Mystery of inscription found under patio slab

A homeowner is searching for answers after an obscure inscription was found written underneath a stone slab in his garden patio.

Builders made the discovery while working on the 300-year-old home of John Adams in Norbury, Shropshire.

Mr Adams shared a photograph on social media to try to work out what the text might say with several people suggesting it was in Hebrew.

"It was obviously significant to the person who wrote on it because they spent time and effort to write something and quite a number of words," he said.

Mr Adams, who works for the National Trust, said his house was located on a road that was once a major travelling route.

"It was an inn previously. It was also a pub," he said. "Maybe it was [written by] somebody who happened to be passing through or staying here."

He believes the slab to have laid undisturbed in his garden for a long time.

"It was laid on a bed of lime mortar so it's old mortar, it’s not been done recently and it's on local stone," he added.

"Norbury stone is very easily identifiable because of the types of fossils that are within it."

Several people on X suggested the text might be Hebrew, which consists of 22 letters and is written from right to left.

"The letters in the alphabet were completely obscure to us," he said. "I went on X – someone said it's Hebrew and your picture is upside down."

He said he had wondered whether the inscription might form part of a gravestone, a monument, or a religious comment.

"It has to have meaning. I think fundamentally it has to have meaning - it's not random or a piece of graffiti," he said. "It meant something to somebody."

Experts at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem have been contacted to see if they can translate the stone.

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