spin

We have an upward movement just where it is expected -- well, there should be a slight concave in the upward movement, but we can't hope for too much -- and you try to say that despite the standard formal shape requirement it's an accident. Look at your second photo (from BAR) and tell me that you see "an attempt at rounding the head".

As your first statement above continues.

We clearly have a sharp enough angle to mark the intention of a normal PE horn. See your second photo.

Final letters often have exaggerated flourishes.

This is a great inscription to use too. I have difficulty seeing what is supposed to be on the inscription. I simply can't see an initial YOD or a WAW before the SAMEK. The following PE looks like the final PE of the inscription rotated 45 degrees anti-clockwise and without the initial stroke. Then there is some less clear scratchings which you seem to want to be part of the PE? (One should add that the final backward Y alef looks like the initial letter!)

One needs a better explanation of the inscription than you have given, given that those scratchings are not attached to the PE and that there are two intertwining lines going downwards right to left.

You have not provided a convincing example of an internal elongated letter.

Sure do. But you're right. It's a monumental script, but it shows the extra work on the horns of the HET. Our HET is "sort of" informal.

Then why is there an upward moving stroke at the top coming to a point where one would expect one in a formal PE??

The first half is not cursive. Ten - love

It shows the varying depths of the second part of the inscription.

[QUOTE][B]The page from Yardeni that I have sitting in front of me shows Figure 156, with examples of letters from 11QPs. According to DJD, 11QPs is Herodian script.

As you know I don't have Yardeni. Is this a formal type script? If not it is irrelevant to the first part.

These things are not black and white. The intention of font style is blatantly formal.

On the DALET:

Twenty - love.

Here is the difference between the first and second parts. The first scribe plainly compensates for errors. Whoever did the last YOD got the angle and the length wrong and there is no sign of trying to change it. Thirty - love.

On the depth of the AYIN:

The final AYIN is exceptionally deep as compared to most other letters in the second half, perhaps even deeper than the hole in the ALEF. The depths of the letters in the first half are all relatively the same, and deeper than those of the second half. Fourty - love.

I may have misinterpreted what you said. Can I miss interpret when you say "a few"? When you agree with at least four letters having such formal indications, how can you say "a few"? And I can see a tittle on the second YOD, which shows formal intentions.

I recommend that you go back to the post and check it out, then tell me if you don't see them. (It's fourth down on the second page of this thread.)

On the wayward angles of the letters of the second half, you return to the first half:

I don't know if this is wilful or not. There is no problem at all with the second BET. The best you can complain about is the bend in the downward stroke of the first BET, the angle of which was changed so as to conform to the scribe's standard of bet instead of letting it continue at the wrong angle. Look at the change in angle of the QOF, the RESH and probably the second arm of the first AYIN. This is simply a more careful scribe. Fifty - love. Game.

Progressive starting where? I see no progression at all. The worst I can see is the abnormal height in my understanding of the PE.

On the downward slope of the second half:

It didn't touch on the problem. Even if the script gets worse in the second half, there is no reason for the sloping off. To clarify the problem: draw a line across the bottoms of the letters in the first half, you'll draw a line through the middles of the ALEF, the DALET, and the SHIN. Even the end of the YOD in AHUI touches the line.

It seems that wherever possible they do and those that do so end with an exaggerated elongation. Compare the elongation of the PE as compared to the QOF.

As you already know, you I am working without any texts. However, your insinuations are plainly rhetorical. You seem to have an a priori commitment to this strange inscription. You seem to have no problem mixing formal and informal to such a degree, though the major informalities conveniently only occur in the second half. You are giving what I consider untenable responses such as your weird analysis of the PE which comes to a plain point where one would expect a horn, showing the scribe's intent. Your wayward comments on the BETs are unreasonable to me. You don't seem to understand the problem of the fat long YOD with the wrong angle in the context of the other YODs and the compensation made by the frist scribe on erratic strokes. It's all okay in your flexible reading of the letters.

