spin

Well, we are part of the way there, but you haven't answered all my questions in an effort to deal with as much as possible and clarify all that we can.

Here's what you didn't reply to, which was directly conditioned on a negative response:

[T2]If not, what don't you understand in my response to your "critical questioning", that you haven't seen fit to respond to? [/T2]

Some of the material requiring a reply beyond the simple "no" is this description from Kraeling who clarified the find location as such:

[T2]it fell, or was dumped afterwards, into a great embankment of earth, ashes and rubbish constructed along the inner face of the western city wall by the Roman garrison, in preparation for a siege. Here it was protected from the elements by the material heaped over and around it, by the layer of mud bricks with which the embankment was covered, and by the desert sand which eventually covered the whole city. Kraeling's monograph, p.3.[/T2]

The location of the find was further given as:

[T2]in one of the baskets of finds from the embankment, behind (west of) Block L8 and not far from Tower 18 Hopkins p.106.[/T2]

This embankment is indicated as that build by filling the street inside the wall with rubble and then covering it with mud bricks. The street was partially excavated in the previous November when they cleared the synagogue, and Hopkins says,

[T2]At the same time a second group would dig between the wall and the stone fortifications, uncovering the outside of the wall, but not cutting too deeply until the pressure of dirt from the inside of the room was removed. Hopkins p.129.[/T2]

So the street behind the synagogue was cleared to prevent the wall from collapsing inwards. It was while working in the basic area 4 or 5 months later, as the season was coming to an end, that the basket carrying the fragment came from. Back to Hopkins, p.106:

[T2]In early March, during the sixth season, the work was slackening off as the trenches began to be blocked out for closing; the massive work of packing and crating frescoes began and the digging came to a close. Not much more, therefore, was expected from the dig when in one of the baskets of finds from the embankment, behind (west of) Block L8 and not far from Tower 18, a piece of parchment scarcely three square appeared.[/T2]

The basket plainly did not come from the top of the embankment, but after five months of diggings, having removed the mudbricks that closed the top and dug down a considerable way as indicated by Kraeling above.

The location of the discovery was sealed a century before Julian marched along the other bank of the river and only excavated sufficiently in 1933.

Now if the above is not clear to you please explain exactly what you have difficulties with.

The conditioned question that you did not reply to was:

[T2]If not, what specifically keeps you hoping that it is reasonable to hold out against what seems obvious to most others that it is ridiculously unlikely that some soldier took time out from a march down the Euphrates in a state of war to cross the river and deposit the fragment at least eight feet below the top of the embankment?[/T2]

Now further on this issue, Ammianus Marcellinus gives no indication that Julian stopped in the vicinity of Dura other than to say that those soldiers who were involved in the boating on the river, the ones with oars, attacked some of the local animals. A.M. says that "after two days... we approached the deserted city of Dura" (24.1.5), which I have noted was on the other side of the river. "Then, after completing a leisurely march of four days,... Lucillianus... was sent... to capture... Anatha."

There was no recorded stoppage across the river from Dura and, as the narrative goes, there is no room for any notable stop.

As you said "no" to the basic question regarding a deposit at the time of Julian, can you now deal with the evidence that we have regarding location of the find and the logistics of Julian's passage of Dura, such that you can mount a reasonable argument to defend your "no"?

Hopefully then we won't hear any more regarding you questioning the christian nature of the fragment. The only problem remaining is your attempt to insinuate a deposit of the fragment under the embankment for it was not found outside the city walls, but between the walls and block L8, the block with the synagogue. How do you imagine a soldier deposited the fragment underneath the embankment which was covered with mud bricks? And how do you conceive that the fragment got into the basket that came from that area at the end of the season after the street had been excavated?

spin

Actually Clark Hopkins did not find it. Susan Hopkins found it. She fished it out of a basket of material that came from the street cleared between tower 18 and the block with the synagogue. We know from Kraeling that it was from an excavated area; it was from under the embankment and under the mud bricks which covered it.

This denies the evidence.

Don't be ridiculous. You have been told that it was found underneath the mud bricks and the embankment under them. A wind storm doesn't lift mud bricks and resettle them in situ. Please be reasonable.

The process is quite costly and when dealing with materials that come from closed contexts such as the embankment at Dura Europos, they wouldn't think it was necessary. Besides, it is normal that such measurements are done with other documents from the location so that there can be a natural range recovered, so that one can know if there is anything strange about a single C14 dating, because of a glitch or contamination.

