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Title: The city of Jerusalem
Author: Conder, C. R. (Claude Reignier)
Language: English
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THE
CITY OF JERUSALEM
BY THE SAME AUTHOR
TENT WORK IN PALESTINE 1878
HANDBOOK TO THE BIBLE 1879
JUDAS MACCABÆUS 1879
HETH AND MOAB 1883
PRIMER OF BIBLE GEOGRAPHY 1883
SYRIAN STONE LORE 1887
ALTAIC HIEROGLYPHS 1887
PALESTINE 1891
TELL AMARNA TABLETS 1893
THE BIBLE AND THE EAST 1896
THE LATIN KINGDOM OF JERUSALEM 1897
THE HITTITES AND THEIR LANGUAGE 1898
THE HEBREW TRAGEDY 1900
THE FIRST BIBLE 1902
CRITICS AND THE LAW 1907
THE RISE OF MAN 1908
[Illustration: HEROD’S TEMPLE.
From the model by Miss M. A. Duthoit.
_Frontispiece_]
]
THE
CITY OF JERUSALEM
BY COL. C. R. CONDER
LL.D., M.R.A.S., R.E.
LONDON
JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET, W.
1909
PRINTED BY
HAZELL, WATSON AND VINEY, LD.,
LONDON AND AYLESBURY.
PREFACE
The object of this volume is to present in a convenient form the
results of research and exploration concerning the history and
buildings of the city of Jerusalem--results which have accumulated
during the last half-century, but which are scattered in many expensive
works not easily accessible for the general reader. The story of forty
centuries is carried down to the present year, and reliance is chiefly
placed on monumental information.
CHELTENHAM,
_January 5th, 1909_.
CONTENTS
CHAP. PAGE
I. INTRODUCTORY 1
II. BEFORE DAVID 25
III. THE HEBREW KINGS 48
IV. EZRA AND NEHEMIAH 74
V. THE GREEK AGE 86
VI. HEROD THE GREAT 108
VII. THE GOSPEL SITES 139
VIII. THE FALL OF JERUSALEM 159
IX. THE ROMAN CITY 188
X. THE BYZANTINES 208
XI. THE ARABS 233
XII. THE TURKS 256
XIII. THE LATIN KINGDOM 275
XIV. FRANKS AND MOSLEMS 308
LIST OF AUTHORITIES, ETC. 327
INDEX 329
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
HEROD’S TEMPLE (MISS DUTHOIT’S MODEL) _Frontispiece_
FACING PAGE
THE SILOAM INSCRIPTION 66
JERUSALEM IN 600 B. C. 78
HEBREW INSCRIPTION (TOMB OF THE BENI ḤEZIR) 104
HERODIAN GRAFFITI 118
DOME AT THE DOUBLE GATE 120
GREEK TEXT OF HEROD’S TEMPLE 122
BLOCK PLAN OF HEROD’S TEMPLE 128
THE SUPPOSED SITE OF CALVARY 152
TOMB WEST OF CALVARY 156
JERUSALEM IN 70 A. D. 176
THE MEDEBA MOSAIC MAP 200
SPECIMENS OF MASONRY 220
JERUSALEM IN 530 A. D. 226
JERUSALEM IN 1187 A. D. 284
EARLY MAP OF JERUSALEM (ABOUT 1308 A. D.) 322
MODERN JERUSALEM 328
THE
CITY OF JERUSALEM
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTORY
I first set eyes on Jerusalem one summer morning in 1872. The view--a
mile away--of the long grey wall, the cypress trees of the Armenian
garden, and the single minaret at the west gate, was not then
obstructed by the row of Jewish cottages since built. The population
was only about a third of what it now is. The railway station was not
thought of, and only a few villas outside the gate existed, while the
suburbs to north and south had not grown up, and Olivet was not covered
with modern buildings. I passed two winters (1873–5) in the city,
the second in a house in the Jews’ quarter, and later on (1881–2) a
third winter at the hotel; and during these visits my time was mainly
occupied in wandering among the less-known corners of the town. It was
a period very favourable for exploration. The survey by Sir Charles
Wilson, the researches of de Vogüé, and the wonderful excavations of
Sir Charles Warren, were then recent. The German Emperor, William I.,
had just ordered the clearing out of the eastern half of the great
square of St. John’s Hospital, having been given by the Sultan the site
of Charlemagne’s hospice beside the Church of St. Mary Latin. In 1874
Mr. Henry Maudeslay was exploring the ancient scarps at the south-west
corner of the Hebrew city; and, by the Sultan’s order, the Dome of
the Rock--deconsecrated for a time--was being repaired, while other
excavations were in progress outside the city on the north.
[Sidenote: DISCOVERIES]
I was thus able to walk in my socks all over the surface of the sacred
Ṣakhrah “rock,” and to ascend the scaffolding to the dome above, in
order to examine the ancient mosaics of our seventh century, as well
as those on the outside, where the old arcaded battlement of the
ninth century was just laid bare. I penetrated, by the old rock-cut
aqueduct at the north-west corner of the Ḥaram, to the Herodian wall,
and discovered the buttresses of the Temple rampart still standing,
and just like those at Hebron. In the Jews’ quarter I found the old
hospice of the Teutonic Order, and the chapel of the Holy Ghost. In
1881 I crawled through the Siloam tunnel with two comrades, in danger
of our lives, to find the point where the two parties of Hezekiah’s
workmen heard each other calling, and joined their work by a cross
cut east and west. These were but a few additions to the work of my
predecessors, and since 1882 many other valuable discoveries have been
made by Mr. Bliss, Mr. Stewart Macalister, and other explorers, which
will be described in due course. We no longer depend on the writings
of Josephus and Tacitus, or on the confused accounts of mediæval
pilgrims. Our ideas are founded on existing remains. We have Hezekiah’s
own inscription at Siloam; the text (found by M. Clermont-Ganneau)
which forbade Gentiles to enter the court of Herod’s Temple; the red
paint instructions which his master-masons scrawled on the foundations
of the mighty ramparts; the votive text to Serapis set up later by
Roman soldiers; the Greek inscriptions of Byzantine monks in tombs on
the south side of the Hinnom Valley, and, yet earlier, those on the
ossuaries, which pious Jews and Jewish Christians used in gathering the
bones of their fathers for burial in the old tombs east and north of
the Holy City. We have Armenian and Georgian mosaic texts, and Gothic
tombstones of Crusaders. Finally, we have the great Kufic, Karmathian,
and Arabic texts of the Khalîfahs and Sulṭâns of Islâm, who founded or
repaired the beautiful buildings in the Ḥaram.
But all this information is still scattered in expensive memoirs, or
separate reports of exploring societies; and it is remarkable that, in
spite of the great accumulation of true information during the last
half-century, no general account of the history of Jerusalem--as a
city--exists, though large volumes of controversial literature continue
to appear. It is hoped that the present volume will give a clear idea
of what is now actually known, and of the natural deductions from the
facts.
Recent visitors have felt themselves perplexed by conflicting
statements as to the Bible sites--“Two Zions, two Temple areas, two
Bethanys, two Gethsemanes, two or more Calvarys, three Holy Sepulchres,
several Bethesdas.”[1] The statement is perhaps an exaggeration, and
the discrepancies as a whole are by no means recent, being due to
ancient misunderstandings or conjectures. Tradition is overlaid by
tradition in the long period of at least 3,400 years since Jerusalem
first became a royal city of the Amorite. Jewish traditions were
followed by those of Christians and Moslems, who were alike ill
informed as to ancient history. The Crusaders brought in new ideas, and
often rejected those of the Eastern Churches. The Franciscans, after
1300 A. D., were deprived of some churches, and the Pope sanctioned
the transference of old sites to other places. It is true that some
literary critics have recently tried to prove that the “city of David”
was not a royal city on the mountain top, but a mere hamlet on the tail
of the Temple ridge. They have unfortunately--as unconscious heirs of
the prejudices of Voltaire--been misled (as in so many other cases)
by fixing on a single allusion, while ignoring other accounts, and
dismissing the statements of Josephus as merely “traditional”; but
they have not given due consideration to the results of exploration,
and they have shown but slight acquaintance with the scientific study
of ancient architecture.[2] As a rule, however, it is not the modern
theorist but the ancient pilgrim who is responsible for the confusion;
and the agreement reached already, on the more important questions of
topography, has been the outcome of actual research and of monumental
studies. No one seems now to doubt that the Temple stood on the top of
the eastern ridge. The positions of Olivet and Siloam have never been
questioned. Herod’s palace is placed by all in the north-west corner
of the upper city, near the so-called “Tower of David,” and Antonia
on the rock of the present barracks at the north-west corner of the
Temple courts. There was a time when the differences of opinion were
much greater. One theorist even went so far as to assert that Hebron
was the true site of ancient Jerusalem. But the topography has hardly
been changed since Nehemiah’s age. The two great citadels are still
held as Turkish strongholds, the Temple is still a sacred enclosure,
the upper and lower markets are still where they always were, and even
the dung-hills outside the wall are close to the “Dung Gate” of Hebrew
times. We may sweep aside the misconceptions due to vague literary
statements, and found ourselves not on paper, but on rock and stone, on
contemporary inscriptions and architectural remains.
[Sidenote: EXCAVATIONS]
Ancient cities, as we now know--whether at Troy, Lachish, and Gezer,
or at Rome and in London--were constantly rebuilt on the ruins of
towns previously laid waste or burned. They present successive strata,
with buildings that are themselves not all of one date, and which were
sometimes carried down to rock, sometimes merely founded on the old
walls and roofs. The street pavements and the lintels of city gates
were renewed even within the period of one city, and more frequently
than the walls and other buildings. The earth was disturbed, so that
old objects were brought up to the surface, and recent objects fell
into the foundation trenches, presenting many puzzles for the explorer;
but, broadly speaking, the strata are as a rule clearly traceable,
giving an historic sequence for the successive cities. In parts of
Jerusalem the valleys within the walls have gradually been filled
with earth and ruined masonry to a depth of 40 or 50 feet, and it is
only where the bare rock is on the surface that we can feel we are
standing on the very ground trodden by the feet of our Lord. There
are at least six successive cities to be studied at Jerusalem, lying
one above another where the depth of the debris is greatest. Within
quite recent times the level of some streets has been raised when they
were repaved. In the twelfth century “Christian Street,” as it is now
called, rose gradually northward, being about 15 feet higher up hill
at the point where it passed the west door of the Cathedral of the
Holy Sepulchre than at the corner where it joined David Street, and
where was the Chapel of St. John Baptist belonging to the Knights of
St. John. But to-day Christian Street runs level, and the floor of
the chapel is 25 feet below the street, being on the same level as
that of the floor of the cathedral. Yet even this chapel floor is 10
feet above the original level of the rock, as it descends into the
great Tyropœon Valley. When I first visited Jerusalem, the buildings of
the Hospital were covered with earth for some depth above the vaulted
roofs of the twelfth-century buildings. Soon after, this earth was
removed on donkeys, which passed in a long procession daily out at the
west gate, where they made a mound on which Jewish shops now stand.
Thus the central valley was filled in, to a depth of 20 feet, before
the Crusaders began to build, and has been again filled in another 20
feet or more since the thirteenth century; while on the outside of the
Temple, as we stand on the pavement at the Jews’ Wailing-place and gaze
on the mighty rampart towering above, we must remember that we only see
less than half its present height, and that it goes down beneath us
nearly 40 feet, to the older pavement of Herod’s age, which was itself
20 feet above the foundation rocks. The causeway to the north of this
is 90 feet above the rock, but in the sixth century the street was at
least 40 feet lower, and in the time of Herod some 30 feet lower still,
yet already 20 feet here also above rock. Such measurements, accurately
ascertained by Sir Charles Warren, whose mine on the north-east side of
the Temple was sunk through the shingle to a depth of 125 feet, will
serve to show the gradual growth of the rubbish and the effacement of
the ancient natural outline in the valleys which ran within the city.
[Sidenote: TWO SCENES]
Many scenes in modern Jerusalem rise before me in recalling the times
when I lived within the walls, and passed so many days in the Temple
enclosure, or in that grim church, defiled with blood, which some
among us are glad to think of as not marking the new sepulchre without
the city where the Prince of Peace was laid. But two scenes especially
come back to mind. The first is that of the sleeping town before the
gates were opened to admit the peasant women and their donkey-loads of
cakes and vegetables. In the purple gloom the domes are beginning to
shine, wet with the heavy dew, as the light spreads behind Olivet “as
far as Hebron”--to quote the Mishnah. The silence is broken suddenly
by the musical cry of the Muedhdhin on the minaret of a mosque--a
long, rolling, and tremulous note, echoing all over Jerusalem, as he
“testifies there is no God but God,” and calls to the faithful that
“prayer is better than sleep.” The simple dignity of Islâm contrasts
with the superstition, the hurried services, the tawdry magnificence
of degraded Eastern churches, and we understand how it was that the
reformed faith of Muḥammad conquered Asia. The second scene is that
of the summer noon, which presents to us an epitome of the long
history of the Holy City. The great Herodian tower of the upper city
glares with tawny stone against the blue sky. The rough cobbles of
the slippery market-place are crowded with chattering peasants. A few
pious Moslems, unconscious of the world, are praying with their faces
towards Mekkah on the steps of the Protestant bishop’s palace, where
the town dogs also lie in summer, but go down to the covered bazaar
when the winter rains and snow begin. The Armenian patriarch is being
escorted, from St. James on Sion to the Holy Sepulchre, by a modest
procession. A Moslem bier passes by, and men crowd round it to lend
their shoulders for a few steps as a pious act. The little Pharisee,
with his lovelocks and dirty gaberdine--or resplendent in his fur cap
on the sabbath, just as Rembrandt drew his fathers--is jostled in the
narrow street of David, yet holds his fingers on the pulses of the city
life. Above the cries of the water-seller and the chinking of the brass
sherbet-cups, the screams of women and the jangling of the metal plates
that serve for bells in churches, rises one recurrent note from the
blind beggar who wanders through the streets, forever calling aloud to
the “everlasting God.” We might almost expect to see a Templar ride by,
with his white gown and blood-red cross over the mail coat, or the page
of some Frankish noble in stripes of yellow and crimson. But instead
we witness the long procession of half-naked Dervish fanatics, with
banners, on their way to the Ḥaram, and then to the “tomb of Moses”
west of Jericho. They bear spears and swords, and are preceded by
jesters with fox-tails or by a convict who has been tarred and covered
with cotton wool--ancient survivals of pagan Saturnalia. The Jew, the
Greek, the Copt, the Georgian, the Armenian, the Arab, and the Turk
mingle with the modern European and with the Franciscan monk from Italy
in the narrow lane; and black-veiled ladies with white cloaks, seated
on crimson saddles high up on the white Damascene asses, are led to
the shops, or to the lower fruit-market which glows with colour, its
green and gold contrasting with the violet or rich brown robes of the
merchants. The whole history of Jerusalem is represented by its crowd
to-day.
[Sidenote: RELICS]
In endeavouring to follow that history we must no doubt give due
attention to tradition, for tradition records the sincere beliefs of
mankind. In cases where the Jew, the Christian, and the Moslem all
honour the same site, it generally appears that we have the actual spot
described, or casually noticed, in the Bible. But there are not many
such sites in Palestine, except the tombs of the Hebrew patriarchs
at Hebron, the grave of Rachel near Bethlehem, Jacob’s Well east of
Shechem, and--in Jerusalem itself--the sites of Siloam and Olivet,
of the Temple itself, and of Herod’s palace and tower. As to others,
there is not a single existing site in the Holy City that is mentioned
in connection with Christian history before the year 326 A. D., when
Constantine’s mother adored the two footprints of Christ on Olivet. We
may not charge the priests of the Catholic Church with “pious fraud,”
for they were no doubt as sincere as those who of late have created
a new site for the Sepulchre by enthusiasm without knowledge. There
is something very pathetic in the story of men who came on foot from
Gaul and Britain in early times, to fortify their faith by seeing for
themselves the very places seen by their Lord, to be buried near Him,
or to kiss the footprints and finger prints which they were shown on
the rocks of Olivet, or in the Aksa Mosque and Dome of the Rock, where
they are now preserved and visited by Moslems only. The adoration
of relics is not peculiar to Christianity. It is an outcome of that
intense longing for certainty and finality which is natural to all
mankind. The Moslem and the Buddhist had from the first their relics
as well as the Christian--nay, we go back to the days of Herodotus,
when the footprints of Herakles was shown in Scythia, or of Pausanias
who saw “Leda’s egg” in a temple. But however sincere the beliefs of
the past may have been, we cannot but confess, when studying in detail
the traditional topography of Jerusalem, that it has grown and changed
just as the city itself has done, because of the succession of various
ruling races, and because to Jew, Christian, and Moslem alike there has
always been a Holy City here which they coveted, and for which they
shed their blood.
Some few of the principal sites have remained always the same; others
have been often shifted; and the number of sites has been increased
continually from century to century. Most of the pilgrims, whether
Christian or Moslem, were illiterate; and those who were better
educated, and whose accounts were copied and re-copied more or less
accurately, were often strangely ignorant of the Bible and of the
history of Palestine. To the ordinary pilgrim the relics and the
pictures were “books of the ignorant,” and strange superstitions--such
as that of the crypt where “Solomon tortured demons”[3]--are mingled
with the statements of the Gospels. The first record of a pilgrim visit
is that of a traveller from Bordeaux in 333 A. D. He makes the curious
mistakes of supposing the Transfiguration to have occurred on Olivet
and David’s victory over Goliath near Jezreel. St. Silvia of Aquitaine,
half a century later, accepts as genuine the forged correspondence
between Christ and King Abgarus; and after the fifth century the
legends of the Apocryphal Gospels--especially those concerning the
Virgin Mary--form the foundation of traditional topography in many
cases. In the Middle Ages the pilgrims are also influenced by the
comments on the Gospels of Tertullian, Origen, and other Christian
fathers, though the works of those fathers who wrote before 325 A. D.
show no acquaintance with any Jerusalem sites. For these reasons it
is evident that the traditions must be received with caution; and,
as the pilgrim texts are only valuable in showing contemporary facts
and beliefs, their accounts may be here summed up as far as regards
traditional sites.
[Sidenote: THE TRADITIONS]
When Helena, the mother of Constantine, visited Palestine in 326
A. D., she was shown nothing at Jerusalem except the two footprints
of Christ on Olivet.[4] The story of her discovery of the true Cross
is not noticed till about a century later,[5] though as early as 348
A. D. St. Cyril of Jerusalem[6] speaks of fragments of the Cross as
being distributed “piecemeal throughout the world.” The site of the
Ascension is thus the first of all to be mentioned. A church was built
by Constantine before 333 A. D. on the summit of Olivet, and the two
footprints of the Saviour impressed in the rock continued to be shown
down to the Middle Ages, though in 1342 A. D. only one was pointed
out, just as at present.[7] Two other footprints of Christ were shown
after the fifth century: one in the Church of St. Mary (now in the Aḳṣa
Mosque), which is still shown by Moslems[8]; the other on the Ṣakhrah
rock, which is now called “the noble footstep” of Muḥammad[9]; while
the marks now called finger-prints of the Angel Gabriel, on this rock,
were supposed to have been those of our Lord, as were others in the
Cave of the Agony.[10] Yet later, in the sixteenth century, footmarks
of Christ were also shown on the south-east side of the little bridge
over the Kidron Valley.[11]
A fragment of the true Cross was adored by St. Paula and by St. Silvia,
near Calvary, sixty years after the time of Helena’s visit; and St.
Silvia was also shown the “title” once affixed to the same. About 530
A. D. the discovery of three crosses is mentioned as due to Helena.
The fragment was taken by Chosroes II. to Persia, but recovered in 628
A. D., and removed to Constantinople with other relics in 634 A. D. As
seen in St. Sophia by Arculphus, half a century later, there appear
to have been three pieces, each less than 3 feet in length. In 1192
A. D. another fragment was believed to be in the keeping of the Syrian
bishop of Lydda, besides that one which Saladin captured in 1187.[12]
St. Silvia gives an extraordinary account of the precautions taken when
pilgrims were allowed to kiss the original relic, due to the fact that
a wretch had once bitten off a piece, which he tried to carry away in
his mouth, probably meaning to sell it in Europe.[13]
“Solomon’s seal” and the “horn of David” were apparently the only other
relics shown in the fourth century at the Anastasis Church,[14] but in
the sixth we find described the onyx cup of the Last Supper, the lance
and sponge used at the Crucifixion, and the crown of thorns. These
also were removed by Heraclius to Constantinople with the Cross, and
the crown of thorns was afterwards sent to St. Louis of France, who
built for it the Sainte Chapelle. Yet in 867 A. D. Bernard the Wise
was shown a crown of thorns hanging up in the Church of St. Sion,[15]
while a silver chalice takes the place of the onyx cup in 680 A. D.,
and appears to have been also regarded as the original relic. The stone
which the angel rolled away from the sepulchre is noticed even by Cyril
and St. Paula, and is spoken of about 680 A. D. as broken in two. In
the eighth century it had disappeared, and a square pointed stone was
shown instead; yet a hundred years later the substitute was accepted as
being the original.[16]
[Sidenote: THE HOLY FIRE]
Many marvels were reported to occur in the Church of the Resurrection.
