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Weekend Roundup

On Sunday, The New York Times posted an article about the meaning of the Hebrew word tekhelet, mentioned in Exodus 26:1 and elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible. Instead of light blue, Zvi C. Koren argues that is was a “closer to a bluish purple.”

On Tuesday, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem posted a press release about the publication of the first volume of The Corpus Inscriptionum Iudaeae/Palestine (CIIP) series. There are 9 volumes of the series scheduled and the goal is to collect “all the inscriptions ever found in Israel and the Palestinian Authority from the period of Alexander the Great (4th century C.E) until Mohammed (beginning of the 7th century A.D.)” The first volume “includes more than 700 inscriptions from Jerusalem and surrounding areas up until the destruction of the Second Temple.”

Also on Tuesday, reports about a break in at an artifact storehouse near the Giza pyramids were posted here and here.

On Wednesday, Aren Maeir posted on his blog a summary and a critique of recent lectures at Hebrew University about the Philistines and Sea Peoples.

Also on Wednesday, an article about archaeology in Libya (in light of the current unrest in that country) was posted by Scientific American here.

On Thursday (as was previously posted on this blog) Zahi Hawass announced that he will step down. Reports of this event can be found here and here. Hawass also posted a report on his blog that day about the dangers that are threatening archaeological sites and artifacts in Egypt. Biblical Archaeology Review intends to publish an interview with Hawass in the next issue.

Also on Thursday, Israel National News posted an article on a new training program being offered by the Israel Antiquities Authority. It is “a program to teach Jews from around the world how to conserve ancient buildings. The program, called Saving the Stones, is a five-month international training internship in historical and archeological conservation.” The IAA’s press release is here.

On Friday, a new exhibit with body casts from Pompeii opened at Discovery Times Square. The exhibit website is here and an article about it in the New York Times is here.

The McMullen Museum of Art at Boston College is currently displaying a collection called Dura-Europos: Crossroads of Antiquity. Admission to the museum is free.

HT: Jack Sasson, Joseph I. Lauer, A.D. Riddle

Tagged Weekend Roundup

Zahi Hawass Resigns

Zahi Hawass, Egypt’s Minister of Antiquities Affairs, has resigned in the wake of the resignation of former Egyptian Prime Minister Hosni Mubarak and the large scale looting of antiquities. Kate Taylor reports the following at the NY Times Art Beat blog.

Zahi Hawass, Egypt’s powerful and controversial antiquities chief,
resigned on Thursday along with the prime minister, after posting on
his Web site for the first time a list of dozens of sites that have
been looted since the beginning of the uprising that led to the fall
of President Hosni Mubarak.

Among the places Mr. Hawass named as having been looted were the
Metropolitan Museum of Art’s storerooms at its excavation site in
Dahshur, south of Cairo. In a statement the Met’s director, Thomas P. Campbell, described that incident as having taken place several weeks ago.

Mr. Campbell expressed alarm about continuing looting, calling it “a
grave and tragic emergency.” In a statement, which was issued before
Mr. Hawass’s resignation was confirmed, he said:
“The world cannot sit by and permit unchecked anarchy to jeopardize
the cultural heritage of one of the world’s oldest, greatest and most
inspiring civilizations. We echo the voices of all concerned citizens
of the globe in imploring Egypt’s new government authorities, in
building the nation’s future, to protect its precious past. Action
needs to be taken immediately.”

HT: Jack Sasson

Tagged Egypt

Tomb(s) of Noah

In Lebanon, just northeast of the city of Zahle, there is a small village named Karak Nouh. Karak Nouh is located in the Beqaa at the eastern foot of the Mt. Lebanon range. In a building adjoining the village mosque, there is a long sarcophagus draped in a green cloth. It is claimed this is the tomb of Noah.

Karak Nouh, Lebanon.

Mark Twain wrote about his visit to Karak Nouh in The Innocents Abroad.

