Abstract
Recent studies attempting to deal with the 'bytdwd/House of David' inscription have revealed madequacies in the knowledge of the theory of theory formation pertaining to historical research on the part of their authors. A detailed analysis of the palaeographical basis for dating the inscriptions previously found on the site shows that they cannot be used for dating purposes, if they were so used, they would more likely point to the eighth century than to any other time Finally, an analysis of the palaeographical study by Josef Tropper shows that he has recognized a number of the problems of the earlier treatments. Tropper remains, however, under the Spell of the publishers' claim of a ninth-century provenance for the inscription, with the ironical result that the types identified by him do not even agree with the tabula scriptorum in his own 1993 study of the Syrian-Phoenician inscriptions. A ninth-century date cannot be maintained on the basis of inscriptional finds.
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