The mysteries of Golgotha in the light of archaeology

Excavations at Roman quarries. Photo: UOJ

According to established church tradition, around 326 the mother of Emperor Constantine, the holy empress Helena, arrived in Jerusalem with the intention of finding the sites of Christ's Passion and the Life-Giving Cross. But none of the then-inhabitants of Jerusalem knew the place of the Crucifixion. After numerous searches, Helena was directed to a Jew named Judas, who for a long time refused to reveal the location, but after torture finally disclosed it.

By order of the empress, the pagan shrine erected by the Romans on Golgotha was dismantled, and during the excavations the burial place of Jesus was discovered along with three crosses: that of Christ and those of the two thieves crucified with Him, as well as the inscription tablet of Pilate and the nails. Since it was impossible to determine which of the three crosses had belonged to the Savior, the Bishop of Jerusalem, Macarius, proposed to test them by a miracle: according to one version, the crosses were applied in turn to a gravely ill woman, who was healed by the touch of one of them; according to another, the true Cross raised a dead man to life.

Judas, who had revealed the location of Golgotha, was baptized under the name Cyriacus and subsequently even became a bishop. After this, the discovered Wood was recognized as the Cross of Christ. According to tradition, part of the relic was left in Jerusalem, part was sent by Helena to Constantine, and the nails that were found were used in the imperial regalia and the horse's bridle. Church tradition associates this event with the beginning of a special universal veneration of the discovered Cross and the subsequent feast of the Exaltation.

It is a very beautiful story, but, alas, not a single source contemporary with these events contains such an account.

The Imperial Mission of Empress Helena

The primary source of information about these events is Eusebius of Caesarea's "Life of Constantine." It is a rather contradictory source. On the one hand, Eusebius was a contemporary of the events, lived in Palestine, was well acquainted with Constantine's activities in the East, and described the events in Jerusalem in detail. On the other hand, Eusebius can in a certain sense be called a court panegyrist of Constantine, who went to great lengths to emphasize the piety of the emperor and his family. His work cannot be called impartial. But it is precisely for this reason that the absence from his account of the story of the finding of the Cross is especially conspicuous.

Eusebius describes in detail how, by Constantine's order, the pagan structure was dismantled, the stones and earth were removed, and the site was cleared. After this, a tomb hewn in the rock was revealed, which was recognized as the place of Christ's burial and Resurrection. However, Eusebius says nothing about the Cross.

Eusebius describes Helena's journey in considerable detail, but does not connect it with the excavations in Jerusalem, much less with the finding of the Cross of Christ. According to him, the elderly empress set out for the East to venerate the holy places, but her journey was not limited to pilgrimage. She visited cities, distributed money to the population and the troops, helped the poor, freed prisoners, and recalled those who had been exiled. This was entirely in keeping with the tradition of consolidating the authority of the imperial house in the Roman provinces.

There is yet another version explaining the motive for the journey: the family tragedy of 326, when by Constantine's order his son Crispus and his wife Fausta were killed (Constantine's guilt in his wife's death is not considered fully proven). This version presents Helena's journey to the East as a kind of penitential mission, but there are no direct sources to confirm it.

Eusebius connects Helena's journey with the construction of churches in Bethlehem and on the Mount of Olives. However, neither Eusebius nor any other author contemporary with the events states that Helena went to Palestine specifically to search for the Cross or the Holy Sepulchre, or that she even participated in this. It is only said that the presumed place of Christ's burial was uncovered by order of Constantine, while the finding of the Cross is not mentioned at all.

Three Hundred Years of Golgotha's Silence

Between the crucifixion of Christ and the excavations in Jerusalem, approximately three centuries passed. Over those three centuries, Jerusalem endured wars, destruction, and a radical transformation of its urban environment.

In 70, as a result of the First Jewish War, the Roman army under the command of Titus captured Jerusalem. The Temple was completely destroyed, and all of Jerusalem was reduced to ruins. There are reports that the Temple Mount was ploughed up. Josephus Flavius claims that during the siege 1.1 million people perished, and although modern historians consider this figure exaggerated, the number of casualties was enormous. The Christian community of Jerusalem, according to Eusebius, had relocated to the town of Pella in Jordan even before the war began.

