Technology Archives - Page 20 of 33

Weekend Roundup

Archaeologists working on the Gezer water system have new evidence supporting its dating to the Middle Bronze period. Volunteers are invited for next season’s dig.

A court has ruled that Elad can continue to run the Jerusalem Archaeological Park in the City of David.

The Museum of the Bible has announced plans to excavate Tel Shimron in Galilee.

Palestinians have set fire to the traditional tomb of Joseph in Shechem.

Nearly 1,000 riders completed a three-day bike race in northern Israel. Dates have been announced for Epic Israel 2016.

Nehemia Gordon shares his experience in working on the Temple Mount Sifting Project. You can donate to the effort here.

The New York Times has issued a correction for their article on the Temple Mount. Jodi Magness’s letter to the editor is here.

ISIS’s destruction of the Roman Arch of Triumph in Palymra made some Russians unhappy.

Egypt is opening a small museum at the Cairo airport later this month.

Volume 3 of NGSBA (Nelson Glueck School of Biblical Archaeology) Archaeology has been released. The articles are primarily about the excavations at Yehud and Maresha. The entire issue can be downloaded for free. Previous volumes are available here.

The Oriental Institute has begun posting their photo archives online. Images are now available from Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon. As far as I can tell, the images are all low-res.

Jodi Magness reviews The Tomb of Jesus and His Family?, edited by James H. Charlesworth. She provides a summary of the articles, including the one by A. Kloner and S. Gibson, excavators of the Talpiot tomb. Ben Witherington provides an abbreviated version of her review.

Brent Seales is on the Book and the Spade to talk about the technology that enabled reading the oldest biblical text outside the Dead Sea Scrolls. Listen here.

Here’s a unique tour of Israel: the Life and Land of Jesus, with Wayne Stiles. This should be particularly attractive for those who want to return but don’t want to visit the same places as every time before.

HT: Agade, Joseph Lauer, Paleojudaica

Our most popular Facebook post and tweet of the week:

Mount of Beatitudes aerial from northeast, ws011415241

The Mount of Beatitudes, Tabgha, Gennesaret, Arbel – so much of Jesus’s ministry right here!

Tagged Egypt, Excavations, Jerusalem, Museums, Photo Resources, Resources, Samaria, Shephelah, Syria, Technology, Temple Mount, Tomb of Jesus, Tourism, Weekend Roundup

Leviticus Scroll Discovered at En Gedi

A 6th-century AD scroll discovered inside a Torah Ark at En Gedi 45 years ago has recently been deciphered to reveal the first 8 verses of Leviticus, making it the oldest scroll discovered since the Dead Sea Scrolls. From a press release from the Israel Antiquities Authority:

Summary: Modern technologies made it possible for the first time to read the contents of a burnt scroll that was found forty five years ago in archaeological excavations at Ein Gedi, on the western shore of the Dead Sea. Surprisingly the scroll is a 1,500 year old copy of the beginning of the Book of Leviticus….
Details: The parchment scroll was unearthed in 1970 in archaeological excavations in the synagogue at Ein Gedi, headed by the late Dr. Dan Barag and Dr. Sefi Porath. However, due to its charred condition, it was not possible to either preserve or decipher it.
The Lunder Family Dead Sea Scrolls Conservation Center of the Israel Antiquities Authority which uses state of the art and advanced technologies to preserve and document the Dead Sea scrolls enabled the discovery of this important find. It turns out that part of this scroll is from the beginning of the Book of Leviticus, written in Hebrew, and dated by C14 analysis to the late sixth–century CE. To date, this is the most ancient scroll from the five books of the Hebrew Bible to be found since the Dead Sea scrolls, most of which are ascribed to the end of the Second Temple period (first century BCE-first century CE).

There are no English articles yet posted, but you should be able to find them as they appear with this link. Haaretz has the story in its Hebrew edition. High-res images may be downloaded here. Thanks to Joseph Lauer for sending the press release and related links.

Ein Gedi Scroll Fragment-Shai Halevi-IAA

Scroll fragment before study, Shai Halevi, IAA

Suggested Merged Text Layer after Unrolling-Seth Parker-University of Kentucky

Virtual Unrolling and Suggested Merged Text Layer, Seth Parker, University of Kentucky and Ehud Shor, Jerusalem

Ein Gedi Potential Scroll Fragments for further research, Shai Halevi, IAA

Tagged Dead Sea, Discoveries, Technology

Weekend Roundup, Part 2

In honor of Jerusalem Day, Noam Chen shares 25 sets of then and now photos of the city.
Biblical Archaeology Review is celebrating its 40th anniversary with a two-volume coffee table book that features one article from each year.

“The Digital Atlas of Ancient Egypt is a digital cultural map of archaeological sites in Egypt” produced by students at Michigan State University.

The Minerva Center for the Relations between Israel and Aram in Biblical Times is calling for applicants for stipends for doctoral studies at Bar Ilan University.

Research into the heights of Egyptian mummies reveals the prevalence of incest among the families of the pharaohs.

A study of animal mummies from Egypt has revealed that a third of them were empty. “Experts believe as many as 70 million animals were‭ ‬ritually slaughtered by the Egyptians to foster a huge mummification industry that even drove some species extinct.”

The Indiana Jones exhibit has opened at the National Geographic Museum. Artifacts on display include the movie version of the ark of the covenant.

