Strata

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Alexandria’s Lighthouse Found, But Will Its Library Disappear?

Ancient Wonder of the World Rediscovered

In Alexandria, Egypt, history is no longer a thing of the past. Its ancient library, which held over a million volumes of the world’s knowledge in one place, is being rebuilt. And the remains of some of its other structures—the Pharos lighthouse, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world, and royal palaces that once were home to Cleopatra, Julius Caesar and Mark Antony—have been discovered in the waters of its two harbors.

Some scholars even speculate that new excavations will uncover the golden sarcophagus of Alexander the Great, who founded the city in 331 B.C. and was purportedly buried there after his death in 323 B.C.

But the excavations face formidable challenges. The ruins of the lighthouse and the palaces cover more than 5.5 acres—an archaeological gold mine, but a tremendous amount of territory to excavate, especially under water. Just mapping it—as Jean-Yves Empereur, director ofthe French Center of Alexandrian Studies, did preliminary to excavation in 1993—cost about $500,000.

Many of the finds, the thousands of statues and pieces of buildings, are colossal (like the obelisk at lower right). Marble blocks fallen from the lighthouse weigh 50 to 75 tons each. Some of the statues once stood 30 feet tall. The smallest fragment, a red granite torso of a woman that was floated to the surface by special balloons and hoisted to shore by a giant crane, weighed 1.5 tons.

How such vast ruins came to rest about 20 feet below the harbor’s surface is uncertain. Some archaeologists speculate that a section of the ancient city sank below sea level or that the city was flooded by a tidal wave following the devastating earthquake of 335 A.D. A series of earthquakes is blamed for toppling most of the lighthouse, though later Alexandrian authorities probably dumped some of its remains into the sea.

Archaeological work in the rough and polluted waters of Alexandria’s harbors has barely begun. For the past three years, a joint French-Egyptian team of 30 divers led by Empereur has excavated the lighthouse’s remains around the island of Pharos (which means lighthouse in Greek), where the structure once stood. Among the finds are a 14-foot-high fragment of a statue of Ptolemy I (367–283 B.C.), a 6-foot-high statue crown and an 8-foot-high pedestal. The stone crown once formed the headdress of a 30-foot-high statue of the fertility goddess Isis, which was recovered in 1961; the pedestal served as the statue’s base.

A second team of 16 divers, led by Franck Goddio of the European Institute of Marine Archaeology in Paris, captured the media’s attention in 1996 by claiming that “the exact topography of the vanished royal city can be identified for the first time.” Goddio’s team had been using global positioning satellites to map, square foot by square foot, every major object in the submerged royal quarters of the Ptolemies—the Greek kings who ruled Egypt from Alexander the Great’s death in 323 B.C. until the suicide of the last Ptolemy, Cleopatra, in 30 B.C. Cleopatra’s palaces were on the lost island of Antirrhodos, where Mark Antony may also have committed suicide in 30 B.C.

As for the Pharos lighthouse, it is unlikely that this magnificent edifice will be restored to its former splendor—even though descriptions in ancient sources and drawings from as early as 200 B.C. tell us a lot about how it looked. (One artist’s reconstruction is shown at left.) Completed in about 279 B.C. by the second Ptolemy, the lighthouse soared to a height of 300 to 500 feet, the equivalent of a modern 40-story building; it was the tallest structure ever made until the Eiffel Tower was erected in 1889. Built of white marble, the lighthouse was designed in three tiers and supported by a 184-foot-high platform containing over 300 rooms. Fuel for the nightly bonfires was apparently hoisted to the lighthouse’s summit by the world’s first hydraulic machine. A great mirror focused the firelight into a beam that could be seen 35 miles out to sea. Some ancient sources even say that the mirror could focus sunlight and set fire to invading ships.

Another kind of dilemma has hindered construction of a new Alexandria Library. Should ancient remains be destroyed to reclaim the glory of those same remains? Alexandria’s ancient library, an illustrious center of learning for over 2,000 years, was begun in 306 B.C.; it later grew into a huge university-like complex with such famous resident scholars as Archimedes and Euclid and a vast collection of books from Greece, Anatolia, Mesopotamia, Palestine and Egypt.^a In the mid-1980s, construction began on the new library—a large learning center on or near the site where the old library stood. This project was stalled for 10 years, however, when archaeologists protested that the building of the new library was destroying the remains of the ancient one. Now construction of the library has begun again.

015

A True Crux

Possible Piece of True Cross Cannot Be Tested Without Being Destroyed

A cross inlaid with wood caused a flurry of international interest when it was suggested that the wood might be part of the True Cross.

The cross was discovered in late January during the emergency excavation of a sixth-century A.D. house or shop unearthed as construction began on a luxury housing project just outside Jerusalem’s Jaffa Gate, one of the principle entrances to the Old City. Crosses have often been discovered before—Jerusalem has long had a flourishing souvenir industry featuring holy oil, holy water and crosses—but this cross is unique because it is inlaid with two pieces of wood. The cross itelf appears to be bronze.

