Footnotes

1. The English word 'ark' is derived from the Latin arca, meaning 'box' or 'chest'. It is used to translate two distinct Hebrew words: aron, meaning 'box' or 'chest', and applying to the ark of the covenant and tebah, meaning 'boat', and applying to Noah's Ark and the ark of bulrushes. However, in the New Testament the same Greek word kibotos, meaning 'box' or 'chest is used of both (Heb. 9:4;11:7).

2. The Sign and the Seal - A Quest for the Lost Ark of the Covenant, Graham Hancock, William Heinemann, 1992.

3. This feast appears to be the Ethiopian equivalent of Epiphany, from the Greek for 'manifestation', the name given to the feast which celebrates the manifestation of the infant Jesus to the Wise Men, or, in the Eastern Church, the baptism of Jesus.

4. Archbishop David Matthew, Ethiopia, London, 1947, p. 12. Cited by Hancock, op. at., p. 254.

5. Professor Edward Ullendorff, "Hebraic-Jewish Elements in Abyssinian (Monophysite) Christianity", Journal of Semitic Studies, Vol. 1, No. 3,1956, pp. 235-6. Cited by Hancock, op. cit., p. 254.

6. Ibid., p. 227. Cited by Hancock, op. cit., p. 255, with added emphasis.

7. Bezalel Porten, Archives from Elephantine: The Life of an Ancient Jewish Military Colony. University of California Press, 1968, pp. 121-2. Cited by Hancock, op. cit., p. 441.

8. Wars of the Jews, Book V, chapter 5.5.

9. Ready to Rebuild: The Imminent Plan to Rebuild the Last Days Temple, Thomas Ice and Randall Price, Harvest House, Oregon, 1992.