A few decades later came the Bar Kokhba revolt, which was suppressed by Emperor Hadrian in 135. On the site of Jerusalem a Roman colony was established — Aelia Capitolina. Jews were forbidden not only to enter Jerusalem but even to look upon it from a distance. The city was actively rebuilt according to a new plan; Roman structures were erected, including pagan temples. The Roman historian Cassius Dio, who lived in the late second and early third century, explicitly speaks of a new city being built on the site of the destroyed Jerusalem.

Around the same time Christians returned to Jerusalem, but these were no longer Jews but former pagans of other nationalities. In 135 Mark became bishop of Aelia Capitolina — the first bishop of this community drawn from the pagans.

Around 314, even before Constantine's works in Jerusalem, Eusebius of Caesarea wrote in his geographical reference work on biblical sites, the "Onomasticon": "Golgotha — the place of the Skull, where Christ was crucified; it is still shown in Jerusalem to the north of Mount Zion." That is, at the beginning of the fourth century there existed a local tradition associating a particular place in Aelia Capitolina with the Crucifixion of Christ. But whether this tradition was continuous from apostolic times, and whether it pointed to the very location where the Church of the Resurrection later arose, cannot be established.

A separate question arises: what might have happened to the Cross itself during those 300 years after the Crucifixion?

Here the popular church version encounters yet another difficulty. The Roman cross was not a unique object crafted individually for each condemned person and then preserved together with his body or somewhere nearby. The practice of crucifixion varied across different periods and places. But the construction consisting of a vertical post (stipes) and a crossbeam (patibulum) is well known.

As a rule, the condemned carried only the crossbeam to the place of execution, while the vertical posts remained fixed in the ground. But even the crossbeam was typically used multiple times, all the more so because timber in Judea was scarce and therefore quite valuable. In the first through third centuries, crucifixions in Jerusalem were carried out on a considerable scale. The Jewish historian Josephus Flavius writes that during the siege of 70 the Romans crucified up to five hundred people a day, and sometimes more. According to him, the number of victims became so great that "there was no room for the crosses, and no crosses for the bodies."

The First Testimonies of the Jerusalem Relic

Be that as it may, already approximately twenty years after the excavations on the site of the present Church of the Resurrection, a relic venerated as the Cross of Christ undoubtedly existed in Jerusalem. Around 350, Saint Cyril of Jerusalem repeatedly mentions the "holy Wood of the Cross" and states that its fragments had spread throughout the world: "The whole world is filled with fragments of the wood of the Cross."

A few decades later, the pilgrim Egeria describes in detail the veneration of the Wood on Good Friday. The bishop held the relic, deacons kept watch over it, and the faithful came forward to kiss it. Egeria even recounts the story of a pilgrim who once managed to bite off a piece of the wood, after which the relic was guarded with particular care. She already writes that the Cross was "found," and connects this with the consecration of Constantine's church complex of the Holy Sepulchre. But Egeria likewise contains no account familiar to us of Helena and the three crosses.

The Birth of the Later Hagiographic Legend

The first versions of the legend familiar to us appear around 395, that is, seventy years after the events. Ambrose of Milan recounts that it was Helena who searched for the Cross, that she found it together with the nails, and that the Cross of Christ was identified by the titulus of Pilate. One of the nails, according to him, was placed in the imperial diadem, and another in the bridle of Constantine's horse.

Around the same time, Sulpicius Severus already speaks of three crosses and the miracle of raising a dead man to life. Similar versions soon appear in Rufinus, and later in Socrates Scholasticus and Sozomen.

In Socrates the account is already very close to the later hagiographic version: Helena comes to Jerusalem, orders excavations to begin, in the course of which three crosses and the tablet of Pilate are discovered. Bishop Macarius then applies the crosses to a dying woman, and one of them heals her. Socrates himself, however, omits certain details and notes that he heard all this from someone else, but that the information is common knowledge.

And finally, in the mid-fifth century Sozomen introduces a version about a certain Jew who learned the location of Golgotha from documents passed down in his family. Still later, this unnamed figure becomes Judas-Cyriacus, who somehow knew the location of the Cross but was unwilling to reveal it. The devout Christians then subjected him to torture, after which he indicated the place of Golgotha. Upon witnessing the miracle of healing (or resurrection), he was baptized and subsequently became a bishop.

