Bits & Pieces

Copper Scroll Coming to U.S.

In “Bits & Pieces,” BAR 18:06, we announced that some fragmentary Dead Sea Scrolls from Israel are to be exhibited at the Library of Congress, starting April 29.

Not to be outdone, Jordan will allow the famous Copper Scroll to be brought to this country perhaps as early as this summer.

While here it will be taken to the Getty Conservation Institute, where preservation work will be performed. The scroll will also be photographed inch-by-inch by Bruce Zuckerman of the Ancient Biblical Manuscript Center in Claremont, California. Zuckerman is now the leading photographer of ancient Near Eastern texts, including cuneiform tablets.

The Copper Scroll is one of the most intriguing of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Written on thin copper sheets, it contains a laundry list of 64 hiding places of huge quantities of gold and silver. Many scholars believe it is a guide to the Temple treasure hidden from the Romans sometime before Jerusalem was burned and the Temple destroyed in 70 A.D.^a Although some efforts have been made to find these hiding places, so far all such efforts have proved unsuccessful.

Los Angeles to Host Scroll Series

“The Extraordinary Work of the Dead Sea Scrolls,” a seven-part lecture series, will take place weekly at 7:45 p.m. from April 21 through June 1, 1993, in Gindi Auditorium on the campus of the University of Judaism, 15600 Mulholland Drive, Los Angeles.