Miriam Tadmor, archaeologist and curator emeritus of the Israel Museum, died on November 12, 2009. She was 83 years old.
Born Miriam Skura, she studied archaeology under Benjamin Mazar and earned her master’s degree in 1950 from the Hebrew University. There she met her future husband, then named Hayim Frumstein, who was also to become a prominent scholar and archaeologist in his own right. The two were married in 1953 and, as was often done at the time, together they chose a new Hebrew last name: Tadmor (the Hebrew form of Palmyra, a major city in Syria).
After participating in the Tell Qasile excavations, Miriam worked for the Israel Department of Antiquities and Museums (now the Israel Antiquities Authority, or IAA), excavating at Rosh Haniqra and Beth Yerah. She and Hayim also spent two years (1955–1957) at the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, where she studied Mesopotamian and Egyptian archaeology. Her research focused on ancient art, especially of the Chalcolithic and Late Bronze Age.
She started her nearly 40-year curatorial career at the Israel Department of Antiquities and Museums. With a UNESCO scholarship, she studied at several museums in London. She was then appointed to the steering committee that planned the archaeological galleries of the newly established Israel Museum, and when the museum opened in 1965, Tadmor stayed on as curator of the early periods. In 1973 she was appointed chief curator of archaeology at the museum.
Following her retirement in 1991, Tadmor was named coeditor of the Israel Exploration Journal, a post she held at her death.
Dan Barag (1935–2009)
Professor Dan Barag of the Hebrew University, and longtime president and chairman of the Israel Numismatic Society, died in mid-November 2009, at age 74.
His research focused on the material culture of the southern Levant from the classical period on, with special interest in ancient glassmaking, as well as Jewish and Palestinian numismatics.
Born in London in 1935, Barag grew up in Tel Aviv. As a youth, Barag joined Yigael Yadin’s excavations at Tel Hazor. In 1956, after his military service, he moved to Jerusalem to pursue studies in archaeology at the Hebrew University, where he completed his Ph.D. in 1970. His unpublished doctoral dissertation on glass vessels in ancient Palestine is still considered the best reference work on the subject.
Barag excavated numerous sites on behalf of the Israel Department of Antiquities and Museums and later led a joint expedition at the synagogue of Ein Gedi, which unfortunately remains unpublished. He has studied and published the finds from others’ excavations, including Ashdod, Hanita, Nahariya and Masada.
In addition to ancient glassmaking, Barag’s other passion was numismatics. His expertise ranged from the Hellenistic period to the Bar-Kokhba Revolt and through the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem. He took over as head of the Israel Numismatic Society in 1975 and remained there for nearly 30 years. He also revived the society’s stagnant English-language Israel Numismatic Journal, whose last volume (its third) had been published in 1965/1966. Barag took over as its editor, publishing the fourth volume in 1980, and continued until his death, near the completion of volume 17.
Miriam Tadmor (1926–2009)
Miriam Tadmor, archaeologist and curator emeritus of the Israel Museum, died on November 12, 2009. She was 83 years old.
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