Mary's Well
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Mary’s Well is reputed to be the site where the Angel Gabriel appeared to the Virgin Mary, and announced that she would bear the Son of God - an event known as the Annunciation.
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[edit] In The New Testament
The earliest written account that lends credence to this view comes from the New Testament, where the Gospel of Luke (1:26-38 ) describes an event which took place in “a city of Galilee named Nazareth” .
The author writes: “And she took the pitcher and went forth to draw water, and behold, a voice said: ‘Hail Mary, full of grace, you are blessed among women.’” The Gospel of Matthew, Gospel of Mark and Gospel of John do not mention a well in their accounts of the Annunciation. Similarly, the Koran records a spirit visiting a chaste Mary to inform her that the Lord has granted her a son to bear, though it does not mention this event as occurring while she is drawing water.
[edit] Through History
There is an underground spring in Nazareth that had traditionally served as the city’s main water source for several centuries, possibly millennia. While the current structure referred to as Mary's Well is a non-functional reconstruction inauguarated as part of the Nazareth 2000 celebrations, the traditional Mary's Well was a local watering hole, with an overground stone structure. Through the centuries, villagers would gather here to fill water pitchers, up until 1966. At another area not too far off, which tapped into the same water source, shepherds and others with domesticated animals would bring herds to drink.
St. Gabriel’s Greek Orthodox Church, located a little further up the hill from the current site of Mary's Well, is a Byzantine era church built over the spring in 3CE, based on the belief that the Annunciation took place at the site. The Catholic Church believes the Annuciation to have take place less than 0.5km away at the Basilica of the Annunciation, a now modern structure which houses an older church inside of it that dates from 4CE.
[edit] Recent Archaeological Discoveries
Excavations by Yardenna Alexandre and Butrus Hanna of the Israel Antiquities Authority in 1997-98 - sponsored by the Nazareth Municipality and the Government Tourist Corporation - discovered a series of underground water systems and suggested that the site today known as Mary’s Well served as Nazareth's main water supply from as early as Byzantine times. Despite having found Roman era potsherds, Alexandre's report claimed hard evidence of Roman-era use of the site was lacking. [1]
In the late 1990s, a local Nazareth couple, Elias and Martina Shama, were trying to discover the source of a water leak in their gift shop just in front of Mary’s Well. After digging through the wall, they discovered underground passages that, upon further digging revealed a vast underground complex. According to Under Nazareth, Secrets in Stone (Dec 17, 2002, International Herald Tribune): [2]
- “Shama called in the Antiquities Authority whose officers told him he had found an Ottoman bathhouse, little more than a century old and of minimal interest. So Shama continued digging out the storage room and the cellar under his shop. After three years Shama had unearthed a beautiful high-vaulted room where he offered visitors coffee before guiding them through the hypocaust, the underfloor heating channels, to see the remains of a white marble floor supported by tile columns meeting in a complex array of arches.
- The story might have ended there but for Shama's unshakable conviction that his discovery was no legacy from the Turkish invaders. A deeply religious Christian Arab, he was plagued by dreams of Jesus sitting in his bathhouse. He visited neighboring ancient sites to make comparisons. The Antiquities Authority's verdict seemed more and more implausible to him.
- He found an ally in a senior archaeologist, Tzvi Shacham of Tel Aviv's Antiquities Museum, who visited the shop and advised the authority that Shama had found a much rarer bathhouse, from the Crusader period and some 1,000 years old.” [3]
A North American research team conducted high-resolution ground penetrating radar (GPR) surveys at a number of locations in and around Mary’s Well in 2004-5 to determine appropriate locations for further digging to be conducted beneath the Crusader-era bathhouse. Samples were collected for radio-carbon dating and the initial data from GPR readings seem to confirm the presence of additional subterranean structures. [4]
In 2003, archaeologist Richard Freund stated his belief that the site was clearly of Roman-era origins: ""I am sure that what we have here is a bathhouse from the time of Jesus," he says, "and the consequences of that for archaeology, and for our knowledge of the life of Jesus, are enormous."[5]
[edit] References
- ^ Excavations at Mary’s Well, Nazareth.. Israeli Antiquities Authority.. Retrieved on cached version: 30 May 2006.
- ^ Cook, Jonathan. (17 December 2002.). Under Nazareth, Secrets in Stone.. International Herald Tribune..
- ^ Cook, Jonathan. (17 December 2002.). Under Nazareth, Secrets in Stone.. International Herald Tribune..
- ^ Jol, Harry M. et al.. Nazareth Excavations: A GPR Perspective.. Drew University, NJ.. Retrieved on 4 July 2006.
- ^ Cook, Jonathon (22 October 2003). Is This Where Jesus Bathed?. The Guardian.
