[2] The layout and names of the major buildings in Lalibela are widely accepted, especially by local clergy, to be a symbolic representation of Jerusalem.

[3] This has led some experts to date the current church construction to the years following the capture of Jerusalem in 1187 by the Muslim leader Saladin.

[7] David Buxton established the generally accepted chronology, noting that "two of them follow, with great fidelity of detail, the tradition represented by Debra Damo as modified at Yemrahana Kristos.

"[8] Since the time spent to carve these structures from the living rock must have taken longer than the few decades of reign of Gebre Meskel Lalibela, Buxton assumes that the work extended into the 14th century.

[9] However, David Phillipson, professor of African archeology at University of Cambridge, has proposed that the churches of Merkorios, Gabriel-Rufael, and Danagel were initially carved out of the rock half a millennium earlier, as fortifications or other palace structures between 600 and 800 A.D, during the days of the Kingdom of Aksum, and that Lalibela's name simply came to be associated with them after his death.

[10] On the other hand, local historian Getachew Mekonnen credits Meskel Kibra, Lalibela's wife, with having one of the rock-hewn churches, Biete Abba Libanos, built as a memorial for her husband after his death.

[16] However, Richard Pankhurst has expressed skepticism about this, pointing out that the Royal Chronicles, which mention Ahmad al-Ghazi's laying waste to the district between July and September 1531, are silent about him ravaging the churches.

"[17] The next reported visitor to Lalibela was Miguel de Castanhoso, who was a soldier under Cristóvão da Gama and left Ethiopia in 1544.

Indeed, the work appears superhuman, because, though they are of the size of the large ones in this country, they are each excavated with its pillars, its altars, and its vaults, out of a single rock, with no mixture of any outside stone.

The first text, written in Coptic (contrary to Raffray's assertion of Greek), is a brief statement attributed to Abuna Bartolomeo, dated during the reign of Dawit (1380-1409).

[13] During the Second Italo-Ethiopian War, Haile Selassie made a pilgrimage to the churches at Lalibela, at considerable risk of capture, before returning to his capital in April 1936.

[23] In early November 2023, Lalibela was the site of fierce fighting between the Ethiopian National Defense Force (ENDF) and Fano fighters.

However, Stuart Munro-Hay argues that since the architecture of the churches were built in the Aksumite style, the foreign influence seems to have largely been limited to "decorative techniques".

[30] David Buxton further attests to this by pointing out that "there are clearly signs of Coptic influence in some decorative details", however he is adamant about the native origins of these churches: "But the significant fact is remains that the rock-churches continue to follow the style of the local built-up prototypes, which themselves retain clear evidence of their basically Axumite origin.

Angel's report also included an inventory of Lalibela's traditional buildings, placing them in categories rating their state of conservation.

[32] This rural town is known around the world for its churches carved from within the earth from "living rock," which play an important part in the history of rock-cut architecture.