Monday, December 23, 2013

The Arshama Project

http://arshama.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/publications/

The Arshama Letters from the Bodleian Library (eds. C. J. Tuplin, J. Ma).
This multi-parted, multi-authored work is a preliminary presentation of some of the findings and activities of the AHRC-funded Research Network which explored the documents relating to the Persian satrap of Egypt, Arshama. This work should be considered as a forerunner of, or taster for, the forthcoming volume Arshama and Egypt: The World of an Achaemenid Prince (OUP). All parts can be freely downloaded for research and instruction purposes, and full citation of the editors and authors should be given.

Vol. 1 Introduction (J. Ma, C. J. Tuplin, L. Allen)
Vol. 2  Texts and English translation with glossary (D. G. K. Taylor)
(This volume can also be downloaded as another version with paired Aramaic texts and English translations followed by the glossary, or indeed as separate parts: textstranslationglossary).
Vol. 3 Commentary (C. J. Tuplin)
Vol. 4 Bibliography and abbreviations

Thursday, December 19, 2013

Institute of Egyptian Art and Archaeology

http://www.memphis.edu/egypt/onlinebiblio.php

This site provides many freely accessible PDFs of books and articles on Egyptology as well as links to websites where access may not be free.

Monday, December 16, 2013

Selected Artifacts from the Shelby White and Leon Levy Center for National Treasures

http://www.antiquities.org.il/t/Default_en.aspx

From the home page:

The National Treasures Department of the Israel Antiquities Authority is responsible for the housing, documentation and control of antiquities in Israel. The National Treasures' collections comprise hundreds of thousands of artifacts that range from prehistoric periods to the end of the Ottoman period. Most of the artifacts are housed and catalogued in the repositories of the Shelby White and Leon Levy Center for National Treasures, and approximately 50,000 artifacts are on loan at archaeological exhibitions in Israel and abroad.

This on-line site offers a selection of published artifacts from the collections of the National Treasures and is available for researchers, curators, students and the general public in Israel and abroad. This site is updated continuously, and new artifacts are added on a regular basis.

The artifacts on the site are arranged both chronologically (according to archaeological periods) and typologically (according to the type of artifact), allowing either a gradual guided entry through the main title pages to the artifact's information card, or directly to the artifact's information card using an advanced search box.

The artifact's information card presents detailed archaeological data about the selected artifact, including provenance, type, dimensions, material, site where discovered, dating and bibliography. In addition, hi-resolution images of on-line artifacts may be purchased on-line from the photographic archives of the Israel Antiquities Authority.

Mitteilungen des Septuaginta-Unternehmens (MSU)

http://adw-goe.de/en/research/research-projects-within-the-academies-programme/septuaginta/publikationen/msu/

Go here for several open access PDF downloadable monographs on the Septuagint.

Wednesday, December 11, 2013

Propylaeum-DOK Digital Repository Classical Studies

http://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/propylaeumdok/view/

This site scholars the opportunity to publish their work on Classics open access, and thus others to access their work freely. At present there are some 2000 free publications

U.S. Epigraphy Project

http://usepigraphy.brown.edu/projects/usep/about/

From the "about" page:

The goal of the U.S. Epigraphy Project (USEP) is to collect and share information about ancient Greek and Latin inscriptions preserved in the United States of America.
The Project currently provides access to a database of some 750 Greek and 1,700 Latin inscriptions in the USA through browsing by collection and publication and by searching various categories of metadata (language, date, origin, type, material) and bibliographic information. A growing digital corpus of the collection registers some 400 EpiDoc editions of Latin texts and provides some 1,000 images of the inscriptions registered by the Project, each of which is identified by a unique USEP number based upon its location.
Further information about any of the materials registered by the Project, which include texts in languages other than Greek and Latin (mainly Etruscan) from within the territory of the Roman empire and nearly 300 paper squeezes of Greek inscriptions from (mostly) Attica and the Greek cities of Asia Minor, may be sought directly from the Project staff at:
U.S. Epigraphy Project | Box 1856 | Brown University | Providence, RI 02906
phone: 401-863-3815 or 1267 | fax: 401-863-7484 | email: john_bodel@brown.edu

Open Richly Anotated Cuneiform Corpus (ORACC)

http://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/

From the homepage:
Oracc is a collaborative effort to develop a complete corpus of cuneiform whose rich annotation and open licensing support the next generation of scholarly research. Created by Steve Tinney, Oracc is steered by Eleanor Robson, Tinney, and Niek Veldhuis.

Tuesday, December 3, 2013

Bible Research: Internet Resources for Students of Scripture

http://www.bible-researcher.com/

This site, run by Michael D. Marlowe, is chocked full of resources--many of which are open access--for the Old and New Testaments. Resources include books as well as articles from other scholars and links to online texts.

Tuesday, November 12, 2013

The Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Royal Inscriptions (Institute of Ancient Studies, Eötvös L. University, Budapest)

http://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/etcsri/

This site is something of a follow-up to the Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature (see May 7, 2013 post). Here's the blurb from the home page:
The Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Royal Inscriptions (ETCSRI) project's main objective is the creation of an annotated, grammatically and morphologically analyzed, transliterated, trilingual (Sumerian-English-Hungarian), parallel corpus of all Sumerian royal inscriptions.

