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Map of the Roman Empire - Judaea
Judaea
P-10 on the Map
Judaea village: el-Yehudiyveh possible reading in 1 Macc. 4. 15 (with some Gk. MSS; others read Idumea—so KJV, RSV). The reading 'Judaea' as name of a village (cf. modern name) is perhaps correct Judah: tribe.
Palestine. The kingdom of Solomon was divided, 10th cent. B. C, into
those of Judah and Israel. The kingdom of Israel conquered by Assyria, B. C. 721
; Judah
by Babylon, B. C. 568. Afterwards subject to Syria; conquered by Pompey, B. C.
63, and finally by Titus, A. D. 70.
Galilee. — Nazareth. — Lake Tiberias.
Samaria. — Sychem. — River Jordan. —Mount Carmel.
Judaea. — Jerusalem. Bethlehem. — Lake Asphaltites, Dead Sea.
Peraea. - Ancient Geography
Iudaea
The Greek and Roman form of the Hebrew word which was used to denote the
country of the Philistines, and which was extended to the whole country. The
Romans called it Iudaea, extending to the whole country the name of its southern
part. It was regarded by the Greeks and Romans as a part of Syria. It was
bounded by the Mediterranean on the west, by the mountains of Lebanon on the
north, by the Jordan and its lakes on the east, and by the deserts which
separated it from Egypt on the south. The Romans did not come into contact with
the country till B.C. 63, when Pompey took Jerusalem. From this time the country
was really subject to the Romans. At the death of Herod his kingdom was divided
between his sons as tetrarchs; but the different parts of Palestine were
eventually annexed to the Roman province of Syria, and were governed by a
procurator. The Jews were by no means well disposed, however, to the rule of the
Romans, and in the first century A.D. broke out with a general rebellion which
was crushed out by Vespasian and Titus with merciless severity. The latter
general took Jerusalem and destroyed it in A.D. 70. Under Constantine, Palestine
was divided into three provinces—Palaestina Prima in the centre, Palaestina
Secunda in the north, and Palaestina Tertia in the south. See Tristram, Land of
Israel (3d ed. 1876); Thomson, The Land and the Book (2d ed. 1880-85); Merrill,
Galilee in the Time of Christ (1881); Darenbourg, Essai sur l'Histoire, etc., de
la Palestine (Paris, 1867); and the articles Herodes; Hierosolyma; Iudaei.
- Harry Thurston Peck. Harpers Dictionary
of Classical Antiquities. New York. Harper and Brothers. 1898.
Judaea
PALAESTINA
PALAESTINA (?a?a?st???: Eth. ?a?a?st????), the most commonly received and
classical name for the country, otherwise called the Land of Canaan, Judaea, the
Holy Land, &c. This name has the authority of the prophet Isaiah, among the
sacred writers; and was received by the earliest secular historians. Herodotus
calls the Hebrews Syrians of Palestine; and states that the sea-border of Syria,
inhabited, according to him, by Phoenicians from the Red Sea, was called
Palaestina, as far as Egypt (7.89). He elsewhere places Syria Palaestina between
Phoenice and Egypt; Tyre and Sidon in Phoenice; Ascalon, Cadytis, Ienysus in
Palaestina Syriae; elsewhere he places Cadytis and Azotus simply in Syria (4.39,
3.5, 2.116, 157, 1.105, 3.5).
The name, as derived from the old inhabitants of the land, originally described
only the sea-border south of Mount Carmel, occupied by the Philistines from the
very earliest period, and during the time of the Israelite kingdom (Exod.
13.17); although it would appear that this district was partially occupied by
the cognate branches of the Canaanites. (Gen. x. 14, 19.) It afterwards came to
be used of the inland parts likewise, and that not only on the west of the
Jordan, but also to the east, as far as the limits of the children of Israel;
and in this wider acceptation it will be convenient here to adopt it; although
it deserves to be noted that even so late as Josephus the name Palaestina was
occasionally used in its more restricted and proper sense, viz. of that part of
the coast inhabited of old by the Philistines. (See the passages referred to in
Relaud, p. 41, who devotes the nine first chapters of his work to the names of
Palestine, pp. 1--51.)
I. GENERAL BOUNDARIES, SOIL, CLIMATE.
The general boundaries of Palestine, in this wider acceptation of the name, are
clearly defined by the Mediterranean on the west, and the great desert, now
called the Hauran, on the east. [HAURAN] The country, however, on the east of
Jordan was not originally designed to form part of the land of Israel; which was
to have been bounded by the Jordan and its inland lakes. (Numb. 34.6, 10--12;
comp. xxxii.) The northern and southern boundaries are not so clearly defined;
but it is probable that a more careful investigation and a more accurate survey
of the country than has hitherto been attempted might lead to the recovery of
many of the sites mentioned in the sacred books, and of natural divisions which
might help to the elucidation of the geography of Palestine. On the south,
indeed, recent investigations have led to the discovery of a well-defined
mountain barrier, forming a natural wall along the south of Palestine, from the
southern bay of the Dead Sea to the Mediterranean, along the line of which, at
intervals, may be found traces of the names mentioned in the borders in the
books of Moses and Joshua, terminating on the west with the river of Egypt (Wady-el-Arish)
at Rhinocorura. (Numb. 34.3--5 ; comp. Josh. 15.1--4; Williams, Holy City, vol.
i., appendix i., note 1, p. 463--468.) On the northern border the mention of
Mount Hor is perplexing; the point on the coast of “the great sea” is not fixed;
nor are the sites of Hamath or Zedad determined. (Numb. 34.7, 8; comp. Ezek.
47.15, 16.) But whatever account may be given of the name Hor in the northern
borders of Palestine, the mention of Hermon as the northern extremity of the
Israelites' conquests in Deuteronomy (3.9, 5.48) would point to that rather than
to Lebanon, which Reland conjectures, as the mountain in question: while the
fact that Sidon is assigned to the tribe of Asher (Judges, 1.21) would prove
that the point on the coast must be fixed north of that border town of the
Canaanites. (Gen. 10.19; Josh. 19.28.) The present Hamah, near to Homs (Emesa),
is much too far north to fall in with the boundary of Palestine, and it must be
conceded that we have not at present sufficient data to enable us to determine
its northern limits. (Reland, lib. i. cap. 25, pp. 113--123.) To this it must be
added that the limits of Palestine varied at different periods of its history,
and according to the views of different writers (ib. cap. 26, pp. 124--127), and
that the common error of confounding the limits of the possessions of the
Israelites with those assigned to their conquests has still further embarrassed
the question. Assuming, however, [2.517] those boundaries, as do the sacred
writers and Josephus, we may now take a general view of its physical features
which have always so much to do with the formation of the character of the
inhabitants. It is well described in its principal features, in the book of
Deuteronomy, as “a land of brooks of water, of fountains and depths, that spring
out of valleys and hills; a land of wheat, and barley, and vines, and fig-trees,
and pomegranates: a land of oil-olive, and honey; a land wherein thou shalt eat
bread without scarceness; thou shalt not lack anything in it; a land whose
stones are iron, and out of whose hills thou mayest dig brass” (8.7--9; comp.
11.11, 12). The great variety of its natural productions must be ascribed to the
diversified character of its surface and the natural richness of its soil, which
was obviously taxed to the utmost by the industry of its numerous inhabitants;
for there is no part of the hill country, however at present desolate and
depopulated, which does not bear evidences of ancient agricultural labour in its
scarped rocks and ruined terrace-walls; while in the vicinity of its modern
villages, the rude traditionary style of husbandry, unimproved and unvaried for
3000 years, enables the traveller to realise the ancient fertility of this
highly favoured land, and the occupations of its inhabitants, as well as the
genius of their poetry, all whose images are borrowed from agricultural and
pastoral pursuits. As the peculiar characteristic feature in the geography of
Greece is the vast proportion of its sea-border to its superficial area, so the
peculiarity of the geography of Palestine may be said to be the undue proportion
of mountain, or rather hill country, to its extent. In the districts of Tripoli,
Akka, and Damascus, three descriptions of soil prevail. In general that of the
mountainous parts of Palestine and central Syria is dry and stony, being formed
in a great measure from the debris of rocks, of which a large portion of the
surface of the districts of Lebanon, the Hauran, and Ledja, with the mountainous
countries of Judaea, are composed; it is mixed, however, with the alluvium
constantly brought down by the irrigating streams. The second and richest
district are the plains of Esdraelon, Zabulon, Baalbek, part of the Decapolis,
and Damascusi as well as the valleys of the Jordan and Orontes, which for the
most part consist of a fat loamy soil. Being almost without a pebble, it
becomes, when dry, a fine brown earth, like garden mould, which, when saturated
by the rains, is almost a quagmire, and in the early part of the summer becomes
a marsh: when cultivated, most abundant crops of tobacco, cotton, and grain are
obtained. The remainder of the territory chiefly consists of the plains called
Barr by the Arabs, and Midbar by the Hebrews, both words signifying simply a
tract of land left entirely to nature, and being applied to the pasture tracts
about almost every town in Syria, as well as to those spots where vegetation
almost entirely fails. Such spots prevail in the tracts towards the eastern side
of the country, where the soil is mostly an indurated clay, with irregular
ridges of limestone hills separating different parts of the surface. The better
description of soil is occasionally diversified by hill and dale, and has Very
much the appearance of some of our downs, but is covered with the liquorice
plant, mixed with aromatic shrubs, and occasionally some dwarf trees, such as
the tamarisk and acacia. Many of the tracts eastward of the Jordan (Peraea) are
of this description, particularly those near the Hauran, which, under the name
of Roman Arabia, had Bozra for its capital. The inferior tracts are frequently
coated with pebbles and black flints, having little, and sometimes no
vegetation. Such are the greater portions of the tracts southward of Gaza and
Hebron, and that part of the pashalick which borders upon Arabia Deserta, where
scarcity of water has produced a wilderness, which at best is only capable of
nourishing a limited number of sheep, goats, and camels its condition is the
worst in summer, at which season little or no rain falls throughout the eastern
parts of Syria.
Owing to the inequality of its surface, Palestine has a great variety of
temperature and climate, which have been distributed as follows.--(1) The cold;
(2) warm and humid; (3) warm and dry. The first belongs principally to the
Lebanon range and to Mount Hermon, in the extreme north of the country, but is
shared in some measure by the mountain districts of Nablűe, Jerusalem, and
Hebron, where the winters are often very severe, the springs mild, and a
refreshing breeze tempers the summer heat. The second embraces the slopes
adjoining the coast of the Mediterranean, together with the adjacent plains of
Akka, Jaffa, and Gaza; also those in the interior, such as Esdraelon, the valley
of the Jordan, and part of Peraea. The third prevails in the south-eastern parts
of Syria, the contiguity of which to the arid deserts of burning sand, exposes
them to the furnace-blasts of the sirocco untempered by the humid winds which
prevail to the west of the central highlands, while the depression of the
southern part of the Jordan valley and the Dead Sea gives to the plain of
Jericho and the districts in the vicinity of that sea an Egyptian climate. (Col.
Chesney, Expedition to the Euphrates, &c. vol. i. pp. 533--537.)
II. GEOLOGY, NATURAL DIVISIONS, AND PRODUCTIONS.
The general geographical position of Palestine is well described in the
following extract:--“That great mountain chain known to the ancients under the
various names of Imaus, Caucasus, and Taurus, which extends due east and west
from China to Asia Minor; this chain, at the point where it enters Asia Minor,
throws off to the southward a subordinate ridge of hills, which forms the
barrier between the Western Sea and the plains of Syria and Assyria. After
pursuing a tortuous course for some time, and breaking into the parallel ridges
of Libanus and Antilibanus, it runs with many breaks and divergencies through
Palestine and the Arabian peninsula to the Indian Ocean. One of the most
remarkable of these breaks is the great plain of Esdraelon, the battle-field of
the East. From this point . . . the ridge or mountainous tract extends, without
interruption, to the south end of the Dead Sea, or further. This whole tract
rises gradually towards the south, forming the hill country of Ephraim and
Judah, until, in the vicinity of Hebron, it attains an altitude of 3250 feet
above the level of the Mediterranean. At a point exactly opposite to the extreme
north of the Dead Sea, i. e. due west from it, where the entire ridge has an
elevation of about 2710 feet, and close to the saddle of the ridge, a very
remarkable feature of this rocky pro. cess, so to call it, occurs. The
appearance is as if a single, but vast wave of this sea of rock, rising and
swelling gradually from north to south, had been suddenly checked in its
advance, and, after a [2.518] considerable subsidence below the general level,
left standing perfectly isolated from the surrounding mass, both as to its front
and sides. Add, that, about the middle of this wave there is a slight
depression, channelling it from north-west to south-east, and you have before
you the natural limestone rock which forms the site of Jerusalem.” Christian
Remembrancer, No. lxvi. N. S., vol. xviii. pp. 425, 426. A few additions to this
graphic sketch of the general geography of Palestine will suffice to complete
the description of its main features, and to furnish a nomenclature for the more
detailed notices which must follow. This addition will be best supplied by the
naturalist Russegger, whose travels have furnished a desideratum in the
geography of Palestine. It will, however, be more convenient to consider below
his third division of the country, comprehending the river Jordan and the Dead
Sea, with its volcanic phaenomena, as those articles have been reserved for this
place, and the historical importance of them demands a fuller account than is
given in his necessarily brief summary. He divides the country as follows:--
* 1. The fruitful plain extending along the coast from Gaza to Juny, north-east
of Beirűt.
