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You trust Duffy greater than the then Bishop of Jerusalem at the Council of Chalcedon?

Why not, is the Bishop of Jerusalem also infallible?

Sorry, the facts are that there is 300 + years of silence, then a myth first appears from apochryphal writings.

Thus, the Transitus literature is the real source of the teaching of the assumption of Mary and Roman Catholic authorities admit this fact. Juniper Carol, for example, writes: ‘The first express witness in the West to a genuine assumption comes to us in an apocryphal Gospel, the Transitus Beatae Mariae of Pseudo–Melito’ (Juniper Carol, O.F.M. ed., Mariology, Vol. l (Milwaukee: Bruce, 1957), p. 149). Roman Catholic theologian, Ludwig Ott, likewise affirms these facts when he says:

The idea of the bodily assumption of Mary is first expressed in certain transitus–narratives of the fifth and sixth centuries. Even though these are apocryphal they bear witness to the faith of the generation in which they were written despite their legendary clothing. The first Church author to speak of the bodily ascension of Mary, in association with an apocryphal transitus B.M.V., is St. Gregory of Tours’ (Ludwig Ott, Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma (Rockford: Tan, 1974), pp. 209–210).

Juniper Carol explicitly states that the Transitus literature is a complete fabrication which should be rejected by any serious historian:

The account of Pseudo-Melito, like the rest of the Transitus literature, is admittedly valueless as history, as an historical report of Mary’s death and corporeal assumption; under that aspect the historian is justified in dismissing it with a critical distaste (Juniper Carol, O.F.M. ed., Mariology, Vol. l (Milwaukee: Bruce, 1957), p. 150).

“Roman Catholic authorities admit this fact.”

Seeing as you’ve accused us of being slaves to the Pope, I should think you’d be looking for Papal evidence.

Ott’s no more of an authority than Duffy. He’s got an opinion. Fact of the matter is that the Pope and his authority argues that the evidence originated at Chalcedon when brought forth by then bishop Juvenal.

“Why not, is the Bishop of Jerusalem also infallible?”

Simply the fact that he was 300 years removed, not 2000 years removed. Big difference.

“Sorry, the facts are that there is 300 + years of silence, then a myth first appears from apochryphal writings.”

Knowing something about the history of Jerusalem, it makes sense. There wasn’t a bishop in Jerusalem per se, until Juvenal. The city was destroyed twice, once in 70 AD, and then again after Bar Kochba. That her tomb and the significance of her tomb would be lost to the church in the interim isn’t surprising.

Especially given the fact that even the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem had also been lost over that period, rediscovered and re-excavated shortly after Constantine’s Edict of Milan.