ETCSRI is to be developed at the Department of Assyriology and Hebrew Studies (Institute of Ancient Studies, Eötvös L. University, Budapest) by a research team led by Gábor Zólyomi as part of The Open Richly Annotated Cuneiform Corpus with the continuous assistance and help of Steve Tinney.
Funding for ETCSRI is provided by the Hungarian Scientific Research Fund (OTKA) between 2008.10.01 - 2013.06.30 (project no. K75104).
 For further information, see the site's "Introduction" page.

Friday, November 8, 2013

Expositions: Interdisciplinary Studies in the Humanities

http://expositions.journals.villanova.edu/index

This resource is a bit far from the focus of this blog, but may nevertheless be helpful. Here's the blurb from the home page:

Expositions is an on-line journal where scholars from multiple disciplines gather as colleagues to converse about common texts and questions in the humanities. Acting on the Augustinian principle that nothing human is foreign to the sympathetic heart, we seek articles, interdisciplinary exchanges, and briefer notes and insights that benefit teaching, research, and the life of the academy.
Expositions provides immediate open access to its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public supports a greater global exchange of knowledge.

Thursday, October 31, 2013

Intertextuality in Biblical Studies: A Core Bibliography

http://kolhaadam.wordpress.com/2013/10/28/intertextuality-in-biblical-studies-a-core-bibliography/

The author of this blog lists several works on intertextuality according to two subcategories: literary theory and biblical studies. Here's the author's introductory remarks:

Writing an “intertextual” analysis or using the “method of intertextuality” has become a veritable rite of passage for scholars in biblical studies, as though this were a well established critical practice in our discipline. Unfortunately this is not the case, and those who use the term are entering, often unwittingly, into an academic battleground for which they are ill equipped. Intertextuality is a contested term, and those who use it would do well to understand the nature of the controversy at hand. The literature on this subject is vast, spanning countless works in literary theory and biblical studies. Below, I have compiled a core bibliography that represents essential studies within the two fields.
Those whose interests concern literary allusions would do well to avoid the language of intertextuality altogether and focus on the more relevant theoretical literature.

Wednesday, October 23, 2013

A Bibliography of Semitic Linguistics (1940-2010)

http://www.semiticbibliography.org/

This site offers a focused bibliography for Semitic linguistics. From the home page:

It seems obligatory at the beginning of this bibliography to set out its limits and justify its objectives. The aim of the bibliography is to collect and arrange systematically only those studies directly or mainly related to subjects of Semitic linguistics, namely, those centred on the study of languages and their phonological, morphological, syntactic and semantic constituents, from both the comparative perspective (close and distant relationship) and the immanent perspective (grammar and lexicon). Consequently, all other studies dealing with the history of the societies which use or used those languages and with everything that is built on them (socio-political history, literature, religion and ‘culture’ in general), remain excluded. This limitation may seem impossible or at the very least without justification and minimalist, in some way resorting to ‘formalism’, giving up the basic element, whose development a language has to perform, namely, the shaping of a universe of social representations, which generates a particular way of communication and creativity. One could say that it means abandoning the ‘context’ in which every linguistic formulation has its meaning, being at the same time its outcome.

Thursday, October 17, 2013

Greek Language and Linguistics

http://greek-language.com/

From the home page:

In addition to tools to support learning Ancient Greek, we provide resources to encourage the study of various forms of Linguistics and their application to Ancient Greek. Our objective is to foster the application of research methods from the field of Linguistics to the study of Hellenic and Hellenistic Greek.
Whether you are a Biblical Scholar, a Classicist, or a student of Linguistics, you will find something here of interest to you.

Wednesday, October 16, 2013

Books from ASOR

From AWOL:

Four ASOR books are available in open access:
An additional eleven ASOR books are available by license through JSTOR books

Archaeological Expedition to Khirbat Iskander and its Environs, Jordan 2009

Book
The Ayl to Ras an-Naqab Archaeological Survey, Southern Jordan 2005-2007 2012

Book
Humayma Excavation Project, 1 2010

Book
The Joint Expedition to Caesarea Maritima Excavation Reports 2009

Book
The Joint Expedition to Caesarea Maritima Excavation Reports 2007

Book
On the Third Dynasty of Ur 2008

Book
The Roman Marble Sculptures from the Sanctuary of Pan at Caesarea Philippi/Panias (Israel) 2012

Book
Shechem IV: The Persian-Hellenistic Pottery of Shechem/Tell Balât'ah 2008

Book
Tel Tanninim: Excavations at Krokodeilon Polis, 1996-1999 2006

Book
Texts from the Late Old Babylonian Period 2011

Book
The Textual Criticism of Sumerian Literature  2012

Book

Update: The Friedberg Genizah Project

An update to the post of 19 July 2011 regarding the FGP:


The announcement:

http://tinyurl.com/k9cm2ap
The Friedberg Genizah Project
Announcement 14

Genazim is pleased to announce the launching of a new version  -
version 12 - of the Friedberg Genizah Website.

