It appears again in Mordechai Gichon's writings about the Limes Palaestinae, but was only excavated between 1985 and 1986 by a team from the British School of Archaeology in Jerusalem led by Richard P. Harper.

Save for a single coin dated to the reign of Diocletian, pierced and therefore worn as a good luck charm, the numismatic evidence suggests the site was occupied from the first half of the fifth century.

Harper notes that 'no specifically military finds were uncovered at the site', though the final excavation report does list one spearhead end and 2 slingstones.

[4] Upper Zohar stands along an ancient road leading from Arabia and the Arava toward the Palestinian heartland and the Mediterranean ports.

Here the road merges with another track coming from the Dead Sea through the fort at Mezad Zohar, which lies to the southeast, before heading west to the northern Negev.

[2][6] Harper had chosen to excavate Upper Zohar because of its potential to contribute to the debate about the nature and date of the Roman limes in Palestine.

[4] Mordechai Gichon had written extensively about the disposition of the Roman army in Palestine, proposing the existence of defensive belt of fortifications in the northern Negev, known as the Limes Palaestinae, against marauding Saracens.

Based on even earlier Judean fortifications, this line of defense was supposedly established by the Flavian emperors and refurbished and expanded by Diocletian.

[7] Gichon, therefore, regarded Upper Zohar as a Flavian establishment, part of their line of defense protecting the settled heartland from desert-based raiders.

[8] Based on the numismatic and ceramic finds, Harper dated the construction of Upper Zohar only to the late 5th century.

[1][4][5] Archaeologist Thomas S. Parker has suggested that the cessation of military activity at the site in the 6th century may have resulted from the demobilization of the Limitanei, attributed to emperor Justinian by Procopius.

[4] Jodi Magness and Benjamin Isaac disagree with Parker, noting that Justinian's reign may have, in fact, witnessed a surge in military building activity in the region.