In my 2015 book NazarethGate (Chp. 6) I showed that Dark’s main conclusion is untenable: there was no Roman-period dwelling at the Sisters of Nazareth site (see post #4). Of course, this should surprise no one, for the venue is the site of a Roman-period tomb complex. The walls are low and rock cut, suitable for agricultural installations but not for the domestic habitation that Dark proposes, a “model courtyard house” with bedroom, living room, upper story room, and storeroom (2012:51–52). In fact, many of the Early Roman-era walls that Dark claims are conjectural (NG 107–12). In my 2015 book I concluded that there was an “evident disconnect between the underlying physical remains and Dark’s reconstruction” (NG 108).
Dark’s recent three books show that the archaeologist has continued to elaborate the dwelling hypothesis, despite the many drawbacks including the onsite presence of tombs and the absence of the requisite walls. Here I will not rehash the arguments made in NazarethGate but will turn to Dark’s arguments that the hypothetical dwelling dates to early I CE, that is, the “time of Jesus.” In Dark’s conception, an early I CE date for the dwelling hinges on a late I CE date of the SoN tombs. Dark has been led to this curious (and complex) state of affairs by the principle of superposition (discussed here) by which the archaeologist argues that the tomb “cut into” the dwelling and thus immediately followed it chronologically. (Of course, all this is moot if one rejects the very existence of a dwelling at the SoN site.) If an archaeologist uses superposition to show that the dwelling was inhabited at the turn of the era, then he must [a] date tomb construction to late I CE, and [b] show that the tomb “cut into” the dwelling. This is precisely what Dark tries to do.
Thus, having argued that a dwelling existed at the SoN site (an argument I disproved in my 2015 book), Dark’s next challenge is to date tomb construction to late I CE (point [a] above)—a point we will now consider.
Dating construction of the SoN tombs to late I CE
At the SoN site are tombs of the kokh type, a form that began in the Galilee in mid-I CE and continued in use through Middle and Late Roman times (MoN 160 ff, NG 84 ff ). Dark’s apparently challenge is to fix the date of the SoN tombs to the beginning of this long period of use—to late I CE. He repeatedly and typically refers to the tombs at the SoN site as “Early Roman-period” (2012:45, 56, 57, 59. etc). His justification for this early dating, however, is both untenable and misleading, for those same sources also allow also for later datings. Dark writes: “Aviam, Berlin and others have dated similar tombs in the Galilee to the first century AD.” (2012:59). However, those scholars also dated similar tombs to later centuries. I consider the debilitating issue of “early dating” in extenso in both my books, and at risk of beating a dead horse will repeat here that M. Aviam also wrote: “Few first century tombs have been found in Galilee and none in the Jewish area” (Aviam 2004:20). In short, if Dark’s view of the SoN tombs were to prevail, those tombs would be the earliest (Jewish) kokh tombs ever discovered in the Galilee!
Dark invokes Kfar Hananya-type pottery shards as evidence for I CE habitation at the SoN site (2012:54). However, this is very dubious evidence. Firstly, the shards in question were not found in situ but in a museum box. They could have come from outside the SoN site—and most of them did, as Dark himself admits: “Despite searching the museum and convent archives for any evidence for the locations in which they were originally discovered, most of these artefacts cannot be assigned confidently to the site itself or often even to Nazareth” (2021:74).
Secondly, Kfar Hananya ware continued in production well into the fifth century CE (NG 82 for discussion and citations). In other words, this ware is not at all diagnostic of the first century CE. In one passage Dark writes that Kfar Hananya pottery was “typical of the Early Roman period” (2021:108), but this is another case of early dating and is not supported by the broader scholarly literature. In another passage the archaeologist actually contradicts himself by including a Byzantine dating for such pottery (2021:227).
Dark also mentions fragments of limestone vessels (used to keep contents ritually pure) as evidence for “domestic occupation in the Early Roman period” at the SoN site (2021:94). Such evidence is very tenuous, for limestone vessels continued to be made until the Bar Kochba Revolt, ca. 135 CE (MoN 183). The use of such artifacts, of course, was necessarily later—often generations later. A sturdy object such as a limestone vessel made in, say, 100 CE could have been used in 150 CE, 200 CE, or even 250 CE (or later). Finding a few such fragments in or around the SoN convent site has little force for use in I CE—much less for use at the turn of the era.
In any case, Dark is uncertain whether the relevant fragments actually belonged to limestone vessels (2012:47; 2021:228, 230). Also weakening his argument is that most of the (alleged) vessel fragments were found in the SoN museum (2021:94)—with all the problems attending those unprovenanced and often unlabeled objects.
In the next post we will continue to explore Dark’s attempts to date the imagined dwelling to the first century CE, focussing on his unusual ideas regarding rolling stones.
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