Theodorus (or Theodosius, as he is also called), in 530 A. D., was
told that the holy lance, which had been made into a cross, “shone at
night like the sun by day.” St. Silvia says that at the early morning
service no lights were brought into the church, but that they were
supplied from an ever-burning lamp within the Cave of the Sepulchre.
This seems to be the germ of the later “holy fire,” which appeared
at Easter, as first clearly described by Bernard the Wise,[17] who
tells us that, on the eve of Easter Day, the “Kyrie eleison” was sung
until the angel came to light the lamps. In the twelfth century the
fire appeared sometimes in the Hospital of St. John or in the Temple
enclosure, sometimes in the cathedral, and was said to pass by an
underground passage between the two latter. In 1192 Saladin is said to
have attended the ceremony, but the Saracens “asserted that it was a
fraudulent contrivance.”[18]
The position of the traditional sites of Calvary and the Holy
Sepulchre, in the middle of the north quarter of Jerusalem, seems to
have given rise to suspicions very early. Eusebius[19] speaks of the
“new Jerusalem rising opposite the old,” and appears to think that the
latter included little more than the traditional Sion and the Temple
hill. Later writers[20] are careful to urge that Hadrian was the first
to enclose the sacred sites within the city wall, though there is
no foundation in contemporary accounts for this assertion. Even the
pilgrims were not always satisfied to accept all the traditions. John
of Würzburg, about 1160 A. D., knew that the Ṣakhrah rock could not be
that of Jacob at Bethel, though Theodorich a dozen years later seems to
have accepted what was then a recent tradition, confounding the “House
of God”--or Temple--with the city Bethel. Some of the early writers
were aware that different statements in the New Testament were “hard
to reconcile,” and sites which were called “Galilee”--on Olivet and on
Sion--arose from apologetic explanations of the different accounts in
the Gospels as to what happened after the Resurrection.[21]
[Sidenote: PILLARS OF SCOURGING]
Next to the relics in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the sites
on Mount Sion were venerated from an early age. A church (now the
Mosque of Nebi Dâûd) already existed in the fourth century, and was
said to mark the sites of the Last Supper and of the descent of the
Holy Ghost at Pentecost. By 440 A. D. it had come to be regarded as
the oldest church in the world, founded by Christ or by the Apostles.
It was regarded by Jews and Christians in the twelfth century as
being close to David’s tomb. The Franciscans held it from 1313 till
the time of Pope Sixtus IV.[22] (1471–84 A. D.), who sanctioned the
transference of the traditions therewith connected to the so-called
“House of Caiaphas”--now the small Armenian convent outside the south
wall--when the Moslems seized the old church as being the sepulchre of
“the prophet David.” About 1547 the Franciscans seem to have recovered
this Church of the Cœnaculum, or Last Supper, but had again lost it by
1561. We do not know the reasons given for approving the translation
of sites, but such transferences were common even in the end of the
thirteenth century, as the Moslems gradually extended their boundaries
in Palestine, acquiring many of the older traditional sites which
pilgrims were then unable to visit. The “House of Caiaphas” was shown
as early as the fourth century as being the place where Peter denied
his Lord. It once belonged to the Georgians, whom the Franciscans
succeeded, and it afterwards became the burial-place of the Armenian
patriarchs. Many traditions clustered round it in the Middle Ages, and
the scene of the Virgin’s death in the house of St. John was shown
close by on the south. In the church porch was a pillar, noticed by the
Bordeaux Pilgrim as that to which Christ was bound for scourging; but
in the Middle Ages the site where this pillar stood is often changed,
and no less than three positions are now indicated. The original Sion
pillar was said, in the sixth century, to have been bidden by Christ
to transfer itself from the House of Caiaphas to the Church of St.
Sion,[23] and the impress of the Saviour’s face was then to be seen
upon it. In the sixteenth century it was supposed to be the pillar
on which the cock stood and crowed when Peter denied Christ. Another
flagellation pillar was taken to Rome; a third was in the Latin chapel
north of the Holy Sepulchre in 1586, and is still shown by Latins; a
fourth, close to Calvary, has been shown by the Greeks since 1341; and
the Franciscans, since the sixteenth century, have shown the hole where
the pillar of scourging once stood in the chapel just north of the
Ḥaram.
There were also two prisons in which Christ was placed, according to
later accounts; one of them was at the “House of Annas,” near the south
wall and within the city. This is now the Syrian convent of the “Olive
Tree,” to which tree our Lord was bound. Here also, in the twelfth
century, was the prison in which St. Peter was confined by Herod; and
the city gate to the south was then supposed to be the “Iron Gate”
which opened of itself.[24] The other prison was a chapel, north-east
of the Holy Sepulchre, which is not noticed earlier than 1102 A. D.,
but must be included in the number of chapels found existing by the
Crusaders.[25] Finally, another site connected with St. Peter was
shown in the twelfth century on the east slope of Sion--namely,
the cave where he wept, covered by the chapel of “Gallicantus,” or
“Cock-crowing,” which some confused with “Galilee.”
[Sidenote: BETHESDA]
The sites in and round the Temple enclosure, and that of St. Stephen’s
death, with some on Olivet, were equally liable to change in course
of time. Thus the Pool of Bethesda has been traditionally pointed out
in three separate places. From 333 A. D. down to 440 A. D. the “Sheep
Pool,” or Bethesda, is placed at the “Twin Pools,” which still exist
in the Antonia fosse,[26] and which may have been cut out of the rock
in the time of Herod or later. They are vaulted over with masonry,
probably of the sixth century A. D., and gradually disappeared from
sight as the level of the street was raised above them; thus already in
the sixth century the “Sheep Pool” is placed at some distance from the
“House of Pilate,” which immediately adjoined the “Twin Pools.”[27]
In the twelfth century Bethesda is always described as being at the
“Piscina Interior,” or “inner pool,” a large rock tank west of the
Church of St. Anne, which was rediscovered in 1888; but even in the
thirteenth century the Templars were showing another site, namely,
that which appears on the old map of Jerusalem (about 1308 A. D.),
and which is the same now pointed out--the Birket Isrâîl, or “Pool
of Israel.”[28] There was considerable difference of opinion also as
to where the Prætorium, or “House of Pilate,” should be placed. In
the sixth century it was at the Antonia site, where Justinian built
a chapel of St. Sophia--now the “Chapel of the Mocking”--inside the
Turkish barracks. In the seventh and early in the twelfth centuries it
was supposed to be on Mount Sion, but in the thirteenth it was replaced
at the north-west corner of the Ḥaram.[29]
The adoration of the Virgin began to be increasingly important after
the great schism of 431 A. D., when Nestorius was condemned at Ephesus
for refusing to her the title “Mother of God.” In the middle of the
sixth century Justinian built his great Basilica of St. Mary on the
south side of the Temple enclosure, and the Tomb of the Virgin is
not mentioned by pilgrims before this time, nor are any of the other
churches of St. Mary which existed within the city. The legend of the
“Virgin’s Well,” where she washed the clothes of the infant Jesus, is
much later. The underground church supposed in 530 A. D. to be the site
of Mary’s tomb was beneath a basilica which Queen Melisinda replaced
by the present church in 1161 A. D. She was buried soon after half-way
down the steps to the crypt, yet in 1385 her tomb is described as that
of “Queen Mary,” while to-day it is known as that of St. Joseph.[30]
On Olivet the little cave-chapel of St. Lazarus in Bethany was built
over in the fourth century,[31] but the sites of the Pater Noster and
Credo chapels, and the Cave of Pelagia, are not noticed before the
sixth century. The old “Cave of the Agony” may have been shown as
“Gethsemane” in the time of Jerome,[32] but the Latin site on the south
side of the road to Bethany was not enclosed by the Franciscans till
1847 A. D. Another site which is often changed is that of the place
where Judas hanged himself, which is usually connected with an arch or
bridge--no doubt on account of an apocryphal legend which I have been
unable to trace.[33] In the sixth century Antony of Piacenza was shown
the fig tree of Judas apparently north of the East Gate of Jerusalem;
but if Adamnan rightly understood the account of Arculphus, his Gaulish
guest in Iona, the bridge was to the south-west of the city, and Judas
hanged himself on the west side of the middle arch, where a great fig
tree then grew. This bridge is not otherwise mentioned, and in the
fourteenth century an elder tree was shown, near Absalom’s tomb, and
the little bridge over the Kidron on the east side of which Judas
hung, according to Zuallardo.[34]
From the fourth to the sixth century the ancient temple wall at the
south-east angle of the enclosure stood up like a “pinnacle” above
the ruins, and this was pointed out as the pinnacle on which Christ
was placed by the Devil. Close by was the small vaulted chamber where
Solomon “wrote Wisdom,” and where (in the “House of Simeon”) was the
cradle of Christ. In the middle of the twelfth century a wooden cradle
was shown, whereas this is now replaced by a Roman vaulted niche laid
flat, which was once intended to hold a statue.[35]
In a Church of St. John on Olivet[36] our Lord was believed, in the
ninth century, to have met the woman charged with adultery, and the
“writing on the ground” was here shown. Early in the twelfth century
this site was transferred to the cave under the Ṣakhrah, where it was
still believed to exist in the fourteenth, though the “writing” of
Christ was then shown on a stone in the Pater Noster Chapel.
[Sidenote: SAINT STEPHEN]
Among the earlier sites, that of the stoning of Stephen has also been
variously placed at different times. The worship of saints developed
in the fifth century, and the tomb of St. Stephen was supposed to have
been found, in 415 A. D., at Caphar Gamala, a village which retains
its old name still, about 20 Roman miles south-west of Jerusalem. The
empress Eudocia, returning after her first visit to the Holy City,
brought back to Constantinople the chains of St. Peter, and the right
arm of St. Stephen, with the portrait of the Virgin said to have been
painted by St. Luke. She retired later to Jerusalem, where she lived
sixteen years and died about 460 A. D. She is said to have built a
church of St. Stephen at the site of his martyrdom by stoning, outside
the North or “Galilee” Gate; but in 530 A. D. a stone was shown on Sion
with which he was said to have been slain, and by the twelfth century
he was believed to have been there buried. The Crusaders found the
church of Eudocia (where she was buried) in ruins, and the North Gate
was still called St. Stephen’s down to about 1200 A. D., though about
1160 A. D. the site of the martyrdom is shifted to the west side of
the town. It first appears in its present position, outside the East
Gate, in the old map of about 1308 A. D. A Greek text has recently been
found at this site, bearing the words “This is the gate of the Lord,
the righteous shall (enter in). Holy Stephen pray for (us).” But this
slab may have been transferred from the ancient site outside the North
Gate.[37]
[Sidenote: LATIN SITES]
Many new Latin sites were created by the Crusaders in the twelfth
and thirteenth centuries. The chapels then built have been carefully
planned and described by Dr. Tobler, Comte M. de Vogüé, and Herr
Schick, architect to the German Emperor and the Sultan, who for so
many years was an untiring student of Jerusalem. In a few cases the
churches mentioned--such of those as St. Agnes and St. Giles--are not
yet identified. On Sion, St. Mark, St. Thomas, St. George, and St.
James the Less, with the Chapel of the Three Maries, still exist. In
the centre of the town, St. Mary Latin, St. Mary Magna, and--north of
the Holy Sepulchre--St. Chariton, are now known. On the north-east were
St. Anne, St. Mary Magdalene, and--at the Ecce Homo Arch--the church
of the “Rest” of Mary. The “Stables of Solomon” are never noticed
before the twelfth century, when the “Oak of Rogel” was pointed out
where a sacred tree still stands at Siloam, being supposed to be the
place where Isaiah was sawn asunder. The “Gate Dolorous” was then the
name of that leading from Antonia, and the “School of the Virgin” was
the title given to the “Dome of the Roll,” at the south-west corner of
the platform of the Dome of the Rock. The “House of Uriah” was then
supposed to have been near David’s palace and tower, and the old tank
near the Jaffa Gate still bears the name of “Bathsheba’s Bath”; but in
the sixteenth century this house was shown at the south-west corner of
the Hebrew city, and the bath was transferred to the Birket es Sulṭân.
The altar of the Temple is said to have been converted into a sundial
by the Saracens,[38] and a block of masonry, south of the Dome of the
Rock, was still pointed out in 1874 as the place where a sundial had
stood. Finally, the fig tree cursed by Christ was shown at the bend of
the road near Bethany; and the place where He “descended from the ass”
near Bethphage--a site said even by Bernard the Wise to be marked by
a marble slab in 867 A. D.--was to be found in a small chapel, where
a block of stone has been recovered, with mediæval Latin texts, and
frescoes representing the raising of Lazarus, the fetching of the ass,
and a third subject.[39]
After the massacre of the Christians in 1244 A. D., the Franciscans
were allowed by the Sulṭân of Egypt to return to Jerusalem, and they
alone--for about five centuries--represented Latin Christianity
in Palestine. The Latin churches were in ruins, and were either
appropriated by Greeks and Armenians, or in other cases were turned
into mosques. The Franciscan monastery of St. Saviour was in the
north-west corner of the city, where the Latin Patriarchate now is.
The friars were the guides of pilgrims after the fall of Acre in 1291
A. D., but they were only able to show sites outside the city, or in
the streets, with exception of those in the Holy Sepulchre Cathedral,
which, by treaty, was reserved to Christians. This seems to have been
the reason why the sites in the Via Dolorosa--which are unnoticed
before 1300 A. D.--came to be established. The capital of a pillar
has been found, on which the legend of St. Veronica and the “holy
handkerchief” is represented,[40] which may be as old as the twelfth
century. The Chapel of the “Spasm” of the Virgin, with its mosaic
floor, has also been recovered at the point where the Via Dolorosa
turns south,[41] and this station is mentioned in the fourteenth
century[42]; but only eight stations are noticed in the sixteenth
century out of fourteen now shown by the Latins.[43] The “Stone of
Unction,” west of Calvary, is first noticed by Ludolph of Suchem, about
1330 A. D., as a Latin site, and “Herod’s House”--still extant, near
the “red minaret” in the north-east of the town--is mentioned by Sir
John Maundeville in 1342 A. D. Two footprints of Christ continued to
be here shown down to the present century, and this place was still
known in 1846, but has now ceased to be reckoned among the sacred
sites.[44] The place where Christ wept for Jerusalem on Olivet, and the
ancient tomb in the Hinnom Valley (probably that of Ananus), which was
converted into a chapel with a frescoed roof and called the “Retreat of
the Apostles,”[45] seem to be first noticed by Zuallardo in 1586 A. D.,
as are also the “House of Dives” and the “House of the Pharisee,” in
the Via Dolorosa.
[Sidenote: LATER SITES]
Detailed study of the traditional sites, fixed by the Oriental and
Roman Churches, thus serves to show that none of them go back to the
earlier years of the fourth century saving those of the Ascension, St.
Sion, Calvary, and the Holy Sepulchre. The statements of the pilgrims
prove to us that the remainder, as a whole, were vague and shifting
identifications, on which no reliance can be placed. We learn from the
Gospel (Luke xxiv. 50) that our Lord led His disciples out “as far as
to Bethany,” and He is not said to have ascended from the summit of
Olivet. The site of Calvary was considered to require defence even in
the fourth century, because it was within the city. There is a gap
of three hundred years, which is not bridged by any ancient allusion
even, separating the first notice of these older sites from the time of
the Crucifixion. Pious opinions, sanctioned by Popes and Patriarchs,
became fixed traditions as time went on, and the number of the sites
constantly increased, while Greeks and Latins showed rival “vestigia”
in rival shrines. Relics were perhaps often meant only to be regarded
as representations of objects connected with the Passion; but, in the
dark age of Gothic ignorance, the belief in miracles wrought by bones
of the saints infected Christianity with all the superstitions which
the illiterate converts brought in from paganism. The first Christians
were intent on the future rather than on the past, and the Gospels
themselves say nothing definite as to the position of Calvary or of the
new tomb in the garden. The pilgrims devoutly believed that they had
kissed the true Cross and the actual footprints of Christ, and knew
little of the earlier history of the sites where they gave alms and
received indulgences. But it is necessary, in endeavouring to ascertain
the truth, to distinguish between their beliefs and their accounts
of existing buildings, and we must found our study of the history
of Jerusalem on existing monuments and inscriptions, and as far as
possible on contemporary statements--on science, not on legend--even if
such examination of facts leads us to discard as improbable sites which
have so long been sacred to Christians; while we must also admit that
certainty and finality are still impossible, in cases where the actual
evidence is meagre. The account here given of the traditions will serve
to show that they have not been disregarded as an element in the study
of various questions of historical importance.
FOOTNOTES TO CHAPTER I
[1] H. Rix, “Tent and Testament,” 1907, p. v.
[2] The views of Thrupp were revived in 1880 by Dr. Robertson Smith,
who has been followed by Dr. Sayce and Dr. G. A. Smith. The untenable
character of this theory has, once more, been ably shown by the Rev.
Selah Merrill quite recently.
[3] Bordeaux Pilgrim, 333 A. D., “Crypta ubi Salomon dæmones torquebat.”
[4] Eusebius, “Life of Constantine,” iii. 42.
[5] Rufinus (died 410 A. D.), i. 7; Theodoret (_c._ 440 A. D.), i. 17;
Sozomen (_c._ 450 A. D.), ii. 1, quoted by Robinson, “Bib. Res.” i. p.
374.
[6] Cyril, “Catech. Lect.” iv. 10, x. 19, xiii. 4, 9. These lectures
were given in the Basilica of the Anastasis to the neophytes preparing
for baptism at Easter, 347–8 A. D.
[7] Maundeville, 1342 A. D., “And yet there appears the imprint of His
left foot in the stone.”
[8] Antony of Piacenza (_c._ 570 A. D.); now _Ḳadam’Aisa_, or
“footprint of Jesus.”
[9] _Ḳadam esh Sherif._ John of Würzburg (_c._ 1160 A. D.), “Pede
domini calcatus et insignatus.”
[10] John of Würzburg.
[11] Zuallardo, “Dev. Viag.” (1586), p. 152.
[12] “Paula et Eustochium”; Silvia, “Perigrinatio”; Theodorus;
Adamnanus (_c._ 680 A. D.); Geoffrey de Vinsauf, v. 53, _cf._ i. 5.
[13] St. Silvia, “Dicitur quidam fixisse morsum ut furasset sancto
ligno.”
[14] St. Silvia (385 A. D.), Theodorus (_c._ 530 A. D.).
[15] Theodorus (_c._ 530 A. D.), Antoninus (_c._ 570 A. D.), Arculphus
(_c._ 680 A. D.), Bernard (_c._ 867 A. D.).
[16] Pilgrimage of St. Paula (384 A. D.); St. Willibald (_c._ 750
A. D.), “In similitudine prioris lapidis”; Bernard (867 A. D.),
“Lapidem ... quem angelus revolvit.”
[17] Bernard (867 A. D.), “Veniente angelo in lampadibus accenditur.”
[18] Theodoricus (_c._ 1172 A. D.); Geof. de Vinsauf, v. 16.
[19] Eusebius, “Life of Constantine,” iii. 33.
[20] Sæwulf (_c._ 1102 A. D.), John of Würzburg (_c._ 1160 A. D.), and
others.
[21] Matt. xxviii. 16; Luke xxiv. 52; John xxi. 1; Acts i. 11, 12.
[22] Eucherius (_c._ 440 A. D.), Theodorus (530 A. D.), Theodoricus
(_c._ 1172 A. D.), Pierre Belon (1553 A. D.), Zuallardo (1586 A. D.).
The last named mentions this remarkable transference of sites (p. 129).
[23] Pilgr. of Paula; Bordeaux Pilgrim; St. Silvia; Zuallardo, “Dev.
Viag.”; Theodorus (_c._ 530 A. D.), “Columna quæ fuit in domo Caiaphæ,
ad quam Dominus Christus flagellatus est, modo in sanctam Sion jussu
Domini ipsa columna secuta est.”
[24] Acts xii. 3, 10.
[25] Sæwulf (_c._ 1102 A. D.); John of Würzburg (_c._ 1160), “Carcer
Domini ... in sinistra apsida ecclesiæ.”
[26] Bordeaux Pilgrim, “Piscinæ gemellares ... quæ appelluntur
Bethsaida”; Eucherius, “Bethesda gemino ... lacu.”
[27] Theodorus, 530 A. D.
[28] The Templar rival site is noticed in an anonymous
thirteenth-century tract. The map of 1308 shows the Piscina (interior)
west of St. Anne, but the Piscina Probatica south of that church. The
pilgrims usually call the pool Bethsaida, as in the Vat. MS. (Sinaitic
Bethzatha), and note its “five cloisters” (John v. 2). Bethesda
probably means “house of the stream,” but _Beth-ṣiddei_ would be “the
house of sides,” or “cloisters.”
[29] Theodorus, Armenian account, Antoninus Martyr, Abbot Daniel (_c._
1106 A. D.), John of Würzburg.
[30] R. Röhricht, “Die Jerusalemfahrt des Peter Sparnau,” 1385.
[31] Onomasticon, s.v. _Bethania_.
[32] _Ibid._, s.v. _Gethsemane_; St. Silvia (385 A. D.).
[33] Acts i. 20. It may be suspected that the idea of the bridge
originated in a confusion between the Greek _epaulis_, “abode,” and
_ep-aulou_, “over a pipe” (or “aqueduct”--_aulōn_), the bridge of
Adamnanus being that of the low-level aqueduct south-west of the city,
as Robinson supposed.
