Avner Raban

Avner Raban was born in 1937 in Ramat David

Avner Raban was born in Kibbutz Ramat David and lived there all his life. He was married to Dina, and they had 4 children.

He served in Shayetet 13 and then studied art at Oranim College. He taught geography at the regional school in Yifat. In 1960 he co-founded the Society for Underwater Research in Israel with Elisha Linder.

He studied geography and archaeology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and went on to a direct doctoral track. He spent a year at the American School of Classical Studies at Athens and received his doctorate in 1981 for research on Canaanite jars in the eastern Mediterranean.

In 1974 he began teaching in the Department of Maritime Civilizations at the University of Haifa, which he helped found, and he headed it from 1991. He directed 20 excavation seasons at the harbor of Caesarea, led the Red Sea survey, and studied Acre and Atlit. In the 1980s he led the team that studied an Ottoman ship sunk in the Sea of Galilee in 1918.

He received awards from the Italian government and UNESCO. He died in England on February 11, 2004, during a sabbatical in Oxford. A yearly conference in his memory is held at the University of Haifa.