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Emmanuel Anati

Emmanuel Anati is an Italian-born Israeli archaeologist known for studying rock art in Val Camonica and for identifying Har Karkom as the biblical Mount Sinai.

born 1930Rock art research in Val CamonicaIdentifying Har Karkom as Mount SinaiFounding a prehistoric studies center

Born: 14 May 1930, Florence
Occupation: anthropologist, archaeologist, paleontologist, university teacher
Education: University of Paris, Harvard University, Hebrew University of Jerusalem

Emmanuel Anati was born in 1930 in Florence

Anati was born in Florence in 1930 to Ugo and Elsa Castelnuovo, a Jewish family. In 1942 the family fled the city and moved between villages in Tuscany, later hiding in a cave in a forest near Villa a Sesta. In 1945 the family moved to the Land of Israel.

He studied archaeology and historical geography at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, finishing his bachelor's degree in 1953 and his master's in 1956. In 1959 he studied anthropology and social sciences at Harvard University. In 1960 he received a doctorate from the Sorbonne in Paris.

In late 1956 he began studying the rock carvings of Val Camonica in northern Italy, and in 1964 he founded a center for prehistoric studies in Capo di Ponte. He became a lecturer at Tel Aviv University in 1965 and an associate professor in 1969. He excavated in Israel, Europe, Mexico, Tanzania, Australia and India, and is a professor emeritus at the University of Lecce.

He first visited Har Karkom in the Negev in 1954 and returned to study it in 1980. In 1983 he published his view that Har Karkom is Mount Sinai. The identification has not gained acceptance among other scholars.