Book of Mormon Evidence: Nephi’s Garden and Tower

Nephi’s Tower and Garden

During a time of wickedness and political turmoil, the prophet Nephi (son of Helaman) went and prayed “upon a tower, which was in the garden of Nephi, which was by the highway which led to the chief market” (Helaman 7:10). The text indicates that the “garden of Nephi” wasn’t simply a generic name for a public garden. Rather the tower “was in his [Nephi’s] garden, which tower was near unto the garden gate by which led the highway.” (Helaman 7:10).

This suggests that Nephi’s tower and garden were part of his personal property, possibly located at his place of residence. When the people saw Nephi praying on his tower, they “came together in multitudes that they might know the cause of so great mourning for the wickedness of the people” (Helaman 7:11). After which Nephi preached and prophesied unto them from his tower.

From these details, the following may be concluded:

• Nephi possessed a walled or fenced residence with a gate (a gate necessarily implies a wall of some sort).
• In or near Nephi’s residence was a garden.
• Nephi possessed a tower structure that was near the gate of his garden.
• Nephi’s tower was prominent enough that he could be seen by multitudes of people, but low enough that he could meaningfully converse with those who gathered to hear him pray.
• A highway was next to Nephi’s tower.
• This highway led to a chief market in Zarahemla (implying that lesser markets were also in or around the city).

Resident Compounds in ancient Mesoamerica

Maya cities and residential compounds were often walled and had specific entrance and exit points that can appropriately be termed as “gates.”¹ Mesoamerican scholar John L. Sorenson has noted that in at least some ancient Mesoamerican cities, “garden areas were cultivated immediately adjacent to single habitation complexes.” Sorenson gave the following examples:

At the archaeological site of El Tajín near the coast of the Gulf of Mexico east of Mexico City are the remains of a city that occupied at least five square kilometers at its maximum period, probably between A.D. 600–900. At that time, the houses of its middle-class people were surrounded by gardens and fruit trees. Likewise, the famous city of Tula, north of the capital of Mexico, was even larger, up to fourteen square kilometers around A.D. 1000–1100, and gardened houselots were common there too.² 

Research at Caracol, Belize likewise indicates that its “households would have been largely self-sufficient because of the fields and gardens that surrounded the residential plazas.”³ Caracol has been described as having a “causeway system” that links together a “constellation of solar markets.”⁴ As defined by one scholar, “Solar market systems consist of a market center serviced by small subsidiary markets located within a single political entity.”⁵ On the east end of many resident compounds was a “mortuary building, shrine, or temple” which was often “one of the highest buildings in any residential group.”⁶ Interestingly, some of Caracol’s “large ‘elite’ households” were associated with outlying market venues and were even directly connected to them “by means of a separate causeway.”⁷ 

This pattern is similar to the often enclosed groups of residential buildings excavated at Chunchucmil, where the compounds “with the tallest pyramids … connect with a sacbe [highway].”⁸ Similarly, a group of buildings outside the city center at Xunantunich has been identified as an elite resident compound based on several features, including “the sacbe [highway] which connects the residential unit to the site core” and the “large pyramidal ancestor shrine on the eastern edge of the central platform complex.”⁹ Just below this particular residential pyramid is a courtyard where people might have naturally congregated before funneling through the highway that led to what some researchers believe may have been a market plaza.¹⁰

Conclusion

As discussed above, researchers generally assume that the large residential compounds which had prominent pyramids and which were near highways were owned by elite members of society. The Book of Mormon’s depiction of Nephi’s residence nicely fits this pattern, seeing that Nephi, who descended from a line of prophets and chief judges, was likely a prominent individual among his people.

The idea that Nephi could have addressed multitudes of people from one of these residential towers is also believable. Mesoamerican scholar Brant A. Gardner has explained, 

Nephi’s tower was almost certainly one of the many low pyramidal structures that archaeologists have found in the majority of Mesoamerican sites from Book of Mormon times on. Those attached to private compounds were lower than the stepped pyramids in public squares used for public rituals, but they were nevertheless similarly constructed, if not nearly so high. Nephi’s tower was low enough to allow easy conversation with the crowd (Hel. 7:12–13). In a family compound, such towers would have been suitable for prayer and communion with God.¹¹ 

Altogether, this picture—of an elite member of society owning a walled residence with a gate, a garden, and a tower, all of which were located near a highway that led to a chief market in a system of markets—fits a Mesoamerican setting remarkably well.