Inside BAR

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Nothing compares with visiting a museum and seeing your favorite piece in person. We often hear from travelers on their return who are thrilled to have finally seen the objects they had previously admired in BAR’s photographs. But many of the most valuable artifacts from the Biblical world will never be seen by museumgoers, no matter how far they travel, or by readers flipping through BAR. These objects reside in private collections, and, although often unmatched by museum holdings, they are off limits to the public—and often to scholars as well. A recent book by a Tel Aviv antiquities dealer and a Haifa University scholar, however, offers a rare glimpse into this shrouded world. “In Private Hands,” presents two reviews of the book, which highlights 40 ancient inscriptions owned by collectors. First, Hershel Shanks reports on one of the book’s most striking subjects—a seventh- or sixth-century bulla, or lump of clay used to seal a document, that not only displays the name of a Biblical scribe, but may also bear “The Fingerprint of Jeremiah’s Scribe.” P. Kyle McCarter, Jr., continues the report in “Pieces of the Puzzle,” where he discusses several of the “new” objects, including a group of arrowheads inscribed with the names of Amurru royalty, a powerful Syrian dynasty that, the arrow-heads reveal, survived well into Iron Age I (1200–1000 B.C.).

A member of BAR’s editorial advisory board, McCarter is the William Foxwell Albright Professor of Biblical and Ancient Near Eastern Studies at Johns Hopkins University. His publications include commentaries on 1 Samuel and 2 Samuel in the Anchor Bible Series and numerous reviews and articles for BAR and Bible Review, including “The Mysterious Copper Scroll—Clues to Hidden Temple Treasure?” (BR, 08:04) and “Let’s Be Serious About the Bat Creek Stone,” BAR 19:04.

It happens so often that Israeli archaeologists, especially those working in Jerusalem, barely break their stride when the news comes their way: Builders, in the course of putting up a new building or while widening a highway, have accidentally uncovered ancient artifacts. Such a call came to Ronny Reich in the course of construction of the Mamilla Project, a residential and commercial complex opposite Jaffa Gate. A rescue dig soon uncovered tombs dating as far back as 2,500 years, but the most intriguing burial proved to be the most recent: a mass grave containing the remains of hundreds of people. In “God Knows Their Names,” Reich explains how the now-mute victims in this collective grave testify to a massacre of Christians in the wake of the Persian capture of Jerusalem in 614 A.D.

An archaeologist for the Israel Antiquities Authority, Reich also teaches at Haifa University. He is currently directing excavations in the area near Robinson’s Arch, at the southwest corner of the Temple Mount. Reich appeared previously in these pages with “Caiaphas Name Inscribed on Bone Boxes,” BAR 18:05, and “The Great Mikveh Debate,” BAR 19:02.

Ancient Jewish communities thrived as far from Israel as the Crimean peninsula, jutting into the Black Sea, and as early as the first century A.D. How do we know? Documents from the first century recording the freeing of slaves and mentioning “the synagogue of the Jews” have been found at several cities in the Crimea; in these documents, the freed slaves are entrusted to the protection of Jewish communities. But there is more: Robert S. MacLennan takes us “In Search of the Jewish Diaspora,” reporting on a number of finds that indicate not only the existence of well-respected Jewish communities in first-century Crimea, but also the likelihood of an actual Jewish public building—or “synagogue” in the modern sense of the term.

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An adjunct professor of classics at Macalaster College in St. Paul, Minnesota, MacLennan is also executive director of the Black Sea Project’s excavations in Chersonesus, in the Crimea. A former Presbyterian minister, he is the author of “Four Christian Writers on Jews and Judaism in the Second Century,” in From Ancient Israel to Modern Judaism (Scholars Press, 1989).

From the simple pebbled floors, laid down 9,000 years ago, to the magnificent sixth-century A.D. mosaic map at Madaba, with its more than two million tiles, the peoples of ancient Jordan adorned the walls and floors of their churches, palaces, mosques and synagogues with intricate designs composed of tiny, colored tesserae made of stone or glass. In “Magic Carpets,” Larry G. Herr discusses Michele Piccirillo’s lavish book, The Mosaics of Jordan, the result of a massive project to catalogue ancient Jordan’s rich mosaic heritage.

Herr, professor of religious studies at Canadian Union College in Alberta, has directed excavations at Tell el-’Umeiri, part of Jordan’s Madaba Plains Project. Among his publications are The Scripts of Ancient Northwest Semitic (Scholars Press, 1978) and “The Search for Biblical Heshbon,” BAR 19:06.

Set 8,000 Bible scholars and archaeologists loose in the City of Brotherly Love for four days and what do they do? Huddle together in the crowded rooms of the city’s immense convention center and listen to each other speak about their latest research, of course. Granted the federal government was shut down and trips to the Liberty Bell were out of the question, but, even so, the participants at the recent Annual Meeting, sponsored by the American Schools of Oriental Research, the Society of Biblical Literature and the American Academy of Religion, proved once again their remarkable dedication to learning. In “‘Annual Miracle’ Visits Philadelphia,” Hershel Shanks offers his 12th annual review of the meeting and notes that sessions on the historical Jesus drew the largest crowds. He takes issue with one meeting participant, Keith Whitelam of the University of Stirling, in Scotland, who accused Bible scholars of suppressing Palestinian history in favor of Israelites.

Our BARlines department is chock-full of the latest goings-on in our field. We begin with reports on two pieces of archaeological news that have made quite a stir lately. The first involves the excavation of newly discovered caves at Qumran, the site where the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered. BAR talks to excavator Hanan Eshel, who explains how his finds answer a long-standing puzzle: Where did the people of the Qumran sect live? The second item tracks a recent front-page embarrassment—the claim that a burial complex yielded an inscription mentioning the Hasmoneans. Though the claim proved to be groundless, the many finds made within the complex are exciting nonetheless. Nor is that all. The department continues with news of people on their way up (or out) and of several exciting new exhibits.

Nothing compares with visiting a museum and seeing your favorite piece in person. We often hear from travelers on their return who are thrilled to have finally seen the objects they had previously admired in BAR’s photographs. But many of the most valuable artifacts from the Biblical world will never be seen by museumgoers, no matter how far they travel, or by readers flipping through BAR. These objects reside in private collections, and, although often unmatched by museum holdings, they are off limits to the public—and often to scholars as well. A recent book by a Tel Aviv antiquities […]