Daily Podcasts Video Research

Lost and Found and Random

JL;DR SUMMARY Amos Oz's childhood fantasy of becoming a book highlights the fragility and miraculous survival of ancient texts, a theme explored in the Posen Library's comprehensive sourcebook edited by Carol Bakhos. A way out west there was a fella, fella I want to tell you about, fella by the name of Jeff Lebowski. At least, that was the handle his lovin' parents gave him, but he never had much use for it himself. This Lebowski, he called himself the Dude. Now, Dude, that's a name no one would self-apply where I come from. But then, there was a lot about the Dude that didn't make a whole lot of sense to me. And a lot about where he lived, likewise. But then again, maybe that's why I found the place s'durned innarestin'.

JL;DR members get full summaries of all articles in the archive, including this one. Donate & start reading »

Tags

Jewish CultureAncient JudaismAmos OzHellenistic PeriodRoman PeriodPreservation Of TextsPosen LibraryExternal BooksChristian PreservationMira Balberg

Places mentioned

Valladolid, Spain
"People can be killed like ants. Writers are not hard to kill either. But not books: however systematically you try to destroy them, there is always a chance that a copy will survive and continue to enjoy a shelf life in some corner of an out-of-the-way library somewhere, in Reykjavik, Valladolid, or Vancouver."
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
"People can be killed like ants. Writers are not hard to kill either. But not books: however systematically you try to destroy them, there is always a chance that a copy will survive and continue to enjoy a shelf life in some corner of an out-of-the-way library somewhere, in Reykjavik, Valladolid, or Vancouver."
Qumran, Jerusalem, Palestinian Territories
"The most well-known example of such lucky survival is the Qumran scrolls, which were kept in jugs and remained hidden in caves until they were discovered near the Dead Sea in 1947."
Alexandria, Egypt
"Hecataeus, who was born in Abdera in Thrace, settled in Alexandria toward the end of the fourth century BCE and worked for King Ptolemy I."
Beer, Southern District, Israel
"The encampment at Beer and the miraculous well. Wall painting from Dura-Europos, circa 245 CE.(Rev Zadobans Bible Land Pictures.)"
Dura-Europos, Deir ez-Zor, Syria
"Similarly, the magnificent frescoes of the synagogue in Dura-Europos, depicting biblical scenes from floor to ceiling, would have probably been effaced long ago if that border city hadn’t been buried under thick layers of dust for seventeen centuries."
Jerusalem, Israel
"Most of the extant written materials are concerned with religious beliefs and practices, centering on the Jerusalem Temple, synagogues, and the Bible."
Rome, Italy
"This is a translation of a Latin inscription on a sarcophagus from the third or fourth century CE, found in Rome."
Masada, Southern District, Israel
"Four dyed woolen hairnets found at Masada, preserved by the region’s arid climate."
This item was indexed and curated by Cairo, JL;DR's web crawler.
Cairo Item ID 78542
Cairo Source ID 11
Retrieved 2026-03-26 05:31:54 UTC
Curated 2026-03-26 08:31:16 UTC