This version contains thousands of new images, thousands of new scans
of catalog entries, tens of thousands of new records of cataloging
data and of transcriptions, and many additions and improvements to the
software system, among them a new module that can help researchers
find, in the Genizah world, potential joins to a given fragment.
 Which directs you to: http://www.jewishmanuscripts.org/ 

Monday, October 14, 2013

2 books from Lawrence Shiffman

http://lawrenceschiffman.com/?wysija-page=1&controller=email&action=view&email_id=24&wysijap=subscriptions

Lawrence Shiffman has made open access the following two (short) books:


The Jews in Late Antiquity

The Hellenistic period begins formally with Alexander’s arrival in the Near East in 334 B.C.E. However, this date should not be seen as the beginning of Hellenistic influence in this region. The Near East as a whole and the Land of Israel and its Jewish residents more particularly were subject to increasing Aegean influence beginning already in the fourteenth century B.C.E. Due to increased trade connections, this influence became much more extensive during the Persian period when Greek coinage became the standard in the Land of Israel. The cultural phenomenon we call Hellenism was a power which would have a lasting impact on Judaism and the Jewish people.

Challenge and Transformation: Second Temple and Rabbinic Judaism

The years of Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine rule in Judea and of Sassanian rule in Babylonia were years of great challenge to the ongoing continuity of Judaism, and, at the same time, years of great accomplishment which resulted in the successful meeting of these challenges. By the time the period of Late Antiquity drew to a close, Judaism had survived the challenges of Hellenization, sectarianism, violent revolution, and even anti-Semitism. In addition, the development of Israelite religion into the rabbinic tradition took place in these very same years. The many transitions that took place in this period are what effectively made possible the long-term continuity of Judaism as an exilic religion, able to enter the medieval period with a new consensus on how to face the future and explain the past.

Thursday, October 10, 2013

Monday, October 7, 2013

Journal: NGSBA (Nelson Glueck School of Biblical Archaeology)

http://ngsba.org/en/ngsba-archaeology-journal

The journal is a publication of the Hebrew Union College. From the website:

NGSBA Archaeology is our platform for presenting the results of our fieldwork. The contents consist mainly of reports on salvage archaeology projects conducted by Y.G. Archaeology under NGSBA oversight. But from time to time reports of our community archaeology and research projects will also be published. We will also accept field reports of projects executed by other organizations. The journal is peer reviewed, edited by David Ilan, the director of the NGSBA, and is overseen by a board of editors. It will appear more or less annually—depending on the quantity of material available for publication—in print and digital form. The digital version can be downloaded from our website for free.

Volume I (2012)

From the "about" page:

The NGSBA Mission

The Nelson Glueck School of Biblical Archaeology is an academic institution with an active field research program. Our work focuses on the Land of Israel, asking both universal questions about the development of human society and more particular ones concerning the special nature of ancient Canaan and Israel and the world of the Bible. The universal and particular mesh well together; so much of modern history is determined by what occurred in antiquity. The ethnic and religious schisms of our region, and the attending political conflicts, have their roots in antiquity. Read More >
 

History of the School

The Nelson Glueck School of Biblical Archaeology was established in 1963 by Nelson Glueck, an ordained rabbi and respected field archaeologist and president of Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion at the time. The campus was initially called Hebrew Union College Biblical and Archaeological School, founded to provide a base for American scholars and researchers engaged in Near Eastern studies. Until the 1948 war the research center for such scholarship had been the American School of Oriental Research (now the Albright Institute) in east Jerusalem. When, following the war, it became difficult for scholars to move between east and west Jerusalem and between Israel and Arab countries, Glueck decided to create an alternative center in Israeli west Jerusalem. 
In the beginning an American scholar was appointed director annually, but in 1968 William G. Dever became its first permanent director; he was followed by Joe E. Seger in 1971.
At a time when Reform Judaism was not exactly welcomed by the orthodox establishment of Israel, archaeology was seen as a foundation for the realization of reform Judaism’s spiritual connection with the Land of Israel. Archaeological research was considered almost sacrosanct by Israel’s secular establishment, and it didn’t hurt that Glueck was well connected.
Read More >
 

What is Biblical Archaeology

Biblical archaeology, “is a branch of biblical studies, an interdisciplinary pursuit that seeks to utilize the pertinent results of archaeological research to elucidate the historical and cultural setting of the Bible” (W.G. Dever “Biblical Archaeology”, in the Oxford Encyclopedia of Archaeology in the Ancient Near East, vol 1, p. 318). Biblical archaeology must carry out scientific archaeology according to international standards of best practice, but its research questions will be derived from the study of the biblical text. At the same time, professional scholarship and a nuanced academic approach to the biblical text must inform biblical archaeological research.
Read More >
 

Why does Progressive (Reform) Judaism sponsor archaeological research?

The connection between archaeology and progressive Judaism was initiated by reformed Rabbi and archaeologist Nelson Glueck (1900-1971). Most of Glueck’s work was carried out in the desert of the Levant--the Negev, Sinai and Transjordan. Glueck's aim was to illustrate and document the formative experience of Israelite-Jewish peoplehood. In his view, the bible preserved the historical memory of the Jewish people. At the same time he acknowledged that the bible was primarily a theological document and as such there was no point in trying to “prove the Bible” (Biblical Archaeologist 22/4 [1959]: p. 106).
Read More >
 

NGSBA staff

Name Position Telephone Resume
David Ilan Director 972-2-6203258
Rachel Ben-Dov Research archaeologist 972-2-6203252
Yifat Thareani Research archaeologist 972-2-6203220
Levana Zias Administrator/Research archaeologist 972-2-6203257
Noga Ze'evi Object illustration and presentation 972-2-6203223










 

Our founder: Nelson Glueck (1900-1971)

Nelson GlueckBorn in Cincinnatti, Ohio in 1900, Nelson Glueck was one of the foremost leaders in the field of biblical archaeology and Reform Judaism. He read the benediction at the swearing-in ceremony of President John F. Kennedy.

