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“An ongoing underwater archaeological project [near Antikythera Island in Greece] most recently recovered a large marble head of a bearded male figure believed to be part of a statue of Hercules.”

Archaeologists discovered granite blocks from the time of Khufu at the temple of the Sun in Heliopolis, along with many other remains.

A study of cattle teeth discovered at Ur sheds light on the economy, health, and diet of ancient Mesopotamia.

Isabella Segalovich gives a brief history of women’s eyebrows in art.

Robyn Ramsden gives workshops on how to create your own Nag Hammadi codex.

“Italy has been so successful in recovering ancient artworks and artifacts that were illegally exported from the country it has created a museum for them.”

“The funerary portraiture from the city of Palmyra, in the eastern Roman Empire, is a rich and heterogenous display of identity dating to the first three centuries CE.”

“A new exhibit at the Israel Museum uses VR technology to bring back to life the rich heritage of the destroyed Great Synagogue of Aleppo.”

New release: The Archaeology of Iran from the Palaeolithic to the Achaemenid Empire, by Roger Matthews and Hassan Fazeli Nashli. Also available as a free download.

New release: A Guide to Scenes of Daily Life on Athenian Vases, by John Howard Oakley (University of Wisconsin Press, 2020). Summarized and reviewed here.

Carl Rasmussen shares photos of the only completely preserved chapel for emperor worship in the Roman world.

Joel Kramer’s latest video is about his visit to Babylon and how the prophecies against the city were fulfilled.

HT: Agade, Joseph Lauer, Arne Halbakken, Paleojudaica

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An ancient shipwreck near the northern Greek island of Alonissos will be the first in Greece to be made accessible to the public. It dates to the 5th century BC and was carrying 4,000 amphoras.

Three archaeological expeditions are working at Nineveh, and authorities plan to open the city to tourists next year.

“Scientists have fully sequenced the DNA of a Pompeii man killed during the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in A.D. 79.”

Judith Sudilovsky went on a tour of Turkey, and she reports on what she saw at Harran, the city where Abraham lived, at Urfa/Edessa, and at the Haleplibahçe Mozaik Museum.

“The United Kingdom and Greece have agreed to formal talks regarding the return of the Parthenon marbles.”

A former president of the Louvre has been charged with crimes related to the trafficking of Egyptian artifacts.

Amanda Claridge, archaeologist and author of Rome: An Oxford Archaeological Guide, died earlier this month.

HT: Agade, Joseph Lauer, Arne Halbakken, Keith Keyser, Explorator

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“A team of archaeologists in Egypt has discovered the 4,300-year-old tomb of a man named Mehtjetju, an official who claimed that he had access to ‘secret’ royal documents.

Images of 46 birds arranged in two rows were discovered at the Temple of Esna in Luxor, Egypt, during an Egyptian-German expedition this month.”

A recently discovered tunnel at Basbük in southeastern Turkey has revealed [Neo-Assyrian] artwork depicting eight gods, three of which were labeled with Aramaic inscriptions.”

“A spectacular ancient mosaic floor that was part of a building from the Hellenistic period is among the important finds from excavations carried out recently at Fabrika Hill in Kato Paphos, Cyprus.”

Lexundria is a digital library of classical antiquity. Although most of the texts on this site can be found elsewhere on the internet, this project aims to make them accessible in a more research-friendly format.”

The Toronto Tribune interviews Steven Fine about the Arch of Titus in Rome.

“Preserving the Biblical Past: A History of Archaeology at La Sierra University” is a 95-minute presentation given at the university’s recent homecoming celebration. Highlights of their decades-long Jordan excavations include the “best-preserved 4-room house” (~17 min), a “King’s House” inscription (~25 min), and the “earliest Moabite national script” specimen (~37 min) resembling that of the Mesha Stele. At the end, they share plans for a new archaeological museum in Madaba.

New release: Pearl of the Desert: A History of Palmyra, by Rubina Raja (Oxford, 2022; $30).

New release: Tall Zirā´a. The 2018 and 2019 Excavation Campaigns. The Iron Age, Hellenistic and Early Roman Period in Area II, The Gadara Region Project (2001–2011). Final Report 9, edited by Katharina Schmidt. (Free download here)

BASONOVA Webinar on May 25: “Sacred Prostitution and the Cult of Aphrodite/Venus in Roman Corinth,” by Barbette Spaeth ($7)

Accordance has a big sale on both OT (5 vols) and NT (4 vols) sets of the Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary ($136 for all).

