No Room at the Inn…What Inn?

by Dwight Longenecker

The typical re-telling of the Christmas story has Joseph, Mary and the donkey arriving in Bethlehem on a cold, winter night looking for a place to stay. All the hotels have “No Vacancy” signs on display because so many people, like Mary and Joseph, have traveled to Bethlehem to register for the census.

A grumpy innkeeper turns them away, but on second thought says if they want they can shelter in the stables. By now Mary is experiencing contractions and desperate for a place where she can give birth, Joseph finds a makeshift shelter in a drafty shed with the donkeys and oxen. He fills a rickety wooden feeding trough with straw to make a crib for the newborn, and when baby Jesus arrives he is wrapped tightly in strips of cloth and laid in the manger bed.

Is that how it happened? No, not really, and yes, but not quite. Was there an inn in Bethlehem? Probably not, as it was such a small village. Where did travelers stay in those times? In her study of travel in the ancient world Sabine Huebner records that along the official Roman roads, spaced about ten miles apart, there was a network of relay stations called mutationes. The relay stations were places to change horses and pack animals.

Spaced about 25 miles apart were mansiones — guesthouses that offered free accommodation for officially…