For Christians, Cana is best known as the place where, according to the Gospel of John (2:1–11), Jesus performed "the first of his signs", his first public miracle, turning a large quantity of water into wine at a wedding feast when the wine provided by the bridegroom had run out. Although none of the other gospels record the event, Christian tradition holds that this is the first public miracle of Jesus.
And there were set there six waterpots of stone, after the manner of the purifying of the Jews, containing two or three firkins apiece. Jesus saith unto them, Fill the waterpots with water. And they filled them up to the brim. And he saith unto them, Draw out now, and bear unto the governor of the feast. And they bare it.
John 2:6-8
In fact there has been much speculation about where Cana might have been. In his 4th century Onomasticon, Eusebius sites it as the village of Cana, about 18 miles from Tyre, and Lebanese Christians venerate the spot. Today most Christians, however, believe that the village of Kafr Cana, now an Arab village about seven kilometres north east of Nazareth, is the site. The first time Kafr Cana is associated with New Testament Cana is in a mid-17th century report to the Pope by Francesco Quaresimo, the papal emissary to Palestine, mainly because it had a church and was on the then-main road from Sepphoris to Tiberias.
However Quaresimo did note in his letter that there were two possible candidates: Kafr Cana and Horvat Cana, the site of this blog post. Some scholars - noting that it was a common practice for new and more affluent and easily accessible sites to be established in place of old ones to accommodate increases in pilgrim traffic, particularly in the late Medieval and Ottoman periods - believe that the identification of Kafr Cana was the result of the decline of Horvat Cana, beginning in the Mamluk period, for which there is some archaeological evidence. Crusader maps and texts from Byzantine and Mediaeval Christian pilgrims have been cited as evidence identifying Horvat Cana with the biblical Cana. A guidebook, The Layout of The Holy Land, written by a certain Theodosius between 517-527 CE, identifies Horvat Cana and indicates that two of the vessels were still at the location (as they were recently found - see below). A pilgrim account written by Saewulf in 1101-1103 CE also identifies the site, as does Belard of Ascoli (c. 1155 CE), and Dominican friar, Burchard of Mount Sion (1283 CE), and a map by noted cartographer Petrus Vesconte in 1321 CE. Burchard of Mount Sion also describes a cave complex located there which was used as a veneration site where "the place is shown at this day where the six water pots stood, and the dining-room where the tables were placed" - again see below.
But whatever the truth of the matter as to whether Horvat Cana is indeed biblical Cana, there is no doubt that it has remains of a Jewish settlement from the Hellenistic to early Arab period. Located on a 100-meter hill on the north side of Netofa valley, some nine kilometres north west of Kafr Cana. Excavated between 1997 and 2008, it was a densely populated, but small, unwalled rural village that relied mainly on agriculture, partially built into the hillsides, resulting in terraced houses on the steep eastern and western slopes of the hill, with larger houses arranged around a courtyard in the flatter areas on the hilltop. There is also a synagogue and several mikves, a later Byzantine complex (possibly a “veneration cave”), and a series of tombs. The synagogue was about 60 x 70 metres, and was excavated revealing monumental columns, cisterns and a stone-paved floor. There some evidence of a monumental building of some kind on the hilltop, perhaps a synagogue, in which a fragment of fresco was found during the excavations of the site.
Illustrative entrance to a cave at Horvat Cana - this one is a tomb. This is not thought to be the "veneration cave," whose precise location has not been widely published by archaeologists for access control reasons.
The “veneration cave” is a series of four connected caves. The main cave has plaster walls and floors, which include graffiti and inscriptions, of which some are Christian. Archaeological evidence shows it was in use as early as the fifth century. The main cave also features benches along the walls, and a possible altar on the north side of the cave, which is partially formed by a sarcophagus lid that features at least one cross. Plastered in place atop the sarcophagus lid were at least two stone vessels (representing the six stone waterpots of the Cana story), with one still in situ, while the imprint of the second vessel remains in the plaster. Carbon dating from inside these caves revealed that the main cave underwent renovation around 1024-1217 (during the period of the Crusades) when a bench was added to the west side of the cave, the floor was plastered, and the walls were re-plastered. This would have been the last phase of considerable use. The altar or table made of the sarcophagus lid with the two stone vessels on its top and space for another four vessels, along with the carbon dating to the time of the Crusaders, provide some evidence that the cave complex may have been used as a reliquary to celebrate Jesus’s turning of water into wine.
Industrial buildings on the edges of the village include facilities for breeding doves, fabric dying, and glass making, as well as olive presses, and there are dozens of water cisterns. Finds at the site include pottery from nearby Shikhin and Kfar Hananya, as well as Hasmonean coins and an Aramaic-inscribed pottery shard. A lack of coinage from the late 4th to early 5th centuries may indicate a decline in settlement, but the town shows signs of renewed growth during the Late Byzantine period (late 5th to 7th centuries). The latest date for a coin found at Khirbet Qana is 613, and it was likely abandoned during the first half of the 7th century, during which time Galilee underwent the Persian invasion and re-conquest, prior to the Arab conquest in 639. The hilltop, however, was again occupied most likely from the late 7th century through the early 8th century, as evidenced by Arab pottery found across the area, as well as renovations to the public building, and an early Islamic fragment of pottery. There is also some evidence of an Arab village and a church or monastery which were uncovered immediately south of the cave complex at Horvat Ragma.
Below is a slide show of the ruins - hover over each picture to see the caption.
Such ruins as those at Horvat Cana are harder to see in the spring, when there is such lush foliage. On the other hand, the weather is kinder for exploring what are , later in the year, parched sites, and the flora and fauna are a joy in themselves, as can be seen from the following slideshow.
