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Georgia McCafferty, CNN
3 minute read
Updated 10:45 AM EST, Thu November 17, 2016
The earliest known stone copy of the Ten Commandments sold at auction in Beverly Hills in 2016 for $850,000.
The stone was first uncovered in 1913.
"The tablet's significance is testament to the deep roots and enduring power of the Commandments that still form the basis of three of the world's great religions: Judaism, Christianity and Islam," says David Michaels, director of ancient coins for Heritage Auctions, who will be conducting the sale.
Specialists at Mossgreen auctions in Australia discovered this Ming dynasty banknote hidden inside the head of this 14th century Buddhist carving. The wooden sculpture represents the head of a Luohan -- an enlightened person who has reached Nirvana in Buddhist culture.
Its face value was worth roughly $98 at the time of its circulation and the 700-year-old banknote is believed to have been handmade during China's Ming dynasty. Together, the banknote and sculpture are expected to fetch between $30,000 to $45,000 at auction.
After studying the banknote and carving details, art specialists were able to estimate the sculpture's age, which dates back to China's Hongwu period in the 14th century.
Mossgreen specialists believe this is the first time a Ming dynasty banknote has been found inside a wooden Buddhist sculpture. They say it's more common to find relics and semi-precious stones left by monks inside Buddhist sculptures.
Ten ancient Roman and Ottoman coins were recently discovered in castle ruins in Okinawa, Japan. This image shows the front of one of the Roman coins.
"I couldn't believe they'd found coins from the Roman empire in Kasturen castle," archiologist Hiroyuki Miyagi, from Okinawa International University, told CNN. This is the front of one of the Ottoman coins.
Archaeologists recently unearthed a rare 2,000 year old Roman coin during a scientific dig in Jerusalem. The gold coin features the face of Emperor Nero and was likely struck in 56-57 AD.
In August 2016, the world's largest pearl was discovered under a bed in the Philippines, where it had lain forgotten for over ten years.
This 1,109 carat, tennis ball-sized diamond made headlines in November 2015 when it was pulled out of the Karowe Mine, in Botswana, by Canadian company Lucara Diamond Corp.
In May 2016, divers discovered a 1,600-year-old shipwreck while swimming the ancient Roman port of Caesarea. These rare bronze artifacts were recovered from the ship.
Over 1,300 pounds (590 kg) of bronze Roman coins dating to the 3rd century A.D. were unearthed in April 2016 by construction workers digging a trench in Spain.
In January 2016, over 4,000 Roman coins were discovered by a fruit and vegetable farmer on a molehill in his cherry orchard in Switzerland.
The bead on this bracelet, from Portland-based design company William Henry, is actually made using fossilized mammoth tooth and dinosaur bones.
Discovered: Incredible treasures found in unexpected places
CNN —
The earliest known stone inscription of the Ten Commandments sold for $850,000 – and a stipulation the owner must put the tablet on public display.
Described as a “national treasure” of Israel, the stone was first uncovered in 1913 during excavations for a railroad station near Yavneh in Israel and is the only intact tablet version of the Commandments thought to exist.
Bidding for this ancient tablet of the 10 Commandments will start at $250,000.
“The tablet’s significance is testament to the deep roots and enduring power of the Commandments that still form the basis of three of the world’s great religions: Judaism, Christianity and Islam,” said David Michaels, director of ancient coins for Heritage Auctions.
“Its surface is worn, battered and encrusted in places, but running a gloved finger over it does produce, in some people, a particular thrill of touching a piece of Bible history.”
Buried for centuries
The two-foot-square (0.18 square meter), 115-pound (52 kg) marble slab is inscribed in an early Hebrew script called Samaritan and most likely adorned a Samaritan synagogue or home in the ancient town of Jabneel, Palestine, which is now Yavneh in modern Israel, according to Michaels.
It lists nine of the 10 commonly known Biblical Commandments from the Book of Exodus, with an additional Commandment to worship on the sacred mountain of Mount Gerizim, near Nablus, which is a now a city in the West Bank.
“You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in Vain” was deliberately left off the list to keep the total number of Commandments to 10, according to scholars.
It is the earliest known intact stone copy of the Biblical text.
Michaels said the the tablet’s home was either destroyed by the Romans between 400 and 600 AD, or by the Crusaders in the 11th century, and that the stone had lain buried in the rubble of the ruins for centuries before its discovery near Yavneh.
“The workmen who found it did not recognize its importance and either sold or gave it to a local Arab man, who set the stone into the threshold of a room leading to his inner courtyard, with the inscription facing up,” Michaels said.
“Some of the letters of the central part of the inscription are blurred – but still readable under proper lighting – either from the conditions of its burial or foot traffic while it was resting in the courtyard.”
Thirty years later, in 1943, the man’s son sold the stone to Y. Kaplan, a municipal archaeologist.
“He immediately recognized its importance as an extremely rare ‘Samaritan Decalogue,’ one of five such known stone inscriptions that date to the late Roman-Byzantine era (300-640 CE) or just after the Muslim invasion of the seventh century CE,” added Michaels.
CE is a term used in academic texts and refers to “Common Era”, which is more commonly known as AD.
The back of the tablet also displays centuries of wear and tear.
National treasure
After recognizing its importance, Kaplan asked a noted archaeologist – Yitzhak Ben-Zvi, who would go on to become Israel’s second-longest serving president – to help him investigate its provenance. They published an academic paper that recounts the story of the stone’s discovery and provides background information about its historical context.
Kaplan eventually sold the stone to an American, Rabbi Saul Deutsch, who took it to the US and put it on display at his Living Torah Museum in Brooklyn, New York.
Described as a “National Treasure” by Israel, its export was approved under a special permit issued in 2005 by the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA).
“It is significant in that it is the only such piece that has secure provenance, a 70-year history of study and scholarship by renowned specialists such as Yitzhak Ben-Zvi, and can now be legally obtained and kept outside of Israel, provided it is placed on public display as per the IAA’s requirements,” Michaels said.
The IAA stipulated that the stone can be sold to a third party, but only on condition that it be placed on public display “where all can view it and enjoy.”
Rabbi Deutsch put the stone up for sale, along with more than 50 other “Bible-related historical artifacts” he owns, to fund an expansion of his Living Torah Museum, according to Michaels.
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