The Myth of Nazareth: The Invented Town of Jesus (48 page)

Evidence from the tombs

Appendix 4
shows that four tombs yielded artefacts. They are tombs 70, 71, 72, as well as a tomb not known to Bagatti, excavated near the crest of the Nebi Sa‘in (El Batris St.) and published in a short report in the
Israel Exploration Journal
.

•
Tomb 70
.
By far the most numerous finds were found in T. 70, located only about 30 meters from the southern wall of the Church of the Annunciation.
^[692]
 

This unichambered tomb has 13 kokhim. It yielded 17 oil lamps. Of those, 7 are bow-spouted, including 4 “Darom” lamps dating between the two Jewish revolts.
^[693]
 The remaining lamps (see Appendix 2) are later and include five “round lamps with decorated discus,” dating to II–III CE.
^[694]
  Of interest is that the discus around the filling holes had apparently been broken out in antiquity. These surfaces held pictorial representations, which would have been offensive to religious Jews. One lamp (
Exc
. Fig. 192:12) is dated to III–IV CE,
^[695]
  while an Islamic lamp (Fig. 192:16) was found outside the entrance of the tomb and does not belong to the assemblage.
^[696]
  

The remainder of material from T. 70 consists of two pots, a pan, a terracotta juglet, and a few glass bottles. This material ranges from
c
. 50 CE–150 CE (pot #18) into early Byzantine times (pan #19), which gives a good idea of the life span of this tomb.
^[697]
  

•
Tomb 71
(=K 22).
This is the largest tomb complex in the basin, located to the east of the basin floor. We have no plan or description beyond the fact that the tomb contained four chambers (one still sealed and unexplored). The complex yielded 24 artefacts, mostly small objects of glass and metal (beads, rings). A half dozen larger objects include three jugs, a pot, and two vases.
^[698]
  The objects date
c
. 70 CE–
c
. 300 CE, that is, to the Middle Roman Period. This was noted by Fernandez, who offers the following overall conclusion:

Two other assemblages merit particular attention: those of tombs 70 and 71, now in the museum of the Franciscan Convent of Nazareth. Their homogeneity and characteristics, supported by a fine collection of lamps and glass bottles, point to [
aconsejan
] a rather precise date, very probably not inferior to [
inferior al
] the Middle Roman Period.
^[699]
 

Presumably,
inferior al
means “earlier than” (as D. Hamidovic understood the phrase),
^[700]
  but “later than” would not significantly change the meaning, for all the artefacts in these two tombs may date to Middle Roman times. This conforms perfectly with the general
terminus post quem
for the oil lamps and kokhim tombs at Nazareth, determined in Chapter Four,
i.e
., the latter half of the first century CE.

• Tomb 72
.
This is the “Richmond” tomb, located about 375m south of the CA. It was apparently not robbed in antiquity, and at the time of discovery yielded six oil lamps (repeatedly mislabeled “Hellenistic” in the literature—see Chapter 3), as well as numerous small objects (mostly beads), and several glass vessels. The oil lamps are shown in Chapter 3,
Illus
.
3.1
, and consist of the following (listed in chronological order):

        Lower left – Bow-spouted oil lamp, Smith Type 2 (
c
. 25 CE–
c
. 135 CE)                               

Lower right – Bow-spouted Darom lamp (
c
. 70 CE–
c
. 135 CE)
^[701]
 

        Upper left & right – Round mould-made, decorated discus (50–III CE)
^[702]

        Lower center right – Wide neck, small wick hole, handle (IV–early V CE)
^[703]
 

        Lower center left – Wide nozzle end flanked by ridges (IV–V CE)
^[704]

The remainder of the assemblage contains some interesting objects, including a Phoenician glass pendant with lion and star (date uncertain). Several glass vessels were also in the tomb. Though Richmond does not attempt a dating of them, Bagatti’s observations regarding other glass objects from his excavations (
Exc
. 310–314, Fig. 237) uniformly point to later Roman times.

• 
El Batris tomb
.
This tomb, excavated in 1995, yielded sparse finds which included a bow-spouted lamp, jug, juglet, store jar, and a bowl. Smaller objects included 76 glass and stone beads. In a short prose summary, the excavator (Zvi Yavor) writes:

The sparse ceramic finds included fragments of a cooking pot, a juglet and a store jar (Fig. 59:1–3), as well as of a bowl and a Herodian lamp. Seventy-six glass and stone beads, some decorated, were recovered, as well as a bronze spatula (length 13.5 cm) and fragments of three glass candlestick bottles (Fig. 59:4–5). These finds provide a date for the burial cave in the 1st century CE.”       (Yavor 1998)

The bow-spouted (“Herodian”) lamp, of which we have no further information, cannot predate
c
. 50 CE since it was found in a kokh tomb. It is questionable whether the recovered artefacts permit such a precise dating (“1st century CE”) as Yavor alleges. In any case, this kokh tomb dates from the latter part of I CE. The archaeologist’s closing statement may be more appropriate: “A rock-cut corner (13), recorded 6 m east of Cave 11, which may belong to another burial cave, contained sparse potsherds of the Roman period.” Given the limited data, the later Roman period is as far as we can press the chronology of these two neighboring chambers.

Non-funerary finds

On pages 272–318 of
Excavations
, Bagatti considers in turn: Big jars (273); Bottles, pots, pitchers, jugs (277); Cooking pots (282); Pans (285); Plates, bowls, cups (288); Large and small basins (296); Clay lamps (299); Glass ware (310); Metal objects and scarabs (314); Stone objects (315–18).

