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The Ivory Comb

On Display from January 27 - May 2, 2025

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Visit the Archaeology Museum

Current Exhibition: Peace and War: The Assyrian Conquest of Lachish

Entrance of the Peace and War: The Assyrian Conquest of Lachish exhibit
Diorama of an elite's house
A carnelian seal on display at our exhibit,This carnelian seal is a part of the Yale Babylonian Collection and is temporarily on display for exhibit.
A replica of the Annals of Sennacherib and a fragment of the Annals of Sennacherib from a clay cylinder on loan from Yale University
The model shows the city of Lachish under Assyrian attack.
A volunteer dry sieving dirt at Lachish dig sight
Students and volunteers excavating at Lachish
Aerial photo of Lachish
Student excavating with a pickaxe
Entrance of the Peace and War: The Assyrian Conquest of Lachish exhibit
Diorama of an elite's house
A carnelian seal on display at our exhibit,This carnelian seal is a part of the Yale Babylonian Collection and is temporarily on display for exhibit.
A replica of the Annals of Sennacherib and a fragment of the Annals of Sennacherib from a clay cylinder on loan from Yale University
The model shows the city of Lachish under Assyrian attack.
A volunteer dry sieving dirt at Lachish dig sight
Students and volunteers excavating at Lachish
Aerial photo of Lachish
Student excavating with a pickaxe

The Ivory Comb

The ivory comb, dating back to 1700 BC, was discovered by archaeologists from Southern Adventist University and Hebrew University of Jerusalem. It will be displayed at Southern Adventist University's Lynn H. Wood Archaeological Museum from January 27 to May 2, 2025. This rare object features the oldest known complete alphabetic sentence: "May this tusk root out the lice of the hair and the beard."

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Peace and War: The Assyrian Conquest of Lachish

Peace and War: The Assyrian Conquest of Lachish features over 80 artifacts and objects from the Fourth Expedition to Lachish, a series of excavations from 2013 to 2017 in the royal city that was second only to Jerusalem in ancient Judah. This exhibit shows the story of a critical tipping point in history that determined the survival of ancient Israel, its kings, and the covenant promise of the Messiah.

Elite House

The elite houses built north of the outer wall of the Palace-Fort courtyard of Lachish were terraced on the slope of the Acropolis with a view to the northeast. The objects and materials found in these houses illustrate various stages of life during the eighth century B.C. Domestic Bowls are the most common domestic objects found in elite houses. They came in various styles and served as containers to hold commodities, including food. Baking trays were typical of every Judean household; baking trays were used to make bread and were often placed over ovens called tabun in Arabic.

Ushna, the servant of Ahaz, Carnelian seal

The use of the scarab (beetle) shape, as well as the motifs of the uraeus (the sacred asp of the headdress of the Pharaohs) and the Osiris crowns suggest that the iconography is borrowed from Egyptian prototypes. The inscription is written in the ancient Hebrew script and not the square Assyrian characters, which were introduced in the Second Temple period and are in use till the present. Though we do not know who Ushna was, the Ahaz of this seal was the eighth-century king of Judah mentioned in II Kings 16.

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Sennacherib Annals

The replica of the Annals of Sennacherib describes how he left Jerusalem "As for Hezekiah of the land of Judah, I surrounded and conquered forty-six of his fortified walled cities and smaller settlements in their environs, which were without number, by having siege ramps trodden down and battering rams brought up, the assault of foot soldiers, sapping, breaching, and siege engines. . . . I confined him inside the city Jerusalem, his royal city, like a bird in a cage.” The clay fragment of Sennacherib’s annals recounts his early defeat of the Babylonian king Merodach-balagan, king of Babylon. On loan courtesy of the Yale Babylonian Collection

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Replica Model of Lachish

The model was built from the vantage point of the Assyrian artist who craved the famous Lachish Reliefs for King Sennacherib. As seen here, the building of the siege ramp required up to one million stones that were most likely quarried just southeast of the base of the ramp; the progress could be observed from the opposite hill by King Sennacherib as he directed the details of the attack against the city.

Dry Sieving

An archaeological method called dry sieving is used to sift sediment with sieve meshes to find small artifacts that could be easily overlooked while digging. When using these sieves, the particles find their way through the gaps in the wire mesh by shaking or vibrating the sieve. The individual particles have the ability to split apart. To later be examined by the archaeologist.

Group Excavation

An archaeological site is examined scientifically and methodically during an excavation. In order to produce the history of the site, excavations are carried out to determine historical settings and place them in order.

Lachish

Located in the Shaphelah slopes of the Judean Mountains, Tel Lachish is roughly 25 miles (41 km) southwest of Jerusalem and 18 miles (30 km) from the Mediterranean Sea.Lachish was ideally situated on the Via Maris route and is considered the second most significant city in the Southern Kingdom of Judah, behind Jerusalem. It was a double-walled, heavily fortified military city that guarded Israel's southern area.

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Student Excavating

A pickaxe is one of the most common digging tools used by archaeologists to remove and break up very hard compacted earth. Other tools used by archaeologists include: fork hoe rake wheelbarrow Wheelbarrows are used to carry the debris or soil to the dump yard or for dry sieving.

Lachish Interviews

During the last session of the Lachish excavation in 2017, students were interviewed about their experiences.

Why We Are Here

Museum attendance has dramatically increased over the last few decades. Every year, three out of five Americans will visit a museum. People are looking for ways to experience learning in an unforgettable way. The birth of the Lynn H. Wood Archaeological Museum began with a vision to bring the biblical world to life dynamically through experiencing the ancient Near East. Our goal is to continue the Seventh-day Adventist Church's long tradition of archaeological research in the Middle East. It is vital to study the biblical world firsthand. Through teaching, research, publication, exhibition, conservation, and community education, we hope to make this an unforgettable experience for our students, visitors, and the community.

What We Offer

The Lynn H. Wood Archaeological Museum is honored to be the home of the William G. Dever Near Eastern Collection, which, together with other donations and acquisitions, provides the basis for a stunning visual display of more than two hundred objects from Egypt, Babylonia, Persia, Syria-Palestine, Greece, Cyprus, and Anatolia. Illustrated through hundreds of photographs, drawings, and pieces of original art, the exhibit is designed to introduce artifacts in their ancient life setting. Highlights of the exhibit include an ancient Babylonian brick stamped with Nebuchadnezzar's name, a complete series of lamps from the Chalcolithic to the early Arabic periods, handwritten cuneiform tablets from the ancient Ur, and a series of Syrian toggle pins from the Middle Bronze Age. 

Our Mission

THE WILLIAM G. DEVER NEAR EASTERN COLLECTION

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