[34] Ant. Martyr (_c._ 570 A. D.); Adamnanus (_c._ 680 A. D.), “Pons
lapideus occurrit eminus per vallem ad austrum recto tramite directus
arcubus sussaltus”; Sir John Maundeville (1342 A. D.); Zuallardo (1586
A. D.), “Dev. Viag.,” p. 152. The “Arch of Judas” was inside the city
about 1187 A. D.
[35] Bordeaux Pilgrim, Eucherius (_c._ 440 A. D.), Theodorus (_c._ 530
A. D.), Sæwulf (_c._ 1102 A. D.), John of Würzburg (_c._ 1160 A. D.).
[36] John viii. 3, 6. Bernardus (867 A. D.), Sæwulf, John of Würzburg,
Maundeville.
[37] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” iii. p. 24; Reland, _Pal._ p. 688;
Theodorus (530 A. D.); Sæwulf (1102 A. D.); Abbot Daniel (_c._
1106 A. D.); John of Würzburg (_c._ 1160 A. D.); Phocas (_c._ 1185
A. D.); “Citez de Jhérusalem” (after 1187 A. D.); Marino Sanudo (_c._
1320 A. D.); Regesta Reg. Hierosol. No. 329 (1157 A. D.). C. K.
Spyridonidis, in _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_ (April 1907, p. 137),
gives the inscription.
[38] John of Würzburg, “Quod a Sarracenis postea mutatum est in
horologium.” He follows Fetellus (_c._ 1151–7 A. D.).
[39] “Mem. Survey West Pal.,” Jerusalem vol., 1883, pp. 331–40.
[40] Canon Dalton and M. Clermont-Ganneau, _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_,
1900, pp. 166 _seq._
[41] _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, 1902, p. 122.
[42] Marino Sanudo (_c._ 1320 A. D.).
[43] Zuallardo, “Dev. Viag.” (1586 A. D.), gives a drawing of the whole
course of the Via Dolorosa.
[44] Schick, _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, April 1896, p. 122, July
1896; T. Tobler, “Topogr.,” i. p. 445.
[45] “Mem. Survey West Pal.,” Jerusalem vol., 1883, p. 419; Josephus,
“Wars,” V. xii. 2.
CHAPTER II
BEFORE DAVID
The mysterious figure of Melchizedek King of Salem haunted the memory
of Hebrew writers in later times.[46] The author of the Epistle to
the Hebrews says, “Now consider how great this man was unto whom even
the patriarch Abraham gave the tenth of the spoils.” Salem appears to
have been Jerusalem, according to the Psalm[47] in which we read, “In
Salem is His dwelling, and His abode in Zion”; and the “King’s Dale”
is placed by Josephus near the city, where perhaps it is again noticed
later.[48] The Samaritans, who grouped so many sacred sites round
Gerizim, seem to have believed that Salem was the Shalem afterwards
visited by Jacob, east of Shechem--the Salim of the Fourth Gospel, now
the village of Sâlim, which is mentioned in the Paschal Chronicle;
while in the fourth century, according to Jerome, “The palace of
Melchisedec was there shown, its magnificence witnessed by the size of
ruins of ancient workmanship.”[49] We may, however, accept the Hebrew
belief that Salem (“safety”) is the same as _Uru-salimu_ (“the city of
safety”), which we now know to have been the Amorite name for their
royal city.
Melchizedek appears and disappears suddenly, without any explanation
as to his race or lineage. Josephus believed him to have been a
Canaanite, and fixes his date as founder of Jerusalem about 2058 B. C.
The chronology of the Hebrew text of Genesis would, however, make it
about a century earlier, in the “days of Amraphel king of Shinar,”
whom Sir Henry Rawlinson identified with ’Ammurabi, the famous sixth
King of Babylon, who has been shown to have acceded in 2139 B. C.,[50]
and who was thus the contemporary of Abraham. It would seem that this
priest-king of Jerusalem was the suzerain of the petty kings of the
cities in the Jordan Valley; but Abraham’s tithes are said to have been
offered to Jehovah as the “most high God,” and not to Melchizedek as
his over-lord. Jerusalem thus appears, even in the earliest notice, to
have been a sacred city,[51] and we are no longer surprised--in reading
the account in Genesis--at the civilisation of Abraham’s age, since we
know that Canaan then shared, in some measure at least, the culture of
the two ancient empires of Babylon and of Egypt, which disputed its
possession.
The original population of the city is said to have been both Amorite
and Hittite,[52] nor is there any reason to doubt that an outlying
tribe of the latter race, coming south from Syria, may have then
occupied the mountains of Salem and Hebron, though early in the
sixteenth century B. C. they were driven out of Palestine by Thothmes
III. It is now very generally agreed that the Amorites were a Semitic
race, and the existing tablets written in and after the fifteenth
century by Amorites are in a Semitic language like that of the
Babylonians. Hittite letters, on the other hand, show quite as clearly
that this race of pigtailed warriors was Mongoloid, and closely akin
to the Akkadians of Babylonia, whose speech was very similar to pure
Turkish.[53]
[Sidenote: EARLY NAMES]
The antiquity of Jerusalem seems to be indicated by the fact that
certain names connected with the city cannot be explained as ordinary
Hebrew words. Jebus, Zion, Hinnom, and Topheth are terms not traced to
any Hebrew roots, and they have always puzzled scholars as much as the
name Jerusalem itself did until it was shown to be of Amorite origin.
Even the meaning of Moriah--the name of the Temple hill--is doubtfully
explained as “vision of Jehovah,” for the Greek translators understood
it to mean “the high.”[54] It is, however, connected[55] both with
Abraham’s vision of Jehovah, and also perhaps with that of David when
the “Angel of the Presence” sheathed his sword on the Temple hill.
Jebus (_Yebûs_) is perhaps Hittite for “strong abode,” equivalent to
the Amorite Uru-Salimu, or “safe city.”[56] Zion has been supposed to
mean a “fortress,” but the derivation is forced; as a Hittite word it
would rather seem to signify a “palace” or “temple.”[57] For Hinnom and
Topheth no Hebrew explanations have been found possible, yet both may
perhaps be rendered as of Canaanite origin: the former would signify
“prince” (_En-num_), and the latter “flat” or “low” (_tuptu_), applying
to the lowest part of the valley junction on the south-east side of the
city.[58] The “King’s Vale” may have been the “deep valley of Molech,”
or it may have been equivalent to the older Hinnom (or Ben-Hinnom),
“the valley of the prince” or of the “prince’s son.” It is remarkable
that its modern name (_Wâdy Rabâbeh_) appears to mean the “valley of
lordship.”
Whatever be thought as to the meaning of these ancient and obscure
words, we know that a Hittite still lived in Jerusalem in David’s
time, and his name Uriah has no probable meaning in Hebrew. In Hittite
it was no doubt _Ur-ia_, “the worshipper of Ya,” while the Jebusite
King Araunah--whose name is so variously spelt--was probably known
as _Ur-ena_, “the worshipper of Baal.”[59] Thus the geographical and
personal names alike seem to indicate the early presence of both
Amorites and Hittites in Jerusalem.
Between the time of Abraham and that of Joshua’s conquest we hear
nothing about the city for six hundred years. After this we have
remarkable evidence of its existence as a royal city in the extant
tablets of the Tell Amarna collection, written to the Pharaoh by
the Amorite king of Uru-salimu. Amenophis III. of Egypt was the
contemporary of Rimmon-nirari of Assyria, who reigned about 1500 B. C.,
and Amenophis IV. was the contemporary of Burnaburias of Babylon,
who acceded about 1440 B. C.[60] Palestine, having been conquered
by Thothmes III. about 1580 B. C., was peacefully ruled by Egypt
when Amenophis III. acceded to the throne. The population appears at
this time to have been entirely Semitic, no letters in any but the
Babylonian language occurring among those of its rulers, while the
names of all the cities mentioned, even in the sixteenth century B. C.,
are also Semitic. The Philistines, like the rest of the Canaanites,
used the Babylonian language and script, and they worshipped the
Babylonian sea-god Dagon, whom ’Ammurabi had adored. Their names are
also Semitic, not only in the Bible but in the Tell Amarna tablets, and
in the later inscriptions of Sennacherib.[61] If any Hittites still
remained in the south, they were no longer a ruling tribe, though in
North Syria and Cappadocia they were then powerful and independent. The
Philistines were loyal to Egypt, but they do not appear to have had
any power in the mountains till four centuries later, and the loyalty
of the Amorite kings of Jerusalem and Gezer was much suspected by the
Pharaohs.
[Sidenote: THE AMORITES]
About the middle of the reign of Amenophis III. a rebellion broke
out in Syria.[62] Hittites and Amorites invaded Phœnicia, attacked
Damascus, and spread in Bashan, shortly before the time when Israel
appeared in Moab according to the Bible chronology. Amenophis was,
however, allied with the Kassite ruler of Babylon, and with the
Armenian and Cappadocian monarchs of the same Mongoloid race. He sent
soldiers to Gebal, and the Cappadocians subdued the Amorites. Some
twenty years later, Amenophis IV. (son of Amenophis III.) having begun
his unfortunate reign, another more formidable revolt occurred. The
friendly Armenian king Dusratta had died, and Aziru the Amorite had
deserted his obedience, allying himself with the Hittite suzerain of
Cappadocia. The Amorites conquered Phœnicia, and Egypt was powerless
to aid its Syrian subjects. The hatred of the memory of Amenophis IV.,
shown in later times, was perhaps due to his loss of the empire rather
than to his worship of Asiatic gods, who had been adored in Egypt in
the time of his father also; for,[63] like his father, he is addressed
by the Asiatic kings as a worshipper of the Egyptian god Amen, and
texts from the Egyptian ritual occur on his coffin.
[Sidenote: THE ABIRI]
The six letters written to Egypt by the King of Jerusalem do not
mention the name of the Pharaoh addressed, but, judging from those of
other personages concerned, they seem to belong to an early period
in this story of rebellion, though Canaan remained in a disturbed
condition even as late as 1440 A. D., when Burnaburias of Babylon
and Assur-uballid of Assyria--writing to Amenophis IV.--speak of
interrupted communications and the robbery of caravans. The name
of Jerusalem (_Uru-sa-limu_ or _U-ru-sa-limu_) has been read with
certainty by Dr. Winckler, but the name of the Amorite king is
variously rendered. It seems, however, to have probably belonged to
the same class with that of Melchizedek, and of Adonizedek, the king
killed by Joshua.[64] Jerusalem was being attacked by a people called
_’Abiri_ or _Ḥabiri_, who destroyed all the Canaanite rulers at Ai,
Ajalon, Lachish, and other places; and, since the period is that of the
Hebrew Conquest under Joshua, according to the Bible, it is natural to
identify these ’Abiri with the Hebrews, as proposed by Dr. Zimmern in
Germany. It is true that scholars who follow the views of Lepsius[65]
and of Brugsch, formed before any notice of Israel had been discovered
in Egyptian monumental texts, have denied this identification. Lepsius
argued that the city of Rameses, built by the Hebrews, could not have
been so named before the time of Rameses II.; but as it is noticed
even as early as the time of Jacob,[66] he was obliged to regard this
allusion as an anachronism, which might equally apply to the passage
on which he relied. Clearly, however, the allusion can only serve to
date the age in which the story of Joseph, as we now have it, was
written down together with the narrative of the Exodus. The conclusions
of Lepsius--who preferred the libels of Tacitus, and those with which
Josephus charges Manetho, to the chronological statements of the
Bible--are quite destructive to Old Testament dates. Rameses, however,
was the later name of Zoan, the city where the Hebrews dwelt in Egypt,
while the site of Pithom--the other “store city” which they built for
the Pharaoh--is still doubtful, though supposed by Dr. Naville to be
the same as that of Succoth. Lepsius called Rameses II. the Pharaoh
of the Oppression, and Mineptah, his son, the Pharaoh of the Exodus,
though he ruled two centuries later than the time of Joshua. As,
however, we now have a text by Mineptah, in which he notices Israel
as being already in Palestine in the fifth year of his reign, it is
impossible that the Exodus and the forty years in the desert could have
coincided with this period of incipient Egyptian decay. We are left
free to accept the new monumental evidence, which illustrates in so
remarkable a manner the historic statements of the Book of Joshua.
Jerusalem was not taken by Joshua, though its Amorite king Adonizedek
was slain at Makkedah, with Japhia, king of Lachish, and three
others.[67] It is remarkable that the Amarna correspondence gives us
the name Japhia (_yap’aa_) as that of the contemporary king of Gezer,
for Gezer came to the aid of Lachish, according to the Bible account.
Joshua is not named in these tablets, which refer only to a certain
Elimelech (a Hebrew name[68]) as one of the invaders, but the letters
speak of incidents identical with those narrated in the story of the
Hebrew Conquest. The more important passages bearing on the history of
Jerusalem may be thus rendered:
[Sidenote: JERUSALEM LETTERS]
“To the King my Lord thus says ’Abd-ṣadaḳ thy servant, at the feet of
my Lord the King seven times and seven times I bow. What have I done
to the King my Lord? They urge on thee that an enemy, a sinner, should
be seized, that ’Abd-ṣadaḳ has rebelled before the King his Lord.
Lo! as for me, no man is my father and none is my friend supporting
me. They rebel in this place, great King, striving with me for my
father’s house. Why should I sin against the King of Kings? Behold the
complaint, O King my Lord. I say to the governor of the King my Lord,
‘Why are ye afraid of the Hebrews?’ and they are afraid to go out, so
they send to the presence of the King my Lord.[69] Lo! I say there is
ruin of the lands of the King my Lord, as they have sent to the King my
Lord; and let the King my Lord know.... The lands of the suzerain[70]
have revolted, all that Elimelech has wasted, all the King’s land; and
let the King beware as to his land, which I say pleading, and let the
King my Lord behold the tears, and the warfare that is mighty against
me; and I receive nothing from the King my Lord, and no order ordered
in the presence of the King ... as to whether he will order men for a
garrison. And let the King my Lord learn, and regard the tears; and now
arise, O King my Lord. Now they have expelled the [Egyptian] governor.
I say there is ruin of the lands of the King. Will you not hear me?...
They have destroyed all the rulers: there is not a ruler [left] for
the suzerain.[70] Let the King give countenance to the people: let him
order soldiers[71] of the King my Lord. There is not one in the lands
of the King. The Hebrew has wasted all the King’s lands, since the
King’s soldiers[71] were sent away this year: they were sent away from
the lands of the suzerain.[70] Since there was not a soldier [left],
there was ruin to the lands of the King my Lord. O Scribe of the King
my Lord, this is ’Abd-ṣadaḳ’s plea for soldiers. The lands of the King
my Lord are ruined.”
This appeal was repeated more than once, but seems to have met with
no reply, except perhaps a demand for hostages to be sent to Egypt
(as in the case of the king of Gezer also), though this may refer to
a previous period. Meanwhile, the petty kings allied to Jerusalem
gathered forces in aid of the city.[72] The Hebrews, it may be noted,
are not mentioned in any of the Amarna letters except those from
Jerusalem.
“[Behold] what Milkilu [of Gezer] and Suardatu [of Keilah] have done
for me as to the land of the King my Lord. They have hired soldiers
of Gezer, soldiers of Gimzo: they have taken Rabbah. The King’s land
has rebelled to the Hebrews; and now as regards the city Jerusalem,
the city called Beth Baalah[73] has revolted [sending?] to the city
of Keilah. Let the King listen to ’Abd-ṣadaḳ thy servant, and order
soldiers, and recover the King’s land for the King: as there were
no soldiers the King’s land has revolted to the Hebrews, who have
confounded me and Suardatu and Milkilu.”
In this connection it should be noted that Baalah, or (as also called)
Kirjath-jearim, was one of the Hivite cities which did not join the
Amorite league, but submitted with Gibeon to Joshua. The passage[74]
which seems to refer to hostages is as follows:
“Behold the King my Lord has established his law from the rising of
the sun to the setting of the sun. It is false what they have falsely
said against me. Behold, as for me, am not I a ruler, a man of the
house of the King my Lord? Behold I myself am a servant of the King,
and I have sent tribute to the King. As for me, no one helps me, no
one is my friend, rising for the King. I have remained in this Chiefs
city.[75]... I have given eight slaves to Suta, the King’s governor,
in charge against me: twenty-one women ... twenty men our prisoners,
to remain in the hands of Suta, obeying the King my Lord. There is
ruin to all the lands of the King that they have taken fighting me.
From the lands of Seir to the city Hareth Carmel they gathered to the
rulers, and fought me. Now they despise the Commander, and the King my
Lord does not regard tears as they fight against me. Lo! I remain a
ship amid the waves. Make ready, great King; you will march to the land
of Nahrima and the land of Chezib--and lo! these are fortresses of the
King--you will march on the Hebrew. There is not a ruler [left] for the
King my Lord, all are destroyed. Lo! they have cut off Turbazu in the
city Beth-zilu, with Zimrida, lo! of the city of Lachish--slaves wore
him out, they did him to death. The region of Rimmon bewails slaughter
... in the city Zilu there is destruction.”
[Sidenote: HEBREW RAIDS]
A later letter,[76] referring to four previous messages, gives further
details of the war:
“Lo! the land of Gezer, the land of Ashkelon, and the land of Lachish
have given them corn, wine, and all else that they have taken away.”
“Behold this land of the city Jerusalem--no man aids me, no tribe
supports me, nor has risen to support me. Lo! it is done to me as was
done to Milkilu, and to the sons of Labaya, who have given the King’s
land to the Hebrews. Behold the King my Lord will be just to me, for
the men are sorcerers [or malicious]. Let him ask the governors. Lo!
strong and many and committing sin, very proud, they demanded property
and [threatened] death.... You will purge the lands in the hands of
the city of Ashkelon. Let the King ask about them--much corn, much
oil, much ... to the command of Pauru the King’s Governor, as far as
Jerusalem.” “The men taking messages for the King they bound--four
messages sent out by men of the fortress. They marched to block the
roads. Like a bird in a snare [I remain]: they [spy?] the city Ajalon.
Let me tell the King my Lord, I do not speak rashly sending about
the road for the King my Lord, for it is not easy. Lo! the King has
established his law in the city Jerusalem for ever, and will not rashly
speak of the desertion of the lands of Jerusalem. To the scribe of the
King my Lord thus says thy servant Abd-ṣadaḳ. I bow at thy feet, I am
thy servant. Render the news well to the King my Lord. O scribe of the
King, I am afflicted, great is my affliction, and you do a deed not
faithful, against the land of Cush. Hear us. Is there not slaughter,
and you ... him, that men of the land of Cush are ... in my city? Let
it ... the King to ... salute the King my Lord seven times and seven
times for me.”
Another letter, on a different kind of clay, possibly refers to a final
retreat from Jerusalem,[77] but it is a fragment only.
“And now the city Jerusalem. Since he went away this land is faithful
to the King. Lo! Gaza has remained to the King. Behold, the city Hareth
Carmel is Tagi’s, and the people in the city ’Aiath[78] have bowed
down. He went far away from the fortress; and have we done this? Lo!
Labaya gave gifts to the Hebrews, as Milkilu sent for tribute and
the young men said, ‘Is not this fortress annexed by us?’ The men of
Keilah gave all they asked; and have we left the city of Jerusalem?
The garrisons you ordered are blockaded by the ravages of this fellow
whom I fear. Addasi has remained in his fortress at Gaza, [sending] the
women ... to Egypt.... To be given to the King.”
The parallelism between the details of this monumental account and
those of the Bible narrative in the Book of Joshua, which--in its
present form--appears to have been composed in the time of David or
of Solomon, is very remarkable, and it is certain that Jerusalem was a
royal city and a strong fortress, which at the time when the letters
were written had not fallen to the ’Abiri or Hebrews, though there were
signs already that its further defence was becoming impossible.
[Sidenote: JEBUS]
From the Book of Judges we learn that after the death of Joshua the
children of Judah smote Jerusalem, and set it on fire. The border
between Judah and Benjamin ran on the south side of the city, along the
Valley of Hinnom, and to the head of the Valley of Rephaim. The town
thus lay in the lot of Benjamin, but the conquest was not complete;
for the “children of Benjamin did not drive out the Jebusites that
inhabited Jerusalem, but the Jebusites dwell with the children of
Benjamin in Jerusalem unto this day”--that is, till the time of David
at least. Josephus thought that the lower city only--perhaps not
yet protected by a wall--was taken, and that the upper city was the
Jebusite stronghold; nor is this an improbable explanation, since the
lower city seems--as will appear later--to have already existed in
David’s time. In the time of Phinehas, the grandson of Aaron, Jebus
was regarded as “the city of a stranger that is not of the children of
Israel,” and it even possessed a Canaanite king in David’s time.[79]
We may endeavour therefore to form some idea of the position and
extent of Jebusite Jerusalem. It was a royal city, a sacred place, and
a fortress of great strength, the taking of which was one of David’s
greatest exploits. The site indeed seems to have been chosen for its
strength, which has again and again been proved by many long and
desperate sieges. The city has always been taken from the north, and
the upper city on the south-west hill has always been the last quarter
to fall. This flat hill, rising 2,500 feet above the level of the sea,
measures about 600 yards east and west by 800 yards north and south,
thus containing an area of about 100 acres. Since the fourth century
A. D. the name Zion has been applied to this hill, which is surrounded
on all sides by deep valleys having steep slopes or precipices--that
called Hinnom forming a natural fosse which sinks some 400 feet below
the hill plateau, and defends the hill on the west and south, while
the Tyropœon Valley--about 500 feet wide--sinks on the north to about
150 feet below the plateau, and turns south, defending it on the east.
