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X-ray Vision for Archaeologists: The “Multi-PAM” Tool

Being able to clearly see what lies underground would solve many headaches for archaeologists.

There is a certain level of guesswork that goes into planning a dig, and only after the available time, money, and manpower has been spent does it become clear whether or not it was worth the investment. However, a professor at Tel Aviv University has developed a new tool that potentially could offer some help in taking the guesswork out of deciding where to dig.

Reported recently in the journal Advances of Geosciences, Prof. Eppelbaum’s new tool gathers data from a number of sources — including radio transmitters used to communicate with nuclear submarines and detailed magnetic field observations — and applies an original algorithmic approach to the measurements to make sense of what lies below the earth’s surface at depths of up to several dozen yards. His tool can help people “see” meaningful objects, artefacts or civilizations — – and lay them out in a four-dimensional chart.

While methods exist for scanning sites of potential archaeological and geological importance, such tools produce significant background noise or inconclusive readings, Prof. Eppelbaum says. …

His tool can be used to evaluate the possible archaeological significance of any given area under scrutiny. Providing rapid results within days or even hours, the algorithm can “read” extensive data before any digging or exploration begins. Financially, technically and ecologically, this tool offers an optimal way to localize and classify ancient buried objects and estimate the potential of the further archaeological investigations, he says.

Prof. Eppelbaum’s solution is called the “multi-PAM,” which stands for “physical — archaeological models.” The tool first interprets what it “sees” by recognizing image targets; then the interpretation can be used to develop a four-dimensional model which can be presented to archaeologists hoping to explore a particular region.

Placed in a small unmanned airplane hovering several yards off the ground and scanning wide tracts of land along the earth’s surface, Prof. Eppelbaum says, the tool can reveal unexplored sites of historical and archaeological significance.

You can read the full post here. A shorter article can be found here.

According to one of the posts, this tool is already in use in some archaeological projects. Does anyone have any personal experience with one? Would you care to share your opinion?

Update:
The catalyst for this news event apparently was a post on the website of the American Friends of Tel Aviv University. This post looks back at the publication of a paper that Prof. Eppelbaum presented in April 2009. The paper is titled: “Archaeological geophysics in Israel: past, present and future.” This paper (along with several others on similar topics) was published in the open access journal called Advances in Geosciences (ADGEO) in 2010. The abstract of Eppelbaum’s paper and a link to download the article can be found here. A list of all the articles in that volume can be found here. For those who desire to learn more about modern techniques for non-intrusive archaeological investigation, this volume is a good place to start.

HT: Joseph I. Lauer

Tagged Excavations, Technology

Chart: The Israelite Schism – 931-841 BCE

The following chart graphically illustrates every single, solitary regnal year of the kings of Judah and Israel from the beginning of the Divided Kingdom (931 BCE) to the end of the Omride line (Israel) and the death of Ahaziah of Judah (841 BCE). Its primary purpose is to show the unwavering consistency of the authors of Kings and Chronicles in their recounting of the reigns of the southern and northern monarchs. Quite simply the accuracy is astonishing. The dates within the chart are based on a synchronized chronology that was first fleshed out by the great scholar, Edwin Thiele, in his groundbreaking work The Mysterious Numbers of the Hebrew Kings (the only chronology “must own” book for every OT student and teacher – recommended here by Todd Bolen).

Thiele’s conclusions are best summed up by the recently deceased scholar, Anson Rainey, who said, “Nobody can discount Thiele’s dates because quite simply his dates work and nobody else’s dates work.” That is the great chronological check – does the chronology actually work? Despite many recent alternative chronologies – Thiele’s now over fifty-year old theory still checks out.

The chart below has some value in that it can be used as a guide to Thiele’s chronology. It allows one to look at the entire landscape of 90 years of Israelite history on a single page (albeit a very large page) while providing the onlooker the ability to compare any given king with his contemporary (I loathe not being egalitarian and using “their” but Athaliah just missed the list). This chart is especially helpful in making sense of some problematic chronological passages. For instance, in the reign of Jehoshaphat (873-848 BCE), the writers of Kings used three different methods (accession year reckoning, non-accession year reckoning, and sole reign after co-reign) of synchronizing Jehoshaphat’s reign with his contemporaries and vice versa . Without an in-depth knowledge of these different ways of recounting – one can become thoroughly lost in recreating his years of reign. Hopefully, this chart can successfully bridge the gap of confusion between text and mathematics.

Click to enlarge

University of Pennsylvania Museum Exhibition

An article in Archaeology magazine highlights a new exhibition at the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology entitled Archaeologists & Travelers in Ottoman Lands. The exhibition opened last September and will run through June 26, 2011. Archaeologists & Travelers in Ottoman Lands focuses on the University of Pennsylvania’s Nippur Expedition, and in particular, the lives of three men involved in the excavations of Nippur: Osman Hamdi Bey, John Henry Haynes, and Hermann Vollrath Hilprecht.

Featured are two paintings by Osman Hamdi Bey: “Excavations at Nippur,” which has never before been on public exhibition, and “At the Mosque Door,” which is shown for the first time in one hundred years. Also shown are about 50 photographs by Haynes, whose contributions as an archaeological photographer are only now being recognized, and more than 40 artifacts from the Nippur expedition (1889–1900), including a Parthian “slipper” coffin, Sasanian incantation bowls and glass, and numerous Sumerian cuneiform tablets.

The Nippur Expedition was the first American expedition to the Near East and lasted from 1889–1900. You can read background to the exhibition at the museum’s website and in the article in Archaeology. The exhibition has a companion website here.

For those interested, there is also a book by Bruce Kuklick that tells the story of the Nippur Expedition, Puritans in Babylon: The Ancient Near East and American Intellectual Life, 1880-1930 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996). It recounts the institutionalization of ancient Near East studies in American universities, the hardships of Middle East fieldwork in the 19th century, and the intramural disputes and posturing of the Nippur Expedition’s staff and researchers. The stories of some key personalities ended tragically, with reputations ruined and careers destroyed. (Kuklick also touches on the role ancient Near East studies played in the secularization of universities, and how many scholars working in these disciplines forsook their religious convictions. “The paradox in the evolution of Near Eastern studies was the manner in which the pursuit of Bible truth might undermine the truth of the Bible.” For him, Christian scholars are a curiosity because they are “a stunning counterexample to easy generalizations about the secularization of higher education in America.”)

Additional photos from the University of Pennsylvania’s Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology can be seen here.

HT: Claude Mariottini

Tagged Museums

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