Biblical Archaeology Review

Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research, 242 (Spring 1981), p. 15.

Arab objections to any institution that excavated in Israel led ASOR in 1969 to separately incorporate its Jerusalem and Amman schools as autonomous institutes. In this way, ASOR schools are able to excavate both in Israel and in Arab countries.

Lapp died in a tragic drowning accident off the coast of Cyprus in 1970.

In fairness to Robinson, it should be pointed out that he was by no means alone during this early period in failing to appreciate the significance of tells. Even in the 1870s, the great British archaeologist Claude Conder, who worked with H. H. Kitchener on the Palestine Exploration Fund’s survey of western Palestine, identified the mounds as ancient brick factories.

It is not clear why King chose Mideast, rather than Near East, in his title. Mideast is the common term for the area in the political realm, and Near East in archaeology and academia, as King recognizes (p. xi).

Published for ASOR by Eisenbrauns, Winona Lake, Indiana, 1983, 292 pp., $15.00.

ASOR is pronounced with a long A, with the emphasis on the first syllable A-sor.

On two occasions during our excavations before 1939, we had to release our workers, who had been called [back to their villages] to dig ditches [to capture the locusts] in the fields in the vicinity of Ras Shamra. Millions of young locusts crawled on the ground [into the ditches where they were then burned]. The mature insects flew over Minet el-Beida and Ras Shamra in thick clouds which darkened the sky.