Mark Wilson describes what it’s like for a biblical scholar to live in Turkey (requires login). Wilson’s Biblical Turkey is now available through Amazon.

HT: Agade, Charles Savelle, Ted Weis

Tagged Egypt, Jerusalem, Museums, Resources, Syria, Technology, Turkey, Weekend Roundup

Weekend Roundup, Part 1

The Passover sacrifice was reenacted recently by Jewish priests-in-training. The Times of Israel article includes a graphic 3-minute video.

Wayne Stiles explains how God connected Passover, redemption, and the Holy Land. He also shows how archaeology helps us to understand the Passion Week.

BibleX shares how one can illustrate the triumphal entry using photos from the Pictorial Library of Bible Lands.

The Temple Mount Sifting Project found a finger from an Egyptian statue last week.

Leen Ritmeyer was recently interviewed on “Cry for Zion.” His blog lists some of the questions he was asked.

The Gazelle Valley Urban Wildlife Park opened in Jerusalem last week.

A.D. The Bible Continues airs Sunday evening on NBC. A trailer is online.

David Laskin visits sites related to King Herod in a travel piece in the New York Times.

Archaeologists have discovered an ancient Egyptian brewery in Tel Aviv.

Passages opened yesterday in Santa Clarita, California.

The Egyptian Museum in Turin, Italy, has re-opened after a five-year restoration. This is the only museum entirely devoted to Egyptian culture outside of Egypt.

A new technology will reduce the length of time required for carbon-14 dating from six weeks to two days.

Accordance’s 20% off sale ends on Monday (with code Celeb2). That discount applies to our own photo collections, including The American Colony Collection ($30 off), Views That Have Vanished, and the new ones: Cultural Images of the Holy Land and Trees, Plants, and Flowers of the Holy Land.

HT: Agade, Ted Weis, Joseph Lauer

Tagged Discoveries, Herod's Tomb, Holidays, Israel's Coast, Jerusalem, Judah, Movies, Museums, Photo Resources, Technology, Temple Mount, Weekend Roundup

Weekend Roundup

Chris Jones has a careful assessment of the damage at the Mosul Museum. Some of the items destroyed were replicas but many were originals.

The Iraqi Prime Minister has condemned the destruction of antiquities from Nimrud and Nineveh by IS. The United Nations Security Council has condemned the latest “barbaric terrorist acts.” Some experts see the video primarily as propaganda. Ferrell Jenkins provides some background and photos he took in 1970.

Militants have also taken control of Ezra’s tomb in Iraq.

Syria is blaming Turkey for the flow of artifacts out of the country.

What are Judean Pillar Figurines? Erin Darby explains our interest, their importance, and their use for protection and healing.

One of the divers gives his account of the discovery of the treasure of golden coins in the Caesarea harbor.

The downside of such discoveries is increased looting by everyone who thinks that they’ll be the next to find buried gold.

D. Scott Stripling: 2014 Excavations at Kh. el-Maqatir: A Proposed New Location for the Ai of Joshua 7–8 and Ephraim of John 11:53-54

The Jezreel Expedition used airborne LiDAR to prepare for an old-fashioned foot survey that showed that Jezreel is much larger than previously thought.

Dothan appears only twice in the Bible, and Wayne Stiles explains the lesson we can learn from Joseph and Elisha.

The Biblical Museum of Natural History recently opened in Beit Shemesh and it includes a skull of what they identify as behemoth.

Popular Archaeology has a profile of the recent excavations of Tel ‘Eton (biblical Eglon?).

Haaretz: What does it mean when a biblical figure “sat in the gate”?

Shmuel Ahituv has been awarded the 2015 Israel Prize for Bible Studies.

Israeli and Jordan authorities have signed a historic agreement on water sharing that includes sharing water from a desalination plant to be built in Aqaba.

The city of Jerusalem plans to build seven public swimming pools.

Newly released: I. M. Swinnen and E. Gubel, eds., From Gilead to Edom. Studies in the Archaeology and History of Jordan, in Honor of Denyse Homès-Fredericq on the Occasion of Her Eightieth Birthday. Akkadica Supplementum XII. Wetteren: Cultura, 2014.

I’ll be traveling the next couple of weekends and unable to collect stories or write round-ups. If you see anything of interest, send me an email and I’ll include it at the next opportunity.

HT: Ferrell Jenkins, Charles Savelle, Agade, Joseph Lauer

Tagged Antiquities Trade, Discoveries, Israel's Coast, Jerusalem, Mesopotamia, Museums, Resources, Samaria, Shephelah, Syria, Technology, Tourism, Turkey, Weekend Roundup

Google Earth Pro is free

(Post by A.D. Riddle)

On January 20, Google announced that Google Earth Pro is now available for free (see here.) Google Earth un-Pro was always free, but prior to this, Google Earth Pro required an annual subscription that cost $399.99.

The announcement lists some of the advantages to using the Pro edition.

Google Earth Pro has all the easy-to-use features and detailed imagery of Google Earth, along with advanced tools that help you measure 3D buildings, print high-resolution images for presentations or reports, and record HD movies of your virtual flights around the world.

Google Earth works on both Windows and Mac. The program can be downloaded here. The free license key is GEPFREE.

To get started with some of the Pro features, this blog describes Movie Maker, and this help describes the use of Super Overlays for importing hi-resolution overlays into Google Earth Pro. Another option for importing large overlays is MapTiler.

Tagged Resources, Technology