Nine passages primarily concerned with the dating of all this material can be isolated,  but the datings Bagatti offers are unusually tentative and quite vague, rarely giving a century and generally restricted to eras,
e.g
., “Roman” (unspecified), “later Roman,” or “Byzantine.”
^[705]
One of the archaeologist’s favorite expressions is “the period of the kokhim tombs,” which for him signifies I BCE–I CE.
^[706]
  However, we have seen that the kokh tomb came to the Galilee in mid-I CE. Thus, the many artefacts which the Italian associates with these tombs are evidence of Middle Roman to Early Byzantine times.

Because the archaeologist is so reserved as regards chronological information, it is not difficult to tabulate the datings he furnishes with regard to the several hundred objects treated. These will be found in
Appendix 6
. The oil lamps are treated separately in
Appendix 5
.

A brief review of the appendices confirms that (1) Roman Nazareth had a wealth of kokh tombs (
Appendix 4
); (2) the earliest datable evidence, the bow-spouted oil lamps, have been independently dated from
c
. 25 CE onwards (
Appendix 5
); (3) excepting the oil lamps, very little material can be dated to I CE (
Appendix 6
); (4) the material greatly increases in II CE and throughout later Roman-Byzantine times (
Appendix 6
).

The Nazareth Village Farm report

A major report on Nazareth archaeology was published in the 2007 issue of the
Bulletin of the Anglo-Israel Archaeological Society
(Vol. 25, pp. 19–79), too late for inclusion in the first edition of
The Myth of Nazareth.
The study is entitled "Surveys and Excavations at the Nazareth Village Farm (1997–2002): Final Report," authored by Stephen Pfann, Ross Voss, and Yehudah Rapuano. Arguably, this extended 60-page article constitutes the most significant contribution to the archaeology of the basin since Bagatti's
Excavations in Nazareth
(1967/69). It is referred to below as the NVFR (Nazareth Village Farm Report).The Nazareth Village Farm lies on approximately fifteen acres to the south and west of the present Nazareth Hospital.
^[707]
The report's authors locate the area "about 500 m from the site of ancient Nazareth," evidently measuring from the CA to the nearest point of the NVF. As we have seen, however, Roman Nazareth was not at the CA but on the valley floor. This locates the NVF about one kilometer from the habitations close enough for daily agricultural work by the ancient villagers.

The grade of the hill in the area of the NVF is considerable, averaging 20%. Though this was clearly the site of ancient agricultural activity and terracing, it is here that an ambitious plan is presently underway to recreate Jesus' hometown, known as "Nazareth Village." When complete, this project will contain streets and several dozen stone houses "inhabited by actors and storytellers in authentic garb, [who] will illuminate the life and teachings of Jesus. A Parable Walk, museum, study center and restaurant are also planned ...”
^[708]
As of 1999, an international consortium of Christian groups (called the Miracle of Nazareth International Foundation) raised $60 million for the project.
^[709]

Stephen Pfann is founder and President of the University of the Holy Land (UHL), as well as co-founder of its subsidiary, the Center for the Study of Early Christianity (CSEC), both located in Jerusalem. Pfann received his M.A. in Bible from the Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley (through the Franciscan School of Theology), and completed his doctoral dissertation on the Dead Sea Scrolls at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He has published two books and a number of articles on the Scrolls. Pfann participated in excavations at Beth Shean (under Y. Yadin) and also in Jerusalem (both in 1983), with the staff specialty of "Semitic languages, texts, epigraphy." Pfann's wife Claire is also a scholar of Early Christianity, and is on the staff of UHL and CSEC.

Ross Voss is Chair of the Department of Archaeology at UHL. He received a Master in Theological Studies degree from Harvard Divinity School, and has worked as a Research Fellow for the W.F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research in Jerusalem. Voss has participated extensively in the Ashkelon Excavation Project (directed by Larry E. Stager). The only publication of his that I have been able to identify is an article on the Bronze Age tombs of Dan.

Yehudah Rapuano has written a number of brief reports for the Israel Antiquities Authority. These one-to-two paragraph resumes (
e.g
. in
Hadashot Arkheologiyot)
date as far back as the 1980s and include sites such as Shoham (an olive press), Tel Dover, Kh. el-Burj, Kh. en Nabi-Bulus,
etc
. He has also dug at Kh. Umm el-'Umdan, a site he identifies with Mod'in, the Maccabean family hometown. Rapuano's archaeological training is not known to me.
^[710]

In fact, it is with Rapuano's work at the NVF that we shall be most concerned, for he authored the critical concluding section on pottery (NVFR:68–78). As regards dating, only the pottery is diagnostic for—with one brief exception (see below)—the remainder of the NVFR deals with non-datable agricultural terraces and other structural remains (watchtowers, presses). The extended discussion of those structural features is indeed illuminating, interesting, and well-written, and has apparently met the NVFR's own stated goal:

It was concluded that excavation would be necessary in order to further define the nature of the ancient farm with the hope that the excavations would illuminate previously unknown aspects of terrace farming in the Galilee. Hitherto, little research had been undertaken on terracing and ancient methods of cultivation practiced in the Galilee (Golomb and Kedar 1971). The remains of the farm were considered to be the most important, since they could potentially provide a key witness to the life and livelihood of the ancient villagers. (NVFR:20)

The NVFR indeed expands our knowledge of the character of the ancient Jewish settlement, and shows that the village of later Roman and Byzantine times husbanded both a "dry" and a "wet" farm (with a cistern and water channels, and possibly a spring house), producing a variety of crops in this area, principally vines, but also some olive trees and possibly figs, almonds, wheat, barley, legumes, and leafy vegetables (NVFR:23).