* 2. The mountain range separating this plain from the valley of the Jordan,
which, commencing with Jebel Khalil, forms the rocky land of Judaea, Samaria,
and Galilee, and ends with the knot of mountains from which Libanus and
Antilibanus extend towards the north.
* 3. The valley of the Jordan, with the basins of the lake of Tiberias and the
Dead Sea, as far as Wady-el-Ghor, the northern end of Wady-el-Araba.
* 4. The country on the east of the Jordan, as far as the parallel of Damascus.
1.The part of the coast plain extending from the isthmus of Suez between the sea
and the mountains of Judaea and Samaria, and bounded by the ridge of Carmel,
belongs, in regard to its fertility, to the most beautiful regions of Syria. The
vegetation in all its forms is that of the warmer parts of the shores of the
Mediterranean; in the southern districts the palm flourishes,
The mountains of Judaea and Samaria, which rise to the height of 2000 feet above
the sea, follow the line of the plain until they meet the ridge of Carmel. The
coast district belongs partly to the older and newer pliocene of the marine
deposits, and partly to the chalk and Jura formations of the neighbouring
mountainous country.
To the north of Carmel the hilly arable land occurs again.
Still further north, with the exception of a few strips of land about Acre, Sur,
Seida, Beirűt, &c., the coast plain becomes more and more narrowed by the
mountains, which extend towards the sea, until there only remains here and there
a very small strip of coast.
Several mountain streams, swollen in the rainy season to torrents, flow through
deep narrow valleys into the plain, in part fertilising it; in part, where there
are no barriers to oppose their force, spreading devastation far and wide. Of
these the principal are Nahr-el-Kelb, Nahr-ed-Damur, the Auli, the Sahararneh,
Nahr-el-Kasimieh, Nahr Mukutta, &c.
The mountain sides of Lebanon, from Seida to Beirűt, are cultivated in terraces;
the principal product of this kind of cultivation is the vine and mulberry; the
secondary, figs, oranges, pomegranates, and, in general, the so-called tropical
fruits.
The want of grass begins to show itself in Syria, and especially on the sides of
the promontory, owing to the long continued droughts. The Syrian mountains along
the coast north of Carmel, and especially the sides of Lebanon, are, with the
exception of the garden-trees, and a few scattered pines, entirely devoid of
wood.
2.The land immediately towards the east, which follows the line of coast from
south to north, at a distance now greater now less, rises in the form of a lofty
mountain chain, the summits of which are for the most part rounded, and rarely
peaked; forming numerous plateaux, and including the whole space between the
coast on the west, and the valley of the Jordan, with the Dead Sea and the lake
of Tiberias, on the east, having an average breadth of from 8 to 10 German
miles.
This mountain chain commences in the south with Jebel Khalil, which, towards the
west and south-west, stretches to the plain of Gaza and the sandy deserts of the
isthmus, and towards the south and south-east joins the mountain country of
Arabia Petraea, and towards the east sinks suddenly into the basin of the Dead
Sea. Immediately joined to Jebel Khalil are Jebel-el-Kods and the mountains of
Ephraim, sinking on the east into the valley of the Jordan, and on the west into
the plain at Jaffa. Further north follows Jebel Nblűs, with the other mountains
of Samaria, bounded on the east by the valley of the Jordan, on the west by the
coast district; and towards the north-west extending to the sea, and forming the
promontory of Carmel. North of Mesj Ibn‘ Amir are the mountains of Galilee,
Hermon, Tabor, Jebel Safed, Saron, &c. This group sinks into the basin of the
lake of Tiberias and the upper valley of the Jordan, on the east, on the west
into the coast district of Acre and Sur, extends into the sea in several
promontories, and is united to the chain of Lebanon at Seida, by Jebel-ed-Drus,
and by the mountains of the Upper Jordan and of Hasbeia to Jebel-es-Sheich, or
Jebel-et-Telj, and thus to the chain of Antilibanus.
The whole mountain chain in the district just described belongs to the Jura and
chalk formation. Crystalline and plutonic rocks there are none, and volcanic
formations are to be found only in the mountains surrounding the basin of the
lake of Tiberias. The highest points are situated in the northern part of the
range, in the neighbourhood of Jebel-es-Sheich, and in the eastern and
southeastern part of Galilee. (Jebel-es-Sheich is 9500 feet above the sea.)
Further south the mountains become perceptibly lower, and the highest of the
mountains of Judaea are scarcely 4000 feet above the sea.
The character of the southern part of this range is very different from that of
the northern. The plateaux and slopes of the central chain of Judaea are wild,
rocky, and devoid of vegetation; the valleys numerous, deep, and narrow. In the
lowlands, wherever productive soil is collected, and there is a supply of water,
there springs up a rich vegetation. All the plants of the temperate region of
Europe flourish together with tropical fruits in perfection, especially the vine
and olive.
In Samaria the character of the land is more genial; vegetation flourishes on
all sides, and several of the mountains are clothed with wood to their summits.
With still greater beauty and grandeur does nature exhibit herself in Galilee.
The mountains become higher, their form bolder and sharper. [2.519] The great;
Hermon (Jebel-es-Sheich) rises hign above the other mountains.
The valleys are no longer inhospitable ravines; they become long and broad, and
partly form plains of large extent, as Esdraelon. A beautiful pasture land
extends to the heights of the mountains. Considerable mountain streams water the
valleys.
3.
To the east of this mountain chain lies the valley of the Jordan, the most
remarkable of all known depressions of the earth, as well on account of its
great length as of its almost incredible depth. [See below, III. and IV.]
4.
On the east of the Dead Sea and the Jordan valley, with the sea of Tiberias,
rises like a wall a steep mountain range of Jura limestone. On the top of this
lies a broad plateau inhabited by nomadic Arabs and stationary tribes. The
southern part of these highlands is known by the name of Jebel Belka; further
north, beyond the Zerka, in the neighbourhood of the lofty Ajlűn, it meets the
highlands of Ez-Zoueit; and still further north begins the well-known plateau
El-Hauran, which, inhabited chiefly by Arabs and Druses, is bounded by
Antilibanus and the Syrian desert, joins the plateau of Damascus, and there
reaches a height of 2304 Paris feet above the sea.
III. THE JORDAN.
The most celebrated river of Judaea, and the only stream of any considerable
size in the country. Its etymology has not been successfully investigated by the
ancients, who propose a compound of Yor and Dan, and imagine two fountains
bearing these names, from which the river derived its origin and appellation. S.
Jerome (Onomast. s. v. Dan) derives it from Jor, which lie says is equivalent to
?e?????, fluvius, and Dan the city, where one of its principal fountains was
situated. But there are serious objections to both parts of this derivation. For
in the first place HEBREW is the Hebrew form of the equivalent for fluvius,
while the proper name is always HEBREW, and never HEBREW, as the proposed
etymology would require; while the name Dan, as applied to the city Laish, is
five centuries later than the first mention of the river in the book of Genesis;
and the theory of anticipation in the numerous passages of the Pentateuch in
which it occurs is scarcely admissible (See Judges, xviii.; Gen. 13.10, 32.10;
Job, 40.23), although Dan is certainly so used in at least one passage. (Gen.
14.14.) Besides which, Reland has remarked that the vowel always written with
the second syllable of the river is different from that of the monosyllabic
city, HEBREW, and not HEBREW. He suggests another derivation from the root
HEBREW, descendit, labitur, so denoting a river, as this, in common with other
rivers which he instances, might be called ?at? ??????: and as Josephus does
call it t?? p?taµ??, without any distinctive name (Ant. 5.1.22), in describing
the borders of Issachar. This is also adopted by Gesenius, Lee, and other
moderns. (Lee, Lexicon, s. v.)
The source of this river is a question involved in much obscurity in the ancient
records; and there is a perplexing notice of Josephus, which has added
considerably to the difficulty. The subject was fully investigated by the writer
in 1842, and the results are stated below.
The Jordan has three principal sources:
* 1. at Banias, the ancient Caesarea Philippi;
* 2. at Tell-el-Kadi, the site of the ancient Dan, about two miles to the west
of Banias;
* 3. at Hasbeia, some distance to the north of Tell-el-Kadi.
These several sources require distinct notice.
* 1. The fountain at Banias is regarded by Josephus and others as the proper
source of the Jordan, but not with sufficient reason. It is indeed a copious
fountain, springing out from the earth in a wide and rapid but shallow stream,
in front of a cave formerly dedicated to Pan; but not at all in the manner
described by Josephus, who speaks of a yawning chasm in the cave itself, and an
unfathomable depth of still water, of which there is neither appearance nor
tradition at present, the cave itself being perfectly dry. (Bell. Jud. 1.21.3.)
He states, however, that it is a popular error to consider this as the source of
the Jordan. Its true source, he subsequently says (3.9.7), was ascertained to be
at Phiala, which he describes as a circular pool, 120 stadia distant from
Caesareia, not far from, the road that led to Trachonitis, i. e. to the east.
This pool, he says (named from its form), was always full to the brim, but never
overflowed, and its connection with the fountain at Paneas was discovered by
Herod Philip the tetrarch in the following manner:--He threw chaff into the lake
Phiala, which made its appearance again at the fountain of Paneas. This
circular, goblet-shaped pool, about a mile in diameter, is now called
Birket-er-Ram. It is situated high in a bare mountain region, and strongly
resembles the crater of an extinct volcano. It is a curious error of Irby and
Mangles to represent; the surrounding hills as “richly wooded” (Travels, p.
287). The water is stagnant, nor is there any appearance or report among the
natives of. any stream issuing from the lake, or of any subterranean
communication with the fountain of Paneas. The above-named travellers correctly
represent it as having “no apparent supply or discharge.” The experiment of
Philip is therefore utterly unintelligible, as there is no stream to carry off
the chaff. (For a view of Phiala, see Traill's Josephus, vol. ii. p. 46, and
lxxx. &c.)
* 2. The second fountain of the Jordan is at Tell-el-Kadi. [DAN] This is almost
equally copious with the first-named; and issues from the earth in a rapid
stream on the western side of the woody hill, on which traces of the city may
still be discovered. The stream bears the ancient name of the town, and is
called Nahr Ledân, “the river Ledân,” sometimes misunderstood by travellers as
the ancient name of the river, which certainly no longer exists among the
natives. This is plainly the Daphne of Josephus, “having fountains, which,
feeding what is called the little Jordan, under the temple of the golden calf,
discharge it into the great Jordan.” (Bell. Jud. 4.1.1, conf. Ant. 8.8.4; and
see leland, Palaestina, p. 263.)
* 3. A mile to the west of Tell-el-Kadi, runs the Nahr Hasbâny, the Hasbeia
river, little inferior to either of the former. it rises 6 or 8 miles to the
north, near the large village of Hasbeia, and being joined in its course by a
stream from Mount Hermon, contributes considerably to the bulk of the Jordan. It
is therefore somewhat remarkable that this tributary has been unnoticed until
comparatively modern times. (Robinson, Bib. Res. vol. iii. p. 354, note 2.)
These three principal sources of the Jordan, as the natives affirm, do not
intermingle their waters until they meet in the small lake now called Bahr-el-Huleh,
[2.520] “the waters of Merom” of Scripture (Josh. 11.5, 7), the SEMECHONITIS
PALUS of Josephus (J. AJ 5.5.1, Bell. Jud. 3.12.7, 4.1.1); but the plain between
this lake and Paneas is hard to be explored, in consequence of numerous
fountains and the rivulets into which the main streams are here divided.
(Robinson, l.c. pp. 353, 354; Bibliotheca Sacra, 1843, pp. 12, 13.)
This point was investigated by Dr. Robinson in 1852, and he found that both the
Ledân and the Hasbâny unite their waters with the stream from Banias, some
distance above the lake, to which they run in one stream. (Journal R. Geog. Soc.
vol. xxiv. p. 25, 1855.)
This region, now called Merj-el-Huleh, might well be designated ???? or ??? t??
???d????, “the marshes of Jordan,” by which name, however, the author of the
first book of Maccabees (1 Macc. 9.42) and Josephus (J. AJ 13.1.3) would seem to
signify the marshy plain to the south of the Dead Sea. The waters from the three
sources above-mentioned being collected into the small lake, and further
augmented by the numerous land springs in the Bahr and Ard-el-Huleh, run off
towards the south in one current towards the sea of Tiberias [TIBERIAS MARE], a
distance, according to Josephus, of 120 stadia. They flow off at the
south-western extremity of this lake, and passing through a district well
described by Josephus as a great desert (p????? ?????a?, B. J. 3.9.7), now
called by the natives El-Ghor, lose themselves in the Dead Sea.
