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BiblePlaces Newsletter
Vol 8, #1 -
April 7, 2009
This issue features some of my favorite things. The free photos
this month are from a recent trip to Petra, the red sandstone city of
the Nabateans. Years of searching for rare and expensive volumes
on the Holy Land finally paid off with the discovery of the Survey of
Western Palestine, online and for free (most of it, anyway).
And this week brings, at least in my family, the combined celebration of
the Passover, the Crucifixion, and the Resurrection.
The Lord is good, and I wish for you his very best.
Todd Bolen
Editor, BiblePlaces.com
News from the BiblePlaces Blog...
Foot-Shaped Stone Enclosures Discovered in Israel
- Enormous
enclosures in Samaria and the Jordan Valley may be related to the
ancient Israelites and possibly to biblical "gilgal" structures...
Restoration of Western Wall in Jerusalem - The deteriorating
condition of stones in the wall of the Temple Mount is now being
addressed by conservationists. The article includes 34
high-resolution photos of the wall and the restoration process...
Aren Maeir on the 35th Annual Archaeological Conference - The
presentation on the Khirbet Qeiyafa ostracon suggests that a full
reading of the five lines may never be possible...
James Ossuary Trial Drags On - The Israel Antiquities Authority
has been presenting its case since September 2005 and a co-defendant
finally took the stand...
New Items in the BiblePlaces.com Store - A bag of rocks, an
archaeologist calendar, and fibers from the rope of the high priest are
among the specials that arrived just in time for April 1st...
And more...
Survey of Western Palestine:
Rare and Expensive, but Now (Mostly) Free
For years I have desired my own copy of the Survey of Western Palestine,
a series of volumes that describe the land as it was in the 1870s in
extraordinary detail. Alas, they are extremely difficult to find.
Daily searches for the set on the internet for more than a decade
have been fruitless, with possibly one exception ($10,000+). In
1999, Archive Editions produced a
facsimile edition, but they have been charging £3,995 ($5,956) for
it. Some years ago I found a copy of just the maps for sale in
Germany and purchased them immediately. That later became the SWP
Maps volume in the Historic Views series ($35
here).
But my thirst for the complete set has gone unsatisfied.
A few weeks ago, however, an electronic edition of one of the volumes
was offered for sale by an internet bookseller. I made the $10
purchase, only to discover that the bookseller was
illegally selling a
Microsoft scan. But that alerted me to their existence, and now I
have identified electronic versions for 10 of the 13 volumes. Of
the other volumes, two are already resources available from
BiblePlaces.com (the
maps
volume, mentioned above, and the
General Index volume). Another volume is in the late stages of
preparation. So while we're not quite there, this should be enough
to give you a jump on your summer reading.
If you want them all, I've made it easy by creating
one large zip file (175 MB).
Available Volumes:
An Introduction to the Survey of Western Palestine: Its Waterways, Plains, & Highlands (1881), by
T. Saunders (pdf)
The Survey of Western Palestine: Memoirs of the Topography, Orography,
Hydrography, and Archaeology: Galilee (Volume 1) (1881), by C. R. Conder
and H. H. Kitchener (pdf)
The Survey of Western Palestine: Memoirs of the Topography, Orography,
Hydrography, and Archaeology: Samaria (Volume 2) (1882), by C. R. Conder
and H. H. Kitchener (pdf)
The Survey of Western Palestine: Memoirs of the Topography, Orography,
Hydrography, and Archaeology: Judea (Volume 3) (1883), by C. R. Conder
and H. H. Kitchener (pdf)
The Survey of Western Palestine: Jerusalem (1884), by C. Warren and C. R. Conder (pdf)
The Survey of Western Palestine: The
Fauna and Flora of Palestine (1885),
by H. B. Tristram (pdf).
The Survey of Western Palestine: Arabic
and English Name Lists Collected during the Survey (1881), by E. H. Palmer
(pdf)
Special Papers on Topography, Archaeology, Manners and
Customs, etc. (1881), by C. Wilson, C. Warren, C. R. Conder, et al.
(pdf)
The Survey of Western
Palestine: Memoir on the Physical Geology and Geography of Arabia
Petraea (1886), by E. H. Hull (pdf)
Survey of Eastern Palestine:
Topography, Orography, Hydrography and Archaeology: The Adwan Country
(1889), by C. R. Conder (pdf)
Available from BiblePlaces.com:
A General Index to The Memoirs, Vols. 1-3; The Special Papers; The
Jerusalem Volume; The Flora and Fauna of Palestine; The Geological
Survey; and to the Arabic and English Names List (info,
pdf)
Map
of Western Palestine in 26 Sheets from Surveys Conducted for the
Committee of the Palestine Exploration Fund, by C. R. Conder and H. H.
Kitchener (1880). The CD edition also includes the map from the
Survey of Eastern Palestine (info,
order)
Forthcoming from BiblePlaces.com:
Excavations at Jerusalem 1867-70 (50 Plates), by C. Warren.
UPDATE (Feb 2014): This article has been updated to reflect additional
volumes now available.
Featured BiblePlaces Photos:
Petra
Petra is probably not mentioned specifically in the Bible, though it
clearly qualifies as a "Bible Places" site because it was an important
part of the world of the Bible. In the Old Testament times, some
have suggested that one of the mountains in Petra was "Sela" (see 2
Kgs 14:7; 2 Chron 25:12; Isa 42:11), and it certainly seems to bear similarities to
the prophecy of Obadiah (esp. verses 3-4). In any case, it was
certainly part of the territory of the Edomites. By New Testament
days, Petra was a fabulously wealthy and beautiful Nabatean city, and
some have suggested that Paul's time in Arabia was spent
here (Gal 1:17). Whether or not that is true, at one time in his
life, Paul was on the
run from a Nabatean ruler (2 Cor 11:32).
This month's featured photos are recent and unpublished.
Each photo below is linked to a higher-resolution
version which may be used freely for personal and educational purposes.
Commercial use requires separate permission. You may also
download these photos in a
PowerPoint file
(1.9 MB). 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. |
