Rome’s ongoing subway system project has uncovered several glimpses of the past, this time the ruins of a Roman military commander’s 14-room luxury villa. ASOR Cultural Heritage Initiatives has a report on the current status of the Ain Dara Temple. Authorities caught tomb raiders in Galilee as they used a bulldozer to loot graves from the Roman period. 3D computational geometry is being used in a long-distance virtual reconstruction to piece together ancient cuneiform texts. Christopher Rollston is on the OnScript Podcast speaking about the Isaiah seal impression. The Digital Archive for the Study of pre-Islamic Arabian Inscriptions “seeks to gather all known pre-Islamic Arabian epigraphic material into a comprehensive online database, with the aim to make available to specialists and to the broader public a wide array of documents often underestimated because of their difficulty of access.” A proposed restructuring at University College London may have adverse effects on the Petrie Museum. You can learn how to help here. Bible Gateway has published an interview with Lois Tverberg about her new book, Reading the Bible with Rabbi Jesus. On sale for Kindle: Provan, Long, and Longman, A Biblical History of Israel ($3.99). Accordance has a big sale going on now on atlases and related resources. The Satellite Bible Atlas is now available on Accordance, and it too is on sale (40% off) until March 12. BAS is offering subscriptions to its video lecture service for 75% off for a limited time. David Z. Moster’s latest video explains how to use the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia. Wayne Stiles shares some new video footage shot over biblical Joppa. The LMLK Blogspot links to a new video of aerial footage of Hebron. HT: Ted Weis, Agade, Charles Savelle, Mark Hoffman
A 12-minute video on the discovery of the Isaiah seal impression describes the background and significance of this find. The video includes interviews with Eilat Mazar and Shmuel Ahituv.
Christopher Rollston issues some cautions about identifying that seal impression with the prophet Isaiah. He follows up with more here. Michael Welch goes further and says that the seal belongs to
Isaiah (son of) Nobai or Isaiah the Nobian and not the famous prophet.
Biblical Archaeology Review is honoring its founder Hershel Shanks with a double issue, the table of contents of which is now online.
Mark D. Smith investigates the probability of a body of an criminal executed by Rome being buried.
Wayne Stiles considers the purpose of Jesus’s transfiguration and its significance to us today.
Ferrell Jenkins recalls his own experiences in visiting the Jordan River near Jericho.
How was Jesus heard without a microphone? That’s the topic on this week’s The Land and the Book broadcast with Barry Britnell.
Sharon Herbert will be lecturing at the Albright Institute on March 1 on “New Work on the Sealings and the Archive from Tel Kedesh.”
Now’s a good time to sign up for the summer excavations at Tell es-Safi/Gath.
HT: Agade, Joseph Lauer, Ted Weis
- Tagged Discoveries, Excavations, Galilee, Jerusalem, Jordan Rift, Lectures, Philistines
Lois Tverberg explains the reading tradition used in the synagogue in ancient times, and she provides a list of the triennial reading schedule used in the 3rd to 7th centuries.
Wayne Stiles’s post on “How to live the impossible Christian life” includes a beautiful photo of the Sea of Galilee.
The Young Archaeologists School in el-Alamein, Egypt, is teaching schoolchildren about the importance of archaeology.
“Why don’t most ancient Near Eastern languages have words for ‘blue,’ ‘yellow,’ or even ‘color’?”
G. M. Grena notes a couple of episodes on the “Excavating the Bible” show that mention LMLK seals.
Chris McKinny is one of the authors of a new article entitled “The Agricultural Landscape of Tel Burna: Ecology and Economy of a Bronze Age/Iron Age Settlement in the Southern Levant.
Aren Maeir has posted the schedule for the annual “Aharoni Day,” this year focused on ancient metallurgy.
In honor of Tu B’Shevat, the Temple Mount Sifting Project shares some of the fascinating story of ancient wooden beams from the Temple Mount.
Israel’s Good Name took a field trip to the IAA Warehouse and to the Rockefeller Museum.
- Tagged Egypt, Galilee, Jerusalem, Lectures, Museums, Shephelah, Temple Mount, Tourism, Weekend Roundup
A team has been excavating the so-called “Cave 12” at Qumran and a statement of their latest work will be released soon.
One of the last unpublished Dead Sea Scrolls has been deciphered using high-tech imagery to put together a puzzle of 60 tiny scroll fragments.
The Times of Israel has more on the depiction of the birth of Athena on the potsherd from et-Tell.
Moshe Gilad, in a lengthy and well-illustrated article at Haaretz, asks why Qasr el-Yahud, the traditional place of Jesus’s baptism, is still mined and booby-trapped seven years after the site opened to tourists.
A conference on the Archaeology of the Dead Sea Region will be held next month at the State Museum of Archaeology Chemnitz in preparation for an exhibition on “Life at the Dead Sea” in the fall of 2019.
In a journal article for NEASB, Brian Peterson considers whether a ram’s head discovered at Khirbet el-Maqatir provides evidence for the Israelite conquest of Ai.
