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Part of the booty taken by the Romans during their conquest of Jerusalem in 70 A.D., a pair of trumpets from the Temple is depicted on the triumphal Arch of Titus in Rome. The instruments are carried upon what is probably the golden table of the shew-bread. Twelve loaves, “shew-bread,” were placed every Sabbath “before the Lord” on a table beside the incense altar of the Temple (Exodus 25.30; 1 Samuel 21:7). At the end of the week, the shew-bread was eaten by the priests alone.

Trumpets were blown from the Temple to announce the Sabbath and the Festivals. A stone from the southwest pinnacle of the Temple Mount bears the inscription, “to the place of the trumpeting.”

Assuming the average height of the men on the Arch of Titus to be 5 ft. 7 in. (about 1.70 meters), the length of the trumpets would be about 3 ft. 7 in. (1.10 meters).