The hill of Zion is only joined to the watershed by a narrow neck, or
isthmus, of high ground at the north-west corner of the upper city, and
it required to be defended by a fortress wall at this point, which has
always been the place attacked by besiegers. The lower city lay to the
north, in the broad Tyropœon, and was defended by a smaller summit,
now occupied by the Cathedral of the Holy Sepulchre, which rises 2,497
feet above sea-level, and bulges out eastwards from the plateau of the
Judean watershed which runs north, west of Jerusalem. Thus, as Josephus
says, the city as a whole lay “over against the temple in the manner
of a theatre”[80]; for the horseshoe shape was caused by the head of
the Tyropœon on the north side of the upper city, the original form of
which has been somewhat obliterated by the accumulation of from 40 to
90 feet of rubbish under David Street, which leads east to the Temple
ridge. Yet even now there is a sharp descent eastwards along this
street, and steep side streets lead up southwards thence to Zion.[81]
[Sidenote: OPHEL]
Such, then, was the natural fortress which made the capture of
Jerusalem so difficult, and which appears to have been occupied from
the earliest times. The temple ridge on the east was 60 feet lower than
Zion even at its highest point; and, as this ridge became narrower and
tailed off towards the south, it sank--on the Ophel spur--to about 200
feet below the level of the upper city. The Ophel spur was unfit for a
fortress, and the part south of the temple contained an area of only
about 15 acres. It is impossible, therefore, to regard it as having
at any time been by itself a “city,” for the more important cities of
Palestine were much larger than such a small hamlet would have been.
Tyre covered 100 acres, Cæsarea and Samaria about 300 acres each, while
even Gezer--a town of less importance--included 40 acres within the
walls. Ophel is not mentioned in history till three hundred years after
David’s time. Nor are the remains of caves or cellars on this narrow
tongue of land apparently of any remote antiquity, though some writers
have supposed them to be of Jebusite origin, and have even called them
“neolithic”--a term which has no meaning in Palestine, because (as in
Egypt and in Babylonia) instruments of stone and of flint are found
at all levels in the excavations, and are contemporary with others of
bronze and of iron. The remains found in connection with these caves
are of Roman origin, and one of the largest of them was a dyeing
establishment, in which Byzantine objects were discovered. There are
similar caves or cellars on the hill of the upper city, and these may
be equally late.[82]
The rock strata at Jerusalem fall with an inclination of about ten
degrees south-east from the watershed, so that the rain-water is
carried naturally in this direction towards the junction (below
Siloam) of the Kidron, the Tyropœon and the Hinnom valleys. The town
indeed has the appearance of sliding downhill towards the south-east,
the Ophel spur being the lowest of those covered by the city at its
time of greatest magnitude, when Jerusalem--including the 30 acres of
the Temple enclosure--covered about 300 acres in all, being half as
large again as the present city within the Turkish walls. The lowest
rock stratum, which appears in the low cliffs on the east side of the
Kidron, is a hard dolomitic limestone, impervious and forming the bed
for streams which sink through the more porous upper limestone. It
appears again on the watershed to the north-west, and is known as the
Santa Croce marble, being mottled with red, which--on the hillock of
the traditional Calvary--was regarded as being due to the blood of
Christ. This formation is of the Greensand period geologically, and
the stone is known as _mezzeh_, or “superior,” in Arabic. Above it lie
beds of fine but rather soft building stone, belonging to the Lower
Chalk age, and called in Arabic _meleki_, or “royal” stone.[83] In
this white limestone the Temple cisterns are cut. Another stratum of
hard limestone, or _mezzeh_, lies over the _meleki_, and above this on
Olivet is the white Upper Chalk, full of ammonites, hippurites, and
other characteristic shells, with beds of the Eocene age, including
a capping of nummulitic limestone. These porous strata are known as
_k’akûli_, or “conglomerate,” and _nâri_, or “fire stone.”
This description may be sufficient to account for the natural
water-supply, which was always most abundant on the south-east, where
the dolomite bed is nearest to the surface in the valleys. The
principal spring is in the Kidron, below the steep eastern slope
of the Ophel spur south of the Temple. It rises under the floor of
a cave, where there must be an underground reservoir in the rock,
resembling many in the Lebanon and in other limestone regions. Towards
the end of winter, when the heavy rains have fallen, this reservoir
overflows frequently through a fissure which acts as a natural syphon,
sucking out all the water as soon as the reservoir is full. The sudden
gush--like that of the Sabbatic River in Syria--occurs every few hours
in early spring, but at the interval of several days in autumn. The
stream originally flowed down the rocky bed of the Kidron, which is
now filled in to a depth of 30 feet. But from early times it would
seem that attempts were made to carry the water to the foot of the
east slope of the upper city hill, in order to bring it nearer to
the fortress. By the time of Hezekiah at least--as will be detailed
later--a rock tunnel carried the waters of the spring to Siloam, or
“westwards to the city of David.”[84] This statement--in consequence
of the English mistranslation--has become the foundation of a literary
theory according to which the city of David was a mere hamlet of
15 acres on Ophel, whereas in reality it appears to show that the
stronghold of Jebus lay towards the west. It is not impossible that a
yet earlier rock-cut channel existed, with the same object of conveying
the waters of this intermittent spring towards the western citadel;
and, as the point has some importance in connection with the history of
the city, the reasons may be given more fully.
[Sidenote: GIHON]
Excavations were made in front of the cave in which the Kidron spring
bursts forth, in the year 1902, and it was then discovered that a
rock tunnel leads away towards the south outside the entrance to the
cave.[85] The level of its floor is only 5 feet above the water-level
at Siloam, and this aqueduct unfortunately has not been explored
along its whole length, nor has it furnished any indications of the
age in which it was made. It has been thought to be part of an old
rock channel traced for 600 feet northwards from the old pool below
the Siloam reservoir. This, however, is doubtful, as the channel in
question rises rapidly, and the levels in consequence would oblige us
to suppose that pipes must have been used, as water does not run uphill
in an open channel.[86] This Siloam channel was still connected, in
1874, with a series of surface channels on the slopes of Ophel, which
have been quarried away since, but which once carried the surface
rain-water to the old pool.
The excavations at the spring showed that a large tank or pool probably
once existed before the cave. The overflow from the cave was also
carried away by the aqueduct, and perhaps brought round to tanks still
existing below Siloam south-west of the pool. If this work was really
ancient, representing the “brook that flowed through the midst of the
earth”[87] even before Hezekiah’s tunnel was made, it is an argument in
favour of the view that the upper city of Jerusalem was the original
Jebusite stronghold.
[Sidenote: EN-ROGEL]
The earliest reference to any feature of Jerusalem topography is the
notice of the spring called En-rogel, on the boundary between Judah and
Benjamin east of the Valley of Hinnom. The meaning of the name has
been differently conjectured,[88] but if the true rendering be “spring
of the water channel,” it would seem that an aqueduct must have existed
at En-rogel when the Book of Joshua was written; and the topographical
evidence in that book indicates a date earlier than the time of Isaiah
and Hezekiah, thus favouring the conclusion that the aqueduct in front
of the cave is ancient.
En-rogel has, it is true, been placed in quite another position.
Brocardus, in the thirteenth century, supposed it to be the well at
the junction of the Kidron and Hinnom valleys which Christians called
“Nehemiah’s Fountain,” in connection with the apocryphal legend of a
fire fountain which was in Persia and not at Jerusalem at all.[89] The
Moslems called it the “Well of Job,” from a legend of the fountain
which sprang up when Job stamped on the ground[90]--perhaps confounding
Job with Joab, since En-rogel was near the “Stone Zoheleth” where Joab
proclaimed Adonijah king. But a well is not a spring, and Zoheleth is
supposed by M. Clermont-Ganneau to be the rock still called _Zahweileh_
(“the slippery”), close to the village of Silwân, and opposite the
cave spring already described, which is the only spring on this side
of Jerusalem. Neither Josephus nor any ancient pilgrim speaks of the
well in question before 1184 A. D., when it was cleared out. There is
no doubt that this well is ancient, but how old it is not easy to say.
It is now 125 feet deep, and at 113 feet below the surface the old
well-shaft rises from a rock-cut cave below. After the rains, in March,
when the Kidron is full of water beneath the surface, a stream here
rises to the surface, and flows down the valley for some distance. West
of the well is a remarkable aqueduct, with another rock reservoir fed
by two channels. This aqueduct is 90 feet below the rock surface, and
runs south for 600 yards. It was discovered by Sir Charles Warren in
1869, and he suggests that this may be the “brook that flowed through
the midst of the earth” which has been noticed above. These works were
evidently intended for the storage of the winter rain waters; but, on
the other hand, the description of the tunnel, with its flights of
steps leading to the water, recalls the aqueduct of Cæsarea,[91] which
is certainly not older than the time of Herod, and may be considerably
later. Whatever be the age of these remarkable waterworks, they have no
connection with a “spring,” such as we must suppose En-rogel to have
been.
[Sidenote: WATER SUPPLY]
The fortress of the upper city was not, however, dependent entirely on
the natural supply of water in the Kidron Valley, or--afterwards--at
Siloam. Even in the time of Nehemiah another spring existed on the
west side of Jerusalem, in the upper part of the Valley of Hinnom.[92]
It was called the “Spring of the Monster,” or, according to the Greek
translators (who regarded the word as Aramaic), the “Spring of the
Figs.” It appears to have been unknown to Josephus, though he speaks of
the “Serpent’s Pool”--apparently the present Mâmilla reservoir, which
was called the “Upper Pool” in the time of Hezekiah. The “Spring of the
Monster” seems to have been buried under the rubbish which has partly
filled the Hinnom Valley, but in the Jebusite age it no doubt formed a
supply on the west side of the upper city. It is also possible that the
rock-cut tank within the city, immediately north of Zion (now called
the “Patriarch’s Bath,” or “Hezekiah’s Pool”), was already ancient in
Hezekiah’s time, when it was known as the “Lower Pool,”[93] and that
it also supplied the original Jebus. There is, in addition to these
supplies, another probably of great antiquity west of the Temple,
outside the north-east corner of the upper city. This is now known as
the _Ḥammâm esh Shefa_,[94] or “healing bath,” and it is connected
with an ancient rock aqueduct which has been partly cut across by the
Herodian wall of the Temple enclosure. This channel is now 60 feet
under ground and 20 feet under a pavement which is older than the
destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A. D.; it is apparently even older than
the time of Pompey’s siege in 63 B. C., since a voussoir of the bridge
then existing has fallen into the aqueduct. The shaft to the “healing
bath” itself is now 86 feet deep, and--at the bottom--a vaulted passage
of the Roman or Byzantine age leads to the original cave, which has
a conduit opening out on the south side. The shaft is comparatively
modern throughout, and the cave must have been on the surface in the
Jebusite age. It receives the drainage of the valley (now filled in by
some 40 to 80 feet of rubbish), which has its head outside the Damascus
Gate north of the city. This supply was carried down the Tyropœon
valley, on the east side of the upper city, apparently to Siloam.
The water-supply has been thus described in detail, because it is
often assumed that the Jebusite city must have depended entirely on
the En-rogel spring in the Kidron ravine, which was clearly not the
case; but, even if it were so, it would not follow that the Jebusite
town must have stood on Ophel, for cities in Palestine were built on
the highest and strongest sites available, even if these were not very
near the springs. Thus at Samaria the springs are a mile away from
the nearest point of the city wall on the east, and other instances
might be cited where cities, like Tyre and Cæsarea, depended on water
brought by an aqueduct from a distance of some miles. Jerusalem, before
the time of Pilate, depended entirely for water on the rainfall of
a comparatively small area east of the Judæan watershed; but, as we
have seen, the storage of this natural supply in caves and tanks gave
a sufficient amount of water on each side of the upper city, and the
various rock channels served to bring this supply close under, and
within, the city walls. There is therefore no difficulty in supposing
that Josephus is right in describing the upper city of his own times as
having been the “mountain top of Zion” captured by David.
[Sidenote: ZION]
The name Zion was older than David’s time. Since the fourth century
A. D. it has always been applied to the hill of the upper city, and
it may have been so placed in the earliest ages. But in the Bible it
is not restricted to this position, but appears as a poetical name
for Jerusalem at large. Josephus never uses this name, but speaks of
“Jerusalem” instead. Zion is mentioned 154 times in the Old Testament,
but only four passages[95]--all referring to early times--are in the
historical narratives, the large majority of the other notices being
in Isaiah, Jeremiah, and the Psalms. Zion was a city with gates, and a
“holy hill.” It is constantly used as a name equivalent to Jerusalem.
It had walls and towers and “dwelling-places”; it is “the city of
Jehovah, the Zion of the Holy One of Israel,” a high mountain, and a
“city of solemnities.” It has been thought that, in the Greek age,
the name applies specially to the Temple hill, but the passages cited
do not really necessitate this conclusion. Ancient names are commonly
preserved in the poetry of a nation, and Zion was a very ancient word,
which--as we have seen--may possibly have meant a “chief’s abode,”
or a “god’s abode,” even when the Hittites and Amorites still held
Jerusalem, and when it was the sacred city of Melchizedek, long before
the Temple of Jehovah was built on the ridge outside, at the threshing
floor of Araunah the Jebusite. Hence it is in the poetry of the
prophets and psalmists of Israel that the name Zion occurs; and, though
there is nothing really wrong in the Christian application of the word
to the south-western hill, yet the term is only vaguely equivalent to
the city generally. But there is one quarter to which it should not be
solely applied--namely, the small spur which is called Ophel in the
Bible.
FOOTNOTES TO CHAPTER II
[46] Ps. cx. 4; Heb. v. 6, 10, vii. 1–4.
[47] Ps. lxxvi. 2.
[48] Gen. xiv. 17, 18; 2 Sam. xviii. 18; Josephus, “Ant.,” I. x. 2;
“Ant.,” VII. x. 3.
[49] Gen. xxxiii. 18 (A.V. marg.), called _Sâlim el Kebîra_ (“Great
Salem”) in Samaritan Chronicle (Neubauer, _Journal Asiatique_, Dec.
1869, p. 433). See “Mem. West Pal.,” ii. p. 230; Tal. Jer., _Abodah
Zara_, v. 4; John iii. 23; Onomasticon, s.v. _Jerusalem_ and _Salem_;
Chron. Paschale, quoted by Reland, “Pal. Illustr.,” ii. p. 977. Jerome
(“Ep. ad Evang.”), “Salem oppidum est juxta Scythopolim quod usque
hodie appellatur Salem et ostenditur ibi palatium Melchisedec,” etc.
[50] Gen. xiv. 1; Josephus, “Wars,” VI. x. 1. See my article in
“Murray’s Bible Dictionary,” 1908, “Chronology.” The date is now
ascertained from the Babylonian Chronicle’s through-reckoning, and
from a text of Nabu-nahid, while the same result was reached by Dr.
Felix Peiser (_Zeitschrift für Assyr._ vi. pp. 264–71) in 1891 from the
statements of Berosus.
[51] Ariel (Isa. xxix. 1, 2, 7) may stand for Babylonian _eri-ilu_,
“city of God,” as a name of Jerusalem.
[52] Ezek. xvi. 3, 45.
[53] See my volume “The Hittites and Their Language,” 1898. Dr. Sayce
(“The Hittites,” 1888) also (p. 14) calls them “Mongoloid.”
[54] Gen. xxii. 2 (LXX. _hupsēlē_); in 2 Chr. iii. 2 it is not
translated in the Greek. In Babylonian _mur-iahu_ would mean “seat of
Yahu.”
[55] Gen. xxii. 14 (see R.V.); possibly to be rendered “in the mount
Jehovah appears.” The LXX.: “In the mount the Lord was seen” (see 2
Sam. xxiv. 16).
[56] Akkadian _ab_ (or _ub_), “abode,” _us_, “strong”; Turkish _eb_
and _üs_. Isaiah refers to the meaning of the Semitic name as “a quiet
habitation” (xxxiii. 20).
[57] In Akkadian _Ṣi-an_ is “palace” (in the Behistān dialect), and
_Zi-una_, “chief’s building” or “God’s place.” Gesenius compares the
Arabic _ṣahweh_, “fortress,” and _ṣahyûn_.
[58] See Isa. xxx. 33, “deep and large.”
[59] _Araunah_ (2 Sam. xxiv. 16, 20); Heb. _Aranieh_ in ver. 18;
_Ornan_ (1 Chr. xxi. 15–28); no doubt originally written with the signs
_UR-AN-EN_, which would read either _Ur-ena_ or _Ur-nun_; in LXX.
always _Orna_.
[60] These synchronisms show that the approximate dates given by
Brugsch for Amenophis III. and IV. are correct. The recent discoveries
of Dr. H. Winckler in Cappadocia also prove that Rameses II. was ruling
about 1330 B. C., as Brugsch supposed. The later dates given by some
Egyptologists are based on a fallacious astronomical calculation, and
do not agree with the known Assyrian and Babylonian dates.
[61] Taylor cylinder text. See also my “Tell Amarna Tablets,” 2nd edit.
1898, pp. 117–20, 193.
[62] “Tell Amarna Tablets,” pp. 8, 14, 187, 193, 200, 202, 210;
_Deutschen Orient Gesellschaft_, No. 35, 1908, discoveries of Dr. H.
Winckler, pp. 33–6.
[63] “Amarna Tablets,” pp. 170, 188.
[64] The signs used are those for “man,” “good,” and “do,” variously
rendered _Arad-Khi-ba_ and _’Abd-Ṭobba_, but perhaps better
_’Abd-ṣadaḳ_, “servant of the just.” Cf. _Melchi-ṣedeḳ_ (“my king is
just”), _Adoni-ṣedeḳ_, “my lord is just.” See “Tell Amarna Tablets,”
pp. 139–51.
[65] Lepsius, “Letters from Egypt,” 1844, English trans. 1853, pp. 484
_seq._
[66] Gen. xlvii. 11; Exod. i. 11.
[67] Josh. x. 3. See “Tell Amarna Tablets,” p. 137, and Josh. x. 33.
[68] Ruth i. 2.
[69] Amarna Tablets, No. 102, Berlin Collection: “_tarayamu ... amili
’Abiri_.”
[70] _Sarru b’elu._
[71] _Pitati_, an Egyptian word, either from _pet_, “bow,” or _pet_,
“foot”--bowmen, or otherwise infantry, and not a chariot force such as
is often mentioned in the plains, in the Amarna letters.
[72] No. 106, Berlin Collection.
[73] Baalah = Kirjath-jearim (Josh. xv. 10), near which was Rabbah
(ver. 60). See Josh ix. 17.
[74] No. 104, Berlin Collection.
[75] _ina Bit-amilla-ma._
[76] No. 103, Berlin Collection, line 54 on back of the tablet.
[77] No. 199, Berlin Collection.
[78] _’Ati_, see Isa. x. 28, = Ai.
[79] Josh. xv. 8, xviii. 16; Judg. i. 8, 21, xix. 11, 12, xx. 28; 2
Sam. xxiv. 23 (“Araunah a king”); Josephus, “Ant.,” V. ii. 2, 5, 8.
[80] Josephus, “Ant.,” XV. xi. 5.
[81] The dome of the rotunda of the Holy Sepulchre Cathedral is fixed
in N. lat. 31° 46´ 45´´, E. long. 35° 13´ 25´´.
[82] Bliss, “Excavations at Jerusalem,” 1898, pp. 231–3; Warren,
“Recovery of Jerusalem,” 1871, pp. 306–8; G. A. Smith, “Jerusalem,”
1907, vol. i. p. 284.
[83] This is the usual explanation, but I have some doubts whether the
word is not really _malaḳeh_, meaning “smooth stone.”
[84] In 1878 I consulted the late Prof. A. B. Davidson as to this
translation of the sentence in 2 Chron. xxxii. 30, and I retain still
his letter of December 30, 1878, pronouncing that this is “the natural
translation of the words.”
[85] _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, Jan. 1902, p. 32.
[86] The channel starts at the level 2,087 feet above the sea. Bottom
of Pool of Siloam, 2,081 feet. The channel north of the old pool at
Siloam is about 2,120 feet.
[87] 2 Chron. xxxii. 4.
[88] “Fountain of the fuller,” or “of the spy,” with reference to
David’s spies. See Josh. xviii. 16, 2 Sam. xvii. 17. I suggested many
years ago a comparison with the Arabic _rujeileh_, “water-channel.” Dr.
G. A. Smith (“Jerusalem,” 1908, i. p. 109) takes the same view, and
compares the Syriac _rogûlo_, a “water-channel.”
[89] 2 Macc. i. 18–36; Brocardus, 1283 A. D.; Zuallardo, “Dev. Viag.,”
p. 142; Robinson, “Bib. Res.,” i. p. 332, note 5; Warren, “Recov. of
Jer.,” pp. 256–64; Wilson, “Ord. Survey Notes,” p. 84; “Mem. Survey
West Pal.,” Jerusalem vol., pp. 371–5.
