherds, Trades, and Travel (150 photos total)

Quotations: We have scoured the reports of travelers in the 19th century for the most interesting and helpful descriptions of these scenes.  Even if you didn't have the photos, your understanding and appreciation for traditional ways would be greatly increased by these quotations!

We dare you not to love this collection.  (Note: We are not easily excited.)

You can purchase it online for $20, with free shipping in the US.

 


News from the BiblePlaces Blog...

Weekend Roundup - New and interesting discoveries or resources from Jerusalem, Gath, Megiddo, and Pompeii.  And here are some items I forgot...

IAA Work on Mary's Gate Makes Jerusalemite Upset - The Israel Antiquities Authority has opened up a gate under the Temple Mount Holy Sepulcher, if you believe one Muslim official...

Where Did Goliath's Head Go? - This question apparently causes some people to stay up at night...

Photos from Israel in 1948 - Three sets of photos taken from the archives of Life Magazine...

View from Mount Nebo, Then and Now - The Bible says that Moses' eye was not dimmed at 120 years of age, and combined with clear air, he could see a far piece...

Bible Mapper Version 4 - This excellent software for creating custom maps of the biblical lands just got better...

And more...
 


Featured BiblePlaces Photos:
Grain Harvest

The featured photos of the month show the various stages of the barley and wheat harvest in Palestine in the early 1900s.  From reaping the grain in the fields, to carrying in the sheaves, to threshing, winnowing, sifting, and measuring the grain, the entire process is illustrated by native farmers who knew no other life. 

Each photo below is linked to a higher-resolution version, but we recommend that you download the Grain Harvest PowerPoint presentation (7.5 MB), which includes an additional 30 photos (36 total) along with fascinating quotations from early explorers.  You are welcome to use these images for personal study and teaching. Commercial use requires separate permission.  These photos are included in the new American Colony volume, Traditional Life and Customs. For more high-quality, high-resolution photographs and illustrations of biblical sites, purchase the Pictorial Library of Bible Lands or the Historic Views of the Holy Land collections.

 

Reaping the fields


Click picture for higher-resolution version.
 

Date of photograph: between 1898 to 1919

Edwin Rice in 1910: "Reaping barley—the earliest crop—opens a merry season in Palestine.  'The entire population of a village turns out into the fields; the men reap and the women glean, the children play about, and the cattle crop the stubble.  Everyone is in good spirits.  As they work they sing, the men and the women responsively, each a line of the harvest song.'"

 

Transporting the sheaves


Click picture for higher-resolution version.
 

Date of photograph: between 1900 and 1920

William Thomson in 1880: "When I passed this way early in June, many years ago, there were hundreds of men, women, and children reaping, gleaning, and carrying the grain to their great threshing-floors.  Long lines of camels, bearing on their backs burdens of unthreshed wheat larger than themselves, were slowly converging to the village from every part of the plain; and the grain lay on the threshing-floor in heaps mountains high."

 

Threshing the grain


Click picture for higher-resolution version.
 

Date of photograph: between 1900 and 1920

F. A. Klein in 1883: "Another method is the use of a weighty plank, into the under side of which are sunk a number of small bits of basalt stone, forming kind of teeth.  This instrument, called a môrej, and made somewhat in the fashion of a sledge, is drawn by a horse over the heap of unthreshed barley or wheat, and crushes out the grain partly by its weight, for the driver sits upon it, and partly by the sharp teeth which tear the corn.  The grain being separated from the straw, the work of winnowing begins."

 

Muzzling the ox


Click picture for higher-resolution version.
 

Date of photograph: between 1900 and 1920

William Thomson in 1880: "The command of Moses not to muzzle the ox that treadeth out the corn is literally obeyed to this day by most farmers, and you often see the oxen eating from the floor as they go round.  There are niggardly peasants, however, who do muzzle the ox—enough to show the need of the command; and Paul intimates that there were some such in the Church in his day: 'Doth God take care for oxen?  Or saith he it altogether for our sakes?  For our sakes, no doubt, this is written: that he that plougheth should plough in hope; and; that he that thresheth in hope should be partaker of his hope.'"

 

Winnowing the wheat


Click picture for higher-resolution version.
 

Date of photograph: between 1898 and 1946

F. A. Klein in 1883: "The grain being separated from the straw, the work of winnowing begins.  This must be done whenever there is a gentle breeze, for with too much or too little wind it is equally impossible.  The threshed grain is tossed with a three-pronged wooden fork; the wind scatters the chaff to a distance, and carries away the dust."

 

 

Sifting the grain


Click picture for higher-resolution version.
 

Date of photograph: between 1898 and 1946

H. B. Tristram in 1868: "So soon as the straw has been removed from the floor, the threshed corn is tossed into the air by shovels, if there be a slight breeze, when the chaff is carried off, and the wheat falls back.  This is repeated till it is tolerably clean, when a sieve is employed to complete the operation, and to get rid of the dust and dirt which still remains.  If there be no wind, a sort of great fan or flapper is employed.  The sifting is very necessary after this rough winnowing, and many of the Bedouin on a journey carry their sieve on their back, to clean the wheat for themselves, and the barley for their horses every evening."

 



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All contents (c) 2009 Todd Bolen.  Text and photographs may be used for personal and educational use.  Commercial use requires written permission.