DailyHebrew.com

The ASOR blog has reported the news that after a brief illness Professor Rainey passed away today, February 19, 2011, at the age of 81.

ז״ל May his memory be for a blessing.

This BAR article is a nice summary of her 2006 Egypt and the Levant article: "Canaanites Reading Hieroglyphs: Horus is Hathor? – The Invention of the Alphabet in Sinai."

Some of you may be interested in a short article in the most recent Bulletin of American Schools of Oriental Research  entitled, "Two New Inscriptions from Zincirli and Its Environs" (Table of Contents).  Others (who are not related to me) will find the other articles by the Zincirli excavation team more to your liking, including Pardee's editio princeps. 

Be sure to check out BASOR 356, it is a great edition put together by Jim Weinstein dedicated to the recent finds of the Oriental Institute expedition, most notably the "Kuttamuwa" (KTMW) inscription.

(The back story may be found here, here, and here.)

"not accepting graduate applications for Biblical Studies and Rabbinics/Classical Judaism for Fall 2010."

http://www.sas.upenn.edu/nelc/Content/appinfotempl.htm

Exciting News from Tim Harrison's dig at Tell Tayinat. The University of Toronto news is reporting:

Excavations led by a University of Toronto archaeologist at the site of a recently discovered temple in southeastern Turkey have uncovered a cache of cuneiform tablets dating back to the Iron Age period between 1200 and 600 BCE. Found in the temple's cella, or 'holy of holies', the tablets are part of a possible archive that may provide insights into Assyrian imperial aspirations.

Photo: J. Jackson

Several articles on the temple were posted earlier in the summer before the season began.