Endnote 3 – Magnificent Obsession: The Private World of an Antiquities Collector

See André Lemaire, “Une inscription paleo-hebraique sur grenade en ivoire,” Revue Biblique 88 (1981). See also the following articles in BAR: “The Divine Name Found in Jerusalem,” BAR 09:02; Lemaire, “Probable Head of Priestly Scepter From Solomon’s Temple Surfaces in Jerusalem,” BAR 10:01; “Was BAR an Accessory to Highway Robbery?” BAR 14:06; and “The Pomegranate Scepter Head—From the Temple of the Lord or From a Temple of Asherah?” BAR 18:03.

For an account of the sale and the likely French collector from whom it was purchased, see Hershel Shanks, “Pomegranate: Sole Relic From Solomon’s Temple, Smuggled out of Israel, Now Recovered,” Moment, December 1988. Since that article appeared, another reliable source has confirmed my identification of the collector who owned it (Paul Altman), and whose estate sold it to the museum. What remains a mystery is, Who provided the money for the purchase by the museum (an amount made available from a Swiss bank account for just about the same amount as the museum paid for the pomegranate) and did that person have any relationship to the Altman family?