Resources Archives - Page 34 of 145

Weekend Roundup, Part 1

This year’s excavations at the Jewish synagogue of Huqoq in Galilee uncovered the first known depictions of Deborah and Jael.

“A professor at the University of Haifa claimed on Wednesday that he had deciphered a 3,500-year-old stone tablet discovered in Jerusalem more than a decade ago, contending that the artifact’s inscription was a curse against the city’s governor at the time.” In response, Christopher Rollston doubts whether it is an inscription at all, and he notes some troubling similarities with the Mount Ebal Lead Inscription.

A brush fire cleared the overgrowth at Tel Gezer but did not cause damage to the archaeological ruins. There are more photos and video (in Hebrew) here.

Week 3 has been the most productive week of excavations at Tel Burna this season.

Was Hezekiah’s Tunnel fitted with a sluice gate to allow water to flow into the Siloam Tunnel and Round Chamber? Chandler Collins summarizes a new theory and identifies some problems with it. You can also subscribe to Chandler’s new newsletter.

Bible History Daily has begun a series on excavations in biblical lands. The first post asks volunteers and students questions about their experiences in the ongoing excavations at Tel Hadid in the Tel Aviv area.

Jason Staples believes that from the exilic period on, the term “Jews” was a subset of the larger group of “Israelites.”

The Albright Institute has issued a call for applications for fellowships for the year 2023-2024.

New release: Women and the Religion of Ancient Israel, by Susan Ackerman (Anchor Yale Bible Reference Library, 2022). Also at Amazon.

New release: Encyclopedia of Material Culture in the Biblical World: A New Biblisches Reallexikon, edited by Angelika Berlejung (Mohr Siebeck, 2022).

Zoom lecture on July 14: “Water the Willow Tree: Memoirs of a Bethlehem Boyhood,” with book author George A. Kiraz talking with Sarah Irving and Jacob Norris.

Online on October 8-9: The 25th Annual Bible and Archaeology Fest, sponsored by the Biblical Archaeology Society and featuring more than 20 speakers.

HT: Agade, Joseph Lauer, Explorator

Tagged Discoveries, Excavations, Galilee, Israel's Coast, Jerusalem, Lectures, Resources, Shephelah, Weekend Roundup

Weekend Roundup, Part 2

“An ongoing underwater archaeological project [near Antikythera Island in Greece] most recently recovered a large marble head of a bearded male figure believed to be part of a statue of Hercules.”

Archaeologists discovered granite blocks from the time of Khufu at the temple of the Sun in Heliopolis, along with many other remains.

A study of cattle teeth discovered at Ur sheds light on the economy, health, and diet of ancient Mesopotamia.

Isabella Segalovich gives a brief history of women’s eyebrows in art.

Robyn Ramsden gives workshops on how to create your own Nag Hammadi codex.

“Italy has been so successful in recovering ancient artworks and artifacts that were illegally exported from the country it has created a museum for them.”

“The funerary portraiture from the city of Palmyra, in the eastern Roman Empire, is a rich and heterogenous display of identity dating to the first three centuries CE.”

“A new exhibit at the Israel Museum uses VR technology to bring back to life the rich heritage of the destroyed Great Synagogue of Aleppo.”

New release: The Archaeology of Iran from the Palaeolithic to the Achaemenid Empire, by Roger Matthews and Hassan Fazeli Nashli. Also available as a free download.

New release: A Guide to Scenes of Daily Life on Athenian Vases, by John Howard Oakley (University of Wisconsin Press, 2020). Summarized and reviewed here.

Carl Rasmussen shares photos of the only completely preserved chapel for emperor worship in the Roman world.

Joel Kramer’s latest video is about his visit to Babylon and how the prophecies against the city were fulfilled.

HT: Agade, Joseph Lauer, Arne Halbakken, Paleojudaica

Tagged Antiquities Trade, Discoveries, Egypt, Greece, Italy, Mesopotamia, Museums, Persia, Resources, Syria, Technology, Weekend Roundup

Weekend Roundup, Part 2

Archaeologists have excavated two Late Bronze tombs belonging to wealthy families near Hala Sultan Tekke on Cyprus.

“New excavations of the ancient complex of Girsu in Iraq, led by the British Museum, have the potential to rewrite accepted histories of the development in Mesopotamia.”

“The pyramids in Egypt are more famous, but the ones in Sudan hide royal burial sites that archaeologists can explore—as long as they don’t mind swimming.” (National Geographic; requires email registration)

“The Lost Heritage Atlas initiative is dedicated to collecting the history and memory of those archaeological sites, monuments, sacred places or cultural items that have been completely destroyed.

A rapid change of climate did not cause the fall of the Akkadian empire.

New releases: The Oxford History of the Ancient Near East: Volume II: From the End of the Third Millennium BC to the Fall of Babylon and The Oxford History of the Ancient Near East: Volume III: From the Hyksos to the Late Second Millennium BC, by Karen Radner, Nadine Moeller, and D. T. Potts. $150 each (slightly cheaper at Amazon)

thetruesize.com allows you to easily compare the sizes of countries. Israel, for example, is smaller than any of its neighbors.

“Jordan’s Tourism and Antiquities Ministry plans to encourage visits to Madaba after the Arab League designated the city as the Arab Capital of Tourism” for 2022.

The Greek Reporter lists six lesser-known archaeological sites to visit near Athens.

Carl Rasmussen shares about a funny thing that happened on his way to the temple of Apollo at Didyma.

Mark Hoffman reports on the creation of three new Pauline pilgrimage paths in Greece to open in the next couple of years. Anyone want to go hiking?

