Remains from the Early Roman era (end of the first century BCE–beginning of the first century CE) have been found here.[3][4][5]
Three strata from the Roman-Byzantine periods was excavated in the centre of the village.[6] A bathhouse, dating from the same time, has also been found.[7]
Ceramics and other remains from the Byzantine era have been found here.[4][8][9]
An excavation revealed remains dating from the end of the Byzantine period (7th century CE), and above it were remains of a residential house from the Abbasid period (9th–10th centuries CE).[10]
In 1882, the PEF's Survey of Western Palestine (SWP) found at Sheikh Meisir "foundations near a modern Mukam" (Muslim tomb).[11] In spite of this, Andrew Petersen, who inspected the Maqam in 1994, suggested "that the building may be considerably older than the nineteenth century."[12]
In the 1945 statistics Meiser was counted with Qaffin and Kh. el Aqaba, together they had a population of 1,570 Muslims,[14] with a land area of 23,755 dunams, according to an official land and population survey.[15] Of this, 5,863 dunams were plantations and irrigable land, 8,371 were used for cereals,[16] while 40 dunams were built-up (urban) land.[17]