Yes, "Please"!


spin

leonarde

But according to you, it was more than one person .
And if it was so "early on" how come you had already formed the opinion that it was a forgery????

Cheers!

Vorkosigan

1. The gospels are fictions and James was not the Brother of Jesus. So any object that pretended to be from that James and said he was Jesus' brother was inauthentic ipso facto.

2. The object had no provenance. Dead giveaway.

3. The object seemed aimed at historicist prejudices.

4. The object came from Andre Lemaire, who had a history of bringing forth spectacular finds from private collections. Nobody is that lucky.

5. Apparently two hands were involved in the inscription.

6. The Israel Geological Survey authenticated the object without performing any critical tests. A dead giveaway that we were looking at a modern forgery.

7. The alleged owner's story shifted and indicated, in the very least, violations of Israeli antiquities laws. Shifting stories are a very bad sign.

These were all reasons to suspect forgery early. None is itself conclusive, but taken together, they were strongly indicative.

Vorkosigan

Haran

I'm pretty sure I now understand what you are saying you see...you seem to believe there is an abrupt upturn toward the right end of horizontal stroke which forms a "horn" on the PE.

Looking at the second picture, I can see why you might think that. However, looking at the enlargement of the inscription (similar to what you saw on my site for the yod/waw pair and the dalet), it becomes obvious that what you are seeing is a play of light and shadow. The enlargement shows no upturn toward the right side of the horizontal stroke. The horizontal line looks straight with no upturn where it joins the right downstroke.

There is no horn and no formal PE (never to mind the fact that the letter falls so far in a supposedly formal and precise inscription).

The inscription reads: YHSP BR QP( -- or -- yehosef bar qafa

Here is the ossuary and my quick transcription of yehosef:




{Ok...my transcription appeared in the thread, then it disappeared. Anyway, you should be able to get to it here.}

The PE in the middle of this inscription is clearly extended as far as the final letter.

I'm not sure why you say "less clear scratchings which you seem to want to be part of the PE". You seem to continually imply that you know what you're talking about. If so, then you would know that it is not only me who reads the inscription this way...

Personally, I think it was a good example, but I can't fault you too much because it is a difficult inscription to read. However, there is still the Shimi inscription with its elongated ayin that you seem to be ignoring again.

See, the problem I have here is that you claim not to have access to a library or any books, and there aren't just a whole lot of examples on the web. So, I'm afraid I'm going to have to give references to Rahmani's anyway, there's nothing left. The following examples contain some elongated letters within inscriptions that iare at least as long as the final letter of the inscription: 132, 151, 477, 501 (probably the best examples), 18, 26, 27, 61, 71, 222, 380 (there are probably others...).

As you remember, I also stated that not all inscriptions end with an elongated final letter (supposed "end-of-text" marker is unclear or non-existent, in other words). Here are some examples: 9, 76 (probably the best examples), 15, 16, 256, 290, 342, 370, 403, 430, 435, 488, 561, 573, 820 (there are probably others...).

There are just too many counter examples to say that the PE in the James Ossuary must necessarily be some sort of "end-of-text" marker.

Yardeni classifies the Uzziah inscription font as a "loop style" Herodian script. It is a different font than what we are dealing with in the JOI. I am glad, though, that you finally seem to be admitting that the HET is not "unusual". This would be an untenable position.

Neither is all of the "last half"... I'll take those points back, thank ya very much.

If this were the case, then I maintain that there would be serifs on other letters besides the resh, bets, and Qoph. Yardeni lists the Herodian ornaments (don't have the page number), and states that the yod, waw, ayin, samekh (see R. 820) have serifs or hooks. The "first half" of the inscription does not appear completely formal.

Hold yer horses. I said rare, not non-existent. In fact, Rahmani 293 shows a somewhat similar dalet. The angles appear similar; the only real difference between it and the JOI dalet is the normal leftmost serif. Number 226 is also somewhat close. The roof is horizontal rather than sloped downward toward the right stroke, but it does not have the left serif.

