Museums Archives - Page 57 of 102

Weekend Roundup

The big story of the week is the discoveries made in excavations at Caesarea, including the altar of Herod’s temple, an inscribed menorah, and a statue of Asclepius. You can read the press release here or download high-res photos here. Haaretz has the best illustrated story. The Times of Israel emphasizes the discovery of an inscribed menorah. The Jerusalem Post focuses on the $27 million project. Art Daily provides another brief summary.This 3-minute video includes English subtitles.

A colossus of Ramses II has been re-erected in front of Luxor Temple’s first pylon.

Ten nations have created an “Ancient Civilizations Forum” to work together to protect ancient heritage from Islamic extremism.

Israeli police arrested a man in Hawara and confiscated hundreds of antiquities they discovered in his house.

A petition is now circulating to save the Yale Babylonian Collection.

A first-century AD bust of Drusus Minor will be returned to Italy by the Cleveland Museum of Art.

Should Egypt sell some of its artifacts to raise money?
BBC: “Madain Saleh isn’t as well-known as Petra, but the Nabateans’ second-largest city played a
crucial role in their mysterious empire.”

Simon Gathercole looks at the historical evidence for Jesus’s life and death.
BAS has published online a web-exclusive chart of 53 biblical people who have been confirmed in inscriptions.

Wayne Stiles’s recent post on Mount Carmel includes photos of its beauty and its burning.

Leon Mauldin visited Bethphage yesterday.

What happened to the cross that Jesus died on?

Mark Hoffman suggests that you may want to download Google Earth before it’s gone.

The Corinth Excavations Archaeological Manual has been published and a pdf has been made available for free. The post includes a link to previously published archaeology manuals.

The four-volume Dictionary of Daily Life in Biblical and Post-Biblical Antiquity is available on
Logos at a pre-pub price of $51. I recommend it.

I’ll be traveling much of May and June, so I probably will not be able to do many roundups.

HT: Joseph Lauer, Agade, Ted Weis, Charles Savelle

Tagged Antiquities Trade, Discoveries, Egypt, Excavations, Greece, Israel's Coast, Jerusalem, Museums, Resources, Weekend Roundup

Weekend Roundup

“An Egyptian archaeological mission in Luxor has announced the discovery of a major tomb in the city’s west bank area dating back to the 18th Dynasty and containing priceless artefacts.”

Israeli archaeologists have begun to study an ancient Jewish pyramid near Khirbet Midras in the Shephelah.

Archaeologists have discovered an estate of Emperor Marcus Aurelius in the mountains of southwestern Turkey.

Symbols found on the the Vulture Stone at Gobekli Tepe in Turkey has led researchers to propose the earth was struck by a devastating comet around 11,000 BC.

Shots were fired near St. Catherine’s Monastery at Mount Sinai, but there are different explanations of what happened.

The Qumran and Bible Exhibition is now online with an audioguide and with a video introduction.

The latest edition of The Holy Land Magazine is online and includes tourist articles on Nazareth Village, Yad VaShem, Neot Kedumim, and more.

Tom Powers considers David Bivin’s recent post on the deteriorating road to Emmaus and adds some observations of his own.

Elizabeth Sloane, writing in Haaretz, asks, “Did the Egyptian goddess Hathor originate with Semitic miners from Canaan?”

The Temple Mount Sifting Project must meet its fundraising goal or it will receive none of the pledged funds.

The Amarna Letters are the topic of the week on The Book and the Spade with guest Alice Mandell.

The Khirbet el-Maqatir exhibit in Pikeville, Kentucky is drawing visitors.

Eisenbrauns is offering the Victor Avigdor Hurowitz memorial volume at a savings of 40% for a few more days: Marbeh Ḥokmah: Studies in the Bible and the Ancient Near East (2 vols). List $139.50; sale: $83.70.

HT: Charles Savelle, Ted Weis, Joseph Lauer, Agade

Tagged Discoveries, Egypt, Excavations, Judah, Museums, New Exhibits, Shephelah, Temple Mount, Tourism, Turkey, Weekend Roundup

Weekend Roundup

“In an statement timed just ahead of Passover, the Temple Mount Sifting Project said Sunday it had found a stone finger that may have belonged to a Bronze Age Egyptian statue, but conceded it wasn’t sure.”