Attention has been lately called to a peculiar phenomenon exhibited by this
river, the problems relating to which have been solved twice within the last few
years by the enterprise of English and American sailors. In the spring of the
year 1838 a series of barometrical observations by M. Bertou gave to the Dead
Sea a depression of 1374 feet below the level of the Mediterranean, and to the
sea of Tiberias a depression of 755 feet, thus establishing a fall of 619 feet
between the two lakes. At the close of the same year the observations were
repeated by Russegger, with somewhat different results; the depression of the
Dead Sea being given as 1429 feet, the sea of Tiberias 666 feet, and the
consequent fall of the Jordan between the two, 763 feet. Herr von Wildenbruch
repeated the observations by barometer in 1845, with the following
results:--Depression of the Dead Sea 1446 feet, of the sea of Tiberias 845 feet,
difference 600 feet. He carried his observations further north, even to the
source at Tell-el-Kadi, with the following results:--At Jacob's bridge, about 2
1/2 miles from the southern extremity of Bahr Huleh, he found the Jordan 899
feet above the Mediterranean; at the Bahr Huleh 100 feet; and at the source at
Tell-el-Kadi 537 feet; thus giving a fall of 1983 feet in a direct course of 117
miles.:--the most rapid fall being between the bridge of Jacob and the sea of
Tiberias, a distance of only 8 miles, in which the river falls 845 feet, or 116
feet per mile. Results so remarkable did not find easy credence, although they
were further tested by a trigonometrical survey, conducted by Lieut. Symonds of
the Royal Engineers, in 1841, which confirmed the barometrical observations for
the Dead Sea, but were remarkably at variance with the statement for the sea of
Tiberias, giving to the former a depression of 1312 feet, and to the latter of
328 feet, and a difference of level between the two of 984 feet. The whole
subject is ably treated by Mr. Petermann, in a paper read before the
Geographical Society, chiefly in answer to the strictures of Dr. Robinson, in a
communication made to the same society,--both of which papers were subsequently
published in the journal of the society (vol. xviii. part 2, 1848). In
consequence of the observations of Dr. Robinson (Bib. Res. vol. ii. p. 595, n.
4, and vol. iii. p. 311, n. 3), the writer in 1842 followed the course of the
Jordan from the sea of Tiberias to the sea of Huleh, and found it to be a
continuous torrent, rushing down in a narrow rocky channel between almost
precipitous mountains. It is well described by Herr von Wildenbruch, who
explored it in 1845, as a “continuous waterfall” (cited by Petermann, l.c. p.
103).
The lower Jordan, between the sea of Tiberias and the Dead Sea, was subsequently
explored by Lieut. Molyneux in 1847, and by an American expedition under Lieut.
Lynch in the following year. The following extracts from the very graphic
account of Lieut. Molyneux, also contained in the number of the Royal
Geographical Society's Journal (pp. 104--123) already referred to, will give the
best idea of the character of this interesting river, hitherto so little known.
Immediately on leaving the sea of Tiberias they found the river upwards of 100
feet broad and 4 or 5 deep; but on reaching the ruins of a bridge, about 2 miles
down the stream, they found the passage obstructed by the ruins, and their
difficulties commenced; for seven hours they scarcely ever had sufficient water
to swim the boat for 100 yards together. In many places the river is split into
a number of small streams, and consequently without much water in any of them.
Occasionally the boat had to be carried upwards of 100 yards over rocks and
through thorny bushes; and in some places they had high, steep, sandy cliffs all
along the banks of the river. In other places the boat had to be carried on the
backs of the camels, the stream being quite impracticable. The Ghor, or great
valley of the Jordan, is about 8 or 9 miles broad at its upper end; and this
space is anything but flat--nothing but a continuation of bare hills, with
yellow dried--up weeds, which look when distant like corn stubbles. These hills,
however, sink into insignificance when compared to the ranges of the mountains
which enclose the Ghor; and it is therefore only by comparison that this part of
the Ghor is entitled to be called a valley. Within this broader valley is a
smaller one on a lower level, through which the river runs; and its winding
course, which is marked by luxurious vegetation, resembles a gigantic serpent
twisting down the valley. So tortuous is its course, that it would be quite
impossible to give any account of its various turnings in its way from the lake
of Tiberias to the Dead Sea. A little above Beisan the stream is spanned by an
old curiously formed bridge of three arches, still in use, and here the Ghor
begins to wear a much better and more fertile aspect. It appears to be composed
of two different platforms; the upper one on either side projects from the foot
of the hills, which form the great valley, and is tolerably level, but barren
and uncultivated. It then falls away in the form of rounded sand-hills, or
whitish perpendicular cliffs, varying from 150 to 200 feet in height, to the
lower plain, which should more properly be called the valley of the Jordan. The
river here and there washes the foot of the cliffs which enclose this smaller
valley, but generally it winds in the most [2.521] tortuous manner between them.
In many places these cliffs are like walls. About this part of the Jordan the
lower plain might be perhaps 1 1/2 or 2 miles broad, and so full of the most
rank and luxuriant vegetation, like a jungle, that in a few spots only can
anything approach its banks. Below Beisan the higher terraces on either side
begin to close in, and to narrow the fertile space below; the hills become
irregular and only partly cultivated ; and by degrees the whole Ghor resumes its
original form. The zigzag course of the river is still prettily marked by lines
of green foliage on its banks, as it veers from the cliffs on one side to those
on the other. This general character of the river and of the Ghor is continued
to the Dead Sea, the mountains on either side of the upper valley approaching or
receding, and the river winding in the lower valley between bare cliffs of soft
limestone, in some places not less than 300 or 400 feet high, having many
shallows and some large falls. The American expedition added little to the
information contained in the paper of our enterprising countryman, who only
survived his exploit one month. Lieut. Lynch's report, however, fully confirms
all Lieut. Molyneux's observations; and he sums up the results of the survey in
the following sentence:--“The great secret of the depression between lake
Tiberias and the Dead Sea is solved by the tortuous course of the Jordan. In a
space of 60 miles of latitude and 4 or 5 miles of longitude, the Jordan
traverses at least 200 miles. . . . We have plunged down twenty-seven
threatening rapids, besides a great many of lesser magnitude.” (Lynch, Narrative
of the United States' Expedition to the Jordan, &c., p. 265.) It is satisfactory
also to find that the trigonometrical survey of the officers attached to the
American expedition confirms the results arrived at by Lieut. Symonds. (Dr.
Robinson, Theological Review for 1848, pp. 764--768.)
It is obvious that these phaenomena have an important bearing on the historical
notices of the river; and it is curious to observe (as Mr. Petermann has
remarked), in examining the results of De Bertou, Russegger, and Von Wildenbruch,
that the depression both of the Dead Sea and of the lake of Tiberias increases
in a chronological order (with only one exception); which may perhaps indicate
that a continual change is going on in the level of the entire Ghor, especially
as it is well proved that the whole Jordan valley, with its lakes, not only has
been but still is subject to volcanic action; as Russegger has remarked that the
mountains between Jerusalem and the Jordan, in the valley of the Jordan itself,
and those around the Dead Sea, bear unequivocal evidence of volcanic agency,
such as disruptions, upheaving, faults, &c. &c.,--proofs of which agency are
still notorious in continual earthquakes, hotsprings, and formations of asphalt.
One of the earliest historical facts connected with this river is its periodical
overflow during the season of barley-harvest (Josh. 3.15; 1 Chron. 12.15;
Jeremiah, 12.5; see Blunt's Undesigned Coincidences, pp. 113, 114); and allusion
is made to this fact after the captivity. (Ecclus. 24.26; Aristeus, Epist. ad
Philocratem.) The river in the vicinity of Jericho was visited by the writer at
all seasons of the year, but he never witnessed an overflow, nor were the
Bedouins who inhabit its banks acquainted with the phaenomenon. The American
expedition went down the river in the month of April, and were off Jericho at
Easter, yet they witnessed nothing of the kind, though Lieut. Lynch remarks,
“the river is in the latter stage of a freshet; a few weeks earlier or later,
and passage would have been impracticable.” Considerably further north, however,
not far below Beisan, Lieut. Molyneux remarked “a quantity of deposit in the
plain of the Jordan, and the marks of water in various places at a distance from
the river, from which it was evident that the Jordan widely overflows its banks;
and the sheikh informed him that in winter it is occasionally half a mile
across; which accounts for the luxuriant vegetation in this part of the Ghor”
(l.c. p. 117). It would appear from this that the subsidence of the basin of the
Dead Sea and the more rapid fall of the Jordan consequent upon it, which has
also cut out for it a deeper channel, has prevented the overflow except in those
parts where the fall is not so rapid.
Another change may also be accounted for in the same manner. “The fords of the
Jordan” were once few and far between, as is evident from the historical
notices. (Josh. 2.7; Judges, 3.28, 7.24, 12.5.) But Lieut. Molyneux says of the
upper part of its course, “I am within the mark when I say that there are many
hundreds of places where we might have walked across, without wetting our feet,
on the large rocks and stones” (p. 115).
The thick jungle on the banks of the river was formerly a covert for wild
beasts, from which they were dislodged by the periodical overflow of the river;
and “the lion coming up from the swelling of Jordan” is a familiar figure in the
prophet Jeremiah (49.19, 1. 44). It was supposed until very recently that not
only the lion but all other wild beasts were extinct in Palestine, or that the
wild boar was the sole occupant of the jungle ; but the seamen in company with
Lieut. Molyneux reported having seen “two tigers and a boar” in their passage
down the stream (p. 118).
The principal tributaries of the Jordan join it from the east; the most
considerable are the Yarmuk [GADARA] and the Zerka [JABBOK].
This river is principally noted in sacred history for the miraculous passage of
the children of Israel under Joshua (iii.),--the miracle was repeated twice
afterwards in the passage of Elijall and Elisha (2 Kings, 2.8, 14),--and for the
baptism of our Lord (St. Matt. iii. &c.). It is honoured with scanty notice by
the classical geographers. Strabo reckons it the largest river of Syria (xvi. p.
755). Pliny is somewhat more communicative. He speaks of Paneas as its source,
consistently with Josephus. “Jordanis amnis oritur č fonte Paneade, qui nomen
dedit Caesareae : amnis amoenus, et quatenus locorum situs patitur ambitiosus,
accolisque se praebens, velut invitus. Asphaltiden lacum dirum natura petit, a
quo postremo ebibitur, aquasque laudatas perdit pestilentibus mistas. Ergo ubi
prima convallium fait occasio in lacum se fundit, quem plures Genesaram vocant,
etc.” (Hist. Nat. 5.15.) Tacitus, though more brief, is still more accurate, as
he notices the Bahr. Huleh as well as the sea of Tiberias. “Nee Jordanes pelago
accipitur: sed unum atque alterum lacum, integer perfluit: tertio retinetur.”
(Hist. 5.6.)
The ancient name for El-Ghor was AULON and the modern native name of the Jordan
is Es-Shiriah.
(Karl von Raumer, Palästina, 2nd ed., 1850, pp. 48--54, 449--452; Ritter,
Erdkunde, &c. West Asien, vol. 15, pp. 181--556, A.D. Der [2.522] Jordan und die
Beschiffung des Todten Meeres, ein Vortrag, &c. , 1850. The original documents,
from which these are chiefly compiled, are:—Comte de Bertou, in the Bulletin de
la Soc. Géog. de Paris, tom. 12.1839, pp. 166, &c., with chart; Russegger,
Reisen in Europa, Asien, Afrika, &c., vol. iii. Stuttgart, 1847, pp. 102–109,
132–134; Herr von Wildenbruch, Monatsberichte de Gesellschaft für Erdkunde zu
Berlin, 1845, 1846.)
IV. THE DEAD SEA.
Of all the natural phaenomena of Palestine, the Dead Sea is that which has most
attracted the notice of geographers and naturalists both in ancient and modern
times, as exhibiting peculiarities and suggesting questions of great interest in
a geological point of view.
Names.—The earliest allusion to this sea, which, according to the prevailing
theory, refers to its original formation, is found in the book of Genesis
(14.3), where it is identified with the vale “of Siddim,” and denominated “the
Salt Sea” (? ???assa t?? ????, LXX.); comp. Numb. 34.3, 12); which Salt Sea is
elsewhere identified with “the sea of the plain” (Deut. 3.17, 4.49; Josh. qqiii.
16, 12.3), ???assa ?a?aßa, LXX.; called by the prophets Joel (2.20), Zachariah
(14.8), and Ezekiel (47.18), the “former,” or “eastern sea.” Its common name
among the classical authors, first found in Diodorus Siculus (inf. cit.), and
adopted by Josephus, is “Asphaltitis Lacus” (?sfa?t?t?? ??µ??), or simply ? ?asfa?t^t??.
The name by which it is best known among Europeans has the authority of Justin
(36.3.6) and Pausanias (5.7.4), who call it ???assa ? ?e???, “Mortuum Mare.” Its
modern native name is Bahr Lűt, “the Sea of Lot,”—therein perpetuating the
memorial of the catastrophe to which it may owe its formation, or by which it is
certain that its features were considerably altered and modified. The name
assigned it by Strabo must be referred to a slip of the author; for it is too
much to assume with Falconer that the geographer had written s?d?µ?? ??µ?? when
all the copies read se?ß???? ?.
So copious are the modern notices of this remarkable inland sea, that it would
be vain to attempt even an abridgment of them; and the necessity for doing so is
in great measure superseded by the late successful surveying expedition,
conducted by Lieut. Lynch of the American navy, whose published narrative has
set at rest many questions connected with its physical formation. The principal
ancient writers will be quoted in detail and in chronological order, that it may
appear how far they have borrowed one from another, or may be regarded as
independent witnesses. Their notices will then be substantiated or controverted
by modern writers. The questions relating to the formation of the sea, its
volcanic origin, and the other igneous phaenomena in the country, will be
reserved for another chapter.
