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“Israeli archaeologists have been left scratching their heads over the discovery of a large tomb containing dozens of skeletons, many of them women, who were buried more than 2,500 years ago in the midst of the Negev desert, at an ancient crossroad far from any known settlements at the time.”

According to Yosef Garfinkel, five sites in Judah indicate that Judah was expanding into the Shephelah already in the 10th century. The underlying journal article is here.

Chris McKinny provides an overview of all of the excavation areas at Tel Burna after their first week of their 13th season.

The Greek Reporter has a well-illustrated story on the Bird Mosaic and the sigma-shaped glass-gold table found in Caesarea.

Martine van den Berg reports on the first-ever “Friends of ASOR Tour to Israel and the Palestinian Territories.” They had quite a few experiences that the average tourist doesn’t get.

After a three-year renovation, Solomon’s Quarries/Zedekiah’s Cave has reopened to visitors. It now includes a multimedia show. The article includes a video report by i24 News.

Ron Simkins discusses “Creation and Ecology in Ancient Israel” on the Biblical World podcast.

Lisa LaGeorge gives a good answer to the question, “What difference does it make if I go to Israel?”

Ferrell Jenkins shares a photo of a beautiful view that he took in the Judean hill country between Bethlehem and Hebron.

Zoom lecture on July 12: “The King is Dead, Long Live the King: Murder, Poetry, and Scribal Culture in Ancient Egypt,” by Margaret Geoga ($7)

The NY Times reports on Christian tourism to Saudi Arabia, though the reporting seems limited to a single tour group.

A large Roman-period mosaic discovered near Homs, Syria, depicts Greek soldiers in the Trojan War as well as the god Neptune and forty of his mistresses.

A conference will be held at Oxford on July 5 entitled “The Aramaeans B.C.: History, Literature, and Archaeology”

The oldest completely hand-sewn boat in the Mediterranean dates to the Iron Age I and is remarkably well-preserved.

A fresco newly discovered at Pompeii looks like a pizza but is more likely a focaccia covered with fruit.

Bryan Windle reports on the top three stories in biblical archaeology for the month of June.

What do real archaeologists think of Indiana Jones?

HT: Agade, Arne Halbakken, Ted Weis

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Peter Goeman invited me to join him on The Bible Sojourner podcast to talk about how understanding geography helps us to better understand Scripture. It was a fun episode, and I was able to share some of my favorite stories along with some new ones.

Peter has a lot of interesting guests and topics related to biblical studies in general, so you may want to add this podcast to your rotation (Spotify, Apple, etc.—full list here).

If you listen on YouTube or Spotify or another channel that has video, you’ll see some photos, maps, and plans that I use to illustrate our discussion.

Here are the time stamps for the YouTube video:

00:00 Introduction

1:20 Todd Introduces Himself

3:05 Background to Bibleplaces.com

6:30 How Does Todd Motivate Students to Care about Geography?

10:30 How Does Geography Impact the Ancient Israelite?

16:17 What are some Key Geographical Locations in Israel?

19:40 Are There Key Locations that Carry Religious Significance?

23:33 How do Archaeologists Determine Where an Ancient City Was?

32:41 What are some Interesting Biblical Examples of Geography in Scripture?

35:00 The Location of Nob

38:50 Esther and the City of Susa

43:16 Acts 12 and the Death of Herod Agrippa I

46:32 The Deliverance of the Demoniac in Mark 5 (in region of Gerasenes or Gadarenes?)

53:03 The Connection between Geography and Modern Israel Life

1:00:50 How Can We Pursue a Further Study in Biblical Geography?

1:05:52 Conclusion

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Scholars at UNI Graz claim that a 3rd century BC papyrus has evidence of a binding, making it the oldest book in the world discovered. The press release is in German, but the video of the press conference is partly in English. Brent Nongbri offers some thoughts.

A network of stone walls along the Nile River provide evidence of ancient hydraulic engineering.

“A team of computer scientists and archaeologists from the University of Bologna in Italy has developed a new tool for identifying archaeological sites using artificial intelligence … [which] reached a predictive accuracy of over 80 percent.”

“A team of archaeologists and computer scientists from Israel has created an AI-powered translation program for ancient Akkadian cuneiform, allowing tens of thousands of already digitized tablets to be translated into English instantaneously.”

The square in Rome where Julius Caesar was assassinated has been opened to the public.

Renovations of the Carthage Museum will begin in 2025 and expand the exhibition space to three times the current size.

The book of Esther’s independence from classical sources makes it “more important as a historical source for Achaemenian history than has traditionally been assumed.”

“An ancient Hebrew Bible and more than 100 Roman coins were recovered by Turkish military police.” The photo with the article is not the seized manuscript.

New release: A Jew in the Roman Bathhouse: Cultural Interaction in the Ancient Mediterranean, by Yaron Z. Eliav (Princeton University Press, $45; save 30% with code P321).

New release: Wounded Tigris: A River Journey Through the Cradle of Civilization, by Leon McCarron (Simon & Schuster, $29)

New release: Famine and Feast in Ancient Egypt, by Ellen Morris (75 pages, Cambridge University Press, $22; free download until July 3).

In the latest episode of Thin End of the Wedge, Agnès Garcia-Ventura discusses the historiography of Assyriology.

