Abstract
The Nazareth Inscription is a Greek inscription on a marble tablet measuring approximately 24 inches by 15 inches. The exact time and place of its discovery is not known. In 1878 it became an addition to the private Frohner Collection of ancient inscriptions and manuscripts, but the details of its acquisition are unknown. Froehner's inventory of this Inscription simply states: "This marble was sent from Nazareth in 1878." This is all that is known about the time and place of its discovery. (Cumont 241-242, Zelueta 1-2) While Froehner did make a Greek transcription of this uncial Inscription in his collection, he never published it, and the contents of the Nazareth Inscription remained unknown to the scholarly world for more than fifty years. In 1925 the Frohner Collection was acquired by the Paris National Library, where the Nazareth Inscription was rediscovered and read by M. Rostovtzeff told his friend, the French scholar M. Franz Cumont about this Inscription in the Paris National Library. (Cumont 241-242) With the encouragement of Rostovtzeff, Cumont published a Greek transcription and a translation of the Nazareth Inscription with a commentary in his article Un Rescrit Imperial Sur La Violation De Sepulture in the French journal Reveu Historique, CLXII, in 1930. The Nazareth Inscription took the scholarly world by storm because it could be read as an imperial decree against the Apostles stealing Christ's body from His tomb and faking His resurrection. It is very similar to the Jewish version of the resurrection of Christ as found in Matthew 28:11-15.