FRIENDS OF ASOR WEBINARS
American Archaeology through the Lens of Albright’s Work at Tell Beit Mirsim, and Beyond
Friends of ASOR (in partnership with the W.F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research) present the next webinar of the 2025-2026 season on November 12, 2025, at 12:00 pm EST, with panelists Igor Kreimerman, Michael Freikman, and Rachel Hallote. This webinar will be free and open to the public. Registration through Zoom (with a valid email address) is required. This webinar will be recorded and all registrants will be sent a recording link in the days following the webinar.
Presentation 1: “Tell Beit Mirsim in Perspective: Revisiting Albright’s excavations in Light of Renewed Work” with Igor Kreimerman
Albright’s excavations at Tell Beit Mirsim marked a turning point in the development of Biblical Archaeology, establishing the site as a key type-site for the discipline. The innovative methods applied in both excavation and publication resonated for decades and provided the foundation for Albright’s wide-ranging synthetic studies. Over time, however, many of his conclusions and theories have been challenged and re-evaluated. The renewed excavations at Tell Beit Mirsim invite a fresh assessment of Albright’s work, comparing his insights with new evidence from the field. This presentation will reconsider the validity of his reports in light of modern scholarship and reflect on the enduring impact of his excavations.
Dr. Igor Kreimerman is a Senior Lecturer in Archaeology and Ancient Near Eastern Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He directs the Selz Foundation Hazor Excavations in Memory of Yigael Yadin and serves as scientific 
advisor to the Renewed Excavations at Tell Beit Mirsim. His research focuses on the social and economic structures of Bronze and Iron Age Levantine societies, as well as on human-induced site formation processes, particularly those related to construction and destruction.
Presentation 2: “Going Where No One has gone Before: A Peek Into the Intricacies of Albright’s Expedition at Tell Beit Mirsim” with Michael Freikman
The excavation of this little-known tell became groundbreaking in the history of biblical archaeology. As one of the earliest American expeditions in the Near East, Albright drew on his wide learning and field experience, effectively turning Tell Beit Mirsim into an open-air laboratory and, in many respects, helping to shape biblical archaeology as we know it today. We will highlight key aspects of his experience at the site—the team’s methodology, day-to-day life in the field, and Albright’s relationships with his team and local population—together forming the enduring legacy of one of the foremost forefathers of modern archaeology.
Dr. Michael Friekman holds a Ph.d in Archaeology at Hebrew Univeristy in Jerusalem. He has studied the megalithic architecture in the Ancient Near East, excavated at Rujm el Hiri, and participated at the excavation and publication of Kh. Qeyiafa, Sha’ar Hagolan, and Tel Tsaf. He presently directs the renewed excavation of Tell Beit Mirsim.
Presentation 3: “Tell Beit Mirsim in Context: The American Archaeological Presence in Ottoman and Mandatory Palestine Before and After Albright” with Rachel Hallote
This talk will put W. F. Albright’s Tell Beit Mirsim excavations into the historical context of archaeological work that had previously been done in Ottoman controlled Palestine. The arrival of Albright at the American Schools of Oriental Studies in Jerusalem immediately after World War I marks the beginnings the a real American presence in archaeology that had not been acknowledged previously. Although the Americans did not dominate the field, the Tell Beit Mirsim excavations came to be known for its concentration on ceramic and stratigraphic methodologies, and continued to influence the discipline in later decades.
Rachel Hallote is Professor of History at Purchase College SUNY. Her research involves British and American archaeologists who excavated in Ottoman-controlled Palestine in the 19th century. She has worked at numerous archaeological sites in Israel, including Tell Miqne and Megiddo. Her publications include Bible, Map, and Spade: The American Exploration Society, Frederick Jones Bliss, and the Forgotten Story of Early American Biblical Archaeology and the co-authored volume, The Photographs of the American Palestine Exploration Society as well as many articles about archaeology and the history of the discipline. She currently co-hosts an archaeology podcast called This Week in the Ancient Near East.
SUPPORT THE WEBINAR PROGRAM!
Friends of ASOR is pleased to announce that the first webinars of the 2025-2026 season will once again be free and open to the public with a goal to raise $10,000 so that the entire webinar season will be free. Will you support this outreach effort with a tax-deductible contribution? All donors/sponsors with gifts of $100 or more will be recognized in subsequent webinars. Help ensure these webinars stay free and available to all by donating today!
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The episode of Alexander’s visit to Jerusalem is familiar mostly through the story of Flavius Josephus. This version of the story dominates not only the public imagination but also scholarly discussion. It is generally assumed that Josephus’ story is derived from the earliest source(s) relating the story; it is consequently also the most often discussed in scholarship, mostly at the expense of any discussion of the other versions of the story. A main conclusion of Dr. Amitay’s recent book, Alexander the Great in Jerusalem: Myth and History (2025, Oxford UP), is that among the four different versions of the Alexander in Jerusalem story – which are quite different from one another – Josephus’ version is not the earliest but rather the latest, and clearly relies on two earlier versions. A second conclusion, which conforms with the consensus of previous scholarship, is that the story, in all its versions, cannot be regarded as history; it is a political myth. Therefore, rather than look in the stories for clues that might reveal some details about the history of Alexander, Dr. Amitay analyzed each of the stories for indicators that would reveal the respective contexts of their creation.
