THE TOMB NEXT DOOR: AN UPDATE TO “STATISTICAL
ANALYSIS OF AN ARCHEOLOGICAL FIND”
By Andrey Feuerverger
University of Toronto
In June of 2010 access via robotic means was obtained to a tomb
adjacent to the one studied in Feuerverger [Ann. Appl. Stat. 2 (2008)
3–54]. In this update, we lay out and attempt to interpret the remark-
able findings from this second tomb and comment on the statistical
and scientific significance of these new data and of their possible in-
ferential connections to the data from the first tomb. Readers are
then invited to formulate their own conclusions.
1. Introduction and summary. The purpose of this article is to update
the discussion in Feuerverger (2008) (hereafter AF08) concerning a certain
tomb (hereafter Tomb 1) in the East Talpiot suburb of Jerusalem in light
of recent additional findings. We refer the reader also to the Discussion, as
well as to the Rejoinder, of the mentioned paper.
The tomb studied in AF08 contained ten ossuaries, of which six bore in-
scriptions of names that, while mostly common, were reminiscent of the New
Testament (NT) family. In that paper, the archeological context, background
on the practice of ossuary interment, the onomasticon of the era, as well as
some historical and genealogical information, were laid out in some detail.
There, a “historical” approach was adopted which, in particular, meant that
the possible existence of a NT tomb site in the vicinity of Jerusalem was
not viewed as being implausible.1 It was then computed—under various
sets of assumptions which are far from universally agreed upon—that the
probabilities (under random assignment of names from the onomasticon) of
drawing a tomb site as closely matching to the NT family as the one at
THE TOMB NEXT DOOR: AN UPDATE TO “STATISTICALANALYSIS OF AN ARCHEOLOGICAL FIND”By Andrey FeuervergerUniversity of TorontoIn June of 2010 access via robotic means was obtained to a tombadjacent to the one studied in Feuerverger [Ann. Appl. Stat. 2 (2008)3–54]. In this update, we lay out and attempt to interpret the remark-able findings from this second tomb and comment on the statisticaland scientific significance of these new data and of their possible in-ferential connections to the data from the first tomb. Readers arethen invited to formulate their own conclusions.1. Introduction and summary. The purpose of this article is to updatethe discussion in Feuerverger (2008) (hereafter AF08) concerning a certaintomb (hereafter Tomb 1) in the East Talpiot suburb of Jerusalem in lightof recent additional findings. We refer the reader also to the Discussion, aswell as to the Rejoinder, of the mentioned paper.The tomb studied in AF08 contained ten ossuaries, of which six bore in-scriptions of names that, while mostly common, were reminiscent of the NewTestament (NT) family. In that paper, the archeological context, backgroundon the practice of ossuary interment, the onomasticon of the era, as well assome historical and genealogical information, were laid out in some detail.There, a “historical” approach was adopted which, in particular, meant thatthe possible existence of a NT tomb site in the vicinity of Jerusalem wasnot viewed as being implausible.1 It was then computed—under various
sets of assumptions which are far from universally agreed upon—that the
probabilities (under random assignment of names from the onomasticon) of
drawing a tomb site as closely matching to the NT family as the one at
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