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Engraved tridacna (clam) shells like this one from Arad seem to have been used as cosmetic containers in the Near East and Mediterranean worlds in the late seventh and early sixth centuries BCE. This…
Ḥay ibn Yaqẓān, composed by the Muslim philosopher Abū Bakr ibn Tufayl al-Qaysi (1110–1185), relates the story of Ḥay ibn Yaqẓān, literally “Alive, son of Awake,” as he grows up alone on a deserted…
The little blue butterfly was born in the red bell of a morning glory. She had been a caterpillar before that and had lived for a while in a cocoon, but she could remember nothing about it.
She peeped…
The top register of this plaque from Hazor depicts a crouching winged sphinx wearing the double crown of Upper and Lower Egypt. The lower register shows two stylized three-tiered palmettes. The…
From Jerusalem, this seal is made of bone. The fish image, a motif known only from Hebrew seals, suggests plenty and fertility (cf. Genesis 48:16) and may also allude to the life-giving nature of…
Images of this type—with a male figure holding two caprids (probably ibexes) by the horns—are dubbed “master of the animals” and are seen throughout the ancient world. They often represent a female…
In this detail from the left side of a pithos (storage jar) from Kuntillet Ajrud, two ibexes are eating the flora of a schematic tree, all set above a striding lion. These common motifs are typically…
My restlessness is of a wolf, and of a bear my rest,
Riot shouts in me, and boredom listens.
I am not what I want, I am not what I think,
I am the magician and I’m the magic-trick.
I am an ancient…
With you, it is not impossible to define
creatures and things with the simplicity
of the fish whose scales streak the sea with blue and gold,
Or of the sea itself that swells with the gracefulness of…
My heart is with your dews, homeland,
At night, above fields of nettles
And to the scent of cypresses and wet thistle
A hidden wing shall I spread out.
Soft sand-cradles are your roads
Spread out…