Some researchers allow that during the excavations on the site of Golgotha wood may have been found and recognized as the Cross of Christ; others consider it impossible to speak of the origin of the relic about whose veneration Cyril of Jerusalem wrote in 350.

Archaeology beneath the Vaults of the Church

The most cautious reconstruction of the events of the fourth century looks as follows: under Constantine, the site of the present Church of the Resurrection was indeed cleared. Beneath the Roman construction an ancient burial complex was discovered, along with a tomb hewn in the rock, which local Christians recognized as the Holy Sepulchre. Beyond these facts, and the further fact that in 350 a venerated relic of the Cross existed in Jerusalem, nothing can be asserted with confidence.

It should be noted that some scholars have proposed alternative locations for Golgotha and the Holy Sepulchre. Near the old city of Jerusalem there are indeed several places that might fit the Gospel description. Nevertheless, the traditional location of Golgotha has more arguments in favor of its authenticity. Modern excavations strengthen this conviction still further.

Research confirms that the site of the present church was originally a quarry. After quarrying ceased, certain parts of it were used for gardens and burials. By the time of Christ, the former quarry was already being used as a burial ground. It lay outside the city wall, which corresponds to the Gospel account of the execution and burial of Jesus outside the city. Rock-hewn tombs were indeed present here as well.

Archaeologists have examined the remains of Roman-period structures that blocked access to the tomb subsequently venerated. Parts of the foundation of a cultic complex from the time of Hadrian were discovered, dismantled during the Constantinian construction. This accords with the account of Eusebius of Caesarea, who states that a pagan structure did indeed stand over the site of the future Christian church and was demolished by order of Constantine.

The finds confirm that an ancient quarry once stood here; subsequently part of the territory was used for agriculture and burials; later the site came to lie within Roman Aelia Capitolina; and in the fourth century it was completely reorganized under Constantine the Great.

Particularly interesting was the discovery of traces of an ancient garden. Archaeologists uncovered low stone walls enclosing plots of cultivated soil, and analysis of the earth and pollen revealed traces of grapevines and olive trees. Nearby were rock-hewn tombs. The result is a landscape that corresponds quite well to the words of the Gospel of John: "Now in the place where he was crucified there was a garden, and in the garden a new tomb" (John 19:41).

However, modern archaeology cannot establish who exactly was buried in a particular tomb at this site, and provides no data that would confirm the discovery of the Cross of Christ here.

The Silence of the Earliest Christian Community

Here one of the most intriguing questions of early Christian history arises. On the one hand, we have numerous testimonies from that era showing that already in the second century Pascha was a firmly established church feast: Polycarp of Smyrna and the Roman bishop Anicetus were already disputing the day of its celebration, Melito of Sardis wrote a special paschal homily, and by the end of the second century the question of the date of Pascha was being discussed at councils, including with the participation of Bishop Narcissus of Jerusalem. Eusebius of Caesarea describes these disputes in detail in his "Ecclesiastical History."

On the other hand, around the same time Christians were commemorating in prayer specific places associated with martyrs. The "Martyrdom of Polycarp" reports that his remains were gathered, placed in a particular location, and that the anniversary of his martyrdom was celebrated there each year. Around 200, the Roman Christian Gaius could point out the "trophies" of the apostles Peter and Paul on the Ostian Road and on the site of the present Vatican.

Against this background, the absence of evidence for the veneration of Golgotha and the Holy Sepulchre is especially striking. We know that the Jerusalem church existed, that it celebrated Pascha, and that interest in the places of Christ's earthly life was gradually growing. Around 314, Eusebius even writes in the "Onomasticon" that Golgotha "is still shown" in Aelia.

They assess the reasons for this silence differently, but agree on one point: the picture familiar to later Christianity of the veneration of Golgotha and the Holy Sepulchre from apostolic times is not confirmed by the historical sources of the first three centuries.

In the next publication we will attempt to explain this paradox, and also to answer the question: why did Constantine at the beginning of the fourth century find it necessary to begin clearing the site associated with Golgotha and the Holy Sepulchre, and why did the tradition of venerating the Cross arise?

Read also