The earliest extant writer who has noticed at any length the marvels of the Dead
Sea, is Diodorus Siculus (B. C. 45), who has twice described it; first in his
geographical survey of the country (2.48), and subsequently in his account of
the expedition of Demetrius against the Nabataei (19.98), to which last account
a few particulars are added, which were omitted in the earlier book.
"We ought not to pass over the character of this lake (Asphaltites) unmentioned.
It is situated in the midst of the satrapy of Idumaea, in length ex- tending
about 500 stadia, and in breadth about 60. Its water is very salt, and of an
extremely noxious smell, so that neither fish nor any of the other ordinary
marine animals can live in it: and although great rivers remarkable for their
sweetness flow into it, yet by its smell it counteracts their effect. From the
centre of it there rises every year a large mass of solid bitumen, sometimes
more than 3 plethra in size, sometimes a little less than one plethrum.1 For
this reason the neighbouring barbarians usually call the greater, bull, and the
lesser, calf. The bitumen floating on the surface of the water appears at a
distance like an island. The time of the rising of the bitumen is known about
twenty days before it takes place; for around the lake to the distance of
several stadia the smell of the bitumen spreads with a noxious air, and all the
silver, gold, and brass in the neighbourhood loses its proper colour; which,
however, returns again as soon as all the bitumen is ejected. The fire which
burns beneath the ground and the stench render the inhabitants of the
neighbouring country sickly and very short-lived. It is nevertheless well fitted
for the cultivation of palms, wherever it is traversed by serviceable rivers or
fountains available for the purposes of irrigation. In a neighbouring valley
grows the plant called balsam, which yields an abundant income, as the plant
grows in no other part of the world, and it is much used by physicians as a
medicine.
“The bitumen which rises to the surface is carried off by the inhabitants of
both sides of the lake, who are hostilely inclined towards each other. They
carry away the bitumen in a singular manner without boats: they construct large
rafts of reeds, which they launch into the lake. Upon each of these not more
than three can sit, two of whom row with oars attached to the raft, and the
third, armed with a bow, drives off those who are sailing up from the opposite
side, or who venture to use violence; but when they come near to the bitumen
they leap on it with axes in their hands, and, cutting it like soft stone, they
lade their raft, and then return. If the raft break and any one fall off, even
though he may be unable to swim, he does not sink as in other water, but floats
as well as one who could swim; for this water naturally supports any weight
capable of expansion, or which contains air, but not solid substances, which
have a density like that of gold, silver, and lead, and the like: but even these
sink much more slowly in this water than they would if they were thrown into any
other lake. This source of wealth the barbarians possess, and they transport it
into Egypt and there sell it for the purposes of embalming the dead; for unless
this bitumen is mixed with the other spices, the bodies will not long remain
undecayed.”
It has been mentioned that Strabo (cir. A. D. 14) describes it under the name of
Sirbonis Lacus, a palpable confusion, as regards the name, with the salt lake on
the eastern confines of Egypt [SIRBONIS LACUS], as is evident from his statement
that it stretched along the sea-coast, as well as from the length which he
assigns it, corresponding as it does with the 200 stadia given by Diodorus
Siculus as the length of the true Sirbonis Lacus, which that author properly
places between Coelesyria and [2.523] Egypt (1.30). The mistake is the more
unaccountable, as he not only describes the Dead Sea in a manner which shows
that he was thoroughly acquainted with its peculiarities, but also cites the
opinions of more ancient authors, who had described and attempted to explain its
phaenomena. His notice is peculiarly interesting from the accounts which he
gives of the formation of the bitumen, and the other indications which he
mentions in the vicinity of the operation of volcanic agency, of which more will
be said in the following chapter. The native traditions of the catastrophe of
the cities of the plain, and the still existing monuments of their overthrow,
are facts not mentioned by the earlier historian.
“The lake Sirbonis is of great extent: some have stated its circumference at
1000 stadia; it stretches along near the sea-coast, in length a little more than
200 stadia, deep, and with exceedingly heavy water, so that it is not necessary
to swim, but one who advances into it up to his waist is immediately borne up.
It is full of asphalt. which it vomits up at uncertain seasons from the midst of
the depth, together with bubbles like those of boiling water, and the surface,
curving itself, assumes the appearance of a crest. Together with the asphalt
there rises much soot, smoky, and invisible to the sight, by which brass,
silver, and everything shining, even gold, is tarnished; and by the tarnishing
of their vessels the inhabitants of the neighbourhood know the time when the
asphalt begins to rise, and make preparations for collecting it by constructing
rafts of reeds. Now the asphalt is the soil of the earth melted by heat, and
bubbling up, and again changed into a solid mass by cold water, such as that of
the lake, so that it requires to be cut; it then floats on the surface by reason
of the nature of the water, which, as I have said, is such that a person who
goes into it need not swim, and indeed cannot sink, but is supported by the
water. The people then sail up on the rafts, and cut and carry off as much as
they can of the asphalt: this is what takes place. But Posidonius states that
they being sorcerers use certain incantations, and consolidate the asphalt by
pouring over it urine and other foul liquids, and then pressing them out. After
this they cut it; unless perhaps urine has the same properties as in the bladder
of those who suffer from stone. For gold-solder (???s?????a, borax) is made with
the urine of boys. In the midst of the lake the phaenomenon may reasonably take
place, because the source of the fire, and that of the asphalt, as well as the
principal quantities of it, are in the middle; and the eruption is uncertain,
because the movements of fire have no order known to us, as is that of many
other gases (p?e?µata). This also takes place in Apollonia of Epeirus. There are
many other evidences also of the existence of fire beneath the ground; for
several rough burnt rocks are shown near Moasas [MASADA], and caves in several
places, and earth formed of ashes, and drops of pitch distilling from tire
rocks, and boiling streams, with an unpleasant odour perceptible from a
distance, and houses overthrown in every direction, so as to give probability to
the legends of the natives, that formerly thirteen cities stood on this spot, of
the principal of which, namely, Sodoma, ruins still remain about 60 stadia in
circumference; that the lake was formed by earthquakes and the ebullition of
fire, and hot water impregnated with bitumen and sulphur; that the rocks took
fire; and that some of the cities were swallowed up, and others were de- serted
by those of their inhabitants who could escape. Eratosthenes gives a different
account, namely, that the country being marshy, the greater part of it was
covered like the sea by the bursting out of the waters. Moreover, in the
territory of Gadara, there is some pernicious lake-water, which when the cattle
drink, they lose their hair, hoofs, and horns. At the place named Tarichiae the
lake affords excellent salt fish; it also produces fruit-trees, resembling
apple-trees. The Egyptians use the asphalt for embalming the dead.” (Lib. xvi.
pp. 763, 764.)
Another confusion must be remarked at the close of this passage, where Strabo
evidently places Tarichiae on the Dead Sea, whereas it is situated on the shores
of the sea of Tiberias.
The next writer is the Jewish historian, who adds indeed little to the accurate
information conveyed by his predecessors; but his account is evidently
independent of the former, and states a few facts which will be of service in
the sequel. Josephus wrote about A. D. 71.
“It is worth while to describe the character of the lake Asphaltites, which is
salt and unproductive, as I mentioned, and of such buoyancy that it sustains
even the heaviest substances thrown into it, and that even one who endeavours to
sink in it cannot easily do so. For Vespasian, having come to examine it,
ordered some persons who could not swim to be bound with their hands behind
their backs, and to be cast into the deep; and it happened that all of them
floated on the surface as if they were borne up by the force of a blast. The
changes of its colour also are remarkable; for thrice every day it changes its
appearance, and reflects different colours from the rays of the sun It also
emits in many places black masses of bitumen, which float on the surface,
somewhat resembling headless bulls in appearance and size The workmen who live
by the lake row out, and, laying hold of the solid masses, drag them into their
boats; but when they have filled them they do not find it easy to cut the
bitumen, for, by reason of its tenacity, the boat adheres to the mass until it
is detached by means of the menstruous blood of women or urine, to which alone
it yields. It is used not only for shipbuilding but also for medicinal purposes:
it is mixed with several drugs. The length of this lake is 580 stadia, as it
extends as far as Zoara of Arabia: its breadth is 150 stadia. On the borders of
the lake lies the territory of Sodom, formerly a flourishing country, both on
account of the abundance of its produce and the number of its cities; now it is
all an arid waste. It is said that it was destroyed by lightning, on account of
the wickedness of its inhabitants. The traces of the heavenly fire and the ruins
of five cities may still be seen; and ashes are found even in the fruits, which
are of an appearance resembling the edible kinds, but which, when plucked, turn
into smoke and ashes. Such confirmation do the legends concerning the land of
Sodom receive from actual observation.” (Joseph. B. J. 4.8.4.)
The Dead Sea and its marvels was a subject suited to the inquiring spirit of the
naturalist; and Pliny's account, though brief, is remarkably clear and accurate,
except that, in common with all writers, he greatly overstates its size. He
wrote probably too soon (A. D. 74) after Josephus to avail himself of his
account and may, therefore, be regarded as an independent authority.
“This lake produces nothing but bitumen, from [2.524] which circumstance its
name is derived. It receives no animal body; bulls and camels float in it; and
this is the origin of the report that nothing sinks in it. In length it exceeds
100 miles; its greatest breadth is 25 miles, its least 6. On the east of it lies
Arabia Nomadum, on the south Macherűs, formerly the second fortress of Judaea
after Jerusalem. On the same side there is situated a hot-spring, possessing
medicinal properties, named Callirrhoë, indicating by its name the virtues of
its waters.” (Hist Nat. lib. 5.16.)
The last author who will be here cited is Tacitus, whose account may be given in
the original. He appears in this, as in other passages, to have drawn largely on
Josephus, but had certainly consulted other writers. He wrote A. D. 97.
“Lacus immense ambitu, specie maris, sapore corruptior, gravitate odoris accolis
pestifer, neque vento impellitur, neque piscesaut suetas aquis volucres patitur.
Incertae undae: superjacta, ut solido, ferunt: periti imperitique nandi perinde
attolluntur. Certo anni, bitumen egerit: cujus legendi usum, ut ceteras artes,
experientia docuit. Ater suapte natureâ liquor, et sparsoaceto concretus,
innatat: hunc manu captum, quibus ea cura, in summa navis trahunt. Inde, nullo
juvante, influit, oneratque, donec abscindas: nec abscindere aere ferrove possis:
fugit cruorem vestemque infectam sanguine, quo feminae per menses exsolvuntur:
sic veteres auctores. Sed gnari locorum tradunt, undantes bitumine moles pelli,
manuque trahi ad littus: mox, ubi vapore terrae, solis inaruerint securibus
cuneisque, ut trabes aut saxa, discindi. Haud procul inde campi, quos ferunt
olim uberes, magnisque urbibus habitatos, fulminum jactu arsisse: et manere
vestigia, terramque ipsam specie torridam, vim frugiferam perdidisse. Nam cuncta
sponte edita, aut manu sata, sive herba tenus aut flore, seu solitam in speciem
adolevere, atra et inania velut in cinerem vanescunt. Ego sicut inclytas quondam
urbes igne coelesti flagrasse concesserim, ita halitu lacus infici terram,
corrumpi superfusum spiritum, eoque foetus segetum et autumni putrescere reor,
solo coeloque juxta gravi.” Hist. 5.6.
This sea is subsequently noticed by Galen (A. D. 164) and Pausanias (cir. A. D.
174), but their accounts are evidently borrowed from some of those above cited
from Greek, Jewish, and Latin writers; in illustration of whose statements
reference will now be made to modern travellers, who have had better
opportunities of testing the truth than were presented to them; and it will
appear that those statements, even in their most marvellous particulars, are
wonderfully trustworthy; and that the hypotheses by which they endeavoured to
account for the phenomena of this extraordinary lake are confirmed by the
investigations of modern science.
1. General Remarks.
It is deeply to be regretted that the results arrived at by the American
exploring expedition, under Lieut. Lynch, have been given to the world only in
the loose, unsystematic and thoroughly unsatisfactory notes scattered through
the personal narrative published by that officer; and that his official report
to his government has not been made available for scientific purposes. The few
meagre facts worth chronicling have been extracted in a number of the
Bibliotheca Sacra, from which they are here copied. (Vol. v. p. 767, and vol.
vii. p. 396.) The distance in a straight line from the fountain 'Ain-el-Feshkhah,
on the west, directly across to the eastern shore, was nearly 8 statute .miles.
The soundings gave 696 feet as the greatest depth. Another line was run
diagonally from the same point to the south-east, to a chasm forming the outlet
of the hot springs of Callirrhoë. The bottom of the northern half of the sea is
almost an entire plain. Its meridional lines at a short distance from the shore
scarce vary in depth. The deepest soundings thus far are 188 fathoms, or 1128
feet. Near the shore the bottom is generally an incrustation of salt; but the
intermediate one is soft, with many rectangular crystals, mostly cubes, of pure
salt. The southern half of the sea is as shallow as the northern one is deep,
and for about one-fourth of its entire length the depth does not exceed 3
fathoms or 18 feet. Its southern bed presented no crystals, but the shores are
lined with incrustations of salt. Thus, then, the bottom of the Dead Sea forms
two submerged plains, an elevated and a depressed one. The first, its southern
part, of slimy mud covered by a shallow bay: the last, its northern and largest
portion, of mud with incrustations and rectangular crystals of salt, at a great
depth, with a narrow ravine running through it, corresponding with the bed of
the river Jordan at one extremity and the Wady-el-Jeib at the other. The
opposite shores of the peninsula and the west coast present evident marks of
disruption.