At the age of 23, Glueck was ordained as a Reform rabbi by the Hebrew Union College and four years later was awarded his Ph.d at Jena, Germany, for his dissertation on the biblical concept of hesed (the Hebrew term for goodness or divine kindness). Until World War II he worked with William Foxwell Albright at the American School of Oriental Research in Jerusalem (ASOR, now the Albright Institute) and at Albright’s excavation of Tell Beit Mirsim. Later, Glueck himself served as director of ASOR, as well as having a faculty position at HUC in Jerusalem.
Read More >
 

Past director: Avraham Biran (1909-2008)

Biran with
Avraham Biran (Bergman) was born in 1909 in Petah Tikvah, grew up in Rosh Pina and was educated at the Reali School in Haifa, where he also taught for a short while. In 1930 he moved to the United States where he received his MA at the University of Pennsylvania and his Ph.D. at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. Between 1935 and 1937 he was a research fellow at the American School of Oriental Research in Jerusalem (now called the Albright Institute). During this time he participated in the excavations of Tell Jerisheh and Ras el-Kharrubeh in Palestine, at Irbid and Tell el- Khleifeh in Transjordan and at Tepe Gawra and Khafajeh in Iraq. Read More >
 

Directors Reports

Every year the NGSBA director submits a report to the president of approximately 4-5 pages in which he or she summarizes the activities of the previous year and makes projections for the coming year. These reports are a good indicator of the school’s strengths, successes and shortcomings. The most recent of these are available below as PDF files.
Read More >

Wednesday, October 2, 2013

Open access language textbooks

Recently posted on AWOL are a number of language textbooks that are open access. To access them, click any of the links to the following, then the "live" URL that appears.

Open Access Textbooks and Language Primers relating to the ancient world
Additional resources of thus type are accessible through the  Less Commonly Taught Languages (LCTLs) Project pages at the University of Minnesota.
And see also Lexicity
And see also  Smarthistory, a "multi-media web-book designed as a dynamic enhancement (or even substitute) for the traditional art history textbook"

Textkit has a huge library of Greek and Latin textbooks

Learn Ancient Greek

Listed below is Textkit’s entire collection of Ancient Greek textbooks. All books are made available for full and free download in PDF format.

Greek Answer Keys

First Greek Book Key, John Williams White
First Greek Writer Key, Arthur Sidgwick
Greek Prose Composition Key, North and Hillard
Greek Prose Composition Key, Arthur Sidgwick

Greek Composition Textbooks

First Greek Writer, Arthur Sidgwick
Greek Prose Composition, North and Hillard
Selections from the Septuagint, Conybeare and Stock

Greek Lexicon/Dictionary

Greek Reading Text

Easy Selections From Plato, Arthur Sidgwick

Greek Reference Grammars

Greek Grammar, William W. Goodwin
Greek Grammar, Herbert Weir Smyth

Greek Textbooks

A First Greek Course, Sir William Smith
First Greek Book, John Williams White
First Greek Grammar Accidence, W. Gunion Rutherford
First Greek Grammar Syntax, W. Gunion Rutherford
NT Greek in a Nutshell, James Strong

Learn Latin

Listed below is Textkit’s entire collection of Latin textbooks. All books are made available for full and free download in PDF format.

Latin Answer Keys

Latin for Beginner’s Key, Benjamin L. D’Ooge
Latin Prose Composition Key, North and Hillard

Latin Composition Textbooks

A New Latin Prose Composition, Charles E. Bennett
Latin Prose Composition, North and Hillard

Latin Reading Text

Caesar’s Civil War in Latin, Charles E. Moberly
Cicero Select Orations, Benjamin L. D’Ooge
Selections From Ovid, Allen & Greenough
The Phormio of Terence in Latin, Fairclough and Richardson

Latin Reference Grammars

A Latin Grammar, Charles E. Bennett
New Latin Grammar, Allen & Greenough

Latin Textbooks

Beginner’s Latin Book, Collar and Daniell
Latin For Beginners, Benjamin L. D’Ooge

Thursday, September 26, 2013

The Semitic Roots Repository

http://www.semiticroots.net/

From the website:

This repository is dedicated to documenting and modelling every single aspect of the Semitic languages. The main database holds a record of all known roots that have been entered so far, and gives many means by which to search and compare them.
The script used for the roots is the Ancient South Arabian script known as the "Musnad". This script was chosen because it is the only known Semitic abjad that contains graphemes for all of the known Semitic phonemes. As this abjad has only recently been included in the Unicode specification, it's not included on most Operating Systems. Therefore you'll need to download the Musnad font from our downloads section. The script is fairly easy to learn (only took me about a day or two) and it is a much better choice than using Latin characters, with various modified characters to represent those letters not known in Latin-based alphabets. The use of the Musnad for the roots does not mean the roots are necessarily existent in the Ancient South Arabian languages, the script is being used as a general way to represent common Semitic roots. However when the script appears in a word, then it is being used to represent an Ancient South Arabian word.
The site has links for words, roots, and languages.

