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Hazor and the James Ossuary

Gordon Franz has just posted three transcribed interviews with staff members of the Hazor excavations, including Amnon Ben-Tor, Sharon Zuckerman, and Orna Cohen.

“Hazor is Number One…”: An interview with Amnon Ben-Tor

“Where is the Archive at Hazor?”: An interview with Sharon Zuckerman

“It is the Best Job in the World”: An interview with Orna Cohen

Cohen is a conservator, and she comments on the controversy of the James Ossuary. She believes that the second half of the inscription is original, but the first part is forged.

I had the pleasure of looking at and checking the James Ossuary and I gave my comments on it. I think the ossuary is authentic and a real one, but the inscription on it, I am convinced there are two hands that wrote the inscription. To my opinion, part of the inscription is faked, part is original. Of course, there are things that go on in trial now. They are still trying to figure out what is faked and by whom it was made. To my opinion, the name Joshua [on the ossuary] is real. The inscription reads: “Ya’acov bar Yosef achi Yehoshua.” [Translation: Jacob, or James, the son of Joseph, the brother of Jesus]. So the first part, I think is added. My professional opinion is almost against all the others that think the last name [on the inscription]; “bother of Jesus” (Joshua) is a fake. So my opinion was against the others [at the trial]. I checked and it’s according to the patina in the letters. There was a fake patina of just dirt that was put in these letters on purpose so I cleaned part of it and underneath there was the original, yellowish patina that based on my experience, was the original one. It was not on the first part of the inscription but it was on the last part of the inscription. That is what I gave as my opinion.

Tagged Excavations, Forgery, Galilee

Ancient Mosaic from Lod to be Conserved

A beautiful and well preserved mosaic from about A.D. 300 from Lod will be fully excavated and preserved in the next few years following a large grant from the Leon Levy Foundation and Shelby White – Chairman of the Friends of the Israel Antiquities Authority. The mosaic will become the centerpiece of the Lod Mosaic Archaeological Center. The Israel Antiquities Authority press release gives some of the background and a link to two high-resolution images (zip).

HT: Joe Lauer

Tagged Excavations

Jerusalem Festival of Lights

From Arutz-7:

The Jerusalem Festival of Lights is a large scale artistic event, the first of its kind in Israel, taking place between June 10 and June 16. The Light Festival brings to Israel the greatest light sculptors and light designers in the world, who exhibit their artworks throughout the streets and alleys of the Old City, in major tourist sites and public spaces.

For photos, see the article.

Tagged Jerusalem

The Low-Level Aqueduct and Sultan’s Pool

One of the most impressive building projects of King Herod and others of his period is the aqueduct system that brought water to Jerusalem from the area south of Bethlehem. Most people aren’t familiar with this project, or if they are, they really can’t fathom how remarkable the system is. This is because unless you get out and hike around for at least a few hours, it is difficult to get a sense for the obstacles that were overcome.

Several aqueducts brought water to a series of three massive pools known today as “Solomon’s Pools.” Two aqueducts then transported the water to Jerusalem. The upper-level aqueduct led to the area of Herod’s Palace on the Western Hill and the lower-level aqueduct fed the pools and cisterns around the Temple Mount.

The relationship and date of Sultan’s Pool (photo below) to the low-level aqueduct has never been clear. The pool is located in the Hinnom Valley on the western side of Jerusalem, and recent excavations suggest that it was only constructed in the Byzantine period.

The Israel Antiquities Authority announced today that they have discovered a channel that diverted water from the low-level aqueduct into Sultan’s Pool. Built in the Byzantine period (330-640), the channel was repaired multiple times in the Ottoman period (1517-1917).

The IAA has issued a press release and two high-resolution aerial photos (zip). Arutz-7 has the story (“Jerusalem’s Secret Revealed”) and includes low-res photos in the article.