2. Dimensions.
It will have been seen that the ancient authorities differ widely as to the size
of the sea: Diodorus stating it at 500 stadia by 60; Pliny at 100 miles in
length, by 25 miles in its widest, and 6 miles in its narrowest part; Josepbus
at 280 stadia by 150. Strabo's measure evidently belongs to the Sirbonis Lacus,
with which he confounded the Dead Sea, and is copied from Diodorus's description
of that lake. Of these measures the earliest, viz. that of Diodorus, comes
nearest to modern measurement. We have seen that a straight line from 'Ain-el-Feshkhah
to the east shore measured nearly 8 statute miles: from 'Ain Jidy directly
across to the mouth of the Arnon the distance was about 9 statute miles. The
length of the sea does not seem to have been measured by the Americans, but the
near agreement of their actual measurement of the width with the computation of
Dr. Robinson may give credit to his estimate of the length also. His
observations resulted in fixing the breadth of the sea at 'Ain Jidy at about 9
geographical miles, and the length about 39,—'Ain Jidy being situated nearly at
the middle point of the western coast. (Bib. Res. vol. ii. p. 217.)
3. Saltness and Specific Gravity.
Its excessive saltness, noticed by Josephus, is attested by all travellers; and
is indicated by the presence of crystals of salt in profusion over the bed of
the sea,—“at one time Stellwagen's lead brought up nothing but crystals,”—as
well as by the district of rock—salt at the south-west quarter of the sea, where
the American officers discovered “a lofty, round pillar, standing detached from
the general mass, composed of solid salt, capped with carbonate of lime,
cylindrical in front and pyramidal behind, about 40 feet high, resting on a kind
of oval pedestal from 40 to 60 feet above the level of the sea.” (Lynch,
Expedition, p. 307.) In the southern bay of the sea, where the water encroaches
more or less according to the season, it dries off into shallows and small
pools, which in the end deposit a salt as fine and as well bleached, in some
instances, as that in regular salt-pans. In this part, where the salt water
stagnates and evaporates, Irby and Mangles “found several persons engaged in
[2.525] peeling off a solid surface of salt, several inches in thickness; they
were collecting it and loading it on asses.” (Travels, p. 139.) It has been
sometimes asserted that the water is so saturated with salt that salt cannot be
dissolved in it. The experi- ment was tried by Lieut. Lynch with the following
result:—“Tried the relative density of the water of this sea and of the
Atlantic—distilled water being as 1. The water of the Atlantic was 1.02, that of
this sea 1.13; the last dissolved 1/11, the water of the Atlantic 1/6, and
distilled water 5/17, of its weight of salt. The boats were found to draw 1 inch
less water when afloat upon this sea than in the river.” (Lynch, p. 377.) The
experiment tried by Vespasian has been repeated by nearly all tra- vellers, of
course with the same result. The density and buoyancy of the waters is such that
it is im- possible to sink in it. “A muscular man floated nearly breast high,
without the least exertion.” Several analyses of the waters have been made with
various results, to be accounted for, as Dr. Robinson supposes, by the various
states of the sea at dif- ferent seasons; for its body of water is increased to
the height of 7 feet or more in the rainy season (Lynch, p. 289), or, according
to Dr. Robinson, 10 or 15 feet; for lie found traces of its high-water mark, at
the south end, in the month of May, more than an hour south of its limit at that
time. The following are the results of the analyses, the standard of comparison
for the specific gravity being distilled water at 1000:—
Dr. Marset, 1807. Gay-Lussac, 1818. Pf. Gmelin, l826. Dr. Ap-john,1839.
Specific Gravity 1211 1228 1212 1153
—— —— —— ——
Chloride of Calcium 3.920 3.98 3.2141 2.438
" Magnesium 10.246 15.31 11.7734 7.370
Bromide of Magnesium 0.4393 0.201
Chloride of Potassium 1.6738 0.852
" Sodium 10.360 6.95 7.0777 7.839
" Manganese 0.2117 0.005
" Aluminum 0.0896
" Ammonium 0.0075
Sulphate of Lime 0.054 0.0527 0.075
—— —— —— ——
24.580 26.24 24.5398 18.780
Water 75.420 73.76 75.4602 81.220
—— —— —— ——
100 100 100 100
(Robinson, Bib. Res. ii. pp. 224,225.)
Russegger says:—“The excessive saltness of the Dead Sea is easily accounted for
by the washing down of the numerous and extensive salt-beds, which are peculiar
to the formation of the basin, in which also are found bituminous rocks in
sufficient quantity to enable us, without doing violence to science, to explain
several chemical and physical peculiarities of this lake-water by the continual
contact of these rocks with water strongly impregnated with salt.” (Reisen, p.
207.)
4. Evaporation.
The enormous quantity of water brought down by the Jordan, particularly in the
rainy season, and by the other streams around the Dead Sea, some of which are
very considerable, —as e. g. the Arnon was found to be 82 feet wide and 4 feet
deep at its mouth,—is all carried off by evaporation; and, when the small extent
of the sea is considered, it is clear that the decomposition of its waters must
be very rapid. The ancient writers speak of a noxious smell, of bubbles like
those of boiling water, of much soot, and an invisible vapour, tarnishing all
metals, and deleterious to the inhabitants; and its change of aspect thrice a
day may also be ascribed to the same cause. Now it is remarkable that nearly all
these phaenomena have been noticed by recent explorers, and the single one which
is not confirmed is accounted for in a manner which must exempt the ancient
geographers from the charge of misrepresentation or exaggeration; and it may
well be believed that the enormous chemical processes, perpetually going forward
in the depths of the sea, may occasionally produce effects upon the surface
which have not been chronicled by any modern traveller. Lieut. Lynch, while
encamped near Engedi, remarked, “a strong smell of sulphuretted hydrogen,”
though there are no thermal springs in this vicinity; and again,“a foetid
sulphureous odour in the night;”—“the north wind, quite fresh, and accompanied
with a smell of sulphur.” Lieut. Molyneux detected the same disagreeable smell
the night he spent upon the sea, which he ascribed to the water (Journal of the
R. Geog. Soc. vol. xviii. p. 127, 1848.) But Lieut. Lynch states that, “although
the water was greasy, acrid, and disagreeable, it was perfectly inodorous.” He
is therefore inclined to attribute the noxious smell to the foetid springs and
marshes along the shores of the sea, increased, perhaps, by exhalations from
stagnant pools in the flat plain which bounds it to the north. (Expedition, pp.
292, 294, 296, 300.) The “pale-blue misty appearance over the sea.” “the air
over the sea, very misty,” and “the two extremities of the sea misty, with
constant evaporation” (p. 294), are other notes indicating the unnatural state
of the atmosphere surcharged with the gases disengaged by the process. On a
stormy night “the surface of the sea was one wide sheet of phosphorescent foam,
so that a dark object could have been discerned at a great distance” (p. 281;
comp. Molyneux, l.c. p. 129). A kind of mirage, noticed by many travellers, may
be attributed to the same cause. “A thin haze-like vapour over the southern
sea:—appearance of an island between the two shores” (p. 288). This phaenomenon
is more fully noticed by Irby and Mangles: “This evening, at sunset, we were
deceived by a dark shade on the sea, which assumed so exactly the appearance of
an island that we entertained no doubt regarding it, even after looking through
a telescope. It is not the only time that such a phaenomenon has presented
itself to us; in two instances, looking up the sea from its southern extremity,
we saw it apparently closed by a low, dark line, like a bar of sand to the
northward; and, on a third occasion, two small islands seemed to present
themselves between a long sharp promontory and the western shore. We were unable
to account for these appearances, but felt little doubt that they are the same
that deceived Mr. Seetzen into the supposition that he had discovered an island
of some extent, which we have had opportunity of ascertaining, beyond all doubt,
does not exist. It is not absolutely impossible, however, that he may have seen
one of those temporary islands of bitumen, which Pliny describes as being
several acres in extent.” (Travels, p. 141.) Two effects of the heavy atmosphere
of the sea remain to be noticed: one, the irresistible feeling of drowsiness
which it induced in all who navigated it; the other, confirming, in a remarkable
manner, the ancient testimonies, above cited, that the water appeared to be
destructive to everything it touched, particularly metals; viz. that “everything
in the boat was covered with a nasty slimy substance, iron dreadfully corroded,
and looked as if covered with coal-tar.” (Molyneux, l.c. p. 128.) The “bubbles
like those of boiling water,” mentioned by Strabo, may be identified with the
curious broad strip of foam, lying in a straight line nearly north and south
throughout the whole length of the sea, which [2.526] seemed to be constantly
bubbling and in motion. (Molyneux, p. 129; Lynch, pp. 288, 289.) And even the
marvellous fact mentioned by Josephus, of the sea changing its colour three
times a day, may derive some countenance from testimonies already cited,, but
more especially from the following notice of Lieut. Lynch:--“At one time,
to-day, the sea assumed an aspect peculiarly sombre. . . . The great evaporation
enveloped it in a thin, transparent vapour, its purple tinge contrasting
strangely with the extraordinary colour of the sea beneath, and, where they
blended in the distance, giving it the appearance of smoke from burning sulphur.
It seemed a vast caldron of metal, fused but motionless” (p. 324): “in the
forenoon it had looked like a sheet of foam.” In the afternoon, of the same day,
it “verified the resemblance which it has been said to bear to molten lead;” “at
night it had the exact hue of absinthe” (p. 276). The earlier testimony of
Prince Radzivil may also be adduced, who, after citing Josephus, adds, that he
had had ocular proof of the fact: “Nam mane habebat aquam nigricantem; meridie,
sole intenso (sunt enim calores hic maximi) instar panni fit caerulea: ante
occasum, ubi vis caloris remittit, tanquam limo permixta, modice rubet, vel
potius flavescit.” (Ierosolymitana Peregrinatio, p. 96.) A familiarity acquired
by three weeks' diligent examination did not remove the feeling of awe inspired
by its marvels: “So sudden are the changes of the weather, and so different the
aspects it presents, as at times to seem as if we were in a world of
enchantments. We are alternately beside and upon the brink and the surface of a
huge and sometimes seething caldron.” (Lieut. Lynch, Bib, Sacr. vol. v. p. 768.)
5. Bitumen.
It is to be regretted that the American expedition has thrown no new light on
the production of the asphalt for which this sea was once so famous. Along
almost the whole of the west coast numerous fragments of this substance are
found among the pebbles, but there is no record of any considerable masses or
fields of it being seen by any European travellers in modern times; unless, as
is suggested by Irby and Mangles, the imaginary islands may be so regarded. But
it is curious that the traditions of the natives still confirm the notice of
Strabo that drops of pitch are distilled from rocks on the eastern shore;--a
story repeated by various Arab sheikhs to Seetzen, Burckhardt, and Robinson, the
last of whom also mentions the fact of their belief that the large masses of
bitumen appear only after earthquakes. Thus, after the earthquake of 1834, a
large quantity was thrown upon the shore near the south-western part of the sea,
of which one tribe brought about 60 kuntârs into market (each kuntâr == 98
lbs.); and that after the earthquake of Jan. 1st, 1837, a large mass of bitumen
(one said like an island, another like a house) was discovered floating on the
sea, and was driven aground on the west side, not far to the north of Usdum. The
Arabs swam off to it, and cut it up with axes so as to bring it ashore; as
Tacitus tells us was done in his times, though he mentions what he considered
the less probable account of its flowing as a black liquid into the ships in a
perpetual stream. (Robinson, Bib. Res. vol. ii. pp. 228--231.) That the water of
this sea is destructive of all animal life, as all the ancients held, seems
sufficiently proved; for although shells have been found on the shore, they have
been evidently washed down by the Jordan or other fresh water streams, and their
inmates destroyed by the sea water ; while the birds that have been occasionally
seen on its surface may be regarded as denizens of those same streams: and no
animal life has been discovered in its waters.
V. VOLCANIC PHAENOMENA.
Something must now be said of the various theories by which it has been
attempted to account for the wonderful phaenomena above recorded of the
depression of the Ghor, or Valley of the Jordan ; and of the formation and
physical constitution of the Dead Sea. All theories suppose volcanic agency: and
it is worthy of observation that, while the earliest historical and poetical
records of the country bear witness to a familiarity with such phaenomena, the
existing geological monuments confirm the testimony. Independently of the
igneous agency by which the cities of the plain were destroyed, much of the
descriptive imagery of the psalmists and prophets is borrowed from volcanos and
earthquakes ; while there are evidences of an earthquake of very great and
probably destructive violence during the reign of Uzziah, king of Judah, which
formed a kind of era in the history of the country, being alluded to after an
interval of 300 years. (Amos, 1.1; Zechariah, 14.5.) The existing phaenomena may
be briefly mentioned, beginning with one recently discovered by the American
explorers, of whom “Mr. Aulick reports a volcanic formation on the east shore,
and brought specimens of lava” (p. 280). The mountain known as Jebel Műsa, at
the northeast of the Dead Sea, composed entirely of black bituminous limestone,
which burns like coal, has not been investigated so fully as it deserves: but
the basaltic columns in the vicinity of the sea of Tiberias have been frequently
noticed by travellers. The thermal fountains of Callirrhoë, Gadara, and Tiberias
complete the chain of evidence, and render it highly probable that the extinct
volcano noticed by Dr. Robinson at a short distance north-west of Safed, the
Frank Mountain, and others, may have been active during the historical period,
and furnished the poets and prophets with the sublime imagery of the Bible.