[90] Ḳorân xxxviii. 40, 41; see 1 Kings i. 9.
[91] See my account, “Mem. Survey West Pal.,” ii. pp. 18–23.
[92] Neh. ii. 13; Josephus, “Wars,” V. iii. 2, xii. 2.
[93] Isa. xxii. 9. See 2 Kings xviii. 17; Isa. xxxvi. 2.
[94] Sir C. Wilson, “Ord. Survey Notes,” p. 85, and Pl. xxii. Explored
October 29, 1864.
[95] 2 Sam. v. 7; 1 Kings viii. 1; 1 Chron. xi. 5; 2 Chron. v. 2. The
word “Zion” occurs also in poetic passages in 2 Kings xix. 21, 31.
Outside the historic books it is found thirty-eight times in Psalms,
forty-seven times in Isaiah, thirty-nine times in Jeremiah, and in
twenty-four other poetic passages. See especially Ps. ii. 6, ix. 11,
14, xlviii. 12, lxxvi. 2, lxxxvii. 1, 5; Isa. iv. 5, x. 24, 32, xii. 6,
xxx. 19, xxxiii. 14, 20, lx. 14; Jer. xxvi. 18, xxxi. 12; Lam. v. 11,
18; 1 Macc. iv. 37, v. 54, vi. 48, 62, vii. 33, x. 11. In 1 Macc. the
word Zion means the Holy City, but is not specially restricted to the
Temple hill. It is mentioned six times only in this book, as cited.
CHAPTER III
THE HEBREW KINGS
From the citadel of Zion the Jebusites looked down on David’s men
arrayed beyond the dividing valley. Like many other defenders of a
doomed city, they mocked their foes, and they set the lame and the
blind on the wall, “saying, Thou wilt not enter here unless thou
removest the blind and the lame: meaning, David cannot enter here.
Nevertheless David took the hilltop of Zion: it is the city of David.
And David said that day, Every slayer of the Jebusite will also reach
by the ravine both the lame and the blind. They hate David’s self,
wherefore they say, Blind and lame he will not come into the place. So
David dwelt on the hilltop, and called it the city of David. And David
built round about from the Millo and inwards.”[96]
[Sidenote: DAVID’S CITY]
The city of David is here identified with the hilltop of Zion; but as
Jerusalem grew larger, the term seems to have been expanded to include
all the Jerusalem of David’s time, and in later days it was applied to
the lower city. This term is used forty times in the Old Testament, and
in four passages it is equivalent to Zion.[97] Josephus never uses it
except in relating David’s capture of the citadel. He always, in other
passages, substitutes the name “Jerusalem.” He says that David--like
all later captors--first took the lower city, but that the citadel held
out till Joab crossed “one of the underlying ravines” (which would
probably be the Tyropœon), and “ascended” to the citadel itself. He
continues that David afterwards made buildings in the lower city. He
identifies the citadel with the upper city of his own time, and places
the lower city to the north. He is only following the Bible account as
he understood it, but there is no reason to doubt that he is right. He
was not merely writing his own fancies, for “the Millo” had already
been long identified, by the Greek translators of the Bible, with the
_Akra_ or “citadel” which defended the lower city.[98] We can, of
course, only conjecture what “the Millo” was, since its position and
character are not explained in the Bible. It was a “filling” of some
kind, whether a valley filled in with earth or a filling place--perhaps
the old Jebusite pool cut in rock immediately outside the north wall
of the citadel. Jewish writers always connect it with the lower city,
and Solomon “built up the Millo, and shut up the breach of the city of
David his father,” or, according to the Greek translators, “founded the
Akra closing the fence of the city of David,” or otherwise “made the
Akra to fence in the fence of the city.” Considering that the “city of
the great king” (or overlord) is described as being on the “flanks of
the north,”[99] there seems to be no improbability in the view taken by
Jewish writers of early date. There was in Jerusalem, somewhat later,
a place called the Maktesh,[100] or “hollow,” apparently a quarter of
the city; this was probably the lower city in the wide Tyropœon Valley
north of the citadel, and it is possible that the Millo was on that
narrow isthmus of land to defend which the “broad wall,” or “wall of
the broad place,” was built.[101] The fact that the lower city was
first fortified by David seems to show that it was only an open town,
beyond the citadel, in Jebusite times.[102]
In the city of David’s time were his palace, and the place where the
Ark was kept in a tent. Here also David and many of his successors
were buried. The civilisation of Babylonia, as then extending to
Phœnicia, was the model for the new Hebrew kingdom, as it had been
for the Canaanite even in Abraham’s time. The “house” of David was
built by Phœnician artisans, and seems to have been in the lower city,
below the Temple ridge and Ophel, but the great palace of Solomon was
outside the city of David. The Ark, apparently, was established at the
original palace, until the Temple was built.[103] The royal tombs were
perhaps just inside the north wall of Jerusalem, as will be explained
in speaking of the later Hebrew kings.
[Sidenote: ABSALOM’S HAND]
The story of David’s life is told in one of the most vivid and
picturesque books of the Old Testament, and contains scattered
allusions to places at Jerusalem. The scribe--perhaps the prophet
Nathan[104]--does not spare his hero in his account of Bathsheba; but,
in spite of his crime of passion, the generosity of David’s character
accorded with that ideal which we find most admired among free Semitic
races, from the days of Job to those of Muḥammad or of Saladin; and
“whatsoever the king did pleased all the people.”[105] His sin met
its nemesis when Ahitophel--Bathsheba’s grandfather[106]--rose to be
a court favourite, and then deserted to the rebellious Absalom. His
schemes soon failed; but David, looking back to the day when Uriah was
betrayed to death, must have recognised his punishment, and humbly
submitted to the rod. To save the city, he marched out[107] with his
faithful guards--the old band that followed him to Gath in earlier
days--and on crossing the Kidron he sent back the Ark into the town. By
the Anathoth road he ascended Olivet, praying on its northern summit,
and so took the way to the wilderness and to Gilead. His faithful
spies were hidden in the cave of En-rogel; and after the defeat and
death of Absalom we are told that this rebel son had erected a “hand,”
or monument, in the “King’s Dale,” which still remained when the
chronicle was written, being--as already mentioned--perhaps somewhere
to the south in the Valley of Hinnom, though mediæval pilgrims thought
that they had found it at the Greco-Jewish tomb east of the Kidron,
where--ever since the fifteenth century A. D. at least--the Jews have
raised heaps of stones, each pilgrim casting his pebble at the supposed
monument of the wicked son.
David’s adventurous life drew towards its end. An old man at the age
of seventy years, the king was nursed by the fair Abishag of Shunem.
His fourth son, Adonijah--the two eldest having met violent deaths,
and the third being perhaps also dead--was supported by his cousin
Joab and by Abiathar the priest. On the rock Zoheleth,[108] beside
En-rogel--a precipice visible from the upper city--he slew sacrifices,
and proclaimed himself king. The old lion was roused by the news
to renew his oath to Bathsheba. Nathan the prophet, and Benaiah the
commander who had superseded Joab, were sent with the swordsmen and
light troops--two regiments of guards distinguished like those of
Assyrian and Egyptian armies--to escort Solomon, on the king’s mule,
“down to Gihon.” There he was anointed by Zadok the priest, with oil
brought from the tent in which the Ark still abode; and apparently the
choice of the place was due to the position of Zoheleth, which was
nearly opposite to it on the east side of the Kidron ravine, Gihon
being thus in sight of Adonijah’s adherents. The piping of pipes, the
shouts of the people, and the sound of the trumpet were heard by Joab
and Adonijah as they feasted, and they fled to take sanctuary at the
altar.[109]
[Sidenote: GIHON]
It is here assumed that Gihon was another name of the spring En-rogel,
though this is, of course, not absolutely certain. The word means
“spouting forth,” and the title is not applicable to a tank, while it
recalls the sudden gush of the Kidron spring as already described.
Gihon lay in a ravine (_naḥal_), a term which is applied in many
passages to the Kidron Valley, as contrasted with the _gai_ or gorge
of Hinnom. It is also described as a “source” (_moṣa_), which word is
used of the Kidron spring in Hezekiah’s inscription at Siloam. The wall
of Ophel, moreover, is said to have run “westwards to Gihon in the
_naḥal_,” so that it is clear that this “source” was not on the west
side of Jerusalem.[110] In the fourteenth century, it is true, the
old map of the city shows the “Upper Pool of Gihon” (at the _Birket
Mâmilla_), and the “Lower Pool of Gihon” (at the _Birket es Sulṭân_),
but such pools are never mentioned in the Bible, or by Josephus, though
the misunderstanding survives even now. The lower of these pools was
made by the Germans about 1172 A. D., and it is not mentioned by any
writer before that age. Gihon was not a pool or tank, and the term
seems most clearly to apply to a source which spouted out at intervals
in the Kidron ravine, and which was otherwise named En-rogel because of
a water channel down which the stream was led.
The building of the Temple was Solomon’s first great work. It stood on
the ridge east of the city, where the threshing-floor of Araunah was
consecrated by David’s altar. There is no doubt that it was placed on
the “top of the mountain,”[111] and that the site of the holy house
itself remained unchanged in later times, when it was rebuilt by
Zerubbabel, and again enlarged by the priests in the time of Herod the
Great. The area of the enclosure was then increased, especially on the
west, by the banking up of earth supported in places on vaults within
the great Herodian walls; but the natural site was very restricted.
The strata are tilted up towards the north-west, so that the ridge
presents an almost precipitous slope on the west side, sinking nearly
200 feet from the level of the Ṣakhrah, or “rock,” to the valley in
which the west Ḥaram wall was built. The eastern slope is less steep,
but the ridge--which was naturally highest on the north-west--is
narrow throughout, except in the neighbourhood of the Dome of the
Rock, which now covers the Ṣakhrah. In this part there is a small
plateau measuring about 200 yards across, and sinking on the east and
south about 20 feet below the crest of the Ṣakhrah itself. As to this
rock site, which forms the natural position for a building surrounded
by courts which were at lower levels, there is no doubt at all. The
visitor can see the rock for himself on the surface to east, south,
and north-west of the platform on which the Dome of the Rock stands,
and the levels of this bare rock have been accurately ascertained. The
Ṣakhrah rises on its west side about 4 feet above the level of the
pavement, and slopes gently eastwards. On the north-west part of the
platform the rock is flat, and is found just under the pavement. It is
just under the floor east of the Ṣakhrah, within the walls of the Dome
of the Rock. Its level north of the building has been ascertained in
the well mouths of the two rock tunnels now used as tanks, and also in
that of a similar excavation to the south-east of the Dome. Rock scarps
are visible on the north and north-east sides of the platform, while on
the south-east and south-west sides there are vaults in which no rock
is found at all. These facts I verified by descending into the tanks
and examining the small vaulted chambers under the platform. If the
platform itself could be removed, there is little doubt that we should
find beneath it two rocky terraces at two levels, that to the east
being some 10 feet lower than that to the west.
[Sidenote: SOLOMON’S TEMPLE]
The Ṣakhrah itself is the controlling feature, because it rises at its
crest 8 feet above the average level of the surrounding rock terrace.
If the Holy House was built over the Ṣakhrah, then the levels of the
descending courts naturally agree with those of the rock site. But
if the Temple itself is placed to the south or to the west of the
Ṣakhrah, it is no longer on the top of the mountain; and any student
who draws a section, in accordance with the ascertained levels of the
rock, will find that he has, in these cases, to suppose foundations of
masonry of at least 30 feet necessary to support the heavy walls of
the building. On the west the rock is found in a cistern mouth, only
100 feet from the Ṣakhrah, but already more than 20 feet lower; and
it descends steeply to the foot of the west Ḥaram wall, where it is
found to be nearly 200 feet lower than the Ṣakhrah crest, which--on
these suppositions--would be the level of the outer court, since it
cannot have been left protruding above that level. Thus, although to
the student who merely considers the plan of the building it seems
allowable to propose any position he prefers, near the Ṣakhrah, as the
exact site of the Holy House, we are in reality very strictly confined
to the conclusion that this sacred “rock” was the foundation on which
it rose. For the later Temple was more than 100 feet long, and it is
unnatural to suppose that it would have been built on the west slope,
or on the lower part of the small plateau, to the south, and raised
up by foundations of such height as would be needed, when there was
just room for the Temple and its inner court on the higher part of
the small plateau. Josephus appears to be quite right in saying, not
only that the Temple was on the “top of the mountain,” but yet more
definitely that “at first the highest flat part barely sufficed for
the Holy House and the altar: for the ground about it was very uneven
and precipitous.” He says that Solomon “built a wall on its eastern
side,” but that “on other parts the Holy House stood naked.” The west
enclosure wall was apparently not erected till much later; and although
when Pompey besieged Jerusalem there was already a bridge from the
upper city to the Temple ridge, the west side of the hill was even
then “abrupt,”[112] and not filled up with earth, within the rampart,
to bring it to a level with the Temple courts. “New banks”--according
to Josephus--were added in later times, and thus “the hill became a
larger plateau.”
Such practical considerations and historic statements fully agree with
Jewish tradition. No Jerusalem Jew doubts that the Temple stood over
the Ṣakhrah “rock,” which they identify with that “Stone [or, Rock] of
Foundation” which, even in Herod’s time, was visible in the Holy of
Holies. The Mishnah was composed in our second century, and records
the statements of rabbis who had witnessed the great destruction of
Jerusalem in 70 A. D., and who had seen the ruins of the Temple as the
Romans left them. In the Mishnah we read[113] the description of the
awful Day of Atonement, when--once a year--the high-priest, in fear
and trembling, entered the Holy of Holies, where there was no longer
any Ark. “When the Ark was removed, a stone was there, since the days
of the first prophets” (that is, of David), “and it was called the
‘foundation’: it was three fingers above the ground, and on it he put
the censer.”
[Sidenote: THE PIERCED STONE]
The Ṣakhrah is a very remarkable rock cut in steps on the west, as
though to form the base of a wall, and having a cave beneath on the
east, with a shaft through its roof to the surface. It is also said
to have another excavation below the floor of the cave,[114] and
this cave was very probably a granary originally connected with the
threshing-floor, and resembling an ancient example near Nazareth.[115]
To identify the rock with the Altar of the Temple is to upset the
whole section of the building, and the altar was of stones, and not of
rock. In the fourth century we find the Jews wailing at this “Pierced
Stone,” as the site of their Holy House.[116] The Moslems have adopted
their tradition, and speak of the Ṣakhrah as the foundation of the
world, a rock of Paradise suspended over the abyss where souls dwell
till the judgment. The Christians of the Middle Ages equally regarded
the Dome of the Rock as the “Temple of the Lord.” The site is one of
the very few as to which there is a general agreement and an unchanging
tradition.
Of the Temple courts we have no full description in the Old Testament.
The Holy House itself is said to have been double the size of the
Tabernacle, not counting the three tiers of small chambers built
against the walls. In the details of its architecture it recalls the
art of Babylonia or of Phœnicia, rather than of Egypt, and its masons
and artificers came from Tyre. The combination of large, well-hewn
masonry with cedar roofs, and adornment of bronze and of gold, carved
figures on the wall, and sacred Ark within, reminds us not only of the
temples in Babylon which Nebuchadnezzar describes in his inscriptions,
but of that famous account, in the Akkadian language, which Prince
Gudea of Zirgul in Chaldea has left us, on his cylinders and statues,
describing the temple which--perhaps as early as 2800 B. C.--he adorned
with precious metals and with cedar wood from Lebanon. We think of the
Cherubim as many-winged angels, such as Italian artists have painted;
but the word _Kirubu_ is written in Assyria over a representation of
one of those winged bulls which, as “guardians,” stood in temples, or
are represented flanking the mystic tree of life, just as Solomon’s
cherubs flanked the palm trees. They were not painted, like the
figures in the dark interior of Egyptian shrines, but carved on the
walls in low relief, and overlaid with gold. They were seen by none
save priests, and even to them they were only dimly visible in the
darkness of a shrine unlighted from without, by the glimmer of the
seven-branched golden lamp. Yet Solomon--like many later kings even
down to the seventh century B. C.--disregarded the command written
on the ancient “token tablets” still stored in the Ark, “Thou shalt
not make unto thee any graven image”; for besides these carvings
and the huge olive-wood cherubs which overshadowed the older golden
guardians of the Ark itself, he also placed his bronze laver on the
necks of bronze bulls, and adorned the steps of his ivory throne with
lions, after the fashion of Babylonian and Phœnician kings. In his
old age the princesses from Sidon and Moab, and the daughters of the
Hittites, Ammonites, and Edomites, whom he wedded, “turned away his
heart after other gods.” But even in his youth he followed the ways of
the Canaanites, while seeking to honour Jehovah by a splendid shrine.
The making of images, in his day as in all times, was the sure sign of
superstition creeping in, to guard against which the commandment of
Moses was written.
[Sidenote: THE TEMPLE GATES]
The description of the Temple need not be further detailed,[117] as
it is clearly understandable in the Bible narrative. The buildings
included an “inner court,”[118] and probably, therefore, an outer one
as well, but we are not told what space these covered, though it has
been conjectured that the former was double the size of that of the
Tabernacle, which would mean roughly about 300 feet east and west by
150 feet north and south.[119] In late accounts we read of a Court of
the Priests and of a great court, and there are passing allusions to
gates, on each side of the enclosure at different levels, and to a
“higher court” by the “new gate.” It would seem that there was a west
gate called that of “Departure” or “Casting Out,” in various passages,
a north gate called “the High Gate of Benjamin,” a “Foundation Gate,”
perhaps in the lower court, and--in the outer wall, which was that of
the city itself--a gate where the “guard” or garrison of the Temple
mustered, by the “Court of the Guard” (or “Prison,” as rendered in
the English). The gate of “Runners” (light troops), on the way to the
palace south of the Temple, was perhaps not the same. The king held his
court of justice at the High Gate, which was “towards the north”; but
another “King’s Gate” seems to have been on the east side of the outer
court. All these were swept away when the Temple was enlarged and its
courts rebuilt by Herod; but the general impression is that the Temple
courts were at first confined to the immediate neighbourhood of the
plateau surrounding the holy house, and that outside them there was
only the city wall on the east; while on the west the natural slope of
the hill remained visible, and no wall divided the Sanctuary from the
city. On the south also the ridge sloped down to Ophel, where the great
court of the palace extended towards the Horse Gate and the Court of
the Guard.[120]
After the Temple the new palace of Solomon was built. It was not in
the city of David, for “the daughter of Pharaoh” remained there “until
he had made an end of building his own house,” and then “came up out
of the city of David unto her house which he had built for her.”[121]
Thus Josephus is apparently right in saying that the queen’s house
“adjoined” that of the king, being in fact the _ḥarîm_ of the palace.
This palace resembled those of Assyrian or of Egyptian kings, as well
as that of later times at Persepolis. It included a main building
measuring 100 cubits by 50 cubits, with cedar pillars and a cedar
roof. There were also separate halls, each 50 by 30 cubits, and two
residences, for the king and queen, as well as a hall of justice, or
throne-room, in which was the ivory throne. Round and within these
buildings there were open courts, besides the “Great Court,” which
apparently included the stables for the king’s horses, which came in
by the “Horse Gate” in the city wall, at which gate Queen Athaliah,
fleeing back from the Temple to her palace, was slain: this gate was
to the south of the Temple courts, as described by Nehemiah. In the
latter book also we find that the “King’s High House” lay on Ophel,
near the “Water Gate,” which was above the Gihon spring, and which
had a rock shaft leading down to the water. In Nehemiah’s time this
palace was called “the house of David,” meaning, apparently, that of
David’s family, just as certain royal tombs are called--in the same
account--“sepulchres of David,” because certain kings of Judah were
there buried; for David would himself evidently not need more than one
sepulchre.
[Sidenote: THE PALACE]
The description is not sufficiently detailed to allow of any plan of
these buildings being drawn,[122] but--including the courts--it is
clear from the dimensions that the palace covered the greater part of
the little Ophel spur, which became the royal quarter, where also--in
later times at least--the high-priest had his house, and where the
Nethinim lived. Moreover, the “king’s garden” was in the Tyropœon
Valley, near Siloam, and in or near it were the “king’s wine-presses,”
which are noticed as marking the south limit of the later city. The
city of David was no doubt densely crowded, and there was no room in it
for a new palace. This was, moreover, placed close to the Temple for
convenience in attending the daily services. In later times Ezekiel
denounces the proximity of the dwelling of idolatrous kings to the
Temple of Jehovah, and the building of a wall of separation, as well as
the burial of the kings inside the city.[123]
The latest buildings of Solomon were shrines in honour of foreign
gods, including Ashtoreth, Milcom, Chemosh, and Molech.[124] The three
former were on “the hill facing Jerusalem”; the last named was no doubt
at Topheth, in the valley which was devoted to the worship of this
savage deity. They are again noticed in the time of Josiah, nearly four
centuries later, and (except Molech) stood on “the Mount of Corruption”
(or, more correctly, of “anointing”), which was apparently the Mount of
Olives. A much-defaced Phœnician text, found by M. Clermont-Ganneau at
the village of Silwân, contains the words “Beth-Baal,” and has been
supposed to be possibly connected with one of these shrines.
