Archaeologists in Israel revealed an impressive Byzantine church building with beautiful mosaic pavements at Moshav Aluma near Kiryat Gat. The site is in the eastern coastal plain, about 10 miles (16 km) east of Ashkelon and 30 miles (48 km) southwest of Jerusalem.

The director of the Israel Antiquities Authority excavations, Daniel Varga, describes the structure in a press release issued by the IAA:

An impressive basilica building was discovered at the site, 22 meters long and 12 meters wide. The building consists of a central hall with two side aisles divided by marble pillars. At the front of the building is a wide open courtyard (atrium) paved with a white mosaic floor, and with a cistern. Leading off the courtyard is a rectangular transverse hall (narthex) with a fine mosaic floor decorated with colored geometric designs; at its center, opposite the entrance to the main hall, is a twelve-row dedicatory inscription in Greek containing the names Mary and Jesus, and the name of the person who funded the mosaic’s construction.

The press release gives more detail of the mosaic floor:

The main hall (the nave) has a colored mosaic floor adorned with vine tendrils to form forty medallions. The medallions contain depictions of different animals, including: zebra, leopard, turtle, wild boar, various winged birds and botanical and geometric designs. Three medallions contain dedicatory inscriptions in Greek commemorating senior church dignitaries: Demetrios and Herakles. The two were heads of the local regional church. On both sides of the central nave are two narrow halls (side aisles), which also have colored mosaic floors depicting botanical and geometric designs, as well as Christian symbols.

The site will be open to the public on Thursday and Friday (Jan 23–24) before the mosaics are removed for future display in a local museum. The church building itself will be buried. More information is available in the press release. The photos posted below are available via this link. Brief news articles have been published by the Jerusalem Post, Washington Post, and Times of Israel.

1Excavation of the Byzantine basilica at Moshav Aluma
2An excavation volunteer cleans the mosaic floor
3 (1)
Mosaic floor of the Byzantine basilica
All photos by Yoli Shwartz, courtesy of the Israel Antiquities Authority
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Logos Bible Software is offering a set of 8 volumes entitled “Classic Studies and Atlases on Biblical Geography.” What you need to know is that it includes the three volumes of Edward Robinson’s Biblical Researches in Palestine. The collection is now listed on the Community Pricing, which is always the most affordable way to purchase books from Logos. Once they receive enough orders, the price will jump up $100 or so. Now you can bid what you feel the set is worth.

For those who don’t know, Edward Robinson’s set is the seminal work on historical geography of the land of Israel. Robinson and his student Eli Smith traveled throughout Palestine in 1838 with a goal of locating ancient sites, primarily on the basis of name preservation. I have a couple of sets of this work, including one original edition from 1841. I once began creating an electronic edition, but other matters came in the way and it was set aside. Now you can purchase this at an attractive price. (And, yes, Google Books has long had this for free, but what you save in money you’ll pay for in the headache of trying to sort out the volumes from various editions that do not go together.)

I do wish that Logos would add to this collection the fourth volume, Later Biblical Researches in Palestine (1856). This was based on a later trip that Robinson and Smith made to answer some outstanding questions.

The other titles included:

Once upon a time, I created a list of the best resources by 19th-century explorers of Palestine.

You can put in your bid here. And here is another collection of similar works, but no longer at the attractive Community Pricing.

HT: Charles Savelle

Robinson's Arch with new excavations, db6806245201
Robinson’s Arch in Jerusalem, named for Edward Robinson
Photo by David Bivin
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Noah Wiener has a follow-up article on the spring tunnel discovered in the Rephaim Valley. He includes a great photo of the tunnel.

Zachi Zweig disagrees with Leen Ritmeyer’s dating of the newly revealed course of ashlar stones on the Temple Mount. He dates it to the Early Islamic period.

A woman has turned over to the IAA a large collection of pottery discovered by a relative in the Mediterranean Sea.

The winter dig at Khirbet el-Maqatir began in the snow. They spent several weeks excavating three caves.

The ancient Myceneans once used portable grills at their picnics.

Archaeologists have discovered grain from the Neolithic period at Çatalhöyük.

The report for the 2013 excavation season at Tall el-Hammam is now online.

The first two volumes of NGSBA Archaeology are available for download. (NGSBA = Nelson Glueck School of Biblical Archaeology.)

