Free Republic

During the Hanukkah festival, hikers discovered a rare engraving of a menorah in a water cistern in the Judean Hills. The Israel Antiquities Authority reports that a rare and intriguing discovery was revealed over the Hanukkah weekend by hikers exploring a water cistern in the Judean hills: On the walls of the cistern, in chalk bedrock, were inscribed ancient engravings of a seven-branched menorah and a cross. Last weekend touring enthusiasts Mickey Barkal, Sefi Givoni, and Ido Meroz, who are members of the Israel Caving Club, went out to visit hidden caves in the Judean hills. According to hiker Ido...

Scientists say that a series of marks carved onto a freshwater clam shell represent the earliest known engravings made by a human ancestor.The zigzag lines visible in the photo above probably were carved at least 430,000 years ago by a Homo erectus, an extinct hominid with a brain only slightly smaller than those of modern humans, researchers say.

The 237th anniversary of Paul Revere's famous midnight ride during the Revolutionary War falls on Wednesday. But long before Henry Wadsworth Longfellow made him famous, Revere was known as an engraver and a silversmith in Boston.Brown University announced this week that it had found a rare engraved print by Revere, one of only five in existence. The print was tucked inside an old medical book that had been donated by physician Solomon Drowne, a member of Brown University's class of 1773."It was an engraving, not a terribly large one," Richard Noble, Brown University's rare books cataloguer tells weekends on All...

MADISON, Wis. – The nation's largest group of atheists and agnostics filed a lawsuit Tuesday seeking to block an architect from engraving "In God We Trust" and the Pledge of Allegiance at the Capitol Visitor Center in Washington. The Madison-based Freedom From Religion Foundation's lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in western Wisconsin, claims the taxpayer-funded engravings would be an unconstitutional endorsement of religion. The House and Senate passed identical resolutions this month directing the Architect of the Capitol to engrave "In God We Trust" and the pledge in prominent places at the entrance for 3 million tourists who visit...