<P> On 14 April 2008, in a UK Channel 4 documentary, Tudor Parfitt, taking a literalist approach to the Biblical story, described his research into this claim . He says that the object described by the Lemba has attributes similar to the Ark . It was of similar size, was carried on poles by priests, was not allowed to touch the ground, was revered as a voice of their God, and was used as a weapon of great power, sweeping enemies aside . </P> <P> In his book The Lost Ark of the Covenant (2008), Parfitt also suggests that the Ark was taken to Arabia following the events depicted in the Second Book of Maccabees, and cites Arabic sources which maintain it was brought in distant times to Yemen . One Lemba clan, the Buba, which was supposed to have brought the Ark to Africa, have a genetic signature called the Cohen Modal Haplotype . This suggests a male Semitic link to the Levant . Lemba tradition maintains that the Ark spent some time in Sena in Yemen . Later, it was taken across the sea to East Africa and may have been taken inland at the time of the Great Zimbabwe civilization . According to their oral traditions, some time after the arrival of the Lemba with the Ark, it self - destructed . Using a core from the original, the Lemba priests constructed a new one . This replica was discovered in a cave by a Swedish German missionary named Harald von Sicard in the 1940s and eventually found its way to the Museum of Human Science in Harare . Parfitt had this artifact radio - carbon dated to about 1350, which coincided with the sudden end of the Great Zimbabwe civilization . </P> <P> French author Louis Charpentier claimed that the Ark was taken to the Chartres Cathedral by the Knights Templar . </P> <P> One author has theorised that the Ark was taken from Jerusalem to the village of Rennes - le - Château in Southern France . Karen Ralls has cited Freemason Patrick Byrne, who believes the Ark was moved from Rennes - le - Château at the outbreak of World War I to the United States . </P>

The art of the covenant in the bible