From the press release:

The Israel Antiquities Authority uncovered the main aqueduct that conveyed water to the Sultan’s Pool during an excavation prior to the construction of the Montefiore Museum in Mishkenot Sha’ananim by the Jerusalem Foundation. The ancient aqueduct supplied pilgrims and residents with water for drinking and purification.
Most Jerusalemites identify the Sultan’s Pool as a venue where large cultural events are held; however, for hundreds of years it was one of the city’s most important water reservoirs.
In an archaeological excavation the Israel Antiquities Authority recently conducted prior to the construction of the Montefiore Museum, which the Jerusalem Foundation plans to build in Mishkenot Sha’ananim, an aqueduct was uncovered that conveyed water to the Temple Mount and also served as the principal water supply to the Sultan’s Pool. The excavation, directed by Gideon Solimany and Dr. Ron Beeri of the Israel Antiquities Authority, focused on a section along the course of the Low-level Aqueduct, on the western side of Ben Hinnoam Valley above the Derekh Hebron bridge.
According to Dr. Ron Beeri, excavation director on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority, “We are dealing with a very impressive aqueduct that reached a height of three meters. Naturally, one of the first things Sultan Suleiman I hastened to do in Jerusalem (along with the construction of the city wall as we know it today) was to repair the aqueduct that was already there which supplied the large numbers of pilgrims who arrived in Jerusalem with water for drinking and purification. Suleiman attached a small tower to the aqueduct, inside of which a ceramic pipe was inserted. The pipe diverted the aqueduct’s water to the Sultan’s Pool and the impressive sabil (a Muslim public fountain for drinking water), which he built for the pilgrims who crossed the Derekh Hebron bridge and is still preserved there today”. Dr. Beeri said, “It is evident that the location of the aqueduct was extremely successful and efficient: we found four phases of different aqueducts that were constructed in exactly the same spot, one, Byzantine, from the sixth-seventh centuries CE and three that are Ottoman which were built beginning in the sixteenth century CE. The last three encircle a large subterranean water reservoir that was apparently built before the Ottoman period”.

Sultan’s Pool in the Hinnom Valley, September 1943
Library of Congress, matpc-12447

From the forthcoming photo CD: The American Colony and Eric Matson Collection: Jerusalem

Tagged Discoveries, Excavations, Jerusalem

Baghdad National Museum, Virtually

You can now visit the Baghdad National Museum online. The Italian creators have done a terrific job. Ansa.it has the story:

The treasures of Baghdad’s National Museum went online for the first time Tuesday as Italy inaugurated the Virtual Museum of Iraq as part of an ongoing cultural collaboration between the two countries.
Looted during the United States-led invasion in 2003, the Baghdad Museum partially reopened in February after six years but the website is designed to make its most important artefacts accessible to everyone.
The site (www.virtualmuseumiraq.cnr.it), in Arabic, English and Italian, offers visitors the chance to walk through eight virtual halls and admire works from the prehistoric to the Islamic period, while videoclips reconstruct the history of the country’s main cities.
”It’s not a simple container of the objects in the museum but a real virtual journey, created for the general public and the scientific community, across 6,000 years of Mesopotamian history,” said Italy’s National Research Council Director Roberto De Mattei.
Among the artefacts on display in the Sumerian hall of the virtual museum is the famous Warka Mask, a marble head of a woman from Uruk dated to 3,400-3,100 BC, which, as with many of the works, visitors can rotate to get an almost 360 degree view.
In the Assyrian hall visitors can also admire colossal limestone statues of human-headed, winged bulls called lamassu, dated to the eight and ninth centuries BC, that guarded the ancient cities of Nimrud on the River Tigris and Dur Sharrukin, modern-day Khorsabad.

The story continues here.

HT: Explorator

Tagged Museums

Great Deal: Context of Scripture, 3 volumes

The best reference for ancient Near Eastern texts related to the Bible is the The Context of Scripture, edited by Hallo and Younger. This three-volume work is superior to Pritchard’s ANET in many ways. Unfortunately, it is published by Brill and thus is very expensive.

Eisenbrauns has an outstanding deal on the complete set in paperback. Instead of $310, it is available this weekend only for $124 (plus shipping).

If you miss the sale, each volume is available at Amazon for $200-300 each (1, 2, 3). Or you can get the set in Libronix (electronic) format for $299.95.

If anyone has volume 1 in hardback and wants to sell or trade, send me an email (tbolen91 at bibleplaces dot com).

Tagged Resources