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Todd Bolen/bibleplaces.com

PUTTING SIFTERS TO WORK. Since it began in 2004, the sifting project has grown exponentially. More than 20,000 volunteers a year visit the project’s ever-expanding facility to spend a few hours sifting through the soil of one of the world’s most sacred and historic sites, Jerusalem’s Temple Mount. Volunteers stationed at more than a dozen wet sifting stations use sieves and high-pressure hoses to sort through the bags of dirt and rubble recovered from the Temple Mount dump (shown here). Their meticulous sifting has revealed invaluable artifacts from ancient Jerusalem, including Egyptian scarabs, Israelite seals and even pieces of the buildings that sat atop Herod’s Temple Mount.