Having then discovered the agent of the geological changes that the country has
passed through, it may be interesting to hear the opinion of two eminent and
scientific writers on the great problem under consideration.
Russegger, who has himself carefully examined the phenomena of the country and
tested the observations of preceding travellers, thus sums up the results (Reisen,
p. 205):--
“From its exit from the lake of Tiberias to its entrance into the Dead Sea the
Jordan has a fall of 716 Paris feet and thus lies at the latter place 1341 Paris
feet below the level of the Mediterranean sea. At the southern extremity of the
Dead Sea lie the marshy lowlands of Wady-el-Ghor, the commencement of
Wady-el-Araba, and apparently very little higher than the Dead Sea itself. These
lowlands join Wady-el-Araba, the bed of which rises gently to the watershed
which separates the water system of the Dead Sea from that of the Red Sea. As
the watershed of Wady-el-Araba is apparently of no considerable height above the
level of the sea, the length of this remarkable depression may be reckoned from
the northern extremity of the plain El-Batiheh (to the north of the sea of
Tiberias) to this watershed, a distance of full three degrees. All the rock of
this region consists of normal formations, amongst which those of the Jura and
[2.527] chalk period prevail. It is in the northern part of this country alone
that volcanic formations are found in considerable quantities. Nevertheless much
of the land in which volcanic rocks are not found bears evident marks of
frequent volcanic action, such as hot-springs; the crater-like depressions, such
as the basin of Tiberias, and that of the Dead Sea, with its basaltic rocks; the
frequent and visible disturbances of the strata of the normal rocks, the
numerous crevices, and especially the frequent and violent earth-quakes. The
line of earthquakes in Syria includes Hebron, Jerusalem, Nablűs, Tiberias, Safed,
Baalbek, Aleppo, from thence takes a direction from south-west to north-east,
follows the direction of the central chain of Syria, runs parallel to that of
the valley of the Jordan, and has its termination northwards, in the volcanic
country on the slope of Taurus (Giaur Dagh), and southwards in the mountain land
of Arabia Petraea. At several places branches of this great volcanic crevice
appear to stretch as far as the sea, and to touch Jaffa, Acre, Beirűt,
Antioch,--unless,indeed, there be a second crevice, parallel to the first,
running along the coast, and connecting the above places. I am of opinion that
such is the case, and that there exists also a third crevice, coinciding with
the direction of the valley of the Jordan, and united to the principal crevice
above mentioned at its northern extremity. This supposition will account for the
depression of the valley of the Jordan. At the time of the destruction of Sodom
and Gomorrah the surface of the crevice opened, and the great depression of the
ground from Jebel-es-Sheich to the watershed in Wady-el-Araba followed. The
difference of the resistance arising from local circumstances, the volcanic
eruptions connected with this phaenomenon, the local form of the land, and the
different depths of the chasm then formed, caused a more or less extensive
depression, and created along the chasm crater-like hollows, some of
extraordinary depth, as the basin of Tiberias and that of the Dead Sea. These
hollows, as is usual in such cases, became filled with water, and formed a
system of lakes. Next the waters from the sides of Jebel-es-Sheich formed the
principal stream of Jordan connecting these lakes, having overflowed them
successively. This however was not the case with the Dead Sea. The watershed of
Wady-el-Araba is probably much more ancient than the depression ; and as the Red
Sea, judging by the geognostic nature of Wady-el-Araba,. formerly seems to have
extended so far inland, this barrier must have existed at the time of the
depression, since otherwise the Red Sea would have burst into the hollow formed
by the sinking of the land. If, however, there existed before the time of the
depression a regular fall throughout the whole valley to the Red Sea, it is
natural to suppose that at that time the Jordan flowed into the Red Sea, and
that when the depression took place its course was interrupted. However this may
have been, after the depression the filling of the basin of the Dead Sea
continued until it became of such superficies, that the evaporation of the water
was equal to the influx. The appearance of its shores proves that, owing either
to a greater influx of water during rainy seasons, or to a less copious
evaporation caused by circumstances of temperature, the sea at one time was
consideraby higher than at present.”
Professor Daubeny introduces his theory with other notices of volcanic agency
collected from modern books of travel. (Dr. Daubeny, A Description of active and
extinct Volcanos, &c. 2nd ed. pp. 350--363.)
“If we proceed southwards, from the part of Asia Minor we have just been
considering, in the direction of Palestine, we shall meet with abundant
evidences of igneous action to corroborate the accounts that have been handed
down to us by ancient writers, whether sacred or profane, from both which it
might be inferred that volcanos were in activity even so late as to admit of
their being included within the limits of authentic history.” (Nahum, 1.5, 6;
Micah, 1.3, 4; Isaiah, 64.1--3; Jer. 51.25, 26.)
“The destruction of the five cities on the borders of the lake Asphaltitis or
Dead Sea, can be attributed, I conceive, to nothing else than a volcanic
eruption, judging both from the description, given by Moses of the manner in
which it took place (Gen. 19.24, 25, 28; Deut. 29.23), and from the present
aspect of the country itself.”
Volney's description of the present state of this country fully coincides with
this view. (Travels in Egypt and Syria, vol. i. pp. 281, 282.)
“The south of Syria,” he remarks,
that is, the hollow through which the Jordan flows, is a country of volcanos:
the bituminous, and sulphureous sources of the lake Asphaltitis, the lava, the
pumice-stones thrown upon its banks, and the hot-baths of Tabaria, demonstrate
that this valley has been the seat of a subterraneous fire, which is not yet
extinguished. Clouds of smoke are often observed to issue from the lake, and new
crevices to be formed upon its banks. If conjectures in such cases were not too
liable to error we might suspect that the whole valley has been formed only by a
violent sinking of a country which formerly poured the Jordan into the
Mediterranean. It appears certain, at least, that the catastrophe of five cities
destroyed by fire must have been occasioned by the eruption of a volcano then
burning.
The eruptions themselves have ceased long since, but the effects which usually
succeed them still continue to be felt at intervals in this country. The coast
in general is subject to earthquakes; and history notices several which have
changed the face of Antioch, Laodicea, Tripoli, Berytus, Tyre, and Sidon. In our
time, in the year 1759, there happened one which caused the greatest ravages. It
is said to have destroyed in the valley of Baalbec upwards of 20,000 persons; a
loss which has never been repaired. For three months the shock of it terrified
the inhabitants of Lebanon so much as to make them abandon their houses and
dwell under tents.
In addition to these remarks of Volney, a recent traveller, Mr. Legh (see his
account of Syria, attached to Macmichael's Journey from Moscow to
Constantinople), states that, “on the south-east side of the Dead Sea, on the
right of the road that leads to Kerak, red and brown hornstone, porphyry, in the
latter of which the felspar is much decomposed, syenite, breccia, and a heavy
black amygdaloid, containing white specks, apparently of zeolite, are the
prevailing rocks. Not far from Shobec, where there were formerly copper mines,
he observed portions of scoriae. Near the fortress of Shobec, on the left, are
two volcanic craters; on the right, one. The Roman road on the same side is
formed of pieces of lava. Masses of volcanic rock also occur in the valley of
Ellasar.”
The western side of the valley of the Jordan, according to Russegger, is
composed of Jura limestone, intersected, by numerous dykes and streams of
basalt, [2.528] which, with its deep fissures, the earthquakes to which it is
subject, and the saline sulphureous springs, which have a temperature of 46°
cent., attest the volcanic origin of this depression.
The other substances met with in the neighbourhood are no less corroborative of
the cause assigned. On the shore of the lake Mr. Maundrell found a kind of
bituminous stone, which I infer from his description to be analogous to that of
Radusa in Sicily.
It would appear that, even antecedently to the eruption mentioned in Scripture,
bitumen-pits abounded in the plain of Siddim. Thus, in the account of the battle
between the kings of Sodom and Gomnorrah and some of the neighbouring princes
(Gen. xiv.), it is said, “ And the vale of Siddim was full of slime-pits,” which
a learned friend assures me ought to be translated fountains of bitumen.
But besides this volcanic eruption, which brought about the destruction of the
cities, it would appear that the very plain itself in which they stood was
obliterated, and that a lake was formed in its stead. This is collected. not
only from the apparent non-existence of the valley in which these cities were
placed, but likewise from the express words of Scripture, where, in speaking of
the wars which took place between the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah and certain
adjoining tribes, it is added that the latter assembled in the vale of Siddim,
which is the Salt (i. e. the Dead) Sea.
It is therefore supposed that the lake itself occupies the site of this once
fertile valley, and that it was produced by the waters of the Jordan, which,
being without an outlet, would fill the hollow until the surface over which they
spread themselves proved sufficiently large to cause the loss arising from
evaporation to be equivalent to the accessions it received from the rains and
snows of the mountains in which it took its rise.
This hypothesis assumes that previously to the existence of the Dead Sea the
Jordan must have had an outlet, either into the Mediterranean or into the Red
Sea; and accordingly when it was discovered by Burckhardt, that there actually
existed a longitudinal valley, parallel to the course which the Jordan took
before it reached the Dead Sea, as well as to the larger axis of that expanse of
waters, running from north to south, and extending from the southern termination
of the Dead Sea to the extremity of the gulf of Akaba, it was immediately
concluded that this valley was in fact the former bed of the Jordan, which
river, consequently, prior to the catastrophe by which the Dead Sea was
produced, had flowed into this arm of the Red Sea.
Briefly, then, to recapitulate the train of phaenomena by which the destruction
of the cities might have been brought about, I would suppose that the river
Jordan, prior to that event, continued its course tranquilly through the great
longitudinal valley called El-Arabah, into the gulf of Akaba; that a shower of
stones and sand from some neighboring volcano first overwhelmed these places;
and that its eruption was followed by a depression of the whole of the region,
from some point apparently intermediate between the lake of Tiberias and the
mountains of Lebanon, to the watershed in the parallel of 30°, which occurs in
the valley of El-Arabah above mentioned. I would thence infer that the waters of
the Jordan, pent up within the valley by a range of mountains to the east and
west, and a barrier of elevated table-land to the south, could find no outlet,
and consequently by degrees formed a lake in its most depressed portion; which,
however, did not occur at once, and therefore is not recorded by Scripture as a
part of the catastrophe (see the passage in Ezekiel, 47.8, indicating, if it be
interpreted literally, the gradual manner in which the Dead Sea was formed, and
likewise perhaps the existence of a tradition that its waters once had their
exit in the Red Sea), though reference is made in another passage to its
existence in what was before the valley of Siddim.
If, as Robinson states, extensive beds of salt occur immediately round its
margin, the solution of the contents of these by the waters of the lake would
account for their present composition, its saltness increasing nearly to the
point of saturation, owing to the gradual accession of waters from above, which,
on evaporating, would leave their salt behind; whilst the bitumen might either
have existed there previously as a consequence of antecedent volcanic eruptions,
or have been produced by the very one to which reference is here made.
I do not, however, see what is gained by attributing the destruction of these
cities, as some have preferred to do, to the combustion of these beds of
bitumen, as the latter could have been inflamed by no natural agent with which
we are acquainted. except the volcano itself, which therefore must in any case
be supposed instrumental, and, being invoked, will alone enable us to explain
all the facts recorded.
It must at the same time be confessed that much remains to be done before this
or any other explanation can be received as established; and I am disappointed
to find that amongst the crowds of travellers who have resorted to the Holy Land
within the last twenty years, so few have paid that attention to the physical
structure of the country which alone could place the subject beyond the limits
of doubt and controversy.
The geologist, for instance, would still find it worth his while to search the
rocks which bound the Dead Sea, in order to discover if possible whether there
be any crater which might have been in a state of eruption at the period alluded
to; he should ascertain whether there are any proofs of a sinking of the ground,
from the existence of rapids anywhere along the course of the river, and whether
south of the lake can be discovered traces of the ancient bed of the Jordan, as
well as of a barrier of lava stretching across it, which latter hypothesis Von
Buch, I perceive, is still inclined to support; nor should he omit to examine
whether vestiges of these devoted cities can be found, as some have stated,
submerged beneath the waters, and buried, like Pompeii, under heaps of the
ejected materials.
VI. HISTORICAL GEOGRAPHY.
1. Earliest period.
The first notice we have of the inhabitants of Palestine is in the days of
Abraham's immigration, when the Canaanite was in the land, from whom it received
its earliest appellation, “the land of Canaan.” (Gen. 12.5, 6, 13.7, 12, &c.)
The limits of their country are plainly defined in the genealogy of Canaan; but
its distribution among the various families of that patriarch is nowhere clearly
stated. “Canaan begat Sidon his first-born, and Heth, and the Jebusite, and the
Amorite, and the Girgasite, and the Hivite, and the Arkite, and the Sinite, and
the Arvadite, and the Zemarite, and the Hamathite: and afterwards were the
families of the Canaanites spread abroad. And [2.529] the border of the
Canaanites was from Sidon, as thou comest to Gerar, unto Gaza; as thou goest
unto Sodom, and Gomorrah, and Admah, and Zeboim, even unto Lasha” (10.15--19).
