Bliss, Frederick Jones

BLISS, FREDERICK JONES: American archeologist; b. at Mount Lebanon, Syria, Jan. 22, 1859. He was educated at Amherst College (B.A., 1880), and was for three years principal of the preparatory department of the Syrian Protestant College, Beirut, Syria. He then studied at Union Theological Seminary, where he was graduated in 1887. Returning to Syria, he was an independent explorer until his appointment, in 1890 as explorer to the Palestine Exploration Fund (London). During the ten years in which he held this position, he excavated the mound of Tell-el-Hesy (Lachish) in 1891–93, and from 1894 to 1897 was engaged in excavations at Jerusalem. In 1898–1900 he excavated four Palestinian cities. In addition to numerous briefer contributions, he has written A Mound of Many Cities; or Tell-el-Hesy Excavated (London 1894); Excavations at Jerusalem, 1894–1897 (1898); Excavations in Palestine during 1898–1900 (1902; in collaboration with R. A. S. Macalister); and The Development of Palestine Exploration, the Ely lectures at Union Seminary for 1903 (New York, 1906).