All these contexts taken together bring us to the third major conclusion, a common denominator that dominates the tradition as a whole: new stories of Alexander in Jerusalem (at least the ones that reached us) were born as a result of a major change in the relationship between the people of Judea and their foreign rulers. These major changes include the Seleukid takeover of the southern Levant, the first arrival of Roman arms in Judea, the abolishment of Judean kingship and the institution of provincia Judaea, and the rearrangement of Judea as an independent province after the destruction of the temple. Given the continued status of Judea as a province of some empire or other during the second temple period (Hasmonean period excluded), and the suddenness and totality of the change brought about by Alexander, it is small wonder that his arrival in Jerusalem became the subject of political myths dealing with major shifts in the relationship of Judea with its foreign rulers.
For the last twenty odd years, Ory Amitay has been teaching and conducting research in the University of Haifa. His research is situated at the intersection of two crossroads: one between myth and history, the other between various peoples of the ancient west. The topic of his new book, and of this lecture, is a clear example. Amitay’s main research strategy in analyzing historical (or rather pseudo-historical) myths is locating the obvious false factoids – parts of the story that are in blatant contradiction to known historical facts – and interpreting them not as the products of carelessness or ignorance, but rather as intentional fabrications. As such, they have both a context, where they make sense historically, and an agenda. The underlying assumption is that false factoids are fabricated with a purpose in mind. The goal is to identify both context and agenda.
The Carolyn Midkiff Strange Committee on Growth, Innovation, and Visibility (GIV) serves as a resource for and leader in engaging and broadening the professional community of ASOR, in order to expand access to the history and cultures served by ASOR. For more information about the committee, click 
Since the release of Raiders of the Lost Ark, the Ark of the Covenant has become one of, if not the most famous biblical “artifact,” despite the fact that scholars don’t agree on what might have happened to it or if it even really existed. Described in the Bible as a wooden chest plated with gold, adorned by cherubim, the Ark is said to have carried the tablets of the Ten Commandments and was one of the locations where God manifested His presence amongst the Israelites. The description may be straightforward and simple, but the Ark has proven to be the subject of a diverse variety of interpretations since biblical times, ranging from an imitation of an ancient Egyptian religious object to an advanced radioactive energy source capable of mass destruction. Ethiopian Christians believe the Ark resides in a church in Africa, while some have looked for it in the ancient Irish city of Tara. Early religious interpreters looked for coded messages in the biblical instructions on how to build the Ark, and modern faith communities build their own replica Arks for use in faith healing services and in Old Testament themed wax museums. All of these communities generally agree on what the Ark looked like, but what the Ark is or was, and why it matters is a different story. Join Kevin McGeough, in a lecture and conversation moderated by Jennie Ebeling and William Caraher, as he 
explores the interpretation of the Ark of the Covenant from the past two thousand years. Introducing his new book, Readers of the Lost Ark, Kevin will discuss how the Ark has been understood in different communities, from ancient Jewish and Christian commentators, through Medieval theologians, to modern ancient aliens theorists, misguided explorers, and Indiana Jones fan communities. There will be something for any “friend of ASOR” interest in this wide-ranging talk!
Kevin M. McGeough is Professor of Archaeology in the Department of Geography & Environment at the University of Lethbridge and holds a Board of Governor’s Research Chair in Archaeological Theory and Reception. McGeough is currently co-director of excavations at Busayra in Jordan and Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump UNESCO World Heritage Site in Canada. He is co-editor of the journal Alberta Archaeological Review, and author of The Ancient Near East in the Nineteenth Century, and Representations of Antiquity in Film: From Griffith to Grindhouse. His most recent book, Readers of the Lost Ark: Imagining the Ark of the Covenant from Ancient Times to the Present is available from Oxford University Press.
Jennie Ebeling is a Professor of Archaeology in the Department of Archaeology and Anthropology at the University of Evansville. Ebeling co-directed the Jezreel Expedition in Israel and is a ground stone artifact specialist with a particular interest in women’s contributions to food and drink technologies in ancient southwest Asia. She edits ASOR’s Archaeological Reports Series and is an editor-at-large for Eisenbrauns, an imprint of Penn State University Press. The co-editor of five volumes, she is the author of Women’s Lives in Biblical Times (T&T Clark, Int’l) and is currently completing a monograph on ethnography, household archaeology, and representations of life in biblical Israel.
Bill Caraher teaches in the Department of History and American Indian Studies at the University of North Dakota. He is the editor of the Annual of ASOR and co-edited the Oxford Handbook of Early Christian Archaeology (2019) and recently published The Archaeology of Contemporary America (2025). He is an archaeologist who has worked in Greece, Cyprus, and the United States.
