Inside BAR

One of the world’s finest collections of ancient Near Eastern art belongs to a single individual, and he wants to give it away. Elie Borowski, perhaps the last of the great dealer-scholar-collectors, has amassed a dazzling array of over 1,700 artifacts, which he has placed in the Lands of the Bible Archaeology Foundation. The collection ranges from Sumerian to Phoenician to Egyptian and Byzantine—spanning more than three millennia. Borowski, 71, dreams of a museum and study center in Jerusalem that will hold and display these unique pieces. In this issue of BAR we look at both the man and his collection. In an article by BAR editor Hershel Shanks, “Elie Borowski Seeks a Home for His Collection,” we follow Borowski from his Warsaw childhood through his wartime army service and his studies in ancient history and languages to his museum-like home in Toronto. Some of the highlights of the Lands of the Bible Collection are illustrated in a photo album, “Treasures From the Lands of the Bible,” which discusses how the artifacts relate to the Bible.

One of the most common archaeological finds in nearly every major period is the oil lamp. From humble beginnings as simple bowls, perhaps as early as the sixth millennium B.C., lamps evolved into a rich art form of Jewish, Greek, Roman and Arab craftspeople. In “Lighting the Way Through History,” Varda Sussman traces the development of the oil lamp.