As several of these names occur no more in the history of Palestine, we must
suppose either that the places reappear under other names, or that these tribes,
having originally settled within the limits here assigned, afterwards migrated
to the north, where we certainly find the Arvadites and Hamathites in later
times. Of the eleven families above named, the first six are found in the
subsequent history of the country: the descendants of Sidon on the coast to the
north; the children of Heth in Hebron, on the south; the Jebusites to the north
of these, in the highlands about Jerusalem; the Amorites to the east of the
Hittites, on the west of the. Dead Sea; the Girgashites, supposed to be a branch
of the Hivites next named, who were situated north of the Jebusites in Shechem
and its vicinity. (Gen. 34.2.) The coast to the south was wrested from the
Canaanites in very early times, if they ever possessed it; for throughout the
records of history the Philistines, descendants of Mizraim, not of Canaan, were
masters of the great western plain (10.14). The distribution of the country
among these tribes is involved in further confusion by the introduction of the
Perizzites with the Canaanites as joint occupiers of the country (13.7), and by
the fact of the Cauaanites appearing as a distinct tribe, where the Hittites,
the Amorites, the Girgashites, and the Jebusites, who were all alike Canaanites,
are severally enumerated (15.19--21). It would appear also that while the name
Canaanites was used in a more restricted sense in the last cited passage, the
names of the particular families were sometimes used in a wider acceptation;
which may account for the Hittites, whose seats we have already fixed to the
south of Jerusalem, being found to the north of that city, in the neighbourhood
of Bethel. (Judges, 1.26.) It may be, however, that the seats of the several
tribes in those early times were not fixed, but fluctuated with the tide of
conquest or with the necessities of a pastoral people: an example of the former
may be found in the victories of Chedorlaomer (Gen. xiv.), and of the latter in
the many migrations of Abraham with his numerous dependents, and of his
descendants, which finally transferred the whole of his posterity into Egypt for
a period of four centuries (12.6--10, 13.1--4, 18, 20.1, 26.1, &c.). To attempt
to trace these various migrations were a fruitless task with the very scanty
notices which we possess ; but the number and general disposition of the
Canaanitish tribes at the period of the Eisodus of the Israelites under Joshua
may be approximately ascertained, and aid in the description of the distribution
of the land among the latter. The tribes then in occupation of the land are said
to be seven (Deut. 7.1), and are thus enumerated:--“Canaanites, Hittites,
Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites, Jebusites,” only six (Exod. 3.8, 17, 33.2); but
in Deuteronomy (l.c.) and Joshua (3.10) the Girgashites are added, which
completes the number. Of these the Amorites occupied the southern border, or
probably shared it with the Amalekites, as it was with the latter that the
Israelites were first brought into collision. (Exod. 17.8, 9; Numb. 14.25,
43--45.) This was therefore called “the Mount of the Amorites” (Deut. 1.19, 20);
and their relative position with regard to the other tribes is thus clearly
stated:--“The Amalekites dwell in the land of the south, and the Hittites, and
the Jebusites, and the Amorites (Joshua, 11.3, adds the Perizzites), dwell in
the mountains: and the. Canaanites dwell by the sea, and by the coast of
Jordan.” (Numb. 13.28,29.) The limits of the Amorite territory are further
defined by the confederacy of the five sheikhs of Jerusalem, Hebron, Jarmuth,
Lachish, and Eglon, all of whom were Amorites (Josh. 10.5) ; while the
hill-country immediately to the north and west of Jerusalem, comprising Gibeon,
Chephirah, Beeroth, and Kirjath-jearim was held by the Hivites (9.3, 7, 17,
11.19), who are also found, at the same period, far to the north, “under Hermon
in the land of Mizpeh” (11.3; Judges, 3.3), as two large and powerful kingdoms
of the Amorites coexisted on the east of the Jordan [AMORITES], the older
inhabitants having been driven out. It is worthy of remark that during the
occupation of Palestine by these Canaanites it is already called “the land of
the Hebrews” or Heberites, which can only be accounted for by an actual
residence in it of Heber himself and his race, which goes far to prove that the
Canaanitish tribes were only intruders in the Land of Promise. (Gen. 40.15; see
Christian Remembrancer, vol. xviii. p. 451.) For fuller details reference may be
made to Reland (Palaestina, cap. xxvii. pp. 135--141) and Bochart (Phaleg. lib.
iv. capp. 34--37).
2. Second period.
We have now to consider the division of Palestine among the twelve tribes of
Israel, on the settlement of the land by Joshua the son of Nun; and the
Scripture statement compared with Josephus will furnish numerous landmarks,
which a more careful survey of the country than has yet been made would probably
bring to light at the present day. To begin with the cis-Jordanic tribes:--
Judah, Simeon, Dan.--The south border of Judah was bounded by the country of
Edom and the wilderness of Zin; the frontier being plainly defined by a chain of
hills, of considerable elevation, forming a natural barrier from the southern
bay of the Dead Sea on the east to the Mediterranean on the west, in which line
the following points are named, viz., the ascent or pass of Acrabbim, Zin,
Kadesh-Barnea, Hezron, Adar, Karkaa, Azmon, the river of Egypt. The east border
extended along the whole length of the Dead Sea to the mouth of the Jordan, from
which the north border was drawn to the Mediterranean along an irregular line,
in which Jerusalem would be nearly the middle point. The road from Jerusalem to
Jericho passes immediately within the line, and ‘Ain-er-Ressűl, Wady Kelt,
Kulaat-ed-Dammimn, and ‘Ain or Kusr Hajlak, are easily identified with Enshemesh,
the river, Adummim, and Beth-hogla. It passed south of Jerusalem, from Enrogel
up the valley of Hinnom, by Nephtoah, Mount Ephron, Kirjath-jearim, Bethshemesh,
Timnah, Ekron, Shichron, and Jabneel. Their cities were, as stated in the
summary, 29 in number, in the south division of the tribe, on the borders of
Edom; but the names, as recounted in the English version, are 39. The
discrepancy is to be accounted for, as Reland remarks, by several of the words,
regarded as proper, or separate names, being capable of translation as
appellatives or as adjuncts to other names. In the valley, including under that
name the declivity of the western plain and the plain itself, there were 14 + 16
+ 9 = 39 towns, with their villages, besides the cities of the Philistines
[2.530] between Ekron and Gaza, which the Israelites did not occupy; in the
mountains 11 + 9 + 10 + 6 + 2 = 38 cities, with their villages; and in the
wilderness, i. e. the western side of the Dead Sea, 6 towns and their villages;
in all, according to the Hebrew version, no less than 112 towns, exclusive of
their future capital, of which the Jebusite still held possession. But the
Septuagint version inserts the names of 11 other cities in the mountain
district, among which are the important towns Bethlehem and Tekoa, which would
make the total 123 in the tribe of Judah alone, implying an enormous population,
even if we admit that these towns were only large villages with scattered
hamlets. It must be remarked, however, that the tribe of Simeon was comprehended
within the limits above assigned to the tribe of Judah; and that 17 cities in
the south of Judah are referred to Simeon, as is expressly stated: “Out of the
portion of the children of Judah was the inheritance of the children of Simeon:
for the part of the children of Judah was too much for them: therefore the
children of Simeon had their inheritance within the inheritance of them.” (Josh.
19.1--9.)
As Simeon possessed the southern part of the territory assigned to Judah, so did
the tribe of Dan impinge upon its north-west border; and in the list of its
seventeen cities are some before assigned to Judah (Josh. 19.41--46); a limited
extent of territory on the confines of the plain of the Philistines, from which
they early sent out a colony to the extreme north of the Holy Land, where their
city, synonymous with their tribe, situated at the southern base of Mount Hermon,
became proverbial in Israel for the worship of the golden calf. (Judges, xviii.)
Benjamin.--The tribe of Benjamin was bounded by Judah on the south, by the
Jordan on the east. The northern line was drawn from Jericho westward through
the mountains, by Bethel and Ataroth-adar, to a hill that lay to the south of
the lower Beth-horon, from which point the boundary was drawn to Kirjath-jearim
of the tribe of Judah. They possessed twenty-six cities, including Jerusalem.
(Josh. 18.11--28.) It is evident that Josephus is mistaken in stating that they
extended in length from Jordan to the sea; for it is clear that the tribe of Dan
and the plain of Philistia lay between them and the Mediterranean. His remark
that the width of their territory was least of all, is more accurate, though his
explanation of the fact may be doubted, when he ascribes it to the fruitfulness
of the land, which, he adds, comprehended Jericho and Jerusalem.
Ephraim.--The tribe of Ephraim was conterminous on the south with the tribe of
Benjamin, as far as the western extremity of the latter; from whence it passed
by Tappuah and the river Kanah to the sea. On the east side are named
Atarothaddar and Beth-horon the upper, and on the north, beginning at the sea
and going east, Michmethah, Taanath-shiloh, Janohah, Ataroth, Naarath, Jericho,
and the Jordan. The cities of Ephraim are not catalogued; but it is remarked
that “the separate cities for the children of Ephraim were among the inheritance
of the children of Manasseh, all the cities with their villages” (16.5--9).
According to Josephus it extended in width from Bethel even to the great plain
of Esdraelon.
Manasseh.--The portion of Manasseh on the west of Jordan was contiguous to that
of Ephraim, and appears to have been allotted to the two tribes jointly, as the
same boundaries are assigned to both (16.1--4, comp. 5--8 with 17.7--10), but in
general the southern part was Ephraim, and the north Manasseh, which latter also
possessed towns in the borders of Asher and Issachar, as Bethshean and Endor, on
the east, in Issachar, and Taanach, Megiddo, and Dor, on the west, in Asher
(ver. 11). It will have been seen that these twin tribes did not extend as far
as the Jordan eastward, but that their eastern boundary excluded the valley of
the Jordan, and formed, with their northern boundary, a curved line from Jericho
to the sea, south of Mount Carmel.
Issachar.--This tribe covered the whole of the north-east frontier of Manasseh
and Ephraim, and so comprehended the valley of the Jordan northward from Jericho
to. Mount Tabor, and the eastern part of the plain of Esdraelon, in which Tabor
is situated, containing sixteen cities, among which were Shunem and Jezreel of
Scripture note, the latter for many years the capital of the kingdom of Israel.
Asher.--To the west of Issachar was Asher, occupying the remainder of the valley
of Esdraelon, now the Plain of Acre, and extending along the coast of the
Mediterranean, from Mount Carmel to Sidon. Our ignorance of the modern geography
of Upper Galilee does not allow us to assign its limits to the east; but there
is little doubt that careful inquiry would still recover the sites at least of
some of their twenty-two cities, and so restore the eastern boundary of their
territory, which extended along the western borders of Zebulun and Naphtali,
which, two tribes occupied the highlands of Galilee to the extremity of the Land
of Promise.
Zebulun.--Of these two, Zebulun was to the south, contiguous to Issachar, having
the sea of Tiberias for its eastern boundary, as far perhaps as the mouth of the
northern Jordan. None of its twelve cities can now be identified with certainty;
but Japhia is probably represented by the modern village of Yapha, in the plain,
not far to the south of Nazareth, which was certainly situated within the
borders of this tribe; and Bethlehem may, with great probability, be placed at
the modern village of Beitlahem, not far from the ruins of Sepphouri to the
north-west. [CAESAREA-DIO.]
Naphtali.--The northernmost of the tribes was Naphtali, bounded by the Upper
Jordan on the east, from its source to its mouth, near which was situated the
city of Capernaum, expressly declared by St. Matthew to have been in the borders
of Zebulun and Naphtali (4.13). On the south was Zebulun, on the west Asher, and
on the north the roots of Libanus and the valley of Coelesyria, now called the
Belkaa. Of their nineteen cities Kedesh is the most noted in Scripture history;
and its ruins, existing under the same name at this day, attest its ancient
importance. Josephus absurdly extends their territory to Damascus, if the
reading be not corrupt, as Reland suspects.
Having completed this survey of the tribes, it may be remarked in anticipation
of the following section, that the subsequent divisions of the country followed
very much the divisions of the tribes: thus the district of Judaea was formed by
grouping together the tribes of Judah, Simeon, Dan, and Benjamin; Samaria was
coextensive with Ephraim and the half of Manasseh; Issachar and Asher occupied
Lower Galilee; Zebulun and Naphtali Upper Galilee.
Trans-Jordanic tribes.--A few words must be [2.531] added concerning the two
tribes and a half beyond Jordan, although their general disposition has been
anticipated in the account of the nations whom they dispossessed. [AMORITES]
Reuben, Gad, and half Manasseh.--The southern part of the old Amorite conquests
on the east of Jordan was assigned by Moses to the Reubenites, whose possessions
seem to have been coextensive with the kingdom of Sihon, king of the Amorites,
whose capital was at Heshbon. [HESBON] There is, however, some apparent
confusion in the accounts; as while Reuben is said to have possessed “from Aroer
by the river Arnon,...Heshbon,...and all the kingdom of Sihon king of the
Amorites,” Gad is also said to have had “the rest of the kingdom of Sihon;” and
while Gad is said to have held “all the cities of Gilead,” Manasseh is said to
have had “half Gilead.” (Josh. xiii. comp. ver. 21 with 27, and 25 with 31);
while from Numbers (32.39--42) it would appear that Manasseh possessed the whole
of Gilead. As the Israelites were not permitted to occupy the country which they
found still in possession of the Ammonites, but only so much of it as had been
taken from them by Sihon king of the Amorites, the limits of the Israelite
possessions towards the Ammonites are not clearly defined [AMMONITAE; BASHAN];
and it may be doubted whether the distribution of the country among the two
tribes and a half was not regulated rather by convenience or the accident of
conquest than by any distinct territorial limits: certain it is that it would be
extremely difficult to draw a line which should include all the cities belonging
to any one tribe, and whose sites are fixed with any degree of certainty, and
yet exclude all other cities mentioned as belonging to one of the other tribes.