The DSS provided documents for a large number of separate datings to be made at the same time--the laboratory was prepared to deal with a number of samples--, allowing for the results to be evaluated with regard to the others, so that they could be seen as significant rather than random. Dating one item by itself has no controls. So it is not a likely scenario, for there is already a sealed context (despite your denial), making it unnecessary and single runs are not sufficiently significant.

DCHindley

While I had tagged the genealogical connection for follow up, I have only gone into detail with overlapping sources that exist in one or more of the Ezra books (Ezra, Nehemiah, 1 Esdras, 2 Esdras, and 2 Chronicles).

Critics have been bogged down over the relationship between these books for a couple of centuries now. I have a research "project" underway but nowhere near ready to support any pronouncements.

DCH

DCHindley

My speculation would be that one of the local laborers hired to remove debris had found the parchment leaf in the rubble and said to himself "Hmmm! This would make a right dandy mitt/glove!" As a result, it was probably not as crumpled up and worn through when he found it, but that's life. The object was to get to the wall foundations, to determine how they were undermined (tunnels, probably) and to what degree of effectiveness.

The general debris itself was probably not subject to close scrutiny unless, or until, someone notices it contains something of interest. Once they get to the "ground" level for the period of interest, they look at the removed soil much more closely. Unskilled diggers expecting to discover human remains, remains of weapons equipment and provisions, living quarters, fortifications, etc. I doubt that anyone expected to recover a parchment page from the Diatessaron (or whatever it actually is).

DCH

aa5874

You claim is a fallacious. There is no known actual evidence to support 100% probability. There is no historical account of the actual seige and no actual written account that the debris was placed at the site 256 CE.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dura-Europos

spin

This is simply nonsense. Why comment when you are totally ignorant of the facts and are not prepared find out how the secure dating was derived? Have you read the source texts?? Stop talking through your nether regions and find out how the site has been dated. That will involve going to a library and opening a book. You might, heaven forbid, have to buy a book.

Archaeology can be your friend when you understand its mechanisms.

When I edited the article I left that bit in. It doesn't mean what you are using it for. You should read the citations I've made from Hopkins and Kraeling regarding the find location. It was not found on the surface or near it, as if simply "covered by sand and mud". It was underneath the defensive work which involved the filling of the street inside the wall with rubble and covering the fill with mud bricks. The fragment was found in a context that was sealed in 256 CE. There is no doubt to this fact, unless you are also prepared to doubt things like Augustus was the first Roman emperor or that the Macedonians conquered Greece in the 300s BCE.

watersbeak

I admit to having not read the whole thread. Sorry.

When the French archaeologists first arrived on the scene, in the early 20th century, was the city equally covered with dirt, or, were some portions higher than others, e.g. the soil on top of the fortifications taller than the soil on top of the temple of Mithra? I am unfamiliar with the history of this ancient Roman outpost. I am guilty, as spin explained above, referring to another reply, of having not read the books, mentioned in the thread. Maybe my questions are all answered therein.

I am confused about why some forum members believe that the "fortifications", covered with mud bricks, had been left undisturbed for centuries, but I don't think that is as important as this scrap of papyrus itself.

How did this scrap survive the many centuries of rainfall, while few other documents had been preserved?

Which other scraps were found in the same location? Were they also from Tatian's harmony?

How did Mrs. Hopkins learn of the scrap of papyrus, if it had not been visible to other investigators at the site?

In an archaeological excavation, of this sort, in the 1930's, was it customary to leave scraps of papyrus in buckets of dirt? Presumably these scraps had been buried, centuries earlier. Why wouldn't the laborer excitedly point to it, at the time of its excavation, instead of including it in the shovel of dirt deposited into the bucket? It looks, or, it appears, reasonable, to suspect, that the Christians in charge of the excavation, inserted the scrap into the rubble. Alternatively, did Mrs. Hopkins comb every basket looking for scraps of papyrus?

Why wasn't this scrap found in the soil from the "church"? Were other "Christian" documents found in that excavated soil, at the floor level of the "church"?

If there had been a herd of deer, nearby, then, with fresh water, and game available, why wouldn't there have been, a thousand years ago, someone else hunting these animals? In such a case, why could not they have placed the "mud bricks" on top of the fortifications, either as a defensive posture against others attacking them, or to conceal themselves from the deer?

I don't know mathematics, either. I certainly don't understand statistics. I make no claim of understanding probability. I am not even certain that tomorrow I will wake up. But, I object to someone writing, as Toto has done, above, with as little information as we possess, 15 centuries later, that such and such is 100% certain.

