Yuval Noah Harari’s best-selling book “Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind” has been a fixture on the Israeli nonfiction best-seller list since it was published in 2011. The book that finally knocked it off the number one spot, “The History of Tomorrow,” came out two months ago – and that’s by Harari, too.

So it’s no surprise that The Israel Museum thought many would see an exhibition based on Harari’s first book. As part of its jubilee celebrations, the museum has created the year’s central exhibit around “Brief History.” The book summarizes the entire history of Homo sapiens since man started talking some 70,000 years ago.

The curator, Tania Coen-Uzzielli, selected significant chapters from the book and used the museum’s collections to prepare the exhibit, which includes archaeological artifacts alongside modern art, in tribute to the museum’s variety and breadth.

“As part of the celebrations, we wanted to try to understand the significance of the museum, its place and its collections, as an organization and institution. We have the first remains of Neanderthal man and Homo sapiens, as well as Einstein’s handwritten theory of relativity,” she explains.

“There are not many museums in the world that can connect the two,” adds Coen-Uzzielli, who was born in Italy and studied archaeology and art history at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. ...