JEWISH ART. A term properly applied to art as practiced by the Jews in Palestine, before the capture of Jerusalem by Titus, as the condi tions of the dispersion afterwards did not allow of any independent art. The earliest arclueolo gical material known is their pottery, which has been found in considerable quantities, especially at Tell-el-Ilesy, where Professor Petrie's sys tematic excavations have enabled him to distin guish several periods marked by superimposed strata of ruins. His periods are: (1) An Ammite; (2) a Plicenician; and (3) a Jewish period. Jewish designs seem mainly to be copies of Plurnician models, which were them seh es cepics of other Oriental arts. In the same way the Jewish glyptics were remotely de rived, through the Canaanites and Pim-nicht:1s, from the glyptics of Babylonia and Assyria; the Hebrew seals, few of which are earlier than the .11accabean age, varying only by the predomi nance of floral and geometric design. owing to the aversion of the Jews to reproducing the hu man figure. remains of Jewish metal
work; carving in wood and ivory and overlaying with metal were practiced, but no works arc ex tant; nor do we know anything of the artistic character of Jewish pictorial decoration. weaving, or embroidery. The tombs near Jerusalem (Tombs of the Kings, etc.) and scattered through out Palestine are similar to the late Hellenistic and Roman works of their class throughout Syria (see TOMB), and Herod, when reviving the pros perity of Palestine, rebuilding the temple and founding Cipsarea, with its magnificent struc tures, frankly adopted the style of Roman art. To this time and to the succeeding century be the few remaining ancient synagogues in Galilee. Consult : Bliss, Tell-el-Ilesy (London. 1894) ; De Sauley, L'arl Judaique (Paris, 1858) : Perrot and Chipiez, Histoire de Part darns vol. iv. (Paris, 1882-98). See SYNA GOGUE.