The Book of Mormon gives Zarahemla a relative setting among Nephite lands and the Sidon River, but it does not identify a modern site. The Church takes no position on specific locations. An Iowa settlement was named Zarahemla in 1841 under D&C 125; that namesake does not establish the ancient city was in Iowa. Mesoamerican and Heartland maps remain proposals with different strengths and unresolved identification evidence.
There is no agreed archaeological identification of ancient Zarahemla. The Book of Mormon describes relationships among places, and researchers have proposed maps that fit some of those details. D&C 125 names a settlement the Saints were directed to build in Iowa in 1841. To identify the ancient city, a proposed location needs independent evidence tying it to the city in the text. Church, Book of Mormon Geography · D&C 125:1–4
We don’t know its modern location. The Book of Mormon gives us places in relation to one another. In Omni, Mosiah’s people leave the land of Nephi, travel through wilderness, and meet the people of Zarahemla. Alma 2 puts the valley of Gideon east of the river Sidon and describes a fight at a river crossing as Alma’s army returns toward Zarahemla. Alma 22 describes a strip of wilderness separating the land of Zarahemla from the Lamanite king’s lands. A proposed map needs to fit those relationships. Matching one river or valley gives researchers a place to look. Omni 1:12–19 · Alma 2:15, 25–35 · Alma 22:27–34
The Church places Book of Mormon events in the ancient Americas and takes no official position on specific locations. There are several published maps. A map drawn to fit the text and an agreed identification of the city are different things. Church, Book of Mormon Geography · BYU Studies, Book of Mormon Geographies
In 1841, the revelation directed the Saints to build a city across the Mississippi River from Nauvoo and name it Zarahemla. The Joseph Smith Papers documents the settlement near present-day Montrose, Iowa, and records that the name was taken from the Book of Mormon. The instruction is about building and naming a settlement in Joseph Smith’s time. It makes no claim about what stood on that land in antiquity. D&C 125:1–4 · Joseph Smith Papers, 1841 revelation and historical introduction
Santa Rosa, Chiapas. John L. Sorenson proposed that the city was at Santa Rosa on the Grijalva River. He treated the Grijalva as Sidon and drew attention to the terrain and a potential nearby ford as a fit for Alma 2. Donald Brockington’s field report documents an archaeological site and ceramic sequence at Santa Rosa. Sorenson’s match to Zarahemla is an interpretation of the geography. The excavated pottery gives researchers a way to study the settlement’s history, while the identification still needs evidence connecting that history to the city in the text. Sorenson, Book of Mormon Peoples and History, pp. 196–97 · Brockington, The Ceramic History of Santa Rosa
Montrose, Iowa. The Heartland Research Group looked for the ancient city in the area that received the name in 1841. Its 2022 report describes earthen banks detected by LiDAR and suggests that some could be walls. The group reports a tree on one bank estimated to be 144 years old at the time of the survey. The tree can help establish that the bank was there when it grew. The construction date and purpose of the bank would still need to be established through excavation and dating. Heartland Research Group, Walls of Zarahemla
The Iowa search also published an estimate of at least 100,000 inhabitants based on a Nephite army of more than 30,000. Trent Horn cites that estimate when arguing that a city of the proposed size should have left evidence. Mormon 1:10–11 describes an army gathered for battles near Zarahemla. A regional army count cannot by itself tell us the city’s population. A test of the Iowa model should start with what the text and the proposed site actually predict. The project’s estimate · Mormon 1:10–11 · Horn, Catholic Answers
Start with a model that says where and when to look, which features the text leads you to expect, and what would count against the proposal. Then look for evidence with a documented find location and date. An ancient inscription naming the city would be especially strong in its original context. A combination of independently dated settlement layers, local records, and distinctive geographical relationships could also make a case. A wall, a river crossing, or a name that appears on a nineteenth-century map has a narrower value on its own.
Here is what independent evidence can look like. Second Kings describes Sennacherib’s campaign against Judah during Hezekiah’s reign. An Assyrian prism from Nineveh names Hezekiah and Jerusalem in its account of the same campaign. The two sources have different perspectives. Their agreement on the named king and city is evidence that a terrain match alone cannot provide. 2 Kings 18:13–17 · Israel Museum, Sennacherib Prism
Trent Horn argues that the lack of an agreed map counts against the book’s historical claims. The documentary on Expedition Bible goes further. It argues that attempts to place the story distort either the text or the geography and concludes that the story has no real-world setting. The contrast with Jerusalem is real. Jerusalem has independent ancient attestation. Zarahemla has proposed locations, but no identification that commands broad agreement. That is a gap in the public historical evidence. It weighs against a particular map when a well-designed search fails to find evidence that map led us to expect. A conclusion about every possible setting requires a wider argument. Horn’s article · Expedition Bible, 8:47–9:41
I believe the Book of Mormon is an ancient witness of Jesus Christ. I can say that plainly and tell you that I don’t know where Zarahemla was. Competing proposals leave the historical identification open. Testing one of them means asking what it predicts and looking for evidence that could distinguish it from the others. How to weigh missing archaeological evidence · The broader archaeology case