The prosperity of Jerusalem declined on the death of Solomon, when
the kingdom was divided; and five years later the city was sacked by
Shishak--the first king of the twenty-second Egyptian dynasty--about
960 B. C. Topographical details are, however, very scanty, though
Jehoash of Israel (about 820 B. C.), attacking Amaziah of Judah, is
said to have broken down the wall from the Gate of Ephraim (which
would be on the north) to the Corner Gate (which was pretty clearly
at the north-west corner of the upper city), a distance of 400
cubits. He thus made his assault, as usual, on the weakest point in
the fortifications.[125] He again carried off the treasures of the
Temple and of the palace. The next king of Judah, Azariah (otherwise
Uzziah), strengthened this point by building towers at the Gate of the
Corner and at the Gate of the _Gai_--a term used exclusively of the
Hinnom Valley. Both these gates--as will appear later--were near the
isthmus which exists inside the present Jaffa Gate; and the towers
were the predecessors of Herod’s “royal towers,” which defended the
upper city at this neck of high ground. Uzziah is also said to have
placed engines--no doubt like those of the Assyrian bas-reliefs--on the
walls.[126]
[Sidenote: THE OLD POOL]
Jotham (about 745 B. C.) is the first Hebrew king who is said to
have built a wall on Ophel,[127] though he may merely have made it
stronger, as it possibly formed part of Solomon’s wall round Jerusalem,
including the Temple and the palace. He was no doubt alarmed at the
progress which was then being made by the Assyrians in the conquest
of Syria. His successor, Ahaz, was attacked by Pekah of Israel and
Rezin of Damascus some ten years later, though they failed to take the
city.[128] We have some details of interest as to the water-supply
of Jerusalem at this time, before the great works of Hezekiah were
carried out[129]; for, in connection with this attack, Isaiah notices
the “conduit of the upper pool,” and the “waters of Shiloah that go
secretly”; he speaks also rather later of the “collection of the waters
of the lower pool,” and of the “place where the waters of the old pool
flowed together between the two walls.” Whether we are to understand
that the Siloam tunnel was begun as early as the time of Ahaz, or
that the older conduit--already described--was then made, there is
apparently no connection between the secret water-supply of Shiloah
and the other pools noticed by Isaiah. It is certain that the Upper
Pool must have been on the west side of the city, since it was there
that the Assyrians appeared in 703 B. C., and the site of the Assyrian
camp was still pointed out as late as 70 A. D. in this direction.[130]
The conduit from this pool to the “lower pool” was no doubt that which
also existed in the time of Herod, and which still carries water to the
so-called “Pool of the Bath” or “of Hezekiah.” The last named may very
well be regarded as the “Old Pool,” being “between the two walls”--that
is to say, inside the wall of the lower city and outside that of the
upper city. This important reservoir, which was “old” even in the
time of Isaiah, thus seems to have been possibly of the Jebusite age.
The work of Ahaz consisted in forming an upper reservoir (now called
_Birket Mâmilla_) to supply the old pool by a conduit leading into the
city.
The fall of Damascus to Tiglath-pileser, in 732 B. C., caused general
consternation in Palestine. Ahaz had already asked aid of the Assyrian
against Israel and the Syrians, and he now hasted to offer tribute to
the conqueror, whose troops were overrunning Gilead and Galilee, and
raided even to Philistia. On the occasion of his visit to Damascus,
Ahaz is said to have seen an altar on which he sacrificed, and a
copy of which he introduced into the Temple at Jerusalem, displacing
Solomon’s bronze altar which he reserved “to inquire by.”[131] There
appears to have been a “covered place” in the Temple adorned with gold
or silver, as was also the “king’s entry,” and these were now stripped
to pay Tiglath-pileser.[132] Ten years later Samaria was captured by
Sargon, and it was then perhaps--or in 711 B. C., when Sargon captured
Ashdod--that the Assyrian outposts appeared at Nob near Mizpeh, where
the most distant glimpse of Jerusalem is caught from the north.[133]
[Sidenote: SILOAM]
Ahaz had been succeeded by Hezekiah six years before the fall--in
722 B. C.--of Samaria. Preparations for a siege, such as might now
be expected, continued to be made at Jerusalem. The older account
merely tells us that Hezekiah “made a pool and a conduit, and brought
water into the city”; the later independent statement says that
besides adding a new outer wall, and repairing “the Millo in the city
of David,” he stopped all the fountains and “the brook that flowed
through the midst of the ground,” and moreover “dammed the source of
the waters of the Upper Gihon, and made it straight below, westwards
to [or, for] the city of David.”[134] Whether this was a completion
and improvement of the Siloam tunnel begun by Ahaz, or a new tunnel
to supersede the older one which may perhaps have already led from
the Kidron spring, is not clear; but the characters in which the
Siloam inscription--recording the making of the tunnel--are written
seem to be nearest to those found on Phœnician weights, in Assyria,
which are rather later than the time of Ahaz. This inscription is the
oldest of Jerusalem monuments as yet found, and is indeed the oldest
purely Hebrew text known. It is of great importance as showing the
civilisation of Hezekiah’s age, which, however, is equally attested by
the historic cylinder of Sennacherib.
The present Pool of Siloam has been found (by Dr. Guthe in 1881) to
be much narrower than that which was probably first cut by Hezekiah
in connection with his tunnel, which perhaps required the reservoir
to be deeper than the older pool there existing. The pool thus became
30 feet deep and 60 feet square,[135] having a flat walk on each side
about 7 feet wide. The tunnel from the Gihon spring is a third of a
mile long, and it was begun from both ends. The spring and the pool
lie in a south-west direction respectively, but the tunnel winds, and
the lower part runs west, either because some soft stratum of rock was
followed, or more probably because, working in the dark, the direction
was lost till a shaft, 30 feet high, was driven down from the surface,
and the correct direction recovered. At the spring a short passage
was driven in west, from the back of the cave, and from this the main
tunnel (1,707 feet long) began. Here also it is first cut in the wrong
direction, westwards, and then bends round south; and here also a great
shaft (discovered by Sir Charles Warren), with a rocky stairway, was
carried down from the surface of Ophel. This no doubt marks the site of
the “Water Gate”; and access to the spring from within the city wall
was so attainable, which may be what is intended by “brought water
into the city.” Finally, when the two parties of miners heard each
other calling, a short cross-cut was made east and west. This point I
examined in 1881, and found that each of the tunnels had been abruptly
stopped where this cross-cut (about 4 feet long) occurs. It seems also
to have been then found that the tunnel was not at a sufficiently low
level in its southern part, and that the water would not flow freely,
which would account for the Siloam end of the tunnel being much more
lofty than the part nearer the spring, the floor level having been cut
down.[136]
[Sidenote: THE SILOAM TEXT]
The famous inscription was carved on the east side of the tunnel near
its mouth, in ancient characters of the alphabet of Hezekiah’s age,
presenting some minor peculiarities which became distinctive of the
script of Israel. It was discovered in 1880 by a Jewish boy, and was
reported by Herr Schick, and visited by Dr. Sayce. The first correct
copy published was taken from my squeeze, and an excellent copy was
almost simultaneously published by Dr. Guthe, through whose courtesy
I had been enabled to work with ease in the tunnel. A cast was also
fortunately made, for the text was afterwards cut out of the rock by
a Greek villain, who was duly punished. Unfortunately, though now
preserved in the Museum of Constantinople, this valuable inscription
has been broken and damaged. When first found, the letters were full of
lime deposit, which Dr. Guthe removed with hydrochloric acid without
injuring the stone, and a true copy could not be made till this was
done. The text may be thus translated, the ends of the lines being
injured, when first found, by the scaling off of the rock.
[Illustration: THE SILOAM INSCRIPTION.
From the Author’s squeeze.]
(1) “The tunnel, and this is the method of the tunnel: while (the
miners) raised
(2) the pick each towards his fellow, and while yet three cubits
were ... the voice of one calling
(3) to his fellow, for there was an excess in the rock to the right
... they struck to the right
(4) in the tunnel: they hewed this cutting each towards his fellow,
pick to pick, and flowed
(5) the waters from the source to the pool for two hundred and one
thousand cubits,
(6) and ... a cubit was the height of the rock at the top of this
cutting.”
The hewing to the right hand in both the excavations was what actually
occurred. The measurement--in round numbers--of 1,200 cubits gives us
roughly a cubit of 17 inches, but the “three cubits” gives us more
exactly a cubit of 16 inches, which appears to have been that used by
Hebrew masons.[137]
This remarkable engineering work had perhaps not long been finished
when, in the third year of his reign, Sennacherib invaded Philistia in
703 B. C., and sent his Tartan or “general,” his Rabsaris or “chief
eunuch,” and his Rabshakeh or “chief headman” from Lachish “with a
great host against Jerusalem.” The curled and oiled Assyrian mockers
stood beneath the wall, beside the “conduit” at the west gate, and
parleyed in Hebrew with the men above. The Hebrew politicians were much
divided in opinion, whether to submit to Assyria or to seek aid from
Egypt. Isaiah alone seems to have relied on the help of Jehovah in that
hour of danger, which passed away when misfortune overtook Sennacherib
on the borders of Egypt. In his own boastful inscription[138] the
invader gives us no reason why the city escaped, though it appears
from his account, as well as from the Bible, that Hezekiah had already
offered tribute. “As for this Hezekiah,” says Sennacherib, “he shut
himself up, like a bird in a snare, in Jerusalem, his royal city. He
raised forts for himself. He was forced to close the gates of his
city.”[139] But no siege or capture is recorded, and it is only claimed
that the priests and warriors of the city subsequently sent tribute,
and Hezekiah large presents, including gems, slaves, and an ivory
throne. Never again, apparently, did Sennacherib attempt the conquest
of Jerusalem: he “went and returned and dwelt at Nineveh,” and was busy
fighting in Babylonia and Elam till his murder about 681 B. C.
Manasseh succeeded his father Hezekiah in 699 B. C., and was also a
tributary of Assyrian kings; of him it is recorded[140] that he “built
a wall outside the city of David, westwards to Gihon in the valley,
and to the entrance of the Fish Gate, and surrounded Ophel and raised
it very high.” This apparently refers to the line of the Ophel wall,
which, in later times at least, ran south-west from the corner by the
Horse Gate, for about 250 yards, to the Water Gate above the Kidron
spring. The Fish Gate, as will appear later, was on the north side of
the city.
[Sidenote: TOMBS OF THE KINGS]
Manasseh was not buried with his fathers, but in the palace garden
near Siloam, where also, in the “field of burial,” the leper Uzziah
had probably been buried, and perhaps Ahaz also. This cemetery is
afterwards noticed as the “sepulchres of David,” but we may now inquire
where the seven kings who were buried, “in” or “at” the city of David,
with David himself and Solomon, were most probably entombed; for the
site was clearly not the same,[141] and was either within or close to
the old city of David’s time. The seven later kings buried “with their
fathers” were Rehoboam, Abijah, Jehoshaphat, Amaziah, Jotham, Hezekiah,
and Josiah, and of these Hezekiah is said to have been laid in the
“upper chamber” (_m’aalah_) of the tomb, which was still known in the
time of Herod, and yet later in that of the apostles.[142] Josephus
gives a remarkable account of this tomb, which was opened by John
Hyrcanus in 134 B. C., and “another room” by Herod yet later, in search
of treasure. He says that the latter “did not come to the coffins of
the kings themselves, for their bodies were buried underground so
artfully that they did not appear even to those that entered into
their monument.” The sepulchre was evidently one of the kind used by
the Hebrews, and by the Phœnicians, with _kokîm_, or “tunnels”--one
for each body--running in lengthwise from the sides of the chamber.
But it had the peculiarity that some at least of these were under the
floor, as in the earlier Phœnician examples--an arrangement which is
not usual in Hebrew tombs; while the mention of an “upper chamber,”
in which Hezekiah was buried, shows that a second tier, on the ground
level, was excavated for later kings thought worthy to rest with David
and Solomon who lay below. There is only one known ancient sepulchre at
Jerusalem, in the city of David, to which this account applies--namely,
the tomb in the west apse of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre,[143]
traditionally containing the graves of Joseph of Arimathæa and of
Nicodemus. A wall has been built across it, but it appears to have
had originally nine _kokîm_ graves, of which six are on the ground
level, while three (on the south) are under the floor, together with
a pit[144] probably used for the purpose of funereal deposits, such
as Josephus says were taken out by Herod, including “vessels of gold
and precious things.” The mouths of the _kokîm_ were originally closed
by slabs, and, if these were like others which I have myself removed,
it would be possible to enter the chamber without knowing--till very
closely examined--that there were any _kokîm_ behind them, while
those under the floor would be even less suspected. The remarkable
correspondence between the statements above noticed--in the Bible and
in the accounts by Josephus--seems to make it highly probable that we
have here, still existing, the tombs of the more famous kings. Whether
they were just inside or just outside the north wall of the city of
David is perhaps uncertain, but that they were visible in a low scarp,
facing east, even later than Herod’s time, seems to be clear. This tomb
of David was distinct from the cemetery in the garden of the palace
near Siloam, which has not as yet been found, but to which the term
“field of burial belonging to the kings” seems to be first applied in
speaking of Uzziah, “for they said, He is a leper.”[145] The above
suggestion has met with acceptance by several writers since I first
made it thirty years ago, but it unfortunately leaves us without hope
of recovering either the treasures which were abstracted by Hyrcanus
and Herod, or the bodies of the kings, which, if they had not crumbled
away, appear to have been removed by later desecrators of this very
ancient sepulchre.
[Sidenote: NEBUCHADNEZZAR]
Passing on to the history of the capture of Jerusalem by
Nebuchadnezzar, it may be noted that the empire of Assyria collapsed
suddenly on the death of Assur-bani-pal in 626 B. C. He was a very
remarkable ruler who imitated ’Ammurabi by concentrating in his own
hands even the most minute details of government. We possess his
political letters, which give us a high opinion of his justice and
courtesy. On his death, Nabopolassar, governor of Babylon, became
independent, and about 610 B. C. he took Nineveh in alliance with the
Medes. He died apparently in 608 B. C., when his son Nebuchadnezzar
became king of Babylonia in the fourth year of Jehoiakim, king of
Judah. This new race of Babylonian monarchs was apparently native to
the city, for Nabopolassar says in a recently discovered text: “I and
the chief rulers of the great city have purified Babylon where we
dwell--our land which the oppressor seized--to establish in its midst
the throne of righteousness.”[146] He refers to Nebuchadnezzar as
his eldest son, the “delight of his heart,” “upholding the dominion
faithfully and gloriously with my hosts.” The first attack on Palestine
was made by Nebuchadnezzar as prince, after the defeat of Necho the
Pharaoh at Carchemish. The latter had aided the attack on Nineveh,
but the allies soon quarrelled. Josiah had been slain by Necho in 612
B. C., and Nebuchadnezzar was obliged to hurry back from Palestine on
his father’s death four years later; but the respite was short, and
Jerusalem fell to the Babylonians about 590 B. C.
We do not as yet possess any monumental account of Nebuchadnezzar’s
campaigns in Palestine, though he has left rock texts in Lebanon and
near Beirût. These record his piety in erecting temples, but one
recently found attests his widespread conquests,[147] for, speaking
of contributions to a temple, he says: “I gathered revenues from all
peoples of mankind, from the upper sea to the lower sea, from distant
lands of widespread peoples of mankind, kings ruling the mountains
and the sea coast.... Princes of the land of the Hittites, near the
Euphrates on the west--for by command of Merodach my lord I had
swallowed up their power--were made to bring strong beams from Mount
Lebanon to my city Babylon.”
[Sidenote: IDOLATRY]
There are many passing allusions in the Book of Jeremiah to the
Jerusalem of this age.[148] When the city fell, in the eleventh year
of Zedekiah, the men of war fled towards Jericho by night, “by the way
of the gate between two walls which is by the king’s garden.” This
gate, as we shall see later, was at the recess above Siloam where
the wall crossed the Tyropœon Valley at a re-entering angle. The
whole city was then burned, and its treasures carried away, with its
chiefs, priests, and all but the “poor of the land, vine-dressers and
husbandmen.” Jerusalem had become a pagan city, full of ugly little
statues of Ashtoreth, and of Baal shrines at each street corner; for
“according to the number of the streets of Jerusalem have ye set up
altars to Bosheth, altars to burn incense to Baal.”[149] The ancient
human sacrifices, offered to Molech, continued to be celebrated in
the Valley of Topheth as in Isaiah’s time. The city in extent was the
same which Nehemiah found in ruins, and its ancient walls were then
merely rebuilt, but a more detailed account of this topography will
be conveniently deferred till the next chapter, in which the work of
Nehemiah’s time is to be considered.
FOOTNOTES TO CHAPTER III
[96] 2 Sam. v. 6–9; see LXX. The Greek reads “and his house” for “and
inwards.”
[97] 2 Sam. v. 7; 1 Kings viii. 1; 1 Chron. xi. 5; 2 Chron v. 2.
Josephus, “Ant.,” VII. iii. 1; “Wars,” V. iv. 1.
[98] Septuagint of 2 Sam. v. 9; 1 Kings xi. 27 (1 Chron. xi. 5–8
differs in the Greek).
[99] Ps. xlviii. 2.
[100] Zeph. i. 11.
[101] Neh. iii. 8. See LXX., _tou plateos_.
[102] Some references seem to make the city of David include the lower
town--see 1 Kings viii. 1, ix. 24; 2 Chron. v. 2, viii. 11; 1 Macc. i.
33, ii. 31, vii. 32--but these are of late date. Stairs ascended from
near Siloam to the city of David (Neh. iii. 15, xii. 37).
[103] 2 Sam. v. 11; 1 Kings viii. 1, ix. 24; 1 Chron. xv. 29; 2 Chron.
v. 2, viii. 11.
[104] Wellhausen’s views as to a double narrative have nothing
convincing to support them.
[105] 2 Sam. iii. 36.
[106] 2 Sam. xv. 12, xxiii. 34; _cf._ xi. 3.
[107] 2 Sam. xv. 13–30, xvii. 17, xviii. 18.
[108] 1 Kings i. 5–53. The Hebrew _eben_ means “a rock” as well as “a
stone” (Gesenius, “Lex.”). Gen. xlix. 24; Job xxviii. 3.
[109] The learned fancy which makes the Cherethites (“hewers”) and
Pelethites (“swift ones”)--who are otherwise called _Kāri_ (“stabbers”)
and “runners”--to have been mercenary Philistines and Carians, has no
solid foundation in any ancient statement. A “Gittite” was a dweller in
Gath--like David himself--but not of necessity a Philistine.
[110] 1 Kings i. 33, 38, 45; 2 Chron. xxxiii. 14. The _naḥal_ is
noticed in the latter passage; and, in 2 Sam. xv. 23, the term applies
to the Kidron, as also in 1 Kings ii. 37, xv. 13; 2 Kings xxiii. 6,
12; 2 Chron. xv. 16, xxix. 16, xxx. 14; Neh. ii. 15; Jer. xxxi. 40;
and probably 2 Chron. xxxii. 4. Josephus (“Wars,” V. iv. 2) calls the
Kidron spring “Solomon’s Pool.”
[111] Ezek. xliii. 12; Micah iv. i. Josephus, “Ant.,” VIII. iii. 9, XI.
iv. 1; “Wars,” V. v. 1, _tô anôtatô khthamalon autou_.
[112] “Ant.,” XIV. iv. 2; “Wars” V. v. i.
[113] _Yoma_, v. 2.
[114] The _Bîr el Arwâḥ_, or “Well of Souls.”
[115] See my account of the rock granary at Yâfa, near Nazareth (“Mem.
West Pal. Survey,” i. pp. 353, 354). It is a cave with inner chambers,
and two tiers of grain wells under the floor.
[116] Bordeaux Pilgrim, 333 A. D., “Sunt ibi et statuæ duæ Hadriani, et
non est longe a statuis lapis pertusus, ad quem veniunt Judæi singulis
annis et unguent eum et lamentant se cum gemitu,” etc.
[117] 1 Kings vi. 1–35.
[118] 1 Kings vi. 36.
[119] See Exod. xxvii. 9, 12.
[120] 2 Chron. iv. 9; see 2 Kings xxi. 5. The “Higher Gate” (2
Kings xv. 35) is perhaps the “High Gate of Benjamin” (Jer. xx. 2;
see Ezek. ix. 2); the Gate Sur (“of departure”), 2 Kings xi. 6, may
be Shallecheth (“casting out”), 1 Chron. xxvi. 16, on west; the
“Foundation” or “Middle” Gate (2 Chron. xxiii. 5; Jer. xxxix. 3), the
Gate of the “Muster” (_Miphkad_, Neh. iii. 31) or “Guard” (Neh. xii.
39; 2 Kings xi. 19, “of Runners”), and the “New Gate of the Higher
Court” (Jer. xxvi. 10, xxxvi. 10) are doubtfully placed. The “King’s
Gate” (1 Chron. ix. 18) was on the east.
[121] 1 Kings iii. 1, ix. 24 (see vii. 8); 2 Chron. viii. 11; Josephus,
“Ant.,” VIII. v. 2 (see 1 Kings vii. 1–12); Isa. xxii. 8; “Middle
Court,” 2 Kings xx. 4; the “throne,” 1 Kings x. 18; “Great Court,” 1
Kings vii. 9; “Horse Gate,” 2 Kings xi. 16; 2 Chron. xxiii. 15; Neh.
iii. 25, 28; “High House,” Neh. iii. 25; “House of David,” Neh. xii. 37.
