New Archaeological Discoveries Beneath the Holy Sepulchre Strengthen the Case for Jerusalem’s Traditional Tomb of Christ

New archaeological discoveries beneath the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem are shedding important new light on one of the oldest and most disputed questions in Christian archaeology: whether the traditional site of Christ’s crucifixion, burial, and Resurrection is historically credible.

The discoveries do not provide an inscription identifying the tomb as that of Jesus, nor do they constitute definitive proof that the tomb preserved within the Holy Sepulchre is the tomb in which Jesus was buried. What they do provide, however, is a remarkably detailed picture of the landscape that existed beneath the church during the first century. That landscape—a disused quarry subsequently used for cultivation and burial—fits important elements of the Gospel accounts and provides new archaeological context for the traditional identification of the site.

The excavations, directed by Francesca Romana Stasolla of the Sapienza University of Rome, have been conducted since 2022 as part of restoration work involving the floor of the Basilica of the Holy Sepulchre. The preliminary results of the 2025 campaign have now been published in Liber Annuus, the archaeological journal of the Studium Biblicum Franciscanum in Jerusalem. The research represents the culmination of investigations in several areas of the complex and provides a broader topographical reconstruction of the site.

Did Saint Porphyrios Reveal the Location of the Lost Tomb of Alexander the Great?

In 2017 a book titled Venerable Porphyrios (Testimonies - Teachings - Counsels) was published in Greek, consisting of various testimonies of visitors and spiritual children of Saint Porphyrios of Kavsokalyva (+ December 2, 1991). According to one testimony recorded in this book, Saint Porphyrios even indicated where he believed the remains of Alexander the Great are located. This is what the testimony says:

"One day we went to visit him, and the Elder told us that with the gift he had since he was a young child, he could distinguish from far away the location of sources of water, holy relics, ancient temples and ancient tombs. Even regarding the tomb of Alexander the Great, he would tell us that it is neither in Egypt nor where they are looking, but it is here in Greece, in ancient Dion, and specifically in Katerini in Kontariotissa, next to the old church of the Panagia."