Yardeni has examples of a few dalets that look exactly like the one in the James inscription on page 125, vol. 2 of her Documentary Texts from the Judean Desert. Look specifically at the mid 1st century line around 4B/4C and read the notes above the chart.

In fact, it can be seen that this form of dalet (in the JOI) probably evolved from earlier aramaic script. To see other exact examples of this kind of dalet, refer to either Rosenthal's Die Aramaistische Forschung or Naveh's Development of the Aramaic Script (specifically p. 47).

Ok, the tennis motif is a little over the top, not to mention you shouldn't be both player and judge anyway.

The problem with what you say is that by simply flipping through Rahmani's catalog, you'd ease a lot of your concerns about the yod. Scripts change throughout the inscriptions. An excellent case in point is Rahmani 293. The inscription starts with a yod with a serif (unlike the JOI), then has a HET (which looks like an H), next a dalet, bet and resh (all with serifs). However, though it started somewhat formally, the inscription devolves the same way the JOI does. The other bets later in the inscription do not appear to have serifs (like the JOI), some of the later letters are cursive (like the JOI), and the inscription begins to slope downward shortly after the mid-point of the inscription.

This one of the better examples I've seen for explaining why the JOI appears to be in one hand (the script of ossuary inscriptions varies quite a bit in most instances...).

This just doesn't mean anything, Spin. Look, you can order Rahmani's catalog online. Order it and take a look at the inscriptions. Most of the inscriptions vary internally in depth and style. You just can't use these things to pick apart an ossuary inscription that is so similar to all the others...

Fine, there are four letters with serifs (I wasn't trying to imply anything by using "few"). And as I said above, there are other letters in the inscription that one would expect to have serifs that don't. The script is inconsistent. Get Rahmani and browse the inscriptions. It might change your mind (though I won't hold my breath ).

The script gets progressively worse from right to left. There is little if any formality after the resh and the first ayin and initial yod are questionable. If you browsed Rahmani, you'd realize your little tennis game is far from up. In fact, your score might be somewhat negative at the moment.

Please find and browse Rahmani. Other scripts start off seeming formal and "droop" toward the end. I think I even remember Rahmani mentioning something about this tendency in his commentary somewhere.

Perhaps you should remedy this somehow if you are going to attempt to argue something this detailed, ya think?

Sorry, let others believe or disbelieve me if they think I'm only being rhetorical, but I'm not getting the feeling that you know what you're talking about.

leonarde

Partial post by Vorkosigan:I confess that I'm totally unable to follow the logic here: are you saying that

1) the failure to perform "any critical tests" is the standard procedure of the Israel Geological Survey??? If so, then ALL such artifacts (ie artifacts submitted to the IGS)would probably be judged genuine by the IGS (but forgeries by persons like you).

or

2) are you saying or intimating that the Israel Geological Survey was part of a conspiracy to put over a forgery on the public (by purposely failing to do the most critical tests)? (which would be the only way that your above statement would make logical sense but seems to me highly unlikely).

Cheers!

Vorkosigan

No. I've explained this several times before. Antique forgery, like all crimes, has a particular pattern.

In this forgery "arc" the forger must have the object authenticated by experts early, to help him sell the object and deflect criticism by those who see what is actually going on. In this first authentication the forger often attempts to gain control of the process somehow, to ensure a veneer of testing without the reality of critical tests. This usually involves conditions of some kind, browbeating, or whatever. I don't know how the forger got some measure of control over the Israeli Geological Survey, but because they authenticated it without actually performing crucial tests, I knew it had to be a modern forgery.

Vorkosigan

leonarde

1) How, in late 2002, did you know that the Israeli Geological Survey "authenticated it without actually performing crucial tests"?
(or how did you, I presume a non-geologist, know which tests were "crucial"?)

2) Is this (the failure to do certain tests) what made you think that "the forger got some measure of control over the Israel Geological Survey"? Or was there some other indication (indications)??


Cheers!

Vorkosigan

How early, you mean. John Lupia pointed it out on XTALK right away. Within a couple of weeks, as I recall.