HT: Agade, Joseph Lauer, Arne Halbakken, Explorator

Tagged Discoveries, Greece, Jordan, Mediterranean Islands, Mesopotamia, Resources, Tourism, Turkey, Weekend Roundup

Weekend Roundup, Part 1

A recent study found evidence for the domestication of olive trees dating back to 7,000 years ago.

“A visitor center under construction at the Armon Hanatziv Promenade [south of Jerusalem’s Old City] will use smart technology to allow visitors to optically zoom in to different landmarks of the modern city as well as see a virtual reality view of how the landscape looked thousands of years ago.”

Rabbi Mordechai Becher writes about how the Dead Sea Scrolls speak to Jews in the 21st century.

The latest issue of Near Eastern Archaeology is all about Tel Rehov. Abstracts of the articles are available online.

Amanda Borschel-Dan will be interviewing Joe Uziel and Jodi Magness in Jerusalem on July 6 about “how archaeology unveils hidden clues into what actually happened during the destructions of the First and Second Temples.”

Virtual Workshop at the Albright Institute on June 23: “Perspectives on the Persian Period,” with Carl S. Ehrlich, Mary Joan Winn Leith, Yigal Levin, and Katja Soennecken

Walking the Text’s recommended resource this month is the brand-new Rose Guide to the Feasts, Festivals, & Fasts of the Bible, edited by Paul H. Wright. It is in stock at Christianbook (and cheaper than Amazon).

New release: Water the Willow Tree: Memoirs of a Bethlehem Boyhood, by George A. Kiraz (Gorgias Press, 2022).

David Barrett, creator of Bible Mapper, has just released TimeGlider, “a free, online, scrollable, searchable timeline of Bible events. With a few button clicks you can even generate a hyperlink to display your own custom event on the timeline, and you can embed this link in digital resources (Word documents, web pages, emails, etc.) to show your event within its chronological context.”

Charles Savelle and Leon Mauldin offer kind words about the value of the 1 & 2 Kings volumes in the Photo Companion to the Bible. The introductory pricing ends today.

HT: Agade, Joseph Lauer, Arne Halbakken

Tagged Dead Sea Scrolls, Jerusalem, Jordan Rift, Resources, Tourism, Weekend Roundup

Weekend Roundup, Part 1

Claudia Chotzen describes her experience as a volunteer excavating the En Gedi synagogue 50 years ago.

The Institute of Biblical Culture is beginning a year-long biblical Hebrew course in July, and you can receive $300 off with coupon BIBLEPLACES.

Jerusalem University College has a number of excellent study options, including Historical and Geographical Settings of the Bible, Jesus and His Times, and Pastor and Parishoner trips.

Bible Archaeology Report: Top Ten Discoveries Related to the Book of Judges. It’s fun to try to make some guesses before reading through.

The latest from Walking the Text with Brad Gray: David and Goliath: Guard Your Shephelah (20 min)

Virtual lecture on June 19: Aren Maeir will be speaking on “New Views on the Philistines: What Archaeology Reveals about Goliath and His Peers” in the BAS Scholars Series ($10).

On sale for Kindle: Zondervan Essential Atlas of the Bible, by Carl Rasmussen

Our team spent years developing the Photo Companion to 1 & 2 Kings, and we finally released it this week. Woohoo!

HT: Agade, Joseph Lauer, Arne Halbakken, Explorator

Tagged Judah, Photo Resources, Resources, Shephelah, Tourism, Weekend Roundup

Weekend Roundup, Part 2

“Egypt has unveiled a major new archaeological find of 250 sarcophagi, 150 small bronze statues of gods and goddesses and other antiquities at the Saqqara necropolis.”

One of the more remarkable finds from the excavations of Satala in Turkey is an ornate bronze belt from an Urartian warrior.

Turkish authorities raided sites in 38 provinces in culmination of a yearlong investigation of an antiquities theft ring.

“The lost [Mittanian] city of ‘Zakhiku’ has resurfaced after spending decades underwater in the Mosul reservoir on the River Tigris in Iraq.”

Joel Kramer has found lots of sulfur balls at Numeira, a possible location of biblical Gomorrah.

Elon Heymans looks at the factors that led the use of silver and other precious metals as a form of currency at the beginning of the Iron Age in the ANE.

Greek Reporter: “Antioch on the Orontes, an ancient Greek city on the eastern side of the Orontes River, was one of the most glorious of all the Greek cities in the world.”

The Unsilencing the Archives Lectures from Badè Museum “explore the often-overlooked contributions made by Middle Easterners to archaeological excavations during the period of the British Mandate in Palestine.” The full series of 11 lectures is now online.

A 21-year-old punk broke into the Dallas Museum of Art and caused $5 million in damage, including the destruction of three ancient Greek vessels.

“Like us, the Romans were adept at scrolling — except they used actual, unwieldy scrolls. They would have loved OmnesViae, a handy online route planner, just for Roman roads.”

The Babylon Bee: “Archaeologists Have Just Discovered CONCLUSIVE PROOF Of The Bible.”

New release: Biblical and Ancient Near Eastern Studies in Honor of P. Kyle McCarter Jr., edited by Christopher Rollston, Susanna Garfein, and Neal H. Walls (SBL Press, $99). Free pdf download here (via AWOL).

BibleTelling’s Christian Storytelling Conference is being held in Jacksonville, Illinois, on June 23-25. The Story Concert will be broadcast live on Friday evening.

HT: Agade, Joseph Lauer, Ted Weis, Arne Halbakken, Deborah Hurn

Tagged Antiquities Trade, Discoveries, Egypt, Jordan, Lectures, Mesopotamia, Museums, Resources, Technology, Turkey, Weekend Roundup