Noah’s tomb is built of stone, and is covered with a long stone building. Bucksheesh let us in. The building had to be long, because the grave of the honored old navigator is two hundred and ten feet long itself! It is only about four feet high, though. He must have cast a shadow like a lightning-rod. The proof that this is the genuine spot where Noah was buried can only be doubted by uncommonly incredulous people. The evidence is pretty straight. Shem the son of Noah, was present at the burial, and showed the place to his descendants, who transmitted the knowledge to their descendants, and the lineal descendants of these introduced themselves to us to-day. It was pleasant to make the acquaintance of members of so respectable a family. It was a thing to be proud of. It was the next thing to being acquainted with Noah himself.

There is another tomb of Noah in the city of Cizre, Turkey (pronounced Jizre). Cizre is on the Tigris River, north of the location where Iraq, Turkey, and Syria all meet. To the east is Cudi Dağ, identified as Mt. Ararat in some traditions.

Tomb of Noah, Cizre, Turkey.

Evidently, there is also a shrine to Noah name Hazrat Nuh in Kerak, Jordan. I have not visited this one, nor do I know if there is a tomb associated with the shrine. I believe the shrine is the small, turquoise building at the far left in this photograph. It is located in a cemetery on the northwestern edge of the modern town.

Kerak, Jordan.

Tagged Jordan, Lebanon, Tourism, Turkey

Featured Accordance Module: American Colony Collection

This month, Accordance’s Featured Product is the American Colony Collection module. They are offering the module at a discounted price of $109 (regularly $149) through the month of March. You can read Todd’s introduction to the collection here and learn more about the Accordance module from Todd and Accordance’s David Lang. If you have already purchased the collection from BiblePlaces.com and are an Accordance user, you may want to consider the crossgrade option.

Tagged American Colony Photos, Resources

Free Books on Archaeology & Ancient History Available in Kindle Form

Let me start by saying that you do not need an Amazon Kindle to read Kindle books. Amazon offers free reading apps for iPads, iPhones, PCs, Macs, Androids, BlackBerries and Windows Phones, so you can read Kindle books on any of those devices. Personally I recently entered the world of Kindle by purchasing a Kindle Wi-Fi, and I would recommend the device to anyone who enjoys reading.

(There is also a 3G version and a version with a 9.7″ display.) But you don’t need to spend $139 or more to get the books referenced below. They are available absolutely free through the use of one of the free reading apps.

One of the things that attracted me to the Kindle was all of the free books that are available in Kindle form. Amazon advertises: “Over 1.8 million free, out-of-copyright, pre-1923 books are available.” Many of these books are “Popular Classics” such as The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, Pride and Prejudice, and Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. However, some of the free books are out of copyright works related to archaeology and ancient history that I think would be of interest to readers of this blog. Here are the works that I have found so far that fit this category:

Jacob Abbott, History of Julius Caesar, (c) 1904.

E. A. Wallis Budge, Legends of the Gods: The Egyptian Texts, Edited with Translations, (c) 1912.

E. A. Wallis Budge, The Literature of the Ancient Egyptians, (c) 1914.

E. A. Wallis Budge, The Babylonian Legends of the Creation and the Fight Between Bel and Dragon, Told by Assyrian Tablets from Nineveh, (c) 1921(?).

E. A. Wallis Budge, The Book of the Dead, (c) 1920(?).

Herodotus, An Account of Egypt, translated by G. C. Macaulay, (c) not listed.

Flavius Josephus, Against Apion, translated by William Whiston, (c) not listed.

Flavius Josephus, The Life of Flavius Josephus, translated by William Whiston, (c) not listed.

Flavius Josephus, The Antiquities of the Jews, translated by William Whiston, (c) not listed.

L. W. King, Legends of Babylon and Egypt in Relation to Hebrew Tradition, The Schweich Lectures of 1916, (c) 1920.

G. Maspero, Manual of Egyptian Archaeology and Guide to the Study of Antiquities in Egypt, revised and enlarged edition, translated by Amelia B. Edwards, (c) 1895.