Mark Janzen is guest on The Book and the Spade discussing the historicity of Moses.

Now that the Plutonium at Hierapolis (aka the gate to Hades) is open, Carl Rasmussen shares photos and explains what you are looking at and how the ancient rites were carried out.

HT: Agade, Alexander Schick

The worst experience in Jerusalem is walking through the drainage channel under the Siloam street. Unless you’re under 5 feet tall.

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A new study claims that Tel Shikmona near Haifa was home to a large Israelite purple dye factory that supplied the prestigious color to Solomon’s temple in Jerusalem from about 850 to 750 BC.

Steve Notley has proposed an explanation for how the New Testament village of Bethsaida came to be known in Arabic as el-Araj, which means “the lame man.”

Abigail Leavitt reports on the final week of excavating at Shiloh, with mention of the discovery of a scarab and a bulla.

Ronit Vered reports on the new exhibition at the Israel Museum entitled “The Feast.”

Joel Kramer has just released a video about the Mesha Stele (Moabite Stone).

The latest episode of Digging for Truth focuses on King Hazael of Aram.

In the latest Biblical World podcast episode, Kyle Keimer discusses Hezekiah’s preparations for the Assyrian invasion, the subject of his dissertation.

The latest edition of Tel Aviv has been published, and a number of the articles are open-access.

Accordance Bible Software has a number of photo collections on sale as well as works from Carta.

Ferrell Jenkins posts some photos of the Dead Sea from his recent trip (also here).

Bryan Windle’s latest archaeological biography is on Aretas IV, the only Nabatean king mentioned in the Bible.

HT: Agade, Ted Weis

Soon visitors to Tel Lachish will have public restrooms to use. There may well also be some displays of artifacts, replicas, or reconstructions.

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Turkey has launched a new ship for underwater archaeology that is considered to be one of the largest archaeological vessels in the world.

NY Times: “A 2,000-year-old collection of medical tools, recently unearthed in Hungary, offer insight into the practices of undaunted, much-maligned Roman doctors.”

Melissa Cradic explains the value of the the open-access web exhibition, “Unsilencing the Archives: The Laborers of the Tell en-Naṣbeh Excavations (1926-1935).”

Zoom lecture on June 23, 10:00am ET: “Beyond Impressions: Cylinder Seals of the Neo-Assyrian Period as Experiential Object,” by Kiersten Neumann (Zoom link)

New release: Picturing Royal Charisma: Kings and Rulers in the Near East from 3000 BCE to 1700 CE, edited by Arlette David, Rachel Milstein, Tallay Ornan (Archaeopress, £32; open access ebook)

New release: Être et paraître. Statues royales et privées de la fin du Moyen Empire et de la Deuxième Période intermédiaire (1850-1550 av. J.-C.), by Simon Connor, is available for free here.

Walking The Text’s recommended resource of the month is Peoples of the New Testament World, by William A. Simmons. (Also available on Logos.)

If you are not familiar with the Lanier Center for Archaeology, you can find out more about their programs here.

New video from World History Encyclopedia: “The Famous Baths of the Roman Empire”

Mark Hoffman has been thinking about AI and biblical art.

HT: Agade, Explorator

The excavations at Shiloh are most impressive in terms of their size and enthusiastic workers. They are making good progress in achieving their goals, and I look forward to forthcoming announcements.

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“A woman walking along the Palmahim Beach discovered an over 3,000-year-old figurine of the Egyptian goddess Hathor floating in the water.”

A group of first-graders discovered an Egyptian scarab on a field trip to Azekah.

The first-ever excavations of the Hasmonean fortress at Hyrcania recently began.

Abigail Leavitt is reporting on her experiences in the excavations of Tel Shiloh, most recently with Week 3. Tim Lopez gives his perspective in Spanish.

“Thousands who were illegally holding antiquities in their homes returned the items during a two-week campaign this month, the Israel Antiquities Authority and Ministry of Heritage reported.” One of the more impressive artifacts returned is a small anchor from the Roman period.

Writing for Christianity Today, Gordon Govier explains how archaeological discoveries have strengthened the case for the historicity of David.

Chandler Collins reflects on Nadav Na’aman’s recent proposal to place the earliest city of Jerusalem on what is today’s Temple Mount.

The “Road of the Patriarchs” is the subject of a new TBN documentary.

Bryan Windle is on Digging for Truth discussing Hoshea, the last king of the northern kingdom of Israel.

Zoom lecture on June 29: “The Jewish Character of Jerusalem in the Early Roman (Second Temple) Period as Attested by Archaeological Records,” by Ronny Reich.

Chandler Collins is inviting participation in his online “Biblical Jerusalem and Its Exploration” course this fall as well as his Jerusalem study tour offered in March by the Biblical Archaeological Society in collaboration with Jerusalem University College.

Other JUC courses offered online this fall include:

  • Archaeology of Religions in the Bible, by Chris McKinny and Kyle Keimer
  • Cultural Backgrounds of the Bible, by Oliver Hersey
  • The Life and Times of Paul, by Chris Vlachos

James Riley Strange reflects on the life of Dennis E. Groh, who died in April.

HT: Agade, Explorator, BibleX

A view of Hyrcania taken a few weeks ago, from the east

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