Does anyone know of a site which would list what all the names were used around 0 AD among the Jewish people (and ideally, how frequent each was)? And as the title asks, does anyone know what the approximate population of Jerusalem would have been at the time?
I can’t help with the names, but I can tell you that Karen Armstrong says that Jerusalem had about 120,000 permanent inhabitants under Herod when he was restoring the city, 23 BCE - 4 BCE.
But she also mentions that during this period, 300,000 - 500,000 pilgrims would assemble there each year for Passsover, the harvest festival, and the feast of Sukkot.
Man, I’ve used this book a lot this week!
Nitpick: there was no such year as 0 AD.
But there is a period of “around 0 AD”. 
Only in the same sense that something can be geographically “near Atlantis”.
I presume that this question is in relation to the book by the crackpot who claims that he found Jesus’ remains.
One scholar who was commenting on this guy said that he had a document from that era which was written by a guy named Jesus, was addressed to another guy named Jesus, and was witnessed by yet another Jesus. So apparently Jesus was a pretty common name. Apparently Joseph, Judas, and James were common names as well, and Miriam (Mary) was an insanely common name for women – something like 25% of women were named Miram or one of its derivatives.
Of course, I’m still waiting for someone to explain why Jesus’ family’s crypt would be in Jerusalem, and not in Nazareth where they actually lived.
Not to mention that there is apparently an ossuary currently touring the US from the same time period which is labled Jesus, son of Joseph. So the juxtaposition of those names isn’t exactly uncommon.
Why anyone allows themselves to be sucked into such obvious marketing ploys is… Oh, sorry, I forget we are human. 
Someone correct me if I’m wrong, and sorry **Sage ** if this isn’t where you wanted the discussion to go…
Isn’t “Jesus” a transliteration of the Greek, which is, in turn, a transliteration of the Hebrew/Aramaic “Yeshua” – the basis of the name “Joshua”?
You’re wrong.
“Jesus” comes from the Latin “Jesu,” from the Old Latin “Yesu,” from the Greek, from the Aramaic. With that long a language chain, Og only knows the original Aramaic pronounciation.
Joshua in Hebrew is “Y’hoshua.” See Y’hoshua ben Nun in the Torah, which predates Aramaic (or at least extensive use of Aramaic).
Malacandra: Santorini, in the Cyclades Islands of Greece, is believed to be near Atlantis. Your point is still good – "around 0 CE / AD 0 " is still an undefined reference, and using such a reference too much may crash the world’s calendars.
Depends on how you parse it. You could parse it as “Take the year 0 AD, and other years near it”, in which case it’s undefined. Alternately, you could parse it as “Take numbers near 0, and look at those years AD”, in which case it’s fine and means what is intended, since 1, 2, etc. are numbers near 0, so you’re asking about 1 AD, 2 AD, etc.
Or alternatively, you could sensibly talk about years like -5, -6, or -2000 AD/CE. Therefore, 0 AD would be the same year as 1 BC, -5 AD would be 6 BC, -2000 AD would be 2001 BC, and so forth.
So there IS a year 0 AD, it just so happens that we never have to use it since it’s the same year as 1 BC.
Is there a similar language chain with the apostles. Was Thomas a common name? John, Matthew, Mark, Judas, Peter?
If so, how is it that the name of Jesus has been changed so much while the others have stayed the same?
Also, he didn’t say “the year 0 AD,” but merely “0 AD.” “0 AD” could also be interpreted as the point between 1 AD and 1 BC, and is therefore midnight between December 31, 1 BC, and January 1, 1 AD.
Nope, the second after 31 Dec 1 BCE 23:59:59 (local) is 1 Jan 1 CE 00:00:00 (local)
I mean the point between those two seconds. 
Joshua is my middle name and Y’hoshua is my Hebrew name. 
Your post inspired me to putz around on the internets and I found this. I may not have been totally right, but if these guys are to be believed, I was mostly right; YMMV. (I’m gonna go ahead and continue to claim that I’m the second greatest Jewish carpenter named Jesus EVER.)
By the way, Sage, the link also includes some info on a few other names you might find interesting.
According to the gospels, wasn’t Jesus placed in Joseph’s tomb?
Clearly, much of the world would love to have some reason to believe the biblical stories aside from the bible, itself. Without such corroboration, we’re left with a set of word of mouth stories put together and edited by god knows how many people, many years after the “fact,” etc, etc. It would make things ever so much easier if there were an external reason to believe it all. I’m waiting until someone comes up with a crypt that has an ancient coin in it with the date 10 AD, to verify it all.
Hm, well so an addon question:
25% of all women having the same name seems a bit unlikely to me. People have mentioned “derivatives” several times, so I have to wonder if to the people at the time (1 BC ), that these derivatives aren’t derivatives, but rather different names? I.e. 25% of women weren’t named “Mary”, but were rather named “Mary”, “Mari”, “Miriam”, “Miri”, etc. and saying they’re all “Mary” is being rather lazy.
Would a particular derivative of a name be constant to a person during their life, or could they shift amongst a couple depending on (???)?
OK, a half second after 31 Dec 1 BCE 23:59:59 is 31 Dec 1 BCE 23:59:59.5.
By definition of BCE/CE numbering, an infinitesimal time epsilon before 1 Jan 1 CE 00:00:00 is 31 Dec 1 BCE 23:59:59 (and 9/9 minus epsilon).