The SAA Archaeological Record

http://www.saa.org/AbouttheSociety/Publications/TheSAAArchaeologicalRecord/tabid/64/Default.aspx

From the website:

Launched in January 2001, The SAA Archaeological Record is issued five times a year. It is a four-color magazine encompassing SAA business, commentary, news, regular columns, software reviews, job listings, opinions, and articles. The SAA Archaeological Record replaced The SAA Bulletin (view back issues).

the Hebrew Union Bible Project

http://www.hum.huji.ac.il/english/units.php?cat=5015&incat=4982

Besides the following the site has links to the journal Textus, the Syro-Palestinian version of the Hebrew Bible, and the monograph series, Kitāb al-Khilaf.

From the website:


The Hebrew University Bible Project (HUBP)
The Hebrew University Bible Project – the flagship of research projects of the Mandel Institute of Jewish Studies at the Hebrew University – was established in 1956 to undertake a comprehensive survey of the history of the textual development of the Hebrew Bible and to produce a major critical edition. The project was initiated by the late Prof. Moshe H. Goshen-Gottstein (Professor of Semitic Linguistics and Biblical Philology), who together with the late Prof. Chaim Rabin (Professor of Hebrew Language) and  the late Prof. Shemaryahu Talmon (Professor of Biblical Studies) constituted the original board of editors.
 The staff of the Bible Project is comprised of recognized experts in the fields of textual criticism, Hebrew language, Masoretic studies and Biblical philology.

The study of the Hebrew Bible is the cornerstone of Jewish Studies, including historical, linguistic, cultural and spiritual aspects. As such, the text of this all-important body of ancient literature demands the most meticulous treatment in regard to its authenticity and history of transmission.

Many classical works of literature have been published in outstanding editions, crowning a painstaking process of collating manuscripts and examining their history, correcting corruptions or interpolations, so as to present the reader with the most authoritative and accurate version of the text possible. Yet to this day, there is no comprehensive critical edition of the Hebrew Bible providing the entire range of textual evidence collated from all extant sources.

The Aleppo Codex
The Aleppo Codex, saved from the flames when hostilities broke out against the synagogue of Aleppo in Syria, which was attacked after the declaration of the State of Israel in 1948, is the oldest and most authoritative complete manuscript of the Masoretic text of the Hebrew Bible, sanctioned by the great Jewish scholar Maimonides. Brought to Israel from Syria to the late President Izhak Ben-Zvi, it serves as the basis for the text of the Bible Project edition.

The Entire Picture
The Hebrew Bible text has been handed down in manuscript form with the greatest of care by many generations of copyists. However, the further back one traces its transmission in history, the more variants are found in the witnesses to the text. This 'pluriformity' is exhibited most dramatically in the fragments of biblical scrolls dating from the late centuries BCE and the early Common Era, found in the Judean Desert (Qumran, Masada, etc.). The Bible Project edition includes all the evidence bearing on the text, listing every difference in the ancient translations: the Greek Septuagint, the Latin Vulgate, the Aramaic Targums and the Syriac Peshitta. It also lists the variant readings attested in the Dead Sea scrolls, quotations of biblical verses in Rabbinic literature, and in medieval Hebrew manuscripts and commentaries.

The text of the Aleppo Codex, together with its masora, the meticulous recording of variant readings from all important witnesses, and accompanying philological notes clarifying readings listed in the apparatuses, make up the most comprehensive critical edition of the Hebrew Bible, reflecting the fruit of years of research.

A Training Ground for Scholars
 The research involved in collating the variant readings for each apparatus is carried out by four separate teams, each headed by an expert in the field. The Bible Project also functions as a training ground for promising young scholars engaged as research assistants for the various apparatuses, under the supervision of senior scholars, who gain invaluable practical experience in the field of biblical research and textual criticism. Many of these go on to become senior teachers and occupy senior academic positions at institutions of higher education both in Israel and abroad.

Saturday, September 21, 2013

The Bible and Interpretation

http://www.bibleinterp.com/

From the home page:

Dedicated to delivering the latest news, features, editorials, commentary, archaeological interpretation and excavations relevant to the study of the Bible for the public and biblical scholars.

Targum Institute

http://targum.nl/

The Targums are Aramaic translations of the Hebrew Bible that commenced at about the beginning of the synagogues (de Lange, Intro to Judaism, 2000). The Hebrew text would be read and an oral translation offered on the spot. In time the oral translations were written. Such translations were necessary because Hebrew had been eclipsed by Aramaic as the lingua franca of Jews. "Translations" is a bit of an understatement, because the Targums actually provided information where the Hebrew text was unclear as well as slight expansions. The Targums are thus fascinating examples of interpretation.

This website offers a number of resources for the study of Targums, including a critical introduction to Targum Samuel and a manuscript database.

Wednesday, September 11, 2013

Scripture Tools for Every Person (STEP)

http://www.stepbible.org/#!__/0/passage/0/ESV/Mat%201/NHV/__/1/passage/0/ESV/Mat%201/NHV

This is a wonderful resource for Biblical Studies that is developing further (with yours truly playing a small role).