Recent episodes on Digging for Truth:

HT: Agade, Joseph Lauer, Arne Halbakken, G. M. Grena

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The first-ever discovery of a soldier bearing the title of “Emperor’s protector” was made on a sarcophagus found in western Turkey.

“A 2nd-century funerary altar marking the remains of a 13-year-old girl was discovered in Rome.”

Hundreds of engraved stones and fragmented bas-relief carvings have recently been discovered in the ruined Tachara Palace” in Persepolis.

“Analysis of Bronze Age daggers has shown that they were used for processing animal carcasses and not as non-functional symbols of identity and status, as previously thought.”

“Lebanon’s tourism ministry inaugurated on Friday a Phoenician museum in the coastal city of Jounieh.”

Pharaoh So is the last of five Egyptian pharaohs in Bryan Windle’s archaeological biography series.

Chris Stantis writes about warriors and warrior burials in the ancient Near East.

Bible History Daily provides an introduction to a current BAR magazine article on dig workers in the Middle East. The article itself derives from more extensive reporting in Allison Mickel’s Why Those Who Shovel Are Silent: A History of Local Archaeological Knowledge and Labor.

“A British tourist could face the death penalty in Iraq after being accused of smuggling artifacts out of the country.”

A new study concludes that the Shroud of Turin is similar to a piece of fabric found at Masada in the 1st century AD.

The Ancient World Online has updated its extensive list of Oriental Institute Open Access Publications.

HT: Agade, Joseph Lauer, Arne Halbakken, Ryan Jaroncyk, Jared Clark, Charles Savelle, Explorator

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A Greco-Roman pottery workshop was recently discovered in Alexandria.

Restoration work is underway on the Ben Ezra synagogue in Cairo.

Mark Janzen and Chris McKinny begin a new series on Egypt and the Bible in the Biblical World podcast.

Jerry Pattengale of the Religion News Service reviews some of the recent controversy related to the claim that Tall el-Hammam was destroyed by a meteoric airburst.

Zoom webinar on April 24: “Preserving Cultural Heritage in Hisban and Umm al-Jimal, Jordan,” featuring Øystein LaBianca, Elizabeth Osinga, and Darrell Rohl.

Philip Boyes writes about the social context of writing in ancient Ugarit. His similarly titled book is available as an open access pdf.

The Jerusalem Post investigates the origins of the menorah etched into the staircase of the Celsus Library in Ephesus.

The 6th-century Imperial Gate of the Hagia Sophia has been vandalized.

American archaeologist Stephen Miller devoted his entire professional life to uncovering the secrets of Nemea and reviving ancient Greece’s Nemean Games.”

A new exhibition at the Landesmuseum Mainz showcases Roman technology including sewer systems, underfloor heating, and weatherproof concrete.

HT: Agade, Joseph Lauer, Charles Savelle, Arne Halbakken, Paleojudaica

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A boat dating to 2000 BC has been excavated near the ancient city of Uruk in Iraq.

Scientists used a mass spectrometer to identify the smells of ancient food residues in jars discovered in the Deir el-Medina necropolis.

Greek graffiti on a statue of Ramses II at Abu Simbel dates to the reign of Pharaoh Psammetichus (circa 590 BC).

Turkish Archaeological News highlights the top stories for the month of March, including the restoration of the “Serpent Column” in Istanbul.

Chariot racing in the Roman world was “the ancient version of NASCAR, except that it was a lot more dangerous.”

“Researchers in Sweden are using virtual reality (VR) to envision what a lavishly decorated home in Pompeii might have looked like before its destruction in 79 C.E.”

“It is now certain that ancient Greek sculptors used bright colors, as well as gold and ivory, to further beautify the magnificent structures they created.”

Researchers believe they now know the date the Antikythera mechanism was first set ticking—December 23, 178 BC.

New from Brill: Queen Berenice: A Jewish Female Icon of the First Century CE, by Tal Ilan. “This is a biography of Queen Berenice, the daughter of King Agrippa I, sister of King Agrippa II, wife of two kings and lover of the emperor designate Flavius Titus.”

Andrea Nicolotti provides a bit of a teaser on Bible History Daily from his recent book, The Shroud of Turin: The History and Legends of the World’s Most Famous Relic (Waco: Baylor Univ. Press, 2020).

HT: Agade, Arne Halbakken, Alexander Schick, Joseph Lauer

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