The Turkish government is building a 10-foot high wall around a cemetery along the eastern wall of the Old City of Jerusalem, according to signs posted there. The municipality has confirmed the report.
John the Baptist’s bones have been found in a monastery on a Bulgarian island in the Black Sea, according to government officials. They have everything to prove the identification except for evidence.
Extracts of the Cyrus Cylinder have been found in China carved on horse bones. The question is when the copies were made.
The French will finance a “national museum” in Bethlehem and train museographers, in a one million dollar deal signed recently. Construction is scheduled to be completed in 2012.
The Jewish Tribune has a story on the woman who discovered the Jerusalem cuneiform tablet.
Contrary to what I wrote before, the tablet was actually discovered during sifting in March. I mixed up a couple of different unannounced sensational discoveries.
Raphael Golb, accused of impersonating Dead Sea Scrolls scholars, has rejected a plea offer in Manhattan Criminal Court. For background, see here.
HT: Joe Lauer
2 thoughts on “Weekend Roundup”
The cuneiform tablet fragment was found in fill excavated from beneath a tower in ophel. Kathleen Kenyon described a tower in that area as having been constructed of stones "of the character identified as Phoenician at Samaria" but for some reason she decided that the massive stones were in secondary use and that "close at hand there was a wall of the time of Solomon, from which the builders of the eighth century B.C. derived their stones". (Digging Up Jerusalem pp. 115, 116). The tablet fragment may help to show that the tower is an original construction from an earlier time than eighth century B.C.
Every so often I come across the announcement of some interesting finding related to the Bible or archology. I do a quick search here before "breaking the news" to you. Pretty much every time you've already mentioned it in your blog.
You may have won this round, but I'll be back again!