Nathan Davis

Nathan Davis (1812–1882) was a British archaeologist known for his work on the site of Carthage. He published Carthage and her remains.

Early life and background Suggestions that Davis was an American are not now accepted. He was British, born in London of Jewish background, and later became a Christian convert.

Missionary work By his late 20s Davis was working for the London Society for Promoting Christianity Among the Jews (LSPCJ). The association with the Society eventually damaged his reputation, according to Moses Margoliouth. Davis chose to side with Margoliouth and Alexander M'Caul in his approach to missionary work, rather than with the alternative views of Charlotte Elizabeth Tonna and Stanislaus Hoga.

Davis spent a number of years in Northern Africa, at Tunis, as missionary to the Jews. From 1838 to 1843 he was there for the LSPCJ. In his Voice from North Africa (1844), Davis attacked some British supposed philo-Semites, and that cost him his position with the LSPCJ.

In 1844 Davis travelled to Scotland, returning to Tunis as a missionary for the Church of Scotland. He held that position to 1848. He was struggling with the work, however, and having caused offence to the local Jewish community was transferred to missionary work in Gibraltar, in 1849. That mission was closed in 1850, and Davis was moved back to London.

Work for the British Museum

From 1856 to 1858 Davis was engaged on behalf of the British Museum in excavations at Carthage and Utica.

With the backing of Anthony Panizzi, Davis had received British Foreign Office support for his dig, an unusual arrangement. Archaeological work had already been done at Carthage by the Danish consul Christian Tuxen Falbe, and the British consul Thomas Reade. Cases from Davis arrived at the museum in 1857; there were 51 cases received in 1858, and more in 1860. The inscription were worked on by William Sandys Wright Vaux with Emanuel Oscar Menahem Deutsch, a book Inscriptions in the Phoenician Character (1863) by Vaux offering translation into Latin with transcription into the Hebrew alphabet. This transliteration then became standard.

Last years Shortly before his death Davis revisited Tunis. He died in Florence on 6 January 1882 of congestion of the lungs. With Benjamin Davidson, Arabic Reading Lessons, London . Evenings in my Tent, or Wanderings in Balad, Ejjareed, illustrating the … Conditions of various Arab Tribes of the African Sahara, 2 vols., London, 1854. Carthage and her Remains, London, 1861. Ruined Cities within Numidian and Carthaginian Territories, London, 1862.