Jerusalem in Original Photographs 1850–1920 Shimon Gibson (Winona Lake, Indiana- Eisenbrauns, 2003) 204 pp., $44.50 This attractive new volume joins dozens of late-19th and early-20th century photographs of Jerusalem with a commentary drawn from contemporary travelogues and letters, many of them cited at length. The effect is to convey in considerable detail the sights and […]
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 model, crafted […]
Jerusalem- Rebirth of a City Martin Gilbert (Jerusalem- Domino Press, 1985) 238 pp., $25.00 Nineteenth-century Jerusalem was, in many ways, both a reflection of the past and a prophecy of the future. Beneath its narrow streets and among its ancient quarters lay the remains of the city’s 5,000-year-long history. In the hearts and minds of […]
A little-known episode in the beginnings of archaeology in the Holy Land Lady Hester Lucy Stanhope, granddaughter of William Pitt and daughter of the third Earl of Stanhope, was the first person who ever intentionally excavated an ancient artifact in the Holy Land. In this sense, she might be considered the first Biblical archaeologist. But […]
The Holy Land David Roberts, R.A. (Terra Sancta Arts Ltd.- Jerusalem, 1982) 360 pp., $120.00 plus $9.50 p/h. The sole U.S. distributor is The Jerusalem Post, 120 East 56th Street, New York, N.Y. 10020. Yesterday the Holy Land David Roberts (Zondervan- Grand Rapids, 1982) 144 pp., $16.95 The delicately colored lithographs of David Roberts are […]
Issued by Roman Emperor Joseph II We, Joseph the Second, by the Grace of God, elected Roman Emperor, at all times the Enlarger of the Empire, King in Germany, Hungary, Bohemia, etc., Archduke in Austria, Duke in Burgandy and Lorraine, send Our Grace to all and graciously make known the following- From the ascension to […]
An ornamental inscription found on the side of the stone bridge leading to David’s Citadel. The inscription bears the name of Suleiman the Magnificent and reads- “Glory to our master Suleiman el-Malik el-Muzaffar Abu en-Nasir Suleiman Shah Ibn Uthman.” The inscription is decorated in the style similar to that of the Mamluk inscriptions of this […]
The coin collection of the Israel Antiquities Authority possesses fifty-three silver lion dollars (‘leeuwendaalders’) of the Low Countries dating to the 16 and 17th century. These coins belong to two hoards, which were deposited at the Rockefeller Museum in the late 1920’s but never properly identified and studied. A search in the files of the […]
The Ottoman star was very much in the ascendant by the time Selim I reached the throne. (“Ottoman” is a corruption of “Osmanli,” the name of the Turkish dynasty founded by the sultan Osman I at the end of the thirteenth century.) Constantinople had fallen to the Ottomans in 1453, and they had overrun what […]
Church of Scotland Hospice Scottish doctor David Watt Torrance arrived in Tiberius in 1884, as the head of the Church of Scotland mission. Upon seeing the appalling sanitary and medical conditions in the city, he opened a hospice in 1894, serving the community of Tiberias. His son Dr Herbert Torrance ran the hospital until his […]