Page:History of Art in Sardinia, Judæa, Syria and Asia Minor Vol 1.djvu/366

 .^6 A History of Art in Sardinia and Jud.ka. silver towards an image ; consequently the rank and file were obliged to put up with teraphim of baked or sun-dried clay ; such as Phoenicia sowed broadcast in the Mediterranean basin. We are inclined to regard the annexed woodcut (Fig. 223), reproduced from a terra-cotta unearthed at Gezer, 1 as a Jewish idol of a local Ashtoreth. It represents a nude figure, her arm folded under the breast, with the turreted headdress so often seen on the Sidonian coins of this goddess. The general type and technique betray a Punic hand ; making it probable that it was imported from a city on the coast. One monument of doubtful origin is not sufficient to enable us to say whether the teraphim were distinguished by any special feature ; since we are wholly without data upon the progressive march of the plastic arts of the Hebrews; 2 nor is our knowledge a whit better respecting the ephod. This had evidently two distinct meanings : sometimes it was applied to the surplice of the priest ; 3 at other times it indicated some object which might be held, or hung, or used to con- sult Iahveh. We read that Abiathar fled from Nod, carrying in his hand the ephod (1 Sam. xxiii. 6), just as a Roman priest would in a similar case take with him the host. Was the ephod, as has been conjectured, a small box which contained twin dice, Urim and Tummin? 4 and if so what was its shape? Are we justified to conceive it as a small casket, the emblem of Tank, with a top handle to facilitate its being carried ? or was its chief ornament like the winged sphere so widely diffused in the Nile and the Tigris Valleys, and which we find on Jewish seals ? Unless unexpected discoveries should be made, great uncertainty must continue to surround the subject. One thing is certain, that the 1 Palestine Exploration Fund, Memoirs, torn. ii. p. 439. 2 As in Greece the xoanon was gradually disengaged from the trunk of a tree to form a figure, so with the Hebrews the ashcrah, " pole," standing by the altar yielded the first rudimentary image, with face and limbs barely outlined, and dressed, as a certain class of Punic baetuli, seen on coins and votive stelas (Hist, of Art, torn. iii. pp. 14- 16 ) !9 2 > Fi 8- 2 3 ? )- 3 Sam. xxii. 18. " Stade, Geschichte, torn. i. pp. 471, 472. De Saui.cy, " Le Costume Sacerdotal chez les Juifs" (Revue Arch., torn. xx. pp. 104-110).