[122] Stade’s plan, given by Dr. G. A. Smith (“Jerusalem,” vol. ii. p.
59), is purely conjectural, and the Temple is wrongly placed on the
west slope of the hill.
[123] 2 Kings xxv. 4; Neh. iii. 15; Jer. xxxix. 4; see 2 Kings xxi. 18,
26; Zech. xiv. 10; Ezek. xliii. 8: see LXX., “in the midst,” for “in
high places.”
[124] 1 Kings xi. 5, 7; 2 Kings xxiii. 10, 13; Isa. xxx. 33.
[125] 2 Kings xiv. 13; 2 Chron. xxv. 23.
[126] 2 Chron. xxvi. 15, 20.
[127] 2 Chron. xxvii. 3.
[128] Isa. vii. 1.
[129] Isa. vii. 3, viii. 6, xxii. 9, 11, xxxvi. 2.
[130] Josephus, “Wars,” V. xii. 2.
[131] 2 Kings xvi. 10–16.
[132] 2 Kings xvi. 18.
[133] Now _Tell en Naṣbeh_; see Isa. x. 32, xx. 1.
[134] 2 Kings xx. 20; 2 Chron. xxxii. 4, 5, 30.
[135] The level of the bottom is 2,080 feet above sea-level, or 7 feet
lower than that of the commencement of the tunnel.
[136] See my report, “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., 1883,
pp. 345–65. The inscription was copied by me on July 15, 1881.
[137] See my article “Weights and Measures” in “Murray’s Bible
Dictionary,” 1908, p. 944, for details.
[138] Taylor cylinder; 2 Kings xviii. 17.
[139] 2 Kings, xviii. 14. The Assyrian reads: _Sasu kima iṣṣuri kuuppi
kirib ali Urusalimmu alu sarrutisu esir-su: khalsi ilisu urakisma, aṣie
abulli ali-su utirra ikkibus_, etc.
[140] 2 Chron. xxxiii. 14.
[141] 2 Chron. xvi. 14, xxvi. 23, xxviii. 27, xxxiii. 20; Neh. iii. 16.
See for the suggested tomb of David my “Handbook to the Bible,” 1879
(3rd edit. 1882, p. 341). Rev. Selah Merrill has recently adopted this
suggestion: “Anct. Jer.,” 1908, p. 258.
[142] 2 Chron. xxxii. 33; Tosiphta, _Baba Bathra_, ch. i.; Josephus,
“Ant.,” VII. xv. 3, XIII. viii. 4, XVI. vii. 1. The kings elsewhere
buried were Asa, Jehoram, Uzziah, Ahaziah, Joash, Ahaz, and Manasseh.
See Acts ii. 29. The Mishnah (_Baba Bathra_, ii. 9) says that tombs
should be 50 cubits outside the city, but the Tosiphta says that those
of the family of David were inside it.
[143] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., 1883, pp. 319–31.
[144] This pit is too short to have been a grave.
[145] 2 Chron. xxvi. 23. This tomb is again noticed in chap. x.
[146] Hilprecht, “Nippur Memoir,” I. i. plate 32.
[147] Hilprecht, “Nippur Memoir,” I. i. plate 34. This translation of
these two texts is from the original.
[148] 2 Kings xxv. 2, 12; Jer. xxxii. 1.
[149] Jer. xi. 13. It is very doubtful whether Bosheth means “shame.”
Jeremiah refers to Topheth (vii. 32, xix. 6), to the tower Hananeel
and the Corner Gate (xxxi. 38), to Gareb (“the plantation”) and Goath
(ver. 39), to the valley of dead bodies and ashes, and the “enclosures”
of Kidron, with the “corner of the Horse Gate” (ver. 40), to the “East
Gate” or “Pottery Gate” (xix. 2), and to “the graves of the common
people” (xxvi. 23), as well as the “Higher Court” and “New Gate” of the
Temple (xxxvi. 10), and the “Gate of Benjamin” (xxxvii. 13) already
noticed. See also Ezek. viii. 3; Joel iii. 2; Zech. xiv. 10. There was
also a baker’s bazaar in Jerusalem (Jer. xxxvii. 21).
CHAPTER IV
EZRA AND NEHEMIAH
[Sidenote: SANBALLAT]
The seventy years of Babylonian oppression reckon from the accession of
Nebuchadnezzar to the first year of Cyrus in 538 B. C., when the cruel
policy of transplanting the population of the empire was abandoned, and
the Jews were permitted to return to Jerusalem. We do not as yet know
what the religious beliefs of Cyrus may have been. A Babylonian text
represents him to have been a worshipper of Babylonian gods. The first
known monumental notice of Ahuramazda, the Persian “All-wise Being,”
occurs in the famous texts of Darius I. This deity was regarded by him
as the maker of heaven and earth, and the Hebrews--speaking to Persian
kings--made use of the title “god of heaven,” which would be understood
by Persians as referring to the deity they themselves adored.[150] The
first Persian kings were famed for their justice and tolerance, and
Darius I. not only permitted the building of the Jerusalem Temple, but
equally permitted the restoration of the temple of the goddess Neith,
which Cambyses had respected, but which had fallen into ruin. He sent
an Egyptian priest from Persia to carry out this work, just as his
descendant sent Ezra and Nehemiah to Jerusalem. It has also quite
recently been discovered that Darius II. was memorialised, by Jewish
priests in Egypt, to permit the restoration of a house of Jehovah at
Elephantine, which was built before Cambyses conquered Egypt in 529
B. C. In this Aramaic petition the title “god of heaven” is used as
meaning Jehovah, just as in the Bible, and the ancient spelling of the
divine name as _Iahu_ is preserved just as it occurs in the text of
Sennacherib, and on early Hebrew signet-rings. The letter, moreover,
mentions Delaya and Shelemya, the sons of Sanballat, “governor of
Samaria,” side by side with the Persian officials Bagohi and Arshama,
thus serving to show that Ezra and Nehemiah lived in the time of
Artaxerxes I.[151] We see from such records that the restoration of the
Jews was part of the settled policy of the Persian kings in dealing
with their foreign subjects.
Zerubbabel began the rebuilding of the Temple in 536 B. C. The old men
“that had seen the first house, when the foundation of this house was
laid before their eyes wept with a loud voice, and many shouted for
joy.” Haggai the prophet, who urged on this work, says, “Who is left
among you that saw this house in her first glory, and how do ye see
it now? is it not in your eyes in comparison to it as nothing?”[152]
We may conclude that it was but an humble edifice, without any of
the adornment with precious metals and carvings that had existed in
Solomon’s Temple. But it stood on the old site, and probably followed
the old dimensions. The building was suspended in the time of Cambyses,
and resumed in 520 B. C., after the accession of Darius I., being
completed four years later. Ezra arrived in 459 B. C.--the seventh year
of Artaxerxes I.--and brought with him vessels and treasures granted by
the king. But it appears that the city walls still remained in ruins,
till Nehemiah was made governor of Jerusalem fifteen years later. On
his departure, in 433 B. C., the enemies of the Jews renewed their
activity.[153] They had already obstructed the building of the Temple
in the time of Xerxes, and had given much trouble to the patriotic
Nehemiah. Rehum the “master of edicts” and Shimshai the scribe complain
to Artaxerxes I. that the Jews have come to Jerusalem, “building the
rebellious and bad city, and have set up the walls and joined the
foundations.” They obtained a decree “that this city be not builded,”
which remained in force for nine years. All work on the Temple was also
suspended for the same period, or to the second year of Darius II.,
which was 423 B. C. This monarch was apparently a degenerate descendant
of his great ancestors, and his reign was troubled by many intrigues,
assassinations, and rebellions. But the Persians had by this time
intermarried with the Babylonians and other Semitic races,[154] and
he appears to have been regarded as a friend by the Jews in Palestine
and in Egypt alike. The great satraps of the western provinces were,
however, almost independent rulers, and the letter of Yedonya--the
Jewish priest in Egypt above noticed--was addressed to “my Lord Bagohi
of Judah,” the Persian governor of Judea a generation later than
Sanballat, the Babylonian “governor of Samaria.” Darius II. may have
desired to control the power of such Persian satraps by his protection
of Semitic subjects, and the power of the Semitic race in his age
is witnessed by the coins of the satraps in Asia Minor inscribed in
Aramaic.[155]
[Sidenote: NEHEMIAH’S RIDE]
The book of Nehemiah contains the fullest account of Jerusalem
topography to be found in the Bible, and casts light on the condition
of the city in earlier times, since his work consisted in rebuilding
the walls which appear to have stood in ruins, for nearly a century and
a half, since their destruction by Nebuchadnezzar. On arrival, in 444
B. C., Nehemiah’s abode was established in the “seat of the governor
on this side the river” (Euphrates),[156] which seems to have been a
house on the west side of the lower city. Thence he went out by night
to view the walls[157]; and, leaving the city by the “Gate of the
_Gai_,” somewhere near the present Jaffa Gate, he found the walls of
the upper city broken down as far as the Dung Gate at the south-west
corner, and the gates burned with fire. Thence he crossed over the
hill eastwards,[158] and reached the “Gate of the Spring” near the
“King’s Pool.” There is no doubt that the latter is the Pool of Siloam,
which--though only a tank--is called a “spring” by Josephus also,
because it was fed by spring water through the aqueduct. The “Gate of
the Spring” appears to have been at the point where the wall of the
upper city formed a re-entering angle, crossing the Tyropœon Valley
above the Siloam Pool. Here Nehemiah found masses of ruins, among which
“the beast that was under” him could not find footing. He viewed the
east wall by going up the _naḥal_ or Kidron Valley, and then returned
by the same way to the Gate of the _Gai_ and to his house.
[Sidenote: THE WALLS]
The whole account of the walls is twice repeated in describing their
building and their consecration.[159] For the right understanding
of these passages it is necessary to keep in mind certain practical
considerations. In the first place, the lines of streets in a city
are usually preserved from age to age by the fact that the ground on
each side of the way is private property which can only be acquired at
great cost, or by seizure in cases when a foreign power attempts the
rebuilding of a town. Thus the modern streets are the same which we
find described in the twelfth century; the same shown on the old mosaic
map of the fifth century; the same which existed in Hadrian’s city;
and very probably the same as in the days of Nehemiah. The west road
approached Jerusalem at the point where the narrow neck of high ground
was on the same level with that of this road outside the town. A street
went straight down the Tyropœon, from the west gate to the Temple. The
north road divided just outside the town of Nehemiah’s time into two
lines. One of these, towards the east, led down the valley west of the
Temple, and descended by steps to Siloam. These steps seem even to be
shown on the fifth-century map, and the old pavements on this line--40
feet underground--have already been noticed. A gate must have existed
in the south wall on this line. The western branch of the north road
formed a street running due south through the middle of the city; and,
ascending the steep slope of the upper city on the present line, it led
probably to the gate near the south-west angle above the Hinnom Valley.
Another line of street led east from a gate near the north-west side of
the northern quarter, and passed north of the Temple to a gate in the
east wall of the city. These are still the main streets of Jerusalem,
and they lead us to suppose that the city had at least six gates, not
counting those on Ophel and on the east wall of the Temple enclosure.
[Illustration: JERUSALEM IN 600 B. C.
REFERENCES
1 _The Sheep Gate_
2 _The Tower Hananeel_
3 _The Tower Meah_
4 _The Fish Gate_
5 _The Old Gate_
6 _The Ephraim Gate_
7 _The Tomb of David_
8 _The Lower Pool_
9 _The Valley Gate_
10 _The Corner Gate_
11 _The Upper Pool_
12 _The Dung Gate_
13 _The Spring Gate_
14 _The Gate between Two Walls_
15 _The Water Gate_
16 _The Outlying Tower_
17 _The Horse Gate_
18 _The Healing Bath_
]
In the second place, we must remember that the walls must have run
on the highest available ground, in order to give advantage to
the defenders over their enemies outside. This is invariably the
arrangement of a fortified town in any age, and it is impossible
to suppose that ancient engineers--any more than those of our own
time--would build walls in valleys, leaving high ground immediately
outside, where the towers and engines of the besiegers could be placed
in positions commanding the town within. At Jerusalem the wall had
to be carried across the head of a narrow valley on the north side,
down which valley ran the street west of the Temple leading to Siloam.
At Siloam also the wall had to be carried across a wider valley--the
south part of the Tyropœon; but, unless it was desired to enclose that
pool, it would here be kept as high as possible on the ground above
the pool to the north. It is certain--at all events in the time of
Josephus--that the Pool of Siloam was outside the wall; but, since it
was flanked by scarps within easy bowshot, it would be sufficiently
defended if the wall was built on these scarps. The same consideration
makes it certain that the wall defending Jerusalem on the north-west
and west must have stood on the higher ground which defends the lower
city on two sides. It would therefore join the wall of the upper
city near the north-west corner of the latter, and would run on the
narrow saddle, or neck of high land, which separates the heads of the
Tyropœon and Hinnom Valleys. No other position can be conceived, since
if it began east of this saddle, it would have stretched through the
Tyropœon, leaving the saddle outside with a command of at least 50
feet above the base of the wall. Farther to the north-west the wall
must also have enclosed, or run over, the high knoll of rock which
was shown later as the site of Calvary--a rock which is nearly as high
as the level ground of the upper city, and which formed the natural
defence of the lower city which lay in the Tyropœon Valley. The wall
might have run farther to the west and north, where the rock is close
to the present surface, but it could not run farther east or south
without leaving high ground immediately outside the fortress; for the
north slope of the broad Tyropœon hollow sinks very rapidly south of
the knoll now shown as Calvary, while not far to the east of this knoll
it also fell about 50 feet to the confluent valley coming from the
present Damascus Gate.
[Sidenote: THE GATES]
The natural lines of defence, and the position of the streets and
gates, have thus been considered without any reference to literary
statements. As to the upper city there is a general consensus of
opinion, and the scarps on which the ancient walls stood have been
examined, both here and on the Ophel spur farther east. It is on the
north that differences of opinion arise, according as the writer
accepts the traditional site of Calvary, and endeavours to show that
it might have been outside the city, or, on the other hand, disregards
this hampering condition, and relies on the ascertained levels of the
hills and valleys. The present writer feels no hesitation in concluding
that rocks on which he has so often set his feet, whether on the
surface or deep down in the great tanks of the Hospice of St. John,
cannot be removed, nor valleys which--though much shallower than of
old--are still traceable inside the city be exalted, on account of the
mistake which Bishop Macarius made as to Calvary in the fourth century.
If there were any indication that Christians preserved the traditional
site in earlier times, due respect should be paid to such indication.
But we do not even know for certain that there were any Christians at
Jerusalem till the third century, or about 170 years after the great
destruction by Titus, and none of the Christian Fathers before about
330 A. D. show any acquaintance with Jerusalem topography, or mention
any tradition as to the situation of Calvary. Fortresses are built on
hills, not under them, unless when a citadel is occupied, with outer
walls on the slopes. Ancient walls do not run in deep ravines, leaving
a commanding ridge just outside. It is on these principles that we may
most safely rest in considering the walls of Jerusalem.
A fortress (_birah_) defending the temple is said to have existed even
in the time of Solomon, and it is incidentally noticed by Nehemiah.
It seems to be the same as the later Baris, which Herod renamed
Antonia.[160] To this fortress the tower of Hananeel and the tower of
Meah (perhaps “the place of observation”) seem to have belonged.[161]
The former is noticed as marking the north-east corner of the city,
which did not extend north of the Birah in Nehemiah’s time. The “Sheep
Gate”[162] thus seems to have been a gate, in the north wall of the
Temple enclosure, by which no doubt the sacrifices were brought in.
The description of the walls begins from this point, and runs west and
south, returning to the same gate by the east and northwards. This
description is easily understood, and agrees with what has been said
above as to the natural sites for the fortifications. The first gate
west of the Temple fortress was the “Fish Gate,” which we may place
on the east branch of the north road; the fish were no doubt brought
to Jerusalem by the old Beth-horon road from the seaside plain,
and we learn that the fishermen were Tyrians.[163] The “Old Gate,”
or more correctly the “Gate of the Old” (quarter), may be placed at
the point where the wall crossed the line of the west branch of the
north road. This term seems to show that part at least of the north
quarter belonged to the oldest city, whereas a “second” district--which
the English version calls “the college”--is noticed with the Fish
Gate.[164] The next gate is called “the Gate of Ephraim,” and it may be
placed on the north-west, at the end of the street that ran east to the
north side of the Temple. This gate was some 400 cubits from the Corner
Gate.[165] The measurement brings us to about the requisite position
if the corner was that near which the wall of the north quarter joined
that of the upper city. Near the Gate of Ephraim, a little farther
south perhaps, was the “Seat of the Governor.” We thus reach the “Wall
of the Broad Place”[166] and the “Tower of the Furnaces”--or perhaps
of the “Cressets.” The “broad place” was no doubt a square on the flat
ground near to where the rock isthmus, already often noticed, leads to
the hill of the upper city.
[Sidenote: THE STAIRS]
We thus arrive at the west road, where was the “Gate of the _Gai_” at
the head of the Hinnom Valley. Whether this was identical with the
“Corner Gate,” or merely near it, depends on whether we should read (in
2 Chron. xxvi. 9) “the Corner Gate even the Valley Gate”; but Jeremiah
describes the breadth of Jerusalem, east and west, by the expression,
“from the Tower of Hananeel to the Gate of the Corner.” The description
next follows the west wall of the upper city to the Dung Gate, which
was 1,000 cubits from the Valley Gate, or more if the whole of the
wall was not in ruins. To the present day the dung-hills outside the
city are found in this direction. It is generally agreed that the wall
extended south to the great rock scarp by the English school, which
was explored by Mr. Henry Maudeslay in 1874, and which formed the
south-west angle of ancient Jerusalem, where a square tower projected
at the corner.[167] From this angle the scarp runs south-east for about
350 feet, to where a broad entrance between two lower scarps cuts the
line. There was probably a gate at this point, which may have been the
Dung Gate, though it is more than 1,000 cubits from the west road, and
thus from the Gate of the Valley. No other ancient gate is noticed on
the south side of the upper city, nor was one required, as no road led
across the deep Hinnom gorge. The wall ran east--perhaps on the line of
the later Byzantine wall--and the next points mentioned are “the Gate
of the Spring,” “the wall of the Pool of Siloah by the king’s garden,”
and “the stairs that go down from the city of David,”[168] which were
at “the going up of the wall.” An artificial rock scarp runs northwards
on the west side of the Pool of Siloam, about 20 feet above the level
of the flat walk which existed on each side of the pool; and between
this and the pool is a broad flight of rock-cut steps. These steps have
been traced for 700 feet northwards, ascending the Tyropœon Valley in
the direction of the south-west angle of the Ḥaram enclosure. They seem
to be indicated also, near this latter point, on the old fifth-century
mosaic map, and are noticed again in 570 A. D., as will appear later.
We can hardly doubt that they represent the “stairs that go down from
the city of David”--that is, from the quarter immediately west of
the Temple. The “Gate of the Spring” is noticed before the “wall of
Siloah,” which would stand on the scarp to the west of the pool, and
it may best be placed at the angle where the south wall of the upper
city now turned north, and where a path still exists. The term “going
up of the wall” obliges us to suppose that it crossed the Tyropœon
Valley north of the Siloam Pool, where the level was about 100 feet
higher than at the corner; and here, passing the stairs, it ran east
to a scarp visible above the surface, and about 120 feet higher than
the ground round the pool. The wall passed the “King’s Garden” and
the “sepulchres of David,” already noticed,[169] and reached a tower
called “the House of Heroes,” turning again north along the east side
of the Ophel spur, at the “going up of the Armoury,” or otherwise of
the “junction.” For the wall ran up-hill all the way to the Temple from
this point. The line thus traced is the same that Josephus describes
in later times, excluding, but yet defending, the Pool of Siloam. As
regards the stairs, it is possible that we have another allusion to
them where the “going down to Silla” (or “the stairway”) is connected
with the “house of Millo,” probably a building in the lower city. We
also read of a “causeway of going up” (more correctly an “ascent of
steps”) in connection with the west gate of the Temple, but this may
have been a distinct flight.[170]
[Sidenote: THE OPHEL WALL]
On the Ophel spur the east wall, south of the Temple, had another
“turning” close to the palace or “king’s high house,” and a projecting
tower near the “Water Gate” which--as explained already--must have been
above the Kidron spring.[171] It ran north-east, on the line already
noticed as fortified by Manasseh, to the “Horse Gate” which was at a
corner. This part was called especially “the wall of the Ophel,” a term
which does not signify a “tower” but a “mound,” such as ancient cities
were built on, and a “place,” as Josephus calls it later, where were
the houses of the Nethinim.[172] The rest of the course, on the east
side of the Temple, is briefly described from the “Gate of the Muster”
(Miphkad), or “of the Guard” (the “Prison” Gate), to the “going up
of the corner” at the north-east angle of Jerusalem, and thus to the
“Sheep Gate” where the description begins.[173]
Jerusalem thus described was a city of about 200 acres--that is, of the
same size as the modern town within the walls, but extending farther
south and less far to the north. The account above given places each of
the main gates on a main road still existing. The gate on the line of
the stairs from the city of David is not named in the book of Nehemiah,
but it is clearly the “gate between the two walls by the king’s
garden,” which we have already seen to be the one by which Zedekiah
fled down the Kidron Valley to Jericho. The “two walls” were the two
flanks of the city wall, which defended the Pool of Siloah (lying
outside the city) on the west and on the north-east.
