VILNIUS, LITHUANIA—According to a Live Science report, continuing excavations at the site of the Great Synagogue of Vilna have unearthed floor tiles with geometric designs, some 200 coins dating from the sixteenth to the twentieth centuries, a seating plaque, and a Hebrew inscription dating to the late eighteenth century. Archaeologist Jon Seligman of the Israel Antiquities Authority explained that the inscription, dedicated by two sons of a leading Lithuanian rabbinical family in memory of their parents, was part of a stone Torah reading table that stood on the synagogue’s two-story bimah, or prayer platform. Buttons found at the site are thought to have been dropped by soldiers in Napoleon’s army as they marched through Vilnius on their way to Moscow in 1812, Seligman added. To read more about the synagogue, go to "World Roundup: Lithuania."