Here's an overview from the main website (with an overview video):

http://www.tyndale.cam.ac.uk/index.php?page=STEP

STEP Bible is a Tyndale House project to build high quality free reliable Bible tools, with the aim of enabling anyone who wants to study the Bible seriously to do so. This has grown out of the free Tyndale Toolbar which is being used by thousands of people all over the world.

In many parts of the world the growth of the Church is outpacing the training of leaders and teachers, and Bible schools are struggling with limited resources. Many believers do not have a computer with reliable internet access but more and more people have access to mobile phones, and many to computers with SOME internet. We have created the STEP software from the ground up with these limitations in mind.

A Digital Bridge to the Ancient World

http://www.eagle-network.eu/

From the website:
EAGLE, The Europeana network of Ancient Greek and Latin Epigraphy is a best-practice network co-funded by the European Commission, under its Information and Communication Technologies Policy Support Programme. EAGLE will provide a single user-friendly portal to the inscriptions of the Ancient World, a massive resource for both the curious and for the scholarly.

The EAGLE Best Practice Network is part of Europeana, a multi-lingual online collection of millions of digitised items from European museums, libraries, archives and multi-media collections. EAGLE will collect, in a single readily-searchable database, more than 1.5 million items, currently scattered across 25 EU countries, as well as the east and south Mediterranean. The project will make available the vast majority of the surviving inscriptions of the Greco-Roman world, complete with the essential information about them and, for all the most important, a translation into English.

The technology that will support the EAGLE project is state-of-the-art and tailored to provide the user with the best and most intuitive possible experience. Our services will include a mobile application, enabling tourists to understand inscriptions they find on location by scanning with a smartphone, and a story-telling application that will allow teachers and experts to assemble epigraphy-based narratives. A multilingual Wiki will be set up for the enrichment and enhancement of epigraphic images and texts, which will provide a basis for future translations of inscriptions into other European languages. The results of the EAGLE project will be disseminated as widely as possible, both within the scholarly community and within the public at large. To this end, EAGLE will publish its own Wikimedia Commons, and will also develop an inscription-themed documentary with a related teaser video.
 
EAGLE will work within the Europeana, and with its sister projects, to ensure full and effective integration within this flagship project to make European culture globally available.

State Archives of Assyria Online (SAAo)

http://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao

From the home page:
State Archives of Assyria Online (SAAo) is an open-access web resource that aims to make the rich Neo-Assyrian materials found in the royal archives of Nineveh, and elsewhere, more widely accessible.
Based on an existing ASCII text database created by Simo Parpola and his team at the University of Helsinki, the online transliterations and translations are those of the standard editions in the series "State Archives of Assyria". All of the published volumes are accessible online, in addition to volume 2 of the companion series "State Archives of Assyria Studies", the edition of the Eponym Lists and Chronicles. The web presentation and linguistic annotation are carried out using tools and standards developed by Steve Tinney (University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia).
Assyrian tablet SAA 5 241, obverse
The state correspondence of king Sargon II (published in volumes 1, 5, 15 and 17) was the first chunk of the SAAo materials to have been "lemmatised", providing glossaries and interactive translation facilities which allow the user to check and question the translations in detail and make the corpus fully searchable, in order to facilitate and encourage an active understanding of the primary sources. This is the work of a team headed by Karen Radner (University College London) and funded by the British Arts and Humanities Research Council. The research project "Mechanisms of Communication in an Ancient Empire: The Correspondence between the King of Assyria and his Magnates in the 8th Century BC" (AH/F016581/1; 2008-2013) also included the preparation of a new edition of the Nimrud Letters, parts of the state correspondence of Tiglath-pileser III and Sargon, by Mikko Luukko (volume 19), which was published simultaneously in print and online in March 2013.

Other parts of the SAAo materials are being made available in the same manner. During his time at UCL, Mikko Luukko lemmatised the prophecies (volume 9) and part of the royal correspondence of the 7th century BC (volumes 13 and 16). Melanie Groß, as part of the research project "Royal Institutional Households in First Millennium BC Mesopotamia" (Fonds zur Förderung der wissenschaftlichen Forschung, S 10802-G18; 2009-2011) headed by Heather D. Baker (University of Vienna), lemmatised the private legal documents (volumes 6 and 14). - As of March 2013, volumes 1, 5-6, 9, 13-17 and 19 have been lemmatised.
Assyrian tablet SAA 8 287, obverse
Online portals provide context and explanatory materials for SAAo. Hence, the website "Knowledge and Power in the Neo-Assyrian Empire", created by Radner, Eleanor Robson (University of Cambridge) and Tinney with funding from the British Higher Education Academy, is dedicated to the 7th century letters, queries and reports exchanged between kings Esarhaddon and Assurbanipal and their scholarly advisors; the companion corpus is http://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/knpp/corpus/. Another such portal, "Assyrian Empire Builders" is devoted to the 8th century political correspondence as part of the UCL research project, with a companion corpus at Assyrian Empire Builders. Further portals are planned.