Sam

spin

Take a look at the profile of the area spanned by the embankment:



They started off by the filling of the street between the wall and the first row of buildings (1). It was noticed that the filling of the space put pressure on the house walls, so the started filling the area that abutted the inner wall as they continued to fill the street with rubble (2). This meant that the buildings closest to the wall were sacrificed and in so doing sealed them for posterity. They also extended the glacis in front of the wall as a precaution to save the wall in case of undermining. The Persians were known to have had success with this siege approach, hence the elaborate precautions of the Romans. When the embankment was finished it was sealed on top with mud bricks. I take it that (3) marks the finished result of the siege precautions and that (4) reflects the erosion and sand build up in the centuries after the city was abandoned.

The fragment was found in this street at the end of the sixth seasons. It had been preserved from the elements by the tons of rubble on top of it, sealed by the mud bricks.

Various odd fragments are on record some of which indicate that soldiers functioned as a species of police in the region. There were also a number of inscriptions of religious and military significance.

I've already cited the find info:

[T2]In early March, during the sixth season, the work was slackening off as the trenches began to be blocked out for closing; the massive work of packing and crating frescoes began and the digging came to a close. Not much more, therefore, was expected from the dig when in one of the baskets of finds from the embankment, behind (west of) Block L8 and not far from Tower 18, a piece of parchment scarcely three square appeared.[/T2]
A workman had filled a basket with material removed from the bottom of the embankment when the fragment was noticed. Hopkins notes that this was serendipitous, because they didn't sift through the rubble, as there was too much for them in the style of excavation at the time. It was merely spotted in the basket after it had been filled and was brought to the attention of Mrs Hopkins.

[T2]It was one of those chance finds, a fragment of parchment two blocks away and on the other side of the Great Gate from the Christian building. How it got into the debris at that point remains a mystery, and how it happened to be preserved and then discovered is another. Since it was impossible to sift the great mass of the embankment, we depended on the sharp eyes of workmen. A small piece of parchment, dirt brown, appearing in the shovel dirt and dust required good fortune as well as sharp eyes.[/T2]

No. See above.

No texts were found in the christian building.

The deer were on the other side of the river. The mud bricks were a part of the embankment constructed specifically to strengthen the walls against a coming siege, a siege that is so well attested to by the archaeology that a clear relative chronology of events can be outlined, including a number of attempts to undermine the walls before finally a double attack with both a ramp and a tunnel. The site was abandoned after the Persian victory. Though there were 14000 coins found at the site spanning the full occupation, none were found dated after the siege.

How do you rate the existence of Augustus? There are some historical indications that are very secure. By complaining about the only slight exaggeration of 100%, you need to consider that such complaining could be done about any person from antiquity. Would you have any doubts about there having been a battle between the Egyptians and the Hittites that led to a treaty of co-operation between the two nations at the time of Ramses II? The evidence is startling, but I can imagine someone complaining about statements of certainty there. The siege at Dura-Europos in 257 CE is extremely well established.

Several Roman soldiers were killed in an underground battle when their countermining tunnel reached the Persian undermining effort. With the dead soldiers were some coins, the latest being from 256 CE.[Clark Hopkins, "The Siege of Dura", The Classical Journal, Vol. 42, No. 5 (Feb., 1947), p. 255.]

stephan huller

Nice try being reasonable spin but we don't care about for your blasted logic. We want to believe in the fourth century conspiracy theory and no amount of evidence or rational argument is going to change that. Christianity is bad! Bad things come from conspiracies! Therefore Constantine invented Christianity! And that's all there is to it ...

stephan huller

I find it so depressing that there are as many as three people in the world who can something as obvious and irrefutable as the reality of this third century witness to the previous existence of Christianity. If people can deny evidence this unassailable, what's the point of hearing what they have to say on other matters?

I used to know a comedian in Toronto who would go on stage and if he got one laugh and you asked him how his show went he'd say, 'I killed.' This is that comedian times a million. Why do people need Christianity to be refuted by this particular idiotic theory? There are hundred thousand other ways to attack the legitimacy of this religion. Why do these three individuals need to have it done THIS WAY - i.e. a fourth century conspiracy theory? If Christianity was illegitimate in the second century or third century, what difference does it make if there is evidence for the existence of Christianity before the fourth century for the underlying argument for illegitimacy?

Why get fixated on the fourth century? Why not argue for Christianity being created in the sixth century and then deny the existence of Eusebius? Or why not alternative argue that it was created in the same laboratory that 'invented' the moon landing and then argue for a massive invention of books and manuscripts from this same lab?

It's as if someone came up with a crazy theory that JFK had to be assassinated by means of a death ray as opposed to a rifle and you had three hardcore lunatics trolling a JFK discussion group presenting moronic 'questions' all leading to presence of this alleged death ray at the crime scene. What's fucking wrong with these people?