The Royal Stoa at the southern end of Herod’s Temple Mount was “a structure more noteworthy than any under the sun,” according to Josephus. And when the First Jewish Revolt broke out in 66 C.E., this magnificent building became a hub for rebel coin minting

019 Powerful segments of the religious community in Israel, supported by some Orthodox Jews in the United States, have long objected to the excavation of ancient Jewish tombs, claiming that it is forbidden by Jewish law (halakhah). But, as...

016 Few places better illustrate the layered history that archaeology uncovers than the little ridge known as the City of David, the oldest inhabited part of Jerusalem. For example, to tell the story of the Pool of Siloam, where Jesus cured the...

The first-century Capernaum synagogue in which Jesus preached has probably been found. Because more than one synagogue may have existed in Capernaum at this time, we cannot be sure that this new find was Jesus’ synagogue. But this recently discovered first-century building is certainly a...

014 014 When archaeology student Zachi Zweig started to sift through the mountains of dirt that had been dumped into the Kidron Valley by Muslim authorities in charge of the unsupervised...

063 There, on a moonlit night beside the ruins of Qumran, was the voice of Yigael Yadin, Israel’s most illustrious archaeologist, dead these 13 years, reading in the original language from a letter by Shimon bar Kosiba, better known as Bar-Kokhba...

052 The port of ancient Gaza has been found. A joint Palestinian-French expedition is conducting the first scientific archaeological excavation since the Palestinian Authority took charge of the city. They have found remains of the port in at...

046 047 An east-west city wall built by Suleiman the Magnificent in the 16th century cuts a jagged, horizontal line across the bottom of this photo; from our vantage point in the north, we look...

027 This article has been adapted by BAR editor Hershel Shanks from a lengthy scholarly study by Professors Yoram Tsafrir and Leah di Segni of Hebrew University in Liber Annuus, published by the Studium Biblicum Franciscanum.1 This...

040 041 AT DAWN THE TOMB OF JESUS WAS FOUND EMPTY. Later that very day two of the disciples, Cleopas and another unnamed, were walking on the road to Emmaus when Jesus appeared to them, but...

055 Hippos-Sussita of the Decapolis: The First Twelve Seasons of Excavations (2000–2011), Vol. 1 By Arthur Segal, Michael Eisenberg, Jolanta Młynarczyk, Mariusz Burdajewicz and Mark Schuler...

047 I have often lamented that, although there are thousands of museums in the United States devoted to every conceivable topic, there is not a single museum here devoted to Biblical archaeology. I have recently been challenged on this assertion—...

022 The first time I telephoned Shlomo Moussaieff I naturally began by introducing myself. “I’m Hershel Shanks, editor of—” “I know who you are,” he interrupted. “I’ve been avoiding you for 20 years.” He has a high-pitched, almost whiny voice,...

062 Shlomo Moussaieff of Herzliya, Israel, and London, England, who owned the world’s largest private collection of Near Eastern antiquities, surpassing that of many major museums, died in Israel on June 29, 2015, at the age of 92. To the...

024 If you want to understand how archaeologists think, how they reason, how they work, how they interpret finds—and why they sometimes disagree—you will enjoy this discussion among four prominent archaeologists who know as much about Qumran and...

001 What the stock market is to Wall Street and government to Washington, archaeology is to Jerusalem. It is full of archaeological talk and archaeological gossip, of new finds and ideas and speculations. In 1843 the first U.S. Patent...

018 Most Dead Sea Scroll scholars agree that Qumran, the settlement near the caves where the scrolls were found, was inhabited by Essenes, an anti-Temple Jewish sect in the years before the Roman destruction of 70 C.E. A stalwart minority of...

From Jerusalem’s earliest inscription to the discovery of Solomon’s fortifications, the city has been abuzz with archaeological activity. Our up-tothe-minute report puts the spotlight on these exciting new finds, as well as the projects and scholars who have brought them to light.

021 Leona Running has written an adoring biography of the dean of Biblical archaeologists, William Foxwell Albright.a Now Professor of Biblical Languages at Andrews University, Dr. Running served as secretary and assistant to the great American...

062 Not long after archaeologists confirmed the location of the cave where Bedouin shepherds had found the first of the Dead Sea Scrolls, an archaeological expedition was organized to excavate the nearby site known as Khirbet Qumran, the ruins of...