For the first time ever, a reenactment of the Passover sacrifice took place in the Jewish Quarter.

Wayne Stiles has released the third video in his virtual tour of the Passion Week.

Carl Rasmussen has written a series of informative posts related to Jesus’s trial and crucifixion, including “Another Gethsemane?,” “Site of Crucifixion of Jesus?,” “Gordon’s Calvary,” and “The Burial Bench of Jesus?”

John DeLancey is on The Book and the Spade discussing the latest renovations of the edicule in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher.

DeLancey also recently announced a tour this fall of Egypt, Jordan, and Israel.

An archaeologist claims that a thick layer of sand at Tel Achziv attests to a tsunami that hit the coast of Israel in the 8th century BC.

Evidence discovered below the Dead Sea suggests that there were significant droughts in the past.

On the ASOR Blog, Douglas Petrovich discusses some of his discoveries behind his theory that Hebrew is the language behind the world’s first alphabet. Alan Millard has written a response. You can get a 25% discount on Petrovich’s book with code PET25.

The Linda Byrd Smith Museum of Biblical Archaeology opens today at Harding University in Searcy, Arkansas.

Israel’s Good Name recently went on a Bar Ilan U tour of the Old City and Ramat Rahel.

The latest issue of Biblical Archaeology Review has articles on the Arch of Titus, Magdala, and three more biblical people confirmed by archaeological evidence.

Leen Ritmeyer notes two new apps that take visitors to ancient Jerusalem. Live Science has more about the Lithodomos VR app.

Divers in Italy have begun the search for a third pleasure barge of Emperor Caligula.

The site of Humayma in southern Jordan was probably founded by the Nabatean king Aretas IV early in the first century AD.

“War and Storm: Treasures of the Sea Around Sicily” is a special exhibit of recovered antiquities at Glyptotek in Copenhagen.

According to The Irish News, some of the Chester Beatty manuscripts are now on display in the Chester Beatty Library in Dublin.

John the Baptist would feel right at home at a Mariners’ game with their new menu offering of toasted grasshoppers.

Frederic William Bush, longtime Professor of Old Testament and Ancient Near Eastern Studies at Fuller Theological Seminary, died last week.

HT: Charles Savelle, Agade, Joseph Lauer, Steven Anderson

Tagged Dead Sea, Holidays, Israel's Coast, Italy, Jerusalem, Jordan, Museums, New Exhibits, Sad News, Technology, Temple Mount, Tomb of Jesus, Tourism, Weekend Roundup

Weekend Roundup (The Real Edition)

High school students excavating in Ramat Beit Shemesh have uncovered remains of a Jewish village from the first century AD.

Aviva and Shmuel Bar-Am describe the recently opened Mikveh Trail south of the Temple Mount.

“Did archaeologists find the royal banqueting complex of King Herod the Great in Jerusalem?”

Carl Rasmussen shares an unusual photo of a cross in Jerusalem.

The predators center (walk-through exhibit) at Hai Bar Yotvata is now closed.

Israel’s Good Name recently paid a visit to the Jerusalem Bird Observatory.

John DeLancey has a wrap-up of his latest Israel tour. You may resonate with some of his concluding observations.

This week on The Book and the Spade, Clyde Billington and Gordon Govier discuss the Jebusite and Roman walls of Jerusalem.

Simon Gathercole lectured recently on “The Journeys of Jesus and Jewish Geography” at the Lanier Theological Library.

Gary Shogren suggests his favorite 5 New Testament archaeological discoveries of recent years.

Appian Media is getting closer to reaching its fundraising goal so they can finish the “Following the
Messiah” series.

Douglas Clark of LaSierra University will be leading a team of scholars to create the Madaba
Regional Archaeological Museum.

Construction workers have discovered a tomb from the Neo-Assyrian period in Erbil, Iraq.

Restoring the Mosul Museum will not be easy without any remaining artifacts.

A new walking trail and viewing terraces have been created to attract more tourists to the Titus Tunnel near the ancient port of Seleucia.

Archaeologists have discovered 38 graves in an ancient Jewish cemetery in Rome.

The tourist company Roma Experience now offers visitors to Domus Aurea an augmented reality experience with 3-D glasses that brings to life Nero’s palace as it was in the first century.