New images of mosaics discovered at the Huqoq synagogue will be displayed for the first time in a lecture at the University of Chester in the UK.
Carl Rasmussen shares photos of reliefs that illustrate the “dogs eating the crumbs” that fall from the table.
Leen Ritmeyer discusses the importance of the Trumpeting Stone discovered below the Temple
Mount and shares some photos from its original discovery.
Wayne Stiles explains why the Lord took his people to Mount Sinai before the Promised Land.
Kenneth Seeskin explains why the Hebrew Bible is so easy/difficult to interpret.
The Caspari Center is running a course on “Discovering Jesus in His Jewish Context” in April and May of this year.
Les and Kathy Bruce of Biblical Byways are leading a tour to Turkey and Greece in May and June.
Elisha Qimron has been awarded the Israel Prize for his work on the Dead Sea Scrolls.
The ESV Archaeology Study Bible is coming in March, and you can read about the editors and their approach.
Appian Media has released a trailer for their next big project: Searching for a King. Filming will begin this summer.
HT: Joseph Lauer, Agade, Charles Savelle
- Tagged Dead Sea, Egypt, Galilee, Jordan Rift, Lectures, Movies, Museums, Resources, Samaria, Technology, Temple Mount, Tourism
A 4th century BC vase discovered at et-Tell (Bethsaida?) has a depiction of an image copied from the Parthenon in Athens.
Haaretz (premium): “A team of Israeli scientists and archaeologists has embarked on a massive four-year project to accurately radiocarbon-date the complex layers of ancient Jerusalem.”
A stele from the reign of Ramses II has been discovered at San al-Hagar.
Roman funeral mummy portraits from Egypt, dating to the first three centuries AD, are on exhibit at Northwestern University’s Block Museum. There’s a 3-minute video here.
ASOR Blog: “What were the types of musicians and instruments in Ancient Egypt, how were they used, and where did they come from?”
How do scholars reconstruct the rules for ancient board games?
David Z. Moster of 929 Chapters has launched a new YouTube channel with a video on “How to
Study the Bible with Ancient Near Eastern Texts.”
The Spring 2018 issue of DigSight includes reports on the Fourth Expedition to Lachish, ecology on ancient seals, and more.
Scott Stripling reports on Week Two of the winter’s work processing material from Khirbet el-Maqatir.
Leon Mauldin writes of the possible connection between the apostle Paul and Gush Halav in Galilee.
Ferrell Jenkins shares photos that illustrate a king making a footstool of his enemies.
Wayne Stiles is leading a tour to Israel this October.
HT: Joseph Lauer, Agade, Ted Weis, Charles Savelle
- Tagged Discoveries, Egypt, Galilee, Greece, Jerusalem, Museums, New Exhibits, Samaria, Shephelah, Weekend Roundup
“The Legio camp [at Megiddo] is the only full-scale imperial Roman legionary base found so far in the eastern empire” and to date they’ve unearthed a monumental gate, a dedicatory inscription, and the cremated remains of a Roman soldier.
The first royal winery of King Herod was discovered at the Herodium. The story does not seem to be in the English press yet, but you can read a Google-translated version of the Israel Nature and Parks
Authority story here. UPDATE: I’ve posted Joseph Lauer’s improved translation here.
Some Israelis are accusing authorities of not protecting Herod’s palace at Jericho from destruction caused by the nearby building of homes.
A new exhibit at the Haifa Hostel tells the story of ancient Castra on the slopes of Mount Carmel.
A new exhibit at the Hecht Museum at the University of Haifa documents the transition of the city of Sussita (Hippos) from pagan to Christian.
The ASOR Blog has a well-illustrated piece on the Ottoman and Turkish history of Majdal Yābā (aka Migdal Aphek, Mirabel).
Leen Ritmeyer explains how Jerusalem’s garbage dump refutes the theory that the temple was built over the Gihon Spring.
New from Wayne Stiles: How to follow God by pondering amazing bird migrations in Israel.
Now published: The Elephant Mosaic Panel in the Synagogue at Huqoq, by Karen Britt and Ra’anan
Boustan. Authorized photos are available at National Geographic. Dr. Britt will lecture on the subject on Feb. 21 at UNC Asheville.
At The Book and the Spade, John DeLancey talks with Gordon Govier about Excavation Plans for 2018.
Israel’s Good Name describes his experience in an archaeological survey of Tel Goded (Moresheth-Gath?) in part 1 and part 2.
With 3.6 million tourists in 2017, Israel hit a new record. This was a 25% increase over 2016. For some trends in tourism between 1990 and 2011, see this booklet.
Israel saw lots of rain yesterday, but probably not the “100 inches” claimed in this article’s subhead.
Lawrence Stager died at the age of 74 after a fall at his home. He directed the excavations at Ashkelon for 30 years.
HT: Agade, Joseph Lauer, Keith Keyser, Charles Savelle
- Tagged Discoveries, Excavations, Galilee, Jerusalem, Jezreel Valley, Judah, Lectures, Museums, New Exhibits, Sad News, Shephelah, Tourism, Weather, Weekend Roundup