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Arch-fi (or Fantastic Archaeology) refers to a series of theories developed outside (or against) the canons of critical archaeology.

Overview

Unsubstantiated claims of newly found historical documents or overt forgery have affected the field of Biblical Studies since its inception. These Modern Apocrypha offered alternative views and new meanings to familiar events and familiar characters, while longing for scholarly attention.

A new phenomenon, however, occurred at the end of the 19th century, when some ancient or new legends about the past exited the real of fiction and began to be developed in scholarly form, as if they were genuine historical facts. The new genre of Fantastic Archaeology (arch-fi) was born. What all arch-fi theories have in common is a total disregard for, if not an overt opposition against, the rules of the historical method. Instead of testing the evidence to see what hypotheses it fits, Arch-fi frames the archaeological data to fit the "desired conclusion."

The book Atlantis: The Antediluvian World (1882) by Ignatius L. Donnelly is regarded as the first example of Fantastic Archaeology; its extraordinary success inspired the publication of similar works. In 1894 Notovitich claimed to have found written evidence that Jesus lived in India. Notovitch's work prompted a revival of the theory that Jesus survived the crucifixion and consequently, went (or returned) to India and died there. The theory was largely exploited in Anti-Semitic circles and by Nazism as evidence that Jesus was an Aryan, persecuted as such by the inferior Jewish race; see Der ewige Jude (1940 Hippler), film. Not accidentally, the two major non-fiction books to revive the Jesus Survival Hypothesis after the Second World War and the Holocaust, namely, The Nazarene Gospel Restored (1953) by Robert Graves and The Passover Plot (1965) by Hugh J. Schonfield, were very careful to distant themselves from racial theories, emphasizing the Jewishness of Jesus.

In the 1970s The Jesus Scroll (1972 Joyce), arch-fi initiated a new trend by claiming that Jesus had a wife or fathered a child. The work also introduced as a historical fact the idea of a conspiracy by Church authorities to hide the true nature of Christianity. In the 1970s it also became popular to take some biblical events as evidence for the presence of aliens on earth; see Alien Jesus.

In the 1980s, such beliefs developed in more and more elaborated theories. In 1982 Holy Blood, Holy Grail by Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh, and Henry Lincoln connected theories about the marriage of Jesus and Church conspiracy, with the legend of the Holy Grail. The book claimed that Jesus of Nazareth married Mary Magdalene, had children and started a royal dynasty championed today by a secret society called the Priory of Sion.

In the 1990s it was the delay in the publication of the Dead Sea Scrolls that generated a new wave of non-fiction literature speculating on the conspiracy by the Vatican to hide material that could have a devastating effect of the credibility of the Christian faith.

The 2000s have seen an unprecedented spread of Fantastic Archaeology. The Internet, the world-wide success of the Da Vinci Code and the general fascination for conspiratory theories, have popularized the genre and prepared the setting for some sensational (and soon forgotten) events, such as the premiere in 2007 of the documentary on The Jesus Family Tomb, which promised nothing less than the rediscovery of the tomb of Jesus and his family.

Gabriele Boccaccini, University of Michigan.