Biblical Archaeology Review, January/February 1987
Features
Lachish—Key to the Israelite Conquest of Canaan?
It is now more than seven years since my first report to BAR readers on the excavation at Biblical Lachish (“Answers at Lachish,” BAR 05:06). At that time, I primarily discussed Iron Age Lachish, the Lachish of the Judean monarchy. Judean Lachish was twice conquered and destroyed...Read more ›
Excavation Opportunities 1987
To delight in the aspects of sentient ruin might appear a heartless pastime, and the pleasure, I confess, shows a note of perversity. —Henry James, Italian Hours Ever-present dust, relentless sun, field-kitchen food and temperatures in the 90s day after day. Sound like the...Read more ›
Discovering What Jewish Miqva’ot Can Tell Us About Christian Baptism
Until the discoveries of modern archaeology, we knew about ancient Jewish ritual immersion baths only from literary texts. Now, however, archaeology has provided us with numerous examples of Jewish ritual immersion baths, called miqva’ot (singular, miqveh), dating to the late Second Temple period, prior to and during...Read more ›
Jerusalem Model Rediscovered
Reveals minute details of 19th-century Jerusalem
But for the curiosity, lively intelligence and considerable sleuthing of a group of young scholars, a unique and exquisitely detailed model of Jerusalem in the 1870s might still lie moldering in the basement of a museum in Geneva. Today, however, the completely restored 13-foot by 15-foot zinc...Read more ›