At Mezad Mahmal, excavation has clarified the relationship between a later Roman fort and an earlier Nabataean installation to its west. Erickson-Gini (2011) demonstrated that the fort itself is Roman rather than Nabataean, constructed in the later second century CE as part of a Severan military initiative to establish tower forts such as at Horbat Qazra, Mezad Neqarot, Horbat Haluqim, and Horbat Dafit. Approximately six meters west of the fort, however, the excavation identified the remains of an earlier Nabataean caravan station dating to the first century CE, apparently organized around rooms surrounding a central courtyard and positioned at the head of the pass.

The Nabataean caravan station exhibited multiple forms of archaeoseismic damage consistent with earthquake destruction. Wall 1 had collapsed northward, and associated collapse debris was documented in adjacent loci. A cooking pot found next to a tabun was broken and partially displaced eastward, suggesting sudden structural failure rather than gradual abandonment. The building as a whole was described as badly damaged, with masonry stones stripped nearly to foundation level, a condition most plausibly attributed to post-earthquake stone robbing rather than the initial collapse.

The chronology of the destruction is constrained by pottery and architectural context. Erickson-Gini (2011) reported that the Nabataean caravan station was founded in the mid-first century CE and remained in use until the early second century CE, when it was destroyed in a seismic event and subsequently abandoned. The ceramic assemblage includes Nabataean painted ware bowls, an Eastern Sigillata ware bowl, undecorated cups and bowls, Nabataean rouletted ware, a Nabataean cooking pot, a Roman carinated cooking pot, jars, Nabataean strainer jugs, and a fragment of a Roman lamp with a decorated discus. Collectively, this assemblage is apparently consistent with occupation ending in the early second century CE.

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