The Royal Inscriptions of the Neo-Assyrian Period

http://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/rinap/

From the home page:
Numerous royally commissioned texts were composed between 744 BC and 669 BC, a period during which Assyria became the dominant power in southwestern Asia. Six hundred to six hundred and fifty such inscriptions are known today. The Royal Inscriptions of the Neo-Assyrian Period (RINAP) Project, under the direction of Professor Grant Frame of the University of Pennsylvania, will publish in print and online all of the known royal inscriptions that were composed during the reigns of the Assyrian kings Tiglath-pileser III (744-727 BC), Shalmaneser V (726-722 BC), Sargon II (721-705 BC), Sennacherib (704-681 BC), and Esarhaddon (680-669 BC), rulers whose deeds were also recorded in the Bible and in some classical sources. The individual texts range from short one-line labels to lengthy, detailed inscriptions with over 500 lines (2500 words) of text.

These Neo-Assyrian royal inscriptions (744-669 BC) represent only a small, but important part of the vast Neo-Assyrian text corpus. They are written in the Standard Babylonian dialect of Akkadian and provide valuable insight into royal exploits, both on the battlefield and at home, royal ideology, and Assyrian religion. Most of our understanding of the political history of Assyria, and to some extent of Babylonia, comes from these sources. Because this large corpus of texts has not previously been published in one place, the RINAP Project will provide up-to-date editions (with English translations) of Assyrian royal inscriptions from the reign of Tiglath-pileser III (744-727 BC) to the reign of Esarhaddon (680-669 BC) in five print volumes and online, in a fully lemmatized and indexed format. The aim of the project is to make this vast text corpus easily accessible to scholars, students, and the general public. RINAP Online will allow those interested in Assyrian culture, history, language, religion, and texts to efficiently search Akkadian and Sumerian words appearing in the inscriptions and English words used in the translations. Project data will be fully integrated into the Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (CDLI) and the Open Richly Annotated Cuneiform Corpus (Oracc).

The National Endowment for the Humanities awarded the RINAP Project research grants in 2008, 2010, and 2012 to help carry out its work. The publications of the RINAP Project are modeled on those of the now-defunct Royal Inscriptions of Mesopotamia (RIM) Project and carry on where its Assyrian Periods sub-series (RIMA) ended.

Tuesday, September 3, 2013

The Babylonian and Oriental Record

http://archive.org/search.php?query=The%20Babylonian%20and%20oriental%20record%20AND%20mediatype%3Atexts

This open access journal is venerable in that it ran from about 1886-1901. Obviously a lot has gone on since, so this may be of interest to historians of archaeology.

TextKit -- grammars of ancient Greek and Latin

http://www.textkit.com/

From the home page:

Learn Greek and Latin!

Textkit was created to help you learn Ancient Greek and Latin!
Textkit began in late 2001 as a project to develop free of charge downloads of Greek and Latin grammars, readers and answer keys. We offer a large library of over 180 of the very best Greek and Latin textkbooks on our Ancient Greek and Latin Learning pages. Since that time we have distributed millions of PDF textbook free of charge world-wide.
Our grammars, readers and keys are public domain textkbooks which Textkit has converted. Many of the very best public domain Greek and Latin grammars, such as D’Oogle’s Latin For Beginners, Smyth’s Greek Grammar and John Wiliams White’s First Greek Book were first posted to the Interent here at Textkit.

Greek and Latin Forums – Join Us!

Our Greek and Latin Forums is the center of our community and it is where you should begin your learning engagement with us.
You can get started by visiting our Learn Ancient Greek and Learn Latin areas to find more downloadable grammars, readers, lexicons and dictionaries.

Textkit’s Top 10 Ancient Greek Textkbooks, Readers and Answer Keys Downloads

Greek Grammar, William W. Goodwin
First Greek Book, John Williams White
Greek Prose Composition, North and Hillard
Greek Grammar, Herbert Weir Smyth
A First Greek Course, Sir William Smith
First Greek Grammar Syntax, W. Gunion Rutherford
First Greek Grammar Accidence, W. Gunion Rutherford

Textkit’s Top 10 Latin Grammar Book, Readers and Keys

Latin For Beginners, Benjamin L. D’Ooge
Beginner’s Latin Book, Collar and Daniell
A Latin Grammar, Charles E. Bennett
New Latin Grammar, Allen & Greenough
A New Latin Prose Composition, Charles E. Bennett
Latin for Beginner’s Key, Benjamin L. D’Ooge
Caesar’s Civil War in Latin, Charles E. Moberly
Cicero Select Orations, Benjamin L. D’Ooge
Latin Prose Composition Based on Cicero
, Henry Carr Pearson

Tuesday, August 27, 2013

Loeb Classical Library

http://ryanfb.github.io/loebolus/

It seems that all of the (first edition only?) LCL volumes are now downloadable, either by one enormous, all-inclusive download or by individual works.

Monday, August 19, 2013

Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenlaendischen Gesellschaft (ZMDG)

http://www.youtube.com/user/ASORTV?feature=c4-feed-u

The good news is that open access to this venerable journal runs almost uninterrupted from 1847-2003. The site also contains annual reports and supplements.

ASOR channel on YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/user/ASORTV?feature=c4-feed-u

Seems like this should have happened a good while ago, nevertheless it's here: a YouTube channel by ASOR. Today's top video is on my favorite archaeological site: Hazor.

