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232<br />
traditions and general repertoire of the Graeco-<br />
Roman calendars.<br />
Diversity of synagogue and church is perceived<br />
in the order of the months and their effect on<br />
the calendar, namely when the year begins or<br />
which is the first month of the year. The Jewish<br />
year began in the spring, the Christian year in<br />
autumn or the winter.<br />
In the ancient (biblical) Israelite tradition<br />
months are indicated by ordinal numbers in<br />
which the ‘First month’ is the first spring month<br />
(Ex. 40.2, 17; Lev. 23.5; Num. 28.16), sometimes<br />
named ‘the month of the spring’ (Ex. 13.4; 23.15;<br />
34.18; Deut. 16.1). The Babylonian month names<br />
are alleged to have been brought back by the<br />
returnees from the Babylonian exile and occur<br />
predominantly in the post-exilic books, which<br />
refer to Nisan (the first month of the spring) as the<br />
first month of the year (Zec.1.7; Est. 3.7, 13; Neh.<br />
2.1). The Jewish calendar continued to allude<br />
to Nisan as the month which begins the year.<br />
This is further proved by the ‘En Gedi mosaic<br />
inscription noted above, which lists the Hebrew<br />
names of the months and the zodiac signs in the<br />
same order, beginning with Nisan and the corresponding<br />
zodiac sign Taleh/ram/Aries (pl. III.4c;<br />
fig. XI-4b).<br />
On church mosaics the calendar order is different.<br />
The year begins either in January or in<br />
autumn. January as the first month appears on<br />
the El-Hammam mosaic pavement with a figure,<br />
almost completely destroyed, but the inscription<br />
survived (pl. VIII.7) (Avi-Yonah 1936: 22).<br />
The months’ representations (destroyed) on the<br />
Gerasa mosaics in St. John church and the cathe -<br />
dral chapel indicate that the year apparently<br />
began with Audnaeus, which corresponds to<br />
January. Wells (1938: 468-469, 480, inscriptions<br />
nos. 274, 295, 307) maintains, ‘The texts shows<br />
either that the Gerasene year did not begin with<br />
Hyperberetaeus, or that Hyperberetaeus was<br />
not equated with October. There seems no possibility<br />
at present of certainly resolving Gerasene<br />
month dates into Julian equivalents. Possibly the<br />
Macedonian year and the indiction had become<br />
coextensive’. The order of these months’ depiction<br />
possibly follows the calendar used in Antioch.<br />
The first month on the mosaic of Elias, Mary, and<br />
Soreg church is Gorpiaios, which corresponds to<br />
2 The seasons on the mosaic of El Maqerqesh chapel<br />
at Beth Guvrin are not arranged according to the order<br />
chapter eleven<br />
September. According to Saller (Saller and Bagatti<br />
1949: 288-9), in the province of Arabia this<br />
month was from the 19th of August the 17th of<br />
September, which means the year according to<br />
this mosaic began in autumn. 2<br />
Personifications of Earth, Sea, Ocean, Nilus,<br />
the Four Rivers of Paradise, a country, or a city<br />
are depicted on secular mansions and church<br />
pavements but not on any of the synagogue pavements.<br />
On synagogue mosaics only the personifications<br />
of the zodiac elements, the four seasons,<br />
the zodiac signs, and the Sun-God appear.<br />
Inscriptions<br />
Short inscriptions usually accompany various<br />
personifications and biblical narratives. Hebrew<br />
inscriptions identify the biblical and the zodiac<br />
renditions on synagogue pavements, consisting<br />
of identifying names and short sentences explaining<br />
biblical scenes; on the synagogue mosaics the<br />
Hebrew names of the zodiac signs, and at Sepphoris<br />
the addition of the names of the months in<br />
Hebrew, accompany the images; the seasons on<br />
the zodiac design are identified by the Hebrew<br />
name of the first month of each of the four seasons.<br />
On Christian mosaics of Beth She"an the<br />
depictions of months are accompanied by their<br />
Latin names and number of days inscribed in<br />
Greek letters, whereas the Gerasa mosaics have<br />
the months with their Macedonian names written<br />
in Greek. Greek names identify personifications,<br />
such as Earth, Sea, rivers and seasons on church<br />
pavements.<br />
The dedicatory inscriptions found in synagogues<br />
and churches are mostly set in mosaic<br />
floors (though some can be found on lintels and<br />
doorposts, columns and capitals, and on chancel<br />
screens). These architectural and ornamental parts<br />
were donated by a private donor or by the community.<br />
Most church inscriptions are in Greek (a<br />
few are in Arabic, Armenian, Christo-Palestinian<br />
Aramaic, Latin, and Syriac). Inscriptions found<br />
in synagogues are in Aramaic, Hebrew (about<br />
90, published by Naveh 1978; 1989: 302-310),<br />
and Greek (about 36, published by Roth-Gerson<br />
1987). The common form of the inscription frame<br />
was the tabula ansata; other forms were circular<br />
and rectangular. The location of the inscriptions<br />
of the year, so they cannot indicate the calendar order or<br />
the month which begins the year.