Research Fields

• Town planning
• Architectural design
• Mosaic art
• Synagogues
• Jewish art
•  Public spectacles
• Evaluation of archaeological finds in light of the socio-cultural behavior of Jewish society and its dialogue with Graeco-Roman and Christian cultures

About

Zeev Weiss is the Eleazar L. Sukenik Professor of Archaeology at the Institute of Archaeology. Trained in Classical Archaeology, he specializes in Roman and Late Antique art and architecture in the provinces of Syria-Palestine. Weiss’s ongoing excavations at Sepphoris since 1990 have uncovered the remains of the ancient city that flourished from the Roman period and throughout late antiquity. The wealth of evidence emerging from Sepphoris, one of the major Galilean settlements, illustrates the glorious past of this large and prosperous city that housed a mosaic of cultures.

 

Selected Publications

 Z. Weiss, Public Spectacles in Roman and Late Antique Palestine (Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2014)

Z. Weiss, Sepphoris: A Mosaic of Cultures (Jerusalem, Yad Izhak ben-Zvi, 2021) (Hebrew)

 M. Sherman, Z. Weiss, T. Zilberman, and G. Yasur, “Chalkstone Vessels from Sepphoris: Galilean Production in Roman Times,” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 383 (2020), 79–95

Z. Weiss, “Urban and Rural Synagogues in Late Antique Palestine: Is there That Much of a Difference between Them?” in Early Christian Encounters with Town and Countryside Essays on the Urban and Rural Worlds of Early Christianity, ed. M. Tiwald and J. K. Zangenberg, Novum Testamentum et Orbis Antiquus / Studien zur Umwelt des Neuen Testaments 126 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2021), 377-396

 Z. Weiss, The “Magdala Stone Table”: Its Function and Role in Determining the Liturgical Furniture in the Ancient Synagogue,” Journal of Roman Archaeology (in press)

 

Selected Awards

Irene Levi-Sala Book Prize in the Archaeology of Israel (for: The Sepphoris Synagogue: Deciphering an Ancient Message through Its Archaeological and Socio-Historical Contexts [Jerusalem, 2005])

 

Teaching

Undergraduate Courses

Introduction to Roman Archaeology (43156)

Introduction to Byzantine Archaeology (43107)

Introduction to Hellenistic, Roman, and Byzantine Archaeology of the Land of Israel (43511)

Classical Art and Architecture: The Roman Period (43427)

Topics of Classical Byzantine Archaeology: Urbanization in Roman Palestine (43526)

Topics of Classical Byzantine Archaeology: Cult Buildings in Ancient Palestine (43526)

The Roman House and Its Decorations (43409)

Graduate Courses

Jews and Christians in Ancient Palestine: The Archaeological Evidence (43956)

In the Path of the Galilee: Architecture, Art, and Society (43776)

The Ancient Synagogue: New Finds, New Paradigms (43760)

Mosaic Art in Ancient Palestine (43814)

Jews and Christians in Byzantine Palestine: A Literary and Archaeological Approach (with Prof. David Satran) (8801)

Between Text and Artifact: Everyday Life in Late Antique Palestine (with Prof. Joshua Levinson) (8804)