Thursday, August 15, 2013

Ebla Digital Archives

http://virgo.unive.it/eblaonline/cgi-bin/home.cgi

From the home page:

The aim of the Ebla Digital Archives [ EbDA ] database is to provide a digital edition of the entire corpus of cuneiform texts belonging to the Ebla Royal Archives. Texts are reproduced in the same sequence as in the individual volumes of the series Archivi Reali di Ebla – Testi published by the “Italian Archaeological Mission to Siria” of the Sapienza University of Rome. Compared with the hard copy publication, the digital edition provides harmonized transliterations, corrections and numerous collations made over the years by the team of epigraphers who cooperate with the Mission.
The project is presented as a work in progress. The ARET volumes currently included in the database will be gradually followed by other volumes published in the past years. Additional texts or portions of texts that have appeared in other series, in monographs or in journals will be also included in the database. Any suggestion by interested users will be highly appreciated.

J. Paul Getty Trust Open Content Program

http://www.getty.edu/about/opencontent.html

Obtaining permission to use copyrighted images can be inconvenient, so the Getty Trust's willingness to make available its images to the world wide audience for "fair use" without permission is welcome news.

From the home page:

The Getty makes available, without charge, all available digital images to which the Getty holds the rights or that are in the public domain to be used for any purpose. No permission is required.

Please see the related press release and Getty president and CEO Jim Cuno's announcement on The Getty Iris for additional information.
Why Open Content?

The Getty adopted the Open Content Program because we recognized the need to share images of works of art in an unrestricted manner, freely, so that all those who create or appreciate art—scholars, artists, art lovers, and entrepreneurs—will have greater access to high-quality digital images for their studies and projects. Art inspires us, and imagination and creativity lead to artistic expressions that expand knowledge and understanding. The Getty sincerely hopes that people will use the open content images for a wide range of activities and that they will share the fruits of their labors with others.
Access to Open Content Images

Initially, the images available through the Open Content Program are of works in the J. Paul Getty Museum's collections. Over time, images from the Getty Research Institute and the Getty Conservation Institute will be added. Museum images can be found on the Museum's Collection webpages or on the Getty Search Gateway. Those available as open content images are identified with a "Download" link. Images provided are JPEG files at a minimum of 300 DPI. See the Guidelines for Successful Printing (PDF) for more information on file format.

If you need new photography, resizing, or color correction, you can request those services by Contacting Museum Rights & Reproductions. A fee (PDF) will be charged for this service.
Public Domain and Rights

Open content images are digital surrogates of works of art that are in the Getty's collections and in the public domain, for which we hold all rights, or for which we are not aware of any rights restrictions. Rights restrictions are based on copyright, trademark, privacy and publicity laws, and contractual obligations. If an image you want is not designated as an open content image, it is because one or more of the above identified legal rights restricts our ability to make that content available under this program. While the Getty reviews the metadata about each picture before making it available as an open content image, there may be some underlying rights that were unknown to us. For that reason, we strongly recommend that users consider the possibility that rights of third parties may be involved, and permission for those rights may need to be obtained by the user for the proposed use.
Fair Use

Open content images can be used for any purpose without first seeking permission from the Getty. Images of many other works in the collections are also on our website in varying formats. The Getty supports fair use of images when the applicable legal criteria are met. For more information on use of digital images of works in the Getty's collections, please refer to the Getty's Terms of Use.
Attribution to the Getty

Please use the following source credit when reproducing an image:
Digital image courtesy of the Getty's Open Content Program.
When using open content images, you should not suggest or imply that the Getty endorses, approves of, or participated in your projects.
Publications Using Open Content Images

While there are no restrictions or conditions on the use of open content images, the Getty would appreciate a gratis copy of any scholarly publications in which the images are reproduced in order to maintain the collection bibliography. Copies may be sent to the attention of:
Open Content Program
Registrar's Office
The J. Paul Getty Museum
1200 Getty Center Drive, Suite 1000
Los Angeles, CA 90049

Frequently Asked Questions

Get answers to frequently asked questions about the Getty's Open Content Program.

Tuesday, August 13, 2013

UC Press E-Books Collection, 1982-2004

http://publishing.cdlib.org/ucpressebooks/

From the home page:

UC Press E-Books Collection, 1982-2004, includes almost 2,000 books from academic presses on a range of topics, including art, science, history, music, religion, and fiction.
Access to the entire collection of electronic books is open to all University of California faculty, staff, and students, while more than 700 of the titles are available to the public. Print versions of many of the electronic books can be purchased directly from the publishers.

Thursday, August 8, 2013

Oqimta: Studies in Talmudic and Rabbinic Literature

http://www.oqimta.org.il/english/HomePage.aspx

From the home page:

Oqimta is a digitized research journal devoted to all spheres and types of talmudic and rabbinical literature – Halakha and Agada 

The articles in this journal undergo academic appraisal and redaction, and are published in the accepted languages for Judaica research. 

Oqimta will be appearing once a year, in digitized form, and is available free of charge to the reading public. Articles that have completed the publication process will be uploaded to the site prior to the finalization of the issue, and can be found on the "In Publication" page.

We are pleased to present the inaugural issue: Oqimta 1 (5773 [2013]) containing thirteen articles. We take this opportunity to invite you to subscribe to our mailing list (see subscribe), and to send us your submissions (see Instructions for Authors).
Editor: Shamma Friedman
Assistant Editor: Alexander J. Tal
Editorial Board: Yeshayahu Gafni, Avraham (Rami) Reiner
Publisher: Ruben A. Knoll
POB 10141 Ramat Gan 5200102 Israel
Copyright © All Rights Reserved