Such was the Jerusalem not only of Nehemiah but of Nebuchadnezzar’s
time, and with this description we close the account of the Hebrew
city: for after the departure of Nehemiah, in 433 B. C., we have no
further notice of Jerusalem during about two centuries and a half of
Jewish history.
FOOTNOTES TO CHAPTER IV
[150] This term _elah_ (or _elohi_) _hash-shemim_ is distinctive of
the age after the return from the captivity (Ezra v. 11, vi. 9, 10,
vii. 12, 21, 23; Neh. i. 4, 5, ii. 4, 20; Dan. ii. 18, 19, 28, 37, 44);
it never occurs in any of those passages in the Pentateuch which some
critical writers assign to this later age.
[151] Brugsch, “Hist. Egt.,” ii. pp. 294–96; Prof. H. Gunkel, _Deutsche
Rundschau_, January 1908. _Sanballaṭ_ (“Sinu has given life”), _Delaya_
(“set free by Ya”), and _Shelemya_ (“friend of Ya”), are Semitic and
apparently Babylonian names.
[152] Ezra iii. 12; Hag. ii. 3.
[153] Ezra iv. 6, 8, 12, 21, 24.
[154] Hilprecht, in his “Nippur Memoirs” (vol. ix. pp. 27, 28), gives
instances of Persians with Babylonian wives as early as the reign of
Artaxerxes I., together with many names of Hebrews who were residing in
Babylonia.
[155] Taylor, “Alphabet,” vol. i. p. 258.
[156] Neh. iii. 7.
[157] Neh. ii. 13–15.
[158] The Hebrew _’abar_ does not of necessity mean “crossing” any
valley. The word is constantly used in the Old Testament with the more
general meaning to “go on,” as in the English of this passage.
[159] Neh. iii. and xii.
[160] 1 Chron. xxix. 19; Neh. ii. 8. Mishnah, _Zebakhim_, xii. 3;
_Tamid_, i. 1; _Middoth_, i. 9.
[161] Neh. iii. 1, xii. 39; Jer. xxxi. 38; Zech. xiv. 10.
[162] Neh. iii. 1–32.
[163] Neh. iii. 3, xii. 39, xiii. 16.
[164] Neh. iii. 6; 2 Kings xxii. 14; Zeph. i. 10.
[165] Neh. xii. 39; 2 Chron. xxv. 23, xxvi. 9; Jer. xxxi. 38. Josephus
describes the streets in this part as oblique to the wall (“Wars,” V.
viii. 1).
[166] Neh. iii. 8, xii. 38.
[167] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., pp. 393–7; Bliss,
“Excavations at Jerusalem,” pp. 2–10.
[168] Neh. iii. 16, xii. 37; see 2 Kings xii. 20; 1 Chron. xxvi. 16.
Bliss, “Excavations at Jerusalem,” p. 151.
[169] See back, p. 69.
[170] Neh. iii. 15, xii. 37; 2 Kings xii. 20; 1 Chron xxvi. 16.
[171] Neh. iii. 23–6, xii. 37. See p. 65.
[172] 2 Chron. xxvii. 3, xxxiii. 14; Neh. iii. 26, xi. 21.
[173] Neh. iii. 31–2, xii. 39.
CHAPTER V
THE GREEK AGE
[Sidenote: THE GREEKS]
The influence of Greece, which afterwards became so important a feature
of Hebrew history, began to be felt in Palestine after the rough
he-goat of Macedon had smitten the ram with two horns--the Medes and
Persians--“in the fury of his power,” and when the four “notable” horns
had sprung up after Alexander died. Hitherto we have seen Israel under
the power of Semitic Assyrians and Babylonians, and of Egyptians. The
first Aryan race with which the Hebrews came in contact was that of
the Persians, but Persian civilisation also was founded on that of
Babylon, and for long ages the Greeks in the West had been the pupils
of Hittites and Semitic Lydians, in Asia Minor, before they developed
an art and culture of their own superior to that of Asia. It is true
that the enthusiasm of classical scholars has led them to over-estimate
the antiquity and importance of Hellenic influence,[174] but the
first appearance of Greeks near the shores of Syria is in the time
of Sargon (about 710 B. C.), when the names of Greek and of Phœnician
kings in Cyprus are noticed. It is of course possible that Cypriote
pottery reached Palestine in this age, and it is known that wild Aryans
attacked North Syria in the fourteenth century B. C., and even invaded
Egypt about 1265 B. C. These fair-haired and blue-eyed peoples are
represented on an Egyptian picture about 1200 B. C., but they were
defeated on each occasion by the Pharaohs, and were driven back to Asia
Minor. Thus they never formed an element of population in Palestine,
nor is Greek influence discernible in the monumental remains before
about 300 B. C. at earliest.
Alexander won the empire of Western Asia in three great battles, at
Issos, at Arbela, and on the Indus; battles which are well worth study,
on account of the tactical skill of his arrangements, which--at Issos
especially--nullified the numerical superiority of the Persians. After
he had entrapped them in the valley east of Tarsus, and after the
fall of Tyre and the capture of Damascus, his march on Egypt met with
resistance only at Gaza. The statesmanship of Aristotle’s pupil and
the generous tolerance of his character rendered him acceptable to
Semitic races which had long groaned under the tyranny of the later
degenerate Persian monarchs. It is doubtful, perhaps, whether his
visit to Jerusalem can be regarded as historical,[175] though there is
nothing very inconsistent with Alexander’s method in the accounts; but
it is clear that the Hebrews submitted to him without any struggle, and
that he favoured the Jews in Egypt, who had a quarter in his new city
Alexandria.
[Sidenote: TYRUS]
Alexander died at Babylon in 324 or 323 B. C., and Laomedon became
ruler of Syria and Phœnicia; but Palestine became part of the
dominions of Ptolemy I. of Egypt, who took Jerusalem on the sabbath
day--the year, however, not being stated.[176] Seleucus, another of
these generals, conquered Babylon in 312 B. C., and the “era of the
Seleucidæ” dates from October 1 of that year. After the battle of Ipsos
in 301 B. C., when the number of independent rulers in West Asia and
Greece and Egypt was reduced to four, Seleucus built Antioch as the
new trading capital of Syria. Ptolemy II.[177] was a very cultivated
ruler, who caused the Law of Moses to be translated into Greek at
Alexandria, and sent splendid gifts to the Temple at Jerusalem. The
city remained under the Egyptians during the wars between Seleucidæ and
Ptolemies, till after the great victory of Antiochus III. (at Baniâs
in 198 B. C.) over Scopas, the general of Ptolemy V.[178] Antiochus
marched into Gilead, and occupied Samaria. He brought elephants with
him even to Jerusalem, where he besieged the citadel and expelled
the Egyptian garrison, being apparently received with favour by the
Jews. He presented costly gifts to the Temple, including salt (for
the sacrifices), which was probably a royal monopoly, and caused the
cloisters to be rebuilt, permitting the inhabitants to live according
to their own law. He afterwards made a league with Ptolemy V., and
Palestine was surrendered as the dower of Cleopatra--daughter of this
Ptolemy--whom Antiochus married.[179] During this period the influence
of Greek art begins to be notable in extant buildings in Palestine, and
not much later a gymnasium was built even at Jerusalem, introducing
ideas which were very repugnant to the Jews, but natural to the
Greeks.[180] Onias, the high-priest, was the son of Simon the Just,
and held office under Ptolemy III. (247–22 B. C.), whom he angered in
the matter of taxes. A Levite named Joseph successfully settled the
dispute--which was no doubt due to religious scruples. After his death,
apparently in 187 B. C., Hyrcanus, a son of this Levite, retired to
Gilead--driven out by his elder brothers--and there established himself
at Tyrus, making war on the Arabs. His fortress with rocky caves and
stables, and his palace of huge masonry, still exist at the place
called _’Araḳ el Emîr_, or “the Prince’s Cavern”; and the ruins are of
great importance as showing that Greek ideas and Greek architectural
style dominated the work even of Hebrew priests before 175 B. C. For
in that year Hyrcanus, fearing punishment by the new tyrant, Antiochus
IV., committed suicide at his palace,[181] which remained apparently
unfinished, and is thus the earliest absolutely dated monument of
Jewish art under Greek influence.[182]
Josephus mentions the lions that adorned this palace, in defiance of
the law, which Hyrcanus broke as Solomon had done, and as even the
rabbis of our second century did later, by the representation of living
beasts. But the ruins furnish yet more remarkable evidence of Greek
influence. The cliff has a gallery excavated more than half-way up its
height, and various chambers run in from it, while below are the rock
stables with their mangers, and the guard-house with its Aramaic text
carved beside the door, proving that we are not dealing with a Greek
site. These were planned by Lieut. Mantell, R.E., in 1881, when he also
photographed the inscription, which I studied at the same time. It is
in Aramaic characters, similar to those of other texts, and to those of
the Jewish coins about half a century later. The comparison with these
shows very clearly that the earlier copyists mistranslated the text,
which reads _’Aûryah_, from a root meaning “to be watchful.” It is thus
either a direction to the “watch-house,” or an exhortation to the guard
to be alert. The palace itself, on the flat ground above the stream,
is surrounded on three sides by a broad court having boundary walls
10 feet high. The building itself measures 70 yards north and south,
by 50 yards east and west, with a pillared entrance on the north. The
unfinished capitals of huge pillars lie amid the ruins inside. On the
east wall the top course at each angle is carved with lions, two facing
north and two facing south respectively towards the corners. These
also were unfinished. The total height of the building is 21 feet, and
the lowest course is 8 feet high. The corner-stone is over 17 feet in
length, and this fine masonry thus rivals that of Herod at Jerusalem
and of the Romans at Ba’albek.
[Sidenote: DRAFTED STONES]
The reason for thus detailing the characteristics of this building is
that it furnishes us with a dated example of Hebrew architecture in the
Greek age, in a style which continued in fashion till the last days of
ancient Jerusalem. We here find the gigantic ashlar finished with a
sunk draft round each block, in imitation of the Greek masonry which
characterises the Acropolis at Athens. Earlier explorers, who had a
very imperfect acquaintance with Palestine architecture, have spoken of
this finish as a “Phœnician bevel,” which is doubly incorrect, since
there is no bevel, but a sunken border or draft, while there is no
evidence that in Palestine--or in Phœnicia either--such masonry was in
use before the Greek age. It never occurs in the older ruins as yet
excavated in Judæa, though some writers have attributed to Hebrews
and Phœnicians the masonry of later ages, including that of Herod and
of the Romans, which they have failed to distinguish from inferior
Byzantine imitations found in the walls of churches and monasteries,
and even from the drafted masonry of the Franks in the twelfth century,
which is distinguishable by the rude projecting bosses, the peculiar
tooling of the smooth drafts, and the mason’s marks on stones used in
interiors. That Solomon or Hiram ever used drafted masonry there is no
evidence at all to prove.
Not only is this masonry Greek in style, but other details are equally
classic, such as those of the Corinthian capitals at the north
gate, the frieze with triglyphs, and the details of ornament with
conventional honeysuckles and ovulæ of a cornice. We have just that
combination of Greek and Asiatic ideals which we find in the Herodian
architecture, and in the rock tombs of the Herodian age at Jerusalem,
as will be noticed later. The palace of Hyrcanus is evidence of the
rapid Hellenising of the Jews, which might have gone on without a check
had not the intolerance of Antiochus IV. roused the patriotism of the
Hasmonæans, and the puritanism of the Ḥasidim, or “pious,” whom they
led in the great struggle for civil and religious liberty.
The Romans, who had defeated Antiochus III. at Magnesia in 190 B. C.,
forbade Antiochus IV. to make war on their protégé Ptolemy VII. in
Egypt. Whether in wrath and disappointment he revenged himself on his
Jewish subjects, or whether he regarded the consolidation of power as
best effected by Hellenising them--as Russian Tsars have regarded the
Russianising of Germans, Finns, and Jews in our own times--may be
doubtful. But whatever the object with which Antiochus IV. deserted
the tolerant policy of his predecessors, it is recorded that, on his
return from Egypt in 170 B. C., he entered Jerusalem and plundered the
city[183]; and two years later, on Cisleu 25, 168 B. C., he placed a
Greek altar on that of Jehovah, and offered swine upon it, as also
on other altars in every city and village of the country. Swine were
offered to Aphrodite among Greeks in connection with the legend of
Adonis, and to Osiris in Egypt.[184] Their bones have been found--as
sacrifices to Demeter--in the ruins of the temple at Cnidus; but the
pig was an unclean animal to Semitic peoples, and we can hardly doubt
that the desecration was wilful, especially as the Semitic custom of
circumcision was then also forbidden.
[Sidenote: THE AKRA]
At the same time Antiochus IV., having--according to Josephus--burned
the principal buildings and thrown down the city walls, “built a
citadel in the lower part of the city; for the place was high and
overlooked the Temple, on which account he fortified it with high walls
and towers, and put into it a garrison of Macedonians.” This was the
famous _Akra_ (or “citadel”) which played so important a part in the
history of the struggle between Judas Maccabæus and his brothers on the
one part, and the Greek kings of Syria on the other, and concerning
which so many mistaken views survive from pre-scientific days.[185]
The statements in the First Book of Maccabees are not very definite,
though it is clear that this Akra was in the city of David, and that
it was “alongside” the “hill of the Temple.” The Greek translators of
the Old Testament, as already noticed, identified this Akra with the
Millo of Solomon’s time. Josephus is more definite, and his evidence
should not be lightly set aside because it contradicts the theories
of modern literary critics, who have no hesitation in saying that the
Jewish historian is wrong when his words cannot be reconciled with
their understanding of the topography. Some writers[186] have placed
the Akra south of the Temple, supposing the existence of an intervening
valley (which, it may be said with certainty, never existed, since
the levels of the rock forbid the supposition) and the existence of
a summit on Ophel which was afterwards cleared away, and which would
have had to be 150 feet high. They crowd all the nomenclature--city
of David, Zion, Akra, Millo, Ophel, lower city, and the _m’ṣudah_
or “hill-top”--into the narrow area of 15 acres (including also the
supposed valley), leaving the city generally without any names for its
quarters; and they reject the measurements and statements of the Bible
and Josephus, except when these are misunderstood as confirming an
unpractical theory. Others, on the contrary, would have us believe that
the Akra destroyed by Simon the Hasmonæan was the same as the citadel
Baris, which he or one of his family built soon after. They have been
misled by Whiston’s translation “adjoined the Temple,” where the Greek
really reads “lay over against the Temple.” If the Akra was levelled
that it might not overlook the Holy House, it could not afterwards
have been that rock which defended the Temple in later times, and
which still rises with a high scarp above the inner courts. Both views
are impracticable, and American scholars[187] seem always to have
understood the topography better than some scholars in England, perhaps
because they are not unconsciously influenced by the desire to save
the traditional site of Calvary, which was the original cause of these
attempts to twist the literary evidence from its natural explanation.
The first school are involved in the dilemma that the city of David was
first lower than the Temple, then--about 800 years later--was higher,
and then lower again; while the supposed peak, 150 feet high, is
geologically a very improbable feature, and the supposed valley never
existed. The second school would make the Hasmonæans first cut down a
hill as being a danger to the Temple, and then--later--build on the
same hill a fortress overlooking and defending the Temple. Disregarding
these dilemmas, we may inquire into the actual statements of ancient
writers concerning the position of the _Akra_ or “citadel,” though
these have again and again been explained, without any answer having
been given to the argument by those who are otherwise convinced.
[Sidenote: THE AKRA]
The word _akra_ is Greek, and means “a citadel.” Josephus never applies
the term to the fortress north of the Temple, which he calls the
_phrourion_. In the First Book of Maccabees we read that the Greeks
“built up the city of David with a great and strong wall and mighty
towers, and it became a citadel (_akra_) for them.”[188] In another
passage[189] we learn that this “city of David” was Jerusalem; and
again[190] that this citadel was “in Jerusalem.” Jonathan, the brother
of Judas Maccabæus, “piled up a great mound between the Akra and the
city, to separate it from the city”[191]; and, as already noted, the
“hill of the temple” lay “alongside the Akra,” which was finally taken
by Simon, the elder brother of Judas.[192] The statements of Josephus
are very clear on this subject. He says that this citadel was in
the “lower part of the city,”[193] yet was “high and overlooked the
Temple.” It moreover “lay over against the Temple,” and commanded the
approach to it. Jonathan, he says, “built another wall to exclude
the market from the Akra,” and this wall was “in the midst of the
city.”[194] Simon took the “Akra of Jerusalem” and destroyed it, and
the Jews then “levelled the mountain, and in that work spent both day
and night without intermission, which cost them three whole years
before it was removed, and brought quite to a level with the plain of
the rest of the city. After which the Temple was the highest of all
the buildings, now that the Akra, as well as the mountain on which
it stood, was demolished.” Again he says that Simon “demolished the
Akra,” and that the “hill which was called Akra and defended the lower
city was gibbous” in shape; “and over against this was a third ridge,
naturally lower than the Akra, and at first divided from the other by
a flat valley. But in the times when the Hasmonæans ruled, they filled
up the valley, deciding to join the Temple to the city; and, having
levelled the mound of the Akra, they made it flatter, so that the
Temple might be above the same.”[195]
There does not seem to be any difficulty in understanding these notices
when taken together, nor do they contradict one another. The city lay
over against the Temple “like a theatre,”[196] the upper city being
on the south, and the lower city in the broad Tyropœon to the north;
the horseshoe head of the valley gave the theatre form, and the hill
defending the lower city was that “gibbous” spur--resembling the moon
in the third quarter--which bulges out eastwards near the Church of
the Holy Sepulchre. At its highest point--the rock of the traditional
Calvary--it is 2,497 feet above sea-level, or more than 60 feet higher
naturally than the rock site of the Temple. Originally the high ground
stretched farther east, not far from the Temple, but separated from it
by a flat valley 40 feet deep, which is the confluent of the Tyropœon,
having its head near the present Damascus Gate on the north side of
the city. By digging down this ridge, and filling the valley east of
it, the surface in this part of Jerusalem became much what it now is;
for the rock in the confluent valley--usually known as the Hasmonæan
Valley--is now 40 feet under the street, and the visitor who follows
the Via Dolorosa from the cathedral to Antonia (the Turkish barracks)
is unaware of the original depth of this valley, though the street is
not quite level throughout. East of this valley the present street
rises towards Antonia, running over the fosse north of that citadel,
which was filled in in 70 A. D., and over the Byzantine roof vaults
of the Twin Pools, which were cut in that fosse. It is thus 40 feet
higher than it was in the Hasmonæan age when the fosse was visible, and
the road nearly level. There was plenty of room on the Akra spur for a
citadel with towers, and the keep of the fortress was probably at the
rock of the orthodox Calvary. The valley has been filled in at some
period of history, and there is no reason to doubt that this was done
by Simon the Hasmonæan. Josephus does not say that the rock was cut
away, but merely that the “mound” on which the Akra stood was “worked
down.”
[Sidenote: THE HASMONÆANS]
Considering the site to be thus settled, we may briefly sum up the
history of the fortress. It was built as the Macedonian citadel in 170
B. C., the rest of the city being more or less destroyed; and--after
the persecution of 168 B. C. and the setting up of “the abomination
that maketh desolate” on the altar--the Temple itself was deserted.
The revolt of the Hasmonæans (commonly known as “Maccabees”[197]) began
at Modin, a little village in the low hills, 6 miles east of Lydda and
17 miles from Jerusalem, overlooking the plains, with a view of the
sea. Here Mattathias the Hasmonæan and his five sons were successively
buried, and their monument perhaps still awaits excavation under the
_tell_ south of the village of Medyeh. Mattathias died in 166 B. C.,
and the heroic Judas about five years later. The energy and ability of
the brothers brought about final independence, in spite of occasional
checks and misfortunes. The relief of the Akra garrison was the
objective of the various Greek generals, and the Macedonian resistance
in this citadel continued for thirty years, until the weakness of the
Seleucidæ, due to internecine disputes in Antioch, rendered Antiochus
VII. willing to accept Simon, the surviving brother of Judas, as
ethnarch of Palestine, under a suzerainty which soon became nominal.
The first great victory of Judas Maccabæus was won over the Greeks near
Emmaus Nicopolis, not far from Modin, in 165 B. C.; he subsequently
defeated Lysias at Bethzur, south of Jerusalem, in an attempt to reach
the city by the southern pass. After this second victory Judas and
his men went up to Mount Sion--that is, to Jerusalem--to cleanse the
Temple[198]: “And when they saw the sanctuary desolate and the altar
profaned, and the gates burned up, and shrubs growing in the courts as
in a forest or in one of the mountains, and the chambers pulled down,
they rent their clothes, and made great lamentation, and cast ashes on
their heads.” The defiled stones were carried out to an unclean place,
but those of the Altar of Jehovah were laid up in the “Mountain of the
Temple,” “until there should come a prophet to show what should be done
with them.” They appear to have remained in the north-east chamber of
the great gate-house called Moḳed (on the north