Anyway, I don't know what "being a non-geologist" has to do with it. I'm not an expert on Sung Dynasty pottery, but I know some of the markers for fake Ding ware. Similarly, I'm not a football coach but I know that a QB sneak on 3rd and nine is a bad idea. So when Lupia pointed out that crucial tests were not performed, I knew it had to be a modern forgery. I originally assumed it was an ancient fake, but the IGS would have had no motive to ignore key tests if the original forger were not around to influence it somehow. Since crucial tests were ignored, it meant the forger was around, which meant it was a modern fake.

I assumed somehow the forger had attained some measure of control because the proper tests were not performed. I concluded that because the IGS does not have a rep for being incompetent, so I assume some other factor was at work -- the influence of the forger. Incompetence would also explain that outcome, but that seemed incredible.

Two books I can't recommend enough are Selling Hitler and The Hermit of Beijing. You should also study the the story of Hans Van Meergeren, the Vermeer forger. Forgery is a crime just like serial killing, with a clear psychological trend. If not caught, the forger just keeps getting bolder and bolder, convinced the authorities are incapable of catching him. The James Ossuary is the equivalent of the Hitler Diaries and the Oath of the Freeman, psychologically. The forger also typically works a single mark, the way Konrad Kujau, the Hitler Diaries forger, worked a Texan millionaire, Van Meergeren worked the critic Bradius, and Golan worked the collector Massioeff in London. It's all the same story. Another good case to study is the Mormon Forgery Murders and Mark Hofman, recounted in Salamander: The Story of the Mormon Forgery Murders. All these men -- Golan, Hofman, Kujau, and Meergeren are very similar, although Meergeren is actually comparably likeable.

Vorkosigan

spin

As I won't be getting my hands on Rahmani, I'll demur to you on the inscription final flourish. That said, I think you are still stonewalling on most of the inscription.

It's not a matter of believing, Haran. It's a matter that either you still don't understand or you don't want to. There is a slightly oblique line following the curvefrom left to near centre; that oblique line meets the downward stroke at about 80 degrees. There is no intention of curvature on the right side. The angle shows the intention of a horn. That is what I've been saying for a while. There is no discrete horn because it requires too much control for the medium, but the intention is clear. You cannot argue that the right side of the top was intended to be curved. The scribe has already shown a willingness to compensate. There is no such willingness here.

Yes, it is straight, but angled slighly upwards. Get it yet?

The intention is clear. You are inventing what you see.

Much of the following I guess is superfluous:

My earlier coment was:

The ... PE looks like the final PE of the inscription rotated 45 degrees anti-clockwise and without the initial stroke. Then there is some less clear scratchings which you seem to want to be part of the PE?

So, why do you want to make those scratchings part of the square PE which is rotated 45 degrees anti-clockwise? If they are the PE what is the rectangular structure similar to the later PE superimposed??

(And as you have the literature, what sort of YOD is it at the beginning of this inscription that basically looks like the final ALEF?)

I have a tendency to try to read what's there, like you did with the WAW that's not there although various transcriptions give it. Unfortunately, unless you do it yourself, there's a fair likelihood that you won't be satisfied.

What makes you think I've ignored it. What I said was this:

The line from the AYIN is obviously not part of the inscription.

The transcription has it follow after the unaccountable added downward line to the SHIN. I don't think one can get any further without a photo though, do you? Have you ever seen such an AYIN before as you imagine it?

--------{End of stuff about final letters}--------

I realise that. It was one example of the sort of thing, not the same thing, but the sort of thing I was talking about with the formal HET, ie that the horns are not simply the tops of the downstrokes.

I never said it was unusual per se. It is simply not formal at all. Therefore unrelated to the script in the first half. Now, to get some clarity, which letters in the first half do you claim are not attempts, given the problems of the medium, at a formal script?

Not so fast. Except with the attempted repeat of the AYIN, which letters are formal in the second half? I need to pin you down, for vagueness hasn't helped this discussion.