In a new article “The Old Testament and the Ancient Near East: Profits and Losses” published on the ABR website, Eugene Merrill identifies “five clear profits,” “three claimed profits,” and “two mixed blessings.”

The National Post loves Eric Cline’s 480-page tome, Three Stones Make a Wall: The Story of Archaeology. An illustrated excerpt discussing the antiquities trade has been posted on the ASOR Blog. The Bible and Interpretation has posted his Megiddo chapter.

Karl Katz, the first curator of the Israel Museum, has written an autobiography entitled The
Exhibitionist, which is reviewed by Asher Weill.

Eisenbrauns has published another valuable study (at a much more affordable price than many academic publishers): The Shephelah during the Iron Age, edited by Oded Lipschits and Aren M. Maeir, with articles about Gezer, Beth Shemesh, Azekah, Qeiyafa, Gath, Zayit, Burna, and Halif. Maeir’s chapter on Gath is online.

William Kelly Simpson and Louis H. Feldman died recently.

HT: Agade, Ted Weis, BibleX

Tagged Discoveries, Excavations, Italy, Jerusalem, Mesopotamia, Museums, Shephelah, Temple Mount, Tourism, Weekend Roundup

Weekend Roundup, Part 2

Haaretz (premium): “Archaeologists in Rome have uncovered the [very fragmentary] remains of a second triumphal arch dedicated to the emperor Titus and his success in putting down the Great Revolt of the Jews in the first century C.E.”

“The remains of a huge Roman temple, the size of St Paul’s Cathedral in London has been found by a Cambridge University archaeological team in central Italy.”

Philippe Bohstrom has written an interesting and well-illustrated article on the Greek site of Poseidonia (Paestum) in southern Italy.

“The location where the Greek naval forces had gathered before the historic sea battle of Salamis against Persians in 480 BC has been discovered.”

“A unique statue, possibly of Queen Tiye, the wife of King Amenhotep III and grandmother of King Tutankhamun, has been unearthed at her husband’s funerary temple in Kom El-Hittan on Luxor’s west bank.”

“The intact tomb of the brother of a 12th Dynasty Elephantine governor has been uncovered, containing a range of funerary goods.”

Antiquities dealers in the US imported $100 million in artifacts from Egypt and Turkey last year.

In order to thwart the plundering of antiquities, Syrian archaeologists have begun painting their treasures with a clear, traceable liquid.

The New York Times previews the new “Mummies” exhibit at the American Museum of Natural
History in Manhattan.

The ABWG has a roundup of links for Awards for Books in Classics, Ancient Near East, and Antiquity.

HT: Ted Weis, Charles Savelle, Steven Anderson, Agade, Joseph Lauer

Tagged Antiquities Trade, Discoveries, Egypt, Greece, Italy, Museums, New Exhibits, Syria, Weekend Roundup

Weekend Roundup, Part 1

Archaeologists working along Highway 1 near Abu Ghosh discovered a cache of bronze coins from the time of the Persian invasion in AD 614.

A study of a core sample from 1,500 feet below the floor of the Dead Sea points to lengthy droughts in the past.

With Easter approaching, the IAA gave reporters a tour of its storage facility. Haaretz goes with the sensational headline.

For two more articles on this week’s story about the edicule in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, see The New York Times and National Geographic. The latter includes some terrific photos.

Carl Rasmussen highlights a video that allegedly shows the original stone wall of Jesus’s tomb inside the edicule.

“A World of Emotions: The Making of an Exhibition” describes the new exhibit at the Onassis Center in New York. Many photos are included.

Bible History Today has a preview of “Where Are the Royal Archives at Tel Hazor?” from the latest issue of BAR.

Philip F. Esler writes about the ancient Jewish woman that we know the most about: Babatha.

Timothy Lim explains what we know about the Dead Sea Scrolls 70 years after the initial discovery.

Wayne Stiles reveals how the events at Shechem teach us how to live more faithful lives.

HT: Gordon Franz, Ted Weis, Charles Savelle, Jared Clark, Agade, Joseph Lauer

Tagged Dead Sea, Discoveries, Galilee, Jerusalem, Judah, Museums, New Exhibits, Samaria, Tomb of Jesus, Weekend Roundup