Generally it may be said that the possessions of Gad and Reuben lay to the south
and west of the trans-Jordanic provinces, while those of Manasseh lay in the
mountains to the east of the Jordan valley and the lake of Gennesaret. It is
plain only that the Jordan was the border of the two former, and that of these
the tribe of Gad held the northern part of the valley, to “the sea of Chinnereth.”
(Josh. 13.23, 27.) When the Gadites are said to have built nine cities, the
Reubenites six, it can only be understood to mean that they restored them after
they had been dismantled by their old inhabitants, as in the case of Machir the
son of Manasseh it is expressly said that he occupied the cities of the
dispossessed Amorites. (Numb. 32.34--42.) It may, perhaps, be concluded from
Deut. 3.1--17 that, while the kingdom of Sihon was divided between the tribes of
Gad and Reuben, the whole kingdom of Og was allotted to the half-tribe of
Manasseh; as, indeed, it is highly probable that the division of the land on the
west of Jordan also followed its ancient distribution among its former
inhabitants.
It is remarked by Reland, that the division of the land by Solomon has been too
commonly overlooked, for, although it had regard only to the provision of the
king's table, it is calculated to throw considerable light on sacred geography.
The country was divided into twelve districts, under superior officers, several
of whom were allied to the king by marriage, each of which districts was made
chargeable with victualling the palace during one month in the year. Whether
these divisions had any further political significancy does not appear, but it
is difficult to imagine that any merely sumptuary exigences would have suggested
such an elaborate arrangement. The divisions agree for the most part with those
of the tribes. (1 Kings, 4.7--19.)
3. Third Period.
We have no distinct account of the civil division of the country on the return
of the Jews from the captivity, and during its subsequent history, until it was
reduced to a Roman province. Under the Persians, the title of “governor on this
side the river,” so frequent in the books of Nehemiah and Ezra, and the
description of the strangers, colonists of Samaria, as “men on this side the
river” (Euphrates), probably indicates the only designation by which Palestine
was known, as a comparatively small and insignificant part of one of the
satrapies of that enormous kingdom. (Ezra, 4.10, 17, 5.20, 6.6, &c.; Neh. 2.7,
3.8, &c.) Among the Jews, the ancient divisions were still recognised, but
gradually the larger territorial divisions superseded the tribual, and the
political geography assumed the more convenient form which we find in the New
Testament and in the writings of Josephus, illustrated as they are by the
classical geographers Pliny and Ptolemy.
The divisions most familiar to the readers of the New Testament are, Judaea,
Galilee, Samaria, Decapolis, and Peraea, in which is comprehended the whole of
Palestine, with the exception of the seaborder, the northern part of which is
called “the coasts of Tyre and Sidon” by the evangelists, and comprehended under
the name of Phoenice by Josephus and the classical geographers. The three first
named districts are very clearly described by Josephus; and his account is the
more valuable as confirming the descriptions contained in the Bible of its
extreme fertility and populousness, which will, however, present no difficulty
to the traveller who has had the opportunity of observing the natural fertility
of the soil in the parts still rudely cultivated, and the numerous traces of the
agricultural industry of ancient times.
Galilee, Upper and Lower.--There are two Galilees, one called Lower, the other
Upper, which are surrounded by Phoenicia and Syria. On the side of the setting
sun they are bounded by the frontiers of the territory of Ptolemais, and Carmel,
a mountain formerly belonging to the Galileans, but at present to the Tyrians;
which is joined by Gaba, called the “ city of knights,” because the knights
disbanded by Herod dwell there; and on the south by Samaris and Scythopolis, as
far as the river Jordan. On the east it is bounded by Hippene and Gadaris, and
Gaulanitis and the frontiers of Agrippa's kingdom. The northern limit is Tyre
and: the Tyrian territory. That which is called Lower Galilee extends in length
from Tiberias to Chabulon, near which on the sea-coast is situated Ptolemais.
Its greatest breadth is from a village called Xalňth, situated in the great
plain, to Berbase; from which place also the breadth of Upper Galilee commences,
extending to a village named Baca, which separates the Tyrian territory from
Galilee. In length, Upper Galilee reaches to Meroth from Thella, a village near
the Jordan.
Now the two Galilees, being of such extent, and surrounded by foreign nations,
have always resisted every hostile invasion; for its inhabitants are trained to
arms from their infancy, and are exceedingly numerous; and neither have the men
ever been wanting in courage, nor the country suffered from paucity of
inhabitants, since it is rich, and favourable for pasture, and planted with
every variety of tree; so that by its fertility it invites even those [2.532]
who are least given to the pursuit of agriculture. Every part of it, therefore,
has been put under cultivation by the inhabitants, and none of it lies idle; but
it possesses numerous cities and multitudes of villages, all densely populated
on account of its fertility, so that the smallest of them has more than 15,000
inhabitants.
Peraea.--On the whole, then, although Galilee is inferior to Peraea in extent,
yet it is superior to it in strength. For the former is all under cultivation,
and productive in every part; but Peraea, although much more extensive, is for
the most part rugged and barren, and too wild for the culture of tender produce.
Nevertheless, wherever the soil is soft it is very productive; and the plains
are covered with various trees (the greater part is planted with olives, vines,
and palms), and watered by mountain torrents, and perennial wells sufficient to
supply water whenever the mountain streams are dried up by the heat. Its
greatest length is from Machaerűs to Pella, and its breadth from Philadelphia to
the Jordan. It is bounded on the north by Pella, which we have mentioned; on the
west by the Jordan. Its southern boundary is Moabitis, and its eastern is Arabia
and Silbonitis, and also Philadelphene and Gerasa.
Samaria.--The country of Samaria lies between Judaea and Galilee; for beginning
at the village called Ginaea, situated in the great plain, it ends at the
toparchy of Acrabatta: its character is in no respect different from that of
Judaea, for both abound in mountains and plains, and are suited for agriculture,
and productive, wooded, and full of fruits both wild and cultivated. They are
not abundantly watered; but much rain falls there. The springs are of an
exceedingly sweet taste; and, on account of the quantity of good grass, the
cattle there produce more milk than elsewhere. But the best proof of their
richness and fertility is that both are thickly populated.
Judaea.--On the confines of the two countries stands the village Annath,
otherwise called Borceos, the boundary of Judaea on the north. The south of it,
when measured by length, is bounded by a village, which stands on the confines
of Arabia, called by the neighbouring Jews Jardan. In breadth it extends from
the Jordan to Joppa, and in the centre of it lies the city Jerusalem; for which
cause the city is called by some, not without reason, the navel of the earth.
Judaea is not deprived of. the advantages of the sea, as it extends along the
sea-coast to Ptolemais. It is divided into eleven districts, of which Jerusalem,
as the seat of government, rules, taking precedence over the surrounding country
as the head over the body. The other districts, after it, are distributed by
toparchies. Gophna is second; after that, Acrabatta, then Thamna, Lydda, Ammaus,
Pella, Idumaea, Engaddae, Herodeum, Jerichus; then Jamnia and Joppa, which take
precedence of the neighbouring country.
Besides these districts, there are Gamalitica and Gaulanitis, Batanaea, and
Trachonitis, parts of the kingdom of Agrippa. Beginning from Mount Libanus and
the source of the Jordan, this country reaches in breadth to the lake of
Tiberias: its length is, from a village called Arpha to Julias. It is inhabited
by Jews and Syrians mixed.
Thus we have given an account, as short as was possible, of Judaea and the
neighbouring regions.
Besides this general description of the country according to its divisions in
the first century of the Christian era, Josephus has inserted in his history
special descriptions of several towns and districts, with details of great
geographical interest and importance. These, however, will be found, for the
most part, under their several names, in these volumes. [AULON; BASHAN;
ESDRAELON VALLIS; BELUS; JERICHO; JERUSALEM; TIBERIAS MARE, &c.]
As the division of Gabinius does not appear to have had a permanent influence,
it may be sufficient to notice it, before dismissing Josephus, who is our sole
authority for it. He informs us that the Roman general having defeated Alexander
the son of Aristobulus, and pacified the country, constituted five councils (s???d??a)
in various parts of the country, which he distributed into so many equal
divisions (µ???a?). These seats of judicature were Jerusalem, Gadara, Amathus,
Jericho, and Sepphoris in Galilee. (Ant. 14.5.4.) In the division of the country
among the sons of Herod the Great, Judaea, Idumaea (i. e., in the language of
Josephus, the southern part of Judaea), with Samaria, were assigned to Archelaus,
with the title of ethnarch. Antipas had Galilee and Peraea, with the title of
tetrarch, and Philip, with the same title, Trachonitis, Auranitis, Batanaea, and
Paneas, mostly without the limits of Palestine [vid. s. vv.]. (Ant. 17.13.4.) On
the disgrace and banishment of Archelaus, in the 10th year of his reign, his
government was added to the province of Syria, and administered by a procurator
subordinate to the prefect of Syria; the same fate attended the tetrarchy of
Philip on his death in the twentieth year of Tiberius, until it was committed to
Herod Agrippa by Caius Caligula, with the title of king, to which was added the
tetrarchy of Lysanias, and subsequently, on the banishment of Antipas, his
tetrarchy also; to which Claudius added besides Judaea and Samaria, so that his
kingdom equalled in extent that of his grandfather Herod the Great. On his
death, his son, who was but seventeen years old, was thought too young to
succeed him, and his dominions reverted to the province of Syria. But on the
death of Herod king of Chalcis, that country was committed to the younger
Agrippa, which was after wards exchanged for the tetrarchies of Philip and
Lysanias, to which Nero added the part of Galilee about the sea of Tiberias, and
Julias in the Decapolis. After his death, in the third year of Trajan, there is
no further mention of the tetrarchies (Reland, Palaestina, lib. i. cap. 30, pp.
174, 175.)
The division into toparchies, mentioned by Josephus, is recognised also by
Pliny, though their lists do not exactly coincide. Pliny reckons them as
follows:--
1. Jericho. 7. Thamna.
2. Emmaus. 8. Bethleptaphene.
3. Lydda. 9. Oreine (in which was Jerusalem.)
4. Joppa.
5. Acrabata. 10. Herodium.
6. Gophna.
Of these 8 and 9 are not reckoned by Josephus; but Reland is probably correct in
his conjecture that 8 is identical with his Pella, and 9 with his Idumaea, as
this district may well be described as ??e???, mountainous. (Plin. Hist. Nat.
5.14.)
The other notices of Pliny are few and fragmentary, but agree in all essential
particulars with the synchronous but independent account of Josephus above
cited.
Its geography had undergone little variation when Ptolemy wrote in the following
century, and the brief notices of that geographer are as accurate as [2.533]
usual. He calls it Palaestina of Syria, otherwise called Judaea, and describes
it as bounded by Syria on the north, by Arabia Petraea on the east and south.
Independently of the coast of the Mediterranean, he reckons the districts of
Galilee, Samaria, Judaea, and Idumaea, but describes the Peraea, by a
periphrasis, as the eastern side of Jordan, which may imply that the name was no
longer in vogue. He names also the principal cities of these several divisions
(5.16).
The most valuable contributions to the ancient geography of Palestine are those
of Eusebius and his commentator S. Jerome, in the Onomasticon, composed by the
former, and translated, with important additions and corrections, by the latter,
who has also interspersed in his commentaries and letters numerous geographical
notices of extreme value. They are not, however, of such a character as to be
available under this general article, but are fully cited under the names of the
towns, &c. (See Reland, Palaest. lib. ii. cap. 12, pp. 479, &c.)
It remains only to add a few words concerning the partition of Palestine into
First, Second, and Third, which is first found at the commencement of the fifth
century of the Christian era, in the Code of Theodosius (A.D. 409); and this
division is observed to this day in the ecclesiastical documents of the Eastern
Church, by which it was adopted from the first; as it is recognised in the
Notitiae, political and ecclesiastical, of the fifth and following centuries.
(Quoted fully by Reland, l.c. capp. 34,35, pp. 204--234.) In this division
Palaestina Prima comprehended the old divisions of Judaea and Samaria;
Palaestina Secunda, the two Galilees and the western part of Peraea; Palaestina
Tertia, otherwise called Salutaris, Idumaea and Arabia Petraea; while the
greater part of the ancient Peraea was comprehended under the name of Arabia.
As the sources of geographical information for Palestine are far too numerous
for citation, it may suffice to refer to the copious list of authors appended to
Dr. Robinson's invaluable work (Bibl. Res. vol. iii. first appendix A., pp.
1--28), and to the still more copious catalogue of Carl Ritter (Erdkunde,
Palästina, 2tr. B. 1te Abt. 1850, pp. 23--91), who in his four large volumes on
the peninsula of Mount Sinai, Palestine, and Syria, has with his usual ability
systematised and digested the voluminous records of centuries, and completely
exhausted a subject which could scarcely be touched within the limits assigned
to a general article in such a work as the present. [G.W]
1 In book ii. he says the smaller masses were two plethra in size.
Dictionary of Greek and Roman
Geography (1854) William Smith, LLD, Ed.