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Throughout those heady spring and summer days we found twelve shipwrecks along a 260-foot-long stretch of seabed—the richest concentration in the eastern Mediterranean—recovering a fifth-century BC Greek war helmet, Roman bronze bowls, and, gratifyingly, the noble timbers of those elusive Late Roman wooden hulls. I got my hands on more ancient pottery than I could ever have wished for. To my corporate friends this may have looked like old garbage, but to me it was living history, a vast jigsaw puzzle that had important historical stories to tell.

The first is the biblical story of the Exodus, when proto-Israelite groups wandered in the wilderness of Sinai around the end of the thirteenth century BC before establishing a Jewish homeland in Israel. The second fixed point dates to AD 81, when the Arch of Titus was built on the summit of the Sacred Way in Rome’s Forum. The scene depicted in its remarkable wall relief is the equivalent of a detailed photograph of its age. Some form of table is carried at shoulder height on wooden poles; two cylindrical trumpets with flaring mouths are tied to its frontal plane.

Volcano of Hate 9. Keeping the Faith? 10. Benjamin of Tudela 11. The Philosopher’s Folly 12. Dead Sea Treasures 13. Castles in the Air TEMPLE TREASURE 14. Divine Light—the Menorah 15. Hunting Graven Images 16. The Tree of Life 17. Bread of Heaven 18. Trumpeting Messages REVOLUTION 19. City of Unbrotherly Love 20. Dead Sea Treasures 21. Castles in the Air 22. Divine Light—the Menorah Photographic Insert IMPERIAL ROME 23. Hunting Graven Images 24. The Tree of Life 25. Bread of Heaven 26. Trumpeting Messages 27.