“It was probably a souvenir from Jerusalem for pilgrims who came to the city,” says Ronny Reich, the Israel Antiquities Authority archaeologist co-directing the excavation with Ya’akov Billig.

Archaeologists think the cross dates from the Byzantine period, between the fifth and eighth centuries A.D., when Jerusalem was under Christian rule. Reich, along with other Israeli archaeologists, doubts the inlaid wood came from Jesus’ cross. But to identify the type of wood and pinpoint its age, it must undergo scientific testing—not an easy feat considering the small amount of wood contained in the cross. Dating the relic by the radiocarbon method will destroy the wood. Says Reich, “Would you like for us to keep the wood in the cross? But then we will not know from which period of time it is! Or, if we sacrifice it and make our carbon-14 analysis, then we’ll have no wood anymore.”

What you will have, however, is an answer. But the decision to test or not to test will wait until the excavation is complete.

California in November?

Scholarships to Annual Meeting Available

The Biblical Archaeology Society is pleased to offer travel scholarships to Israeli and Arab archaeologists and Bible scholars presenting papers at the 1997 annual meetings of the American Schools of Oriental Research (ASOR), the Society of Biblical Literature (SBL) and the American Academy of Religion (AAR).

The $1,000 grants, which cover travel from the Middle East and lodging, are available to active Israeli Ph.D. candidates, Israeli women who have completed a Ph.D. within the past ten years and Arab archaeologists. Applicants must demonstrate that they could not otherwise afford to attend the meetings. Previous recipients of BAS travel scholarships are ineligible.

The 1997 annual meeting of ASOR will be held in Napa, California, November 15–21, 1997. SBL and AAR will convene immediately after in San Francisco, November 22–25, 1997.

To apply, send us the title and abstract of your proposed paper by August 1, 1997. Please include information about your education, experience and financial need. Write to BAS Meeting Scholarships, 4710 41st St., NW, Washington, DC 20016; fax: 202-364-2636; e-mail: basedit@clark.net.

Scholars must arrange their own place on the annual meeting program. They may apply for a BAS meeting scholarship before acceptance of their papers, but should contact us as soon as they receive notification of their acceptance.

016

Saving Face

An Egyptian Statue and Its Face Are Reunited 100 Years After Excavation

Talk about cosmetic surgery. After at least 1,500 years, a Luxor statue of the ancient Egyptian goddess Mut has recently received a face-lift, thanks to restoration work by the University of Chicago.

The statue’s limestone face apparently fell off in the seventh or eighth century A.D. and was discovered during Luxor’s excavation nearly 100 years ago. The excavators, not knowing where it belonged, deposited it in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo without proper identification. There it remained until recently, when researchers stumbled upon it and asked University of Chicago Egyptologists if they could identify the fragment.

By coincidence, a University of Chicago team was restoring the Luxor site, including a 12-foot-high dyad statue of the vulture-goddess Mut and her mate, Amun, the chief god of Luxor. Mut’s face was missing. One of the statue’s restorers, W. Raymond Johnson, thought the face in the photograph the museum had sent might be the missing part. So he went to the museum and made a cast of the back of the fragment. When he placed the cast on the statue to test his theory, it “fit like a glove.”

Finding a missing piece of a statue is extremely rare. “Usually when statues are repaired, they are already in museums,” said Peter Dorman, field director of the Epigraphic Survey at Chicago House, the Oriental Institute’s headquarters in Luxor. “It is rare that a statue gets restored in situ, where it has been standing since antiquity.” Fragments from two other statues of Mut, at Luxor and Karnak, have also been identified and will be restored in situ. All three Mut statues were originally carved in about 1350 B.C.

All three were also apparently restored before, during the Ptolemaic period, about 200 to 100 B.C. A dowel mark on the forehead of the dyad statue indicates that its face had been reattached with metal dowels at that time. The restorers used metal rods for the modern reinstallation as well.

Unfortunately, despite the recent restoration and the care lavished on her for centuries, Mut has still not completely regained her former glory. Her nose, also reinstalled in antiquity, is now missing. But there’s no reason to spite the restoration of her face because it cuts off at the nose.

017

Getting Technical

Radiocarbon Dating

When scientists cut a tiny square from a Dead Sea scroll made of papyrus, say, send it to the laboratory for radiocarbon dating, and report back that the scroll dates to the first century B.C., what have they actually done?

They have simply determined how much of the unstable element carbon 14 remains in the ancient fragment.

Carbon appears naturally in three isotopes (the scientific name for atoms that have the same number of protons and nearly identical chemical properties but different physical characteristics as a result of having different masses). The nucleus of the most common carbon atom contains six protons and six neutrons (a proton without a positive charge); this isotope is called carbon 12. A much rarer form, carbon 13, is blessed with an extra neutron. The extremely rare carbon 14, which has two additional neutrons, makes up only about one billionth of all carbon atoms.

While the first two carbon isotopes are stable, carbon 14 is unstable, or radioactive—meaning that it “decays” over time and eventually is converted to nitrogen 14. Scientists can measure this rate of decay: Only half of a certain sample of carbon 14 will remain after 5,730 years (plus or minus 40 years); a quarter of the original sample will remain after twice this number of years, that is, 11,460 years; and so on—thus 5,730 years is the “half-life” of carbon 14.

