Museums:

The Museo Egizio di Torino has recently posted 11,000 objects from ancient Egypt online.

Six new galleries for ancient Egypt and Nubia opened today at the Ashmolean Museum. The Ashmolean is the most popular free UK museum outside of London.

The British Museum will close its Department of the Middle East to visitors from December 12, 2011 to January 20, 2012.

John E. Curtis will be lecturing on “Babylon: A Wonder of the Ancient World” at the Met on December 19.


Resources/Sales:

The latest production by SourceFlix is now available. You can watch the trailer of “The Sacrifice” at their site. It looks great.

The Logos version of Austen Henry Layard’s Nineveh and Its Remains will close in community bidding on Friday. It’s now at $18 but may well go down to $16 or $14.

BAS has dozens of items for sale this weekend only, including 50% off Jerusalem’s Temple Mount, Freeing the Dead Sea Scrolls, The Copper Scroll, and Scholars on the Record.

Glo Premium is available for only $35 through Monday. The special includes a free DVD.

Accordance is selling all Carta modules and combos for 20% off through December. The sale includes Ritmeyer’s The Quest, Rainey and Notley’s The Sacred Bridge, and Eusebius’ Onomasticon.

Tyndale Tech explains why Perseus, now available for free in Logos, is the best collection for studying backgrounds of the New Testament.

HT: Jack Sasson

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Christianbook.com (CBD) has some Black Friday specials that may be of interest to readers here.

255727: Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary Old Testament, 5 Volumes Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary Old Testament, 5 Volumes. Hardcover. List is $250, on sale for $120 (Amazon: $175)
613176: Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds NT Commentary,  4 Volumes Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds NT Commentary, 4 Volumes. Paperback. List is $130, on sale for $35 (Amazon: $69)
939580: NIV Archaeological Study Bible Renaissance Fine Leather, Venetian Brown 1984 NIV Archaeological Study Bible Renaissance Fine Leather, Venetian Brown 1984. List is $110, on sale for $50 (not listed at Amazon)

The best deal above is the 4-volume ZIBBC NT set.

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This one won’t wait for tomorrow’s roundup because it’s a “Deal of the Day” at Eisenbrauns. I’ve mentioned before (many times) the incomparable value of The Sacred Bridge, by Anson F. Rainey and R. Steven Notley (2005). This work sells for $135, but if you do not need the original languages printed in the text (Hebrew, Greek, Egyptian, Akkadian), you can save half by purchasing the Carta’s New Century Handbook and Atlas of the Bible for $70.

If you don’t mind bent corners and you make up your mind before noon today (and before they sell out), you can save more than half again and get the book for $25. I wonder if there is a book published in the last 10 years in the field of biblical studies that has more packed into 280 pages than this one.

Eisenbrauns also has a non-bent-corner edition for less than Amazon at $50.

You can see the publisher’s information sheet, including the table of contents, in this pdf file. My previous assessment of “The Sacred Abridgement” can be found here.

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More than once I’ve been asked to put together a book with my photos. Even if I had the time, I could not do better than others have done. The most recent work features 200 photos from my collection in A Verse by Verse Trip through the Holy Land. Written by Rob and Lisa Laizure, this new book takes the reader on a tour of 27 sites in Israel, guiding them with interesting facts, large doses of Scripture passages, and 1-3 photos on nearly every page. The reader is taken as far north as Caesarea Philippi and as far south as En Gedi, from Capernaum to Bethlehem. Jerusalem is given extra attention.

The book is available from www.ConnectingTheDotsMinistries.com for $25. Those leading a tour can purchase larger quantities at a discount.

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Ancient Israel: Highlights from the Collections of the Oriental Institute University of Chicago is a new 127-page publication written by Gabrielle Vera Novacek and illustrated with 66 beautiful photographs and diagrams. The book is available for pre-order from Amazon or as a free download (pdf).

Six lectures in Hebrew are now online from the 12th Studies of Ancient Jerusalem conference held in September in the City of David. The speakers included Israel Finkelstein, Ronny Reich, Gabriel Barkay, Asher Grossberg, Eli Shukron, and Yosef Garfinkel.

“Libya’s famed ancient Roman sites, including the sprawling seaside ruins of Leptis Magna, were spared damage by NATO during the recent airstrikes, says a London-based Libyan archaeologist.”

Muslims continue to bury their dead next to the eastern wall of the Temple Mount, according to the Committee to Prevent the Destruction of Temple Mount Antiquities.

The head of the Supreme Committee of the Grand Egyptian Museum was fired this week.

“Ultra-Orthodox young men curse and spit at Christian clergymen in the streets of Jerusalem’s Old City as a matter of routine.” Last week a judge ruled in favor of an Armenian seminary student who fought back.

HT: Daniel Wright, Jack Sasson, ANE-2, AWOL

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In follow-ups to yesterday’s story, Nadav Shragai writes that the Mughrabi Bridge must be built. The city engineer is threatening to destroy the temporary bridge. The Muslim Waqf says that they are sovereign over all.

A preliminary report from excavations at Gezer from 2006-2009 is now online. Elsewhere excavator Sam Wolff writes that they are a season or two away from floor levels associated with the (Solomonic) six-chambered gate.

Jerusalem plans to develop an extensive archaeological site 30 feet (10 m) below the plaza at Jaffa Gate in order to share with the public a 220-foot (70-m) aqueduct, a Byzantine bathhouse, and other remains.

Haaretz’s Week’s End has an interesting article on the Cairo Geniza and ambitious plans to digitize all 350,000 fragments.

A couple of Tel Aviv archaeologists would like to move some of historic Jerusalem from the City of
David to the Rephaim Valley. Lipschits and Na’aman have proposed that the King’s Garden was located not where the Kidron and Hinnom Valleys meet but on one end of Emek Refaim Street in west Jerusalem.

The Oriental Institute in Chicago will run an exhibit entitled “Picturing the Past: Imaging and Imagining the Ancient Middle East” from February 6 to September 2, 2012.


A Biblical Chronology from Abraham to Paul is a new book by Andrew E. Steinmann. Justin Taylor has links to his OT and NT Chronologies as well as a 48-page excerpt from his book. It seems to agree with standard conservative views except that Jesus was born in 1 BC. [Note: be prepared for sticker shock. Perhaps you can ask your library to purchase a copy.]

Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has begun a list of Archaeological Excavations in 2012.

A photograph of McDonalds at Masada has prompted the site archaeologist to write an article in Haaretz. The photogapher [sic] has rejected the charges.

Thousands of people pass by the place where the ark of the covenant rested every day. Wayne Stiles explains the significance of Kiriath Jearim (and, unlike most, he gets the chronology right!).

The Big Picture celebrates Sukkot.

Israel’s prime minister and education minister are urging everyone to vote for the Dead Sea as one of the New 7 Wonders of Nature. The Dead Sea is one of 28 finalists. Voting ends on November 11.

HT: Joseph Lauer, Jack Sasson

Sunrise over Dead Sea at En Gedi, tb021906180

The Dead Sea at sunrise
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