Isaac Myer, Scarabs: The History, Manufacture and Religious Symbolism of the Scarabaeus, in Ancient Egypt, Phoenicia, Sardinia, Etruria, etc., (c) 1894.

Robert Franklin Pennell, Ancient Rome: From the Earliest Times Down to 476 A.D., revised edition, (c) 1890(?).

W. M. Flinders Petrie, ed., Egyptian Tales, Translated from the Papyri: First Series, IVth to XIIth Dynasty, 2nd edition, (c) 1899.

W. M. Flinders Petrie, ed., Egyptian Tales, Translated from the Papyri: Second Series, XVIIIth to XIXth Dynasty, 2nd edition, (c) 1913.

W. M. Flinders Petrie, The Religion of Ancient Egypt, (c) 1906.

Various authors, How to Observe in Archaeology: Suggestions for Travellers in the Near and Middle East, (c) 1920. The authors include J. G. C. Anderson, T. P. Droop, H. R. Hall, G. F. Hill, D. G. Hogarth, F. G. Kenyon, R. A. S. Macalister, J. L. Myres, and W. M. Flinders Petrie.

Let me also point out that this is not an exhaustive list. In addition to the fact that there are probably other books available on Amazon’s website that I missed, works from the Internet Archive, Open Library, Project Gutenberg, and ManyBooks.net can be delivered to your Kindle or Kindle App as well. More information on how to do that can be found here. Also, I did not include books that are available for very little money through the Kindle Store. Perhaps we’ll explore those titles at a later date.

Disclaimer: Please keep in mind that these books are free, and to some degree “you get what you pay for.” So don’t expect too much. For example, in many (if not all) cases, the illustrations that were included in the original book are not included in the free Kindle book. At the same time, if I had to choose between having a free Kindle version of a book and not having the book at all, I would choose the Kindle book. After all, if I find that the work is particularly valuable, I can always track down a physical copy of the book to use in serious research or a writing project. In that sense, these free books serve as a great introduction to some of the classic works on Middle Eastern archaeology and ancient history.

Also (although it is not exactly free) I should mention that there is a subscription available to the BiblePlaces Blog through the Kindle store for 99 cents a month. Unlike an RSS feed which only sends a stub about new posts, this subscription service delivers new posts in their entirety. The first 14 days of service are free, if you would like to try it out.

Anyone else know of any free books that would be of interest?

Tagged Resources

Chart: The Kingdom(s) of Israel

The following chart represents my baseline understanding of the kingdoms of Israel. I use this chart (or one of its cousins) as a “big picture” tool when my students get bogged-down in the minutiae of the Kings/Chronicles narrative. I also find this tool to be helpful in facilitating discussion regarding a comparison of different periods (i.e. David to Josiah or Hezekiah to Uzziah) or contemporaneous Israelite and Judahite kings.

For instance, one of my major research goals is to understand and contrast the relationship between Jehoshaphat king of Judah (873-848 BCE) and Ahab king of Israel (874-853 BCE) – while at the same time comparing the allied front of Ahab/Jehoshaphat to the Solomonic kingdom. Were their respective reigns a return to Solomonic glory? Something more? Something less? Was Jehoshaphat merely a vassal to the almighty Ahab? This chart does not answer these questions – but it allows the researcher and student alike to take into account the biblical, epigraphic, and archaeological data in the form of a “peak” or “valley.”

This chart represents my own understanding of the biblical and archaeological history of ancient Israel (i.e. very conservative). It would be exceptionally helpful if the other side would create their own “peaks and valleys” chart – then we could compare geography. Admittedly, their chart would not be quite as interesting (think Texas compared to California) – since it would be one long arduous climb out of the “valley” with only a couple “peaks” at the end.

Tagged Resources