This motley assemblage arrived in Jerusalem in 1909, when the Holy City was still under the authority of the Ottoman Empire, ruled from Istanbul. Nor was the object of their search ordinary. Led by a handsome British aristocrat, its members included a Swiss psychic, a Finnish poet, an English cricket champion and a mustachioed Swede who once piloted a steamboat on the Congo River.
In the annals of archaeology, it ranks as the most bizarre excavation team. Photo illustration by Meilan Solly / Photos: Public domain, Ben Schumin via Wikimedia Commons under CC BY-SA 2.5 Pictured here: a replica of the Ark of Covenant in front of an early 20th-century map of Jerusalem A new book by journalist Andrew Lawler chronicles an illicit 1909–1911 excavation in Israel's Holy City.