There is as I said a tittle on the second YOD, probably one on the first, but it is less clear. I continue to sustain that there is an effort at a horn on the PE. So most letters to me have clear formal indications. There are no coherent indications in the second part.

I think you are now being pedantic. There is a clear intention -- intention being what one can expect in the medium we are dealing with -- of a formal style script.

I'm not sustaining its impossibility. You are aware that it doesn't fit into the font of the first half at all.

The James inscription doesn't devolve: it simply stops being formal and we get a wayward ALEF starting a wayward mixed font.

Does it actually "devolve" or is it a sudden change such as seen in the James inscription?

THIS IS NOT THE CASE WITH THE FIRST HALF OF THE JAMES INSCRIPTION.

The text is of a fairly even depth.

You continue to impute things that are contrary to photos of the inscription.

A "few" indicates less than four, probably two. I say there are at least six letters that indicate the intention of a formal font. A better photo might reveal more. You seem to have access to better material. Why not share it??

I don't believe you. The scribe's intention is clear.

This is plain wrong. There is no progression at all. The formal stops with the PE. The irregular starts with the ALEF. Perhaps the final three letters are slightly better done than the previous six. Where do you get this progression mantra from?

You have complained about the PE. The worst that can be said about it is that it doesn't rise to the standard height. You've complained and I think unreasonably about the RESH. (More below.)

You are kidding me. The YOD has a tittle indicating a serif. The PE has a sharp angle on the top right, indicating an attempt at a horn.

What's your problem with the AYIN? It's fairly clear to me. The initial YOD I can't see clearly enough, but it is not a simple short straight downstroke. It is clearly larger at the top. But then, so is the second WAW in both your photos.

You could save all the bother: if you have a decent photo of the inscription that you haven't distributed, you might make it available.

When you find it, let me know.

What is necessary is a decent photo of the text. You are intimating you have such access.

Sticking to what we can see in the inscription:

You have attempted to say that the first half of the text is not consistent with its font. You have failed to get beyond saying it, as the photo doesn't support you. There are uncontestably four letters which even you agree are formal. We disagree over the PE, but you still have not described it accurately, claiming that the scribe meant to round it where the formal letter has a horn and this one has a clear corner. No compensation was made to round it, yet the scribe compensates with other letters to make them the desired shape, so it represents basically the desired shape, ie pointed on the top right where you would expect it. The scribe has done his job and the PE is therefore formal (at least in intent). You can no longer complain that he intended to round the letter because you would be simply repeating the bald assertion and not considering the facts we can glean from the scribe's willingness to compensate.

I guess you accept the erratic depths of the letters of the second part. There is no problem with those of the first half.

The shape of the DALET is still unexplainable in the context of the two BETs and the RESH which are of the one type and the DALET should be of a similar form to the RESH or the BET without its base horizontal. If the scribe had managed those BETs and the RESH, there would have been no extra effort for a similar DALET.

The ALEF is neither the horned lambda shape nor an X-shaped ALEF.

The best you've done is to complain about my lack of access to books and not dealt with much of the original set of problems, attempting to first say that the BETs weren't well done, nor the RESH. This is because one of the BETs is bent and the horizontal stroke of the RESH is not quite horizontal and you won't ascribe these minor variations to the medium used. As you seem to like other people's opinions over the forms of the letters themselves, you should be aware that almost no scholars would agree with you over the shapes of these letters -- if you look at the range of opinions on the net.

Then you talk about progressive worsening from start to finish. I see no such progressive devolution. I see one part which is generally formal and formal in intent. I see the other which is a slapdash job with no consistency. You run to rare examples for the odd letter shapes in the second half which only prove my point on the matter.

Again, you are still stonewalling.


spin

leonarde

Partial post by Vorkosigan:Do you have a link to XTALK or the IIDF thread wherein Lupia's comments are discussed and/or linked? As I mentioned earlier, I'm trying to revisit the arguments, not so much as made by II members, but as made by persons like Altman and (I guess) Lupia...

Cheers!