Just published: The Oxford Handbook of the Archaeology of the Levant: c. 8000-332 BCE, edited by
Margreet L. Steiner and Ann E. Killebrew. Oxford University Press. 912 pages. $165.

Wayne Stiles explains how to make the maps in your Bible atlas fully searchable.

HT: Joseph Lauer, Tim Graham, Jack Sasson

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(Post by Seth M. Rodriquez)


Our “obscure site” this week is mentioned only once in the Bible and almost in passing. However, it was the starting point of one of the most famous adventures of the apostle Paul.

In the first century, the city of Myra stood near the southern shores of western Asia Minor. It lies over two miles from the shore so it was closely associated with its port city of Andriace. In fact the harbor city was sometimes just referred to as Myra. The city and its harbor were most likely founded in the fifth century B.C. In the Roman period it was a key location along the trade route used by sailing vessels as they transported grain to Rome. The harbor of Myra was a staging ground where grain from Egypt would be transferred to boats that would carry it on to Rome. In fact, the boat that Paul boarded in Myra may very well have been one of these granary boats (see Acts 27:5-6, 38).

Paul visited Myra while he was a prisoner of the Romans, on his way to a trial before Caesar in Rome. The Wycliffe Historical Geography of Bible Lands, by Charles F. Pfeiffer and Howard F. Vos, provides the following description of what it would have been like to travel by boat from Caesarea to Myra like Paul did:

The westerly winds which favored the voyage from Patara or Myra to Tyre made the return voyage from Tyre to Myra an impossibility. The regular course for ships from Palestine or Phoenicia was northward past the east end of Cyprus and thence along the Asia Minor coast. Then, by means of ocean currents and land winds which blew off the coast, they made their way westward toward Myra. The voyage from Caesarea to Myra might be done in as short a time as ten days, but recorded trips over that route took as long as twenty days. Ships of the Roman grain fleet (on one of which Paul probably sailed) might take the same route if the winds required, but normally they sailed directly from Alexandria to Myra on the Lycian coast …

In the photograph below, you can see the area where the ancient harbor once existed (it has since filled up with silt):

Pfeiffer and Vos provide the following details about Myra and its significance:

In Greek times Patara surpassed Myra, but in Roman times Myra, forty miles eat of Patara, became the chief seaport of Lycia. It grew especially as a result of the Alexandrian grain trade with Italy. Though Myra was located two and one-half miles up the Andracus River from the coast, the same name was often applied to its harbor, Andriaca.

There are several “obscure sites” that Paul passed on his journey to Rome. In future posts we will explore some of them.

This photo and map are available in Volume 10 of the Pictorial Library of Bible Lands and is available here for $34 (with free shipping). This volume also includes the less obscure sites of Ephesus, Smyrna, and Pergamum. For other posts in our series on “obscure sites in the PLBL,” see here.

The excerpts are taken from Charles F. Pfeiffer and Howard F. Vos, Wycliffe Historical Geography of Bible Lands (Chicago: Moody Press, 1967), p. 376.

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If you’re in the Dallas area this Friday, you might want to stop in for a free lecture on Tel Burna (possibly biblical Libnah) at Dallas Theological Seminary. The announcement gives location details but is not clear who is giving the lecture. I think it is Chris McKinny, one-time writer of our popular “Secret Places” series. (We’re hoping we see Chris back around these parts before too long!)

Ceramic mask fragment discovered at Tel Burna
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(Post by A.D. Riddle)

The University of Chicago’s Martin Marty Center for the Advanced Study of Religion is sponsoring a three-part lecture series on “Assyria in Israel, Judea, and the Levant.”

The first lecture presented by Irene Winter (Harvard University, emerita) is on February 11 (Tuesday). No title is yet provided for this lecture.

The second lecture by David Wright (Brandeis University) on “The Covenant Code Appendix (Exodus 23:20–33) and Assyrian Royal Inscriptions” will be given on February 26 (Wednesday).

The last lecture by Elizabeth Bloch-Smith (Saint Joseph’s University) will address “The Assyrian Military Impact on the Ground and in Biblical Texts” on March 13 (Thursday).

The series will take place in the Divinity School’s Swift Hall Common Room on the 1st floor. Lectures begin at 5:00pm and end at 6:30pm. The website for the lectures is here.

Relief from Sennacherib’s palace in Nineveh depicting
the Assyrian siege of Lachish in the reign of Hezekiah.
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