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 in the waning days of the Kingdom of Aksum, and that Lalibela's name simply came to be associated with them after his death.
Con todo, David Phillipson, profesor de arqueoloxía africana na Universidade de Cambridge, propuxo que as igrexas de Merkorios, Gabriel-Rufael e Danagel foron inicialmente esculpidas na rocha. medio milenio antes, como fortificacións ou outras estruturas palacegas nos últimos días do Reino de Aksum, e que o nome de Lalibela simplemente se asociou con elas logo da súa morte.