Credit must be given to two books mentioned in the text:Masada: Herod’s Fortress and the Zealots’ Last Stand by Yigael Yadin, George Weidenfeld & Nicolson Limited, 1966;The Jesus Scrol by Donovan Joyce, Dial Press, 1973.

Last, but far from least, heartfelt thanks to my editor, Nan Graham. Her advice madeCross Bones a far better book. Thanks also to my editor across the pond, Susan Sandon.

And, of course, to Jennifer Rudolph Walsh, Co-Head of the Worldwide Literary Department, Executive Vice President, and one of the first two women appointed to the Board of Directors of the Wil iam Morris Agency. Way to go, girl! Thanks for hanging in as my agent.

For Susanne Kirk, editor, Scribner, 1975–2004

and

For Dr. James Woodward, chancel or,

University of North Carolina at Charlotte, 1989–2005

Thanks for the years of support and encouragement.

Enjoy your retirements!

Depart from evil, and do good. Seek peace, and pursue it.

—Jewish Holy Scripture,

Psalm 34:14

The fruit of righteousness is sown in peace for them that make peace.

—New Testament, James 3:18

And make not Al ah because of your swearing (by him) an obstacle to your doing good and guarding (against evil) and making peace between men, and Al ah is Hearing, Knowing.

—Koran 2:224

The Facts

• From 1963 to 1965, Masada, site of a first-century Jewish revolt against the Romans, was excavated by Israeli archaeologist Yigael Yadin and a team of international volunteers. Yadin’s workers recovered the fragmentary and commingled remains of approximately twenty-five skeletons from a cave complex, designated Loci 2001/2002, located below the casement wal at the southern tip of the summit. Unlike other human remains found within the main complex of ruins at the northern end of Masada, these bones were not immediately reported to the press.

In the 1990s, a photo surfaced of a single intact skeleton that was also recovered from Loci 2001/2002 during the 1963 to 1965 excavation. That skeleton was never mentioned or described by the project’s physical anthropologist, Nicu Haas. It was not discussed by Yadin in his published reports or interviews.

* Formal field notes were not kept during the Masada excavation, but oral briefings took place regularly between Yadin and his staff. Transcripts of these sessions are archived at the Mount Scopus Campus of Hebrew University. Pages covering the period of the discovery and clearing of Loci 2001/2002

are missing.

* Neither the bones from the twenty-five commingled individuals, nor the articulated skeleton, nor the contents of Loci 2001/2002, are described in the six volumes of the final Masada excavation publication.

* Though Nicu Haas was in possession of the bones for more than five years, he published nothing on the commingled individuals or on the complete skeleton recovered at Loci 2001/2002. Haas’s handwritten notes, including a ful bone inventory, indicate he never received the complete skeleton.