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FROM CHARLES WARREN, “INSCRIPTIONS AND MASONS’ MARK S,” PALESTINE EXPLORATION FUND QUARTERLY 2 (1870), P. 327

NABATEAN FUNERARY INSCRIPTION. This Nabatean funerary inscription was discovered in 1868 near the site of Umm er-Rasas and dates to the first century C.E. In 1871, Shapira showed a forged granite copy of this inscription to Henry Lumley, who was visiting Jerusalem from England, and claimed it came from Moab and dated to the time of Moses—more than a millennium earlier than its actual date. Emanuel Deutsch of the British Museum recognized the inscription and exposed Shapira’s copy as a forgery.