So why doesn’t all the carbon 14 simply disappear? Because the earth’s atmosphere continually produces the isotope. In the atmosphere’s upper levels, cosmic rays split the nuclei of atoms; the fragments fly apart at high speeds and collide with other nuclei. When a neutron collides with a nitrogen atom (which contains seven protons and seven neutrons) and dislodges a proton, the result is an atom with six protons and eight neutrons—carbon 14.

After this strange birth, carbon 14 behaves like any other form of carbon: It binds with oxygen to form carbon dioxide, spreads throughout the biosphere and enters the food chain after being absorbed by plants. All organisms, plant and animal, contain carbon, which is one of the building blocks of proteins and other essential compounds—therefore, all living things also contain small amounts of carbon 14.

In the bodies of living organisms, some carbon 14 atoms decay while others are supplied through photosynthesis (in plants) or the eating of plants (by animals). Each living organism, that is, maintains a uniform level of carbon 14. But when an organism dies, the decayed atoms are no longer replenished—so the amount of carbon 14 dwindles, at the rate of its half-life. This regular rate of decay allows scientists to determine the age of any organic (that is, once living) material. They compare the amount of carbon 14 remaining, say, in a gram of our papyrus scroll to the amount of carbon 14 in a gram of a living papyrus reed, and then they calculate how long it has taken for the scroll to lose so much carbon 14.

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Mark Your Calendar

Exhibitions

The Story of Masada: Discoveries of the Excavation

Through September 18, 1997

Over 700 artifacts—including gold-leafed capitals, sandals, armor, weaponry, ostraca and scrolls—illustrate the Herodian and Roman history of Masada. A related exhibition displays one of the Bar-Kokhba deeds from the Cave of Letters, four scrolls from Qumran and at least one Qumran artifact, a horned altar, never exhibited before.

Mistress of the House, Mistress of Heaven: Women in Ancient Egypt

Through May 18, 1997

Gold, silver and faience jewelry, statues and reliefs are among the 250 art objects used to explore the roles of ancient Egyptian women, as servant, priestess or queen.

The Glory of Byzantium

Through July 6, 1997

A treasure trove of middle period Byzantine art (from mid-9th to mid-13th centuries). Some of the 350 objects—mosaics, frescoes, ivories, enamels, silks, stone carvings, gems, ceramics, gold and silver secular and liturgical objects, and icons—are traveling for the first time.

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BAS Seminars

Call our travel/study department at (800) 221-4644 for more information on the listings below.

North Carolina Study Seminar

June 22 to June 28, 1997

“Were New Testament Writings Found at Qumran?” is one of 20 lectures on the Dead Sea Scrolls during BAS’s summer seminar at Guilford College in Greensboro, North Carolina. Martin G. Abegg, Jr., and Peter Flint will cover Old and New Testament topics related to the scrolls and address some of the questions the archaeology of Qumran has raised about that settlement.

Oregon Study Seminar

July 13 to July 19, 1997

“The Quest for the Historical Jesus” continues at Marylhurst College in Portland, Oregon, when Bart Ehrman and Edward Cook speak on that topic and “The World of Ancient Judaism as Reflected in the Dead Sea Scrolls.”

Minnesota Study Seminar

July 27 to August 2, 1997

Learn how archaeology illuminates the Old and New Testaments as George L. Kelm and Dan Schowalter lecture at St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota, 35 miles south of Minneapolis.

Alaska Seminar Cruise

August 10 to August 20, 1997

Cruise from Vancouver to Anchorage aboard the luxurious MS Noordam, taking in the Inside Passage, the Hubbard Glacier and the Harrisman fjords while studying “The Dead Sea Scrolls’ Impact on Understanding the Bible and Christian Origins” with James Sanders.

Oxford University Study Seminar

August 10 to August 22 1997

Bronze Age mounds, Blenheim Palace, Cotswolds cottages and tea on the Thames are moments away from St. Edmund Hall, Oxford University, where William Dever and Ronald Hendel will explore the relationship between archaeology and the Bible. Timothy Lin leads an optional extension to Edinburgh August 22–27 that focuses on “Qumran and Its Community.”

015

What Is It?

A: Hittite bowling ball

B. Mace-head

C. Doorstop

D. Stool

E. Vase

017

What It Is, Is …

B. Mace-head.

Lions grapple on this inscribed limestone mace-head from the ancient Sumerian capital of Girsu, located in modern Telloh, Iraq. Dating to 2550 B.C., the mace-head bears the name of Mesilim, King of Kish, and a dedication to Nigirsu, the city’s chief warrior and fertility god. Mesilim’s title is especially significant since Kish was one of the most important cities of ancient Mesopotamia and is thought of as the first seat of kingship after the Flood. The 7.5-inch-tall mace-head was discovered during the first excavation of a Sumerian site, an excavation led by Frenchman Ernest de Sarzec from 1877 to 1900.

Alexandria’s Lighthouse Found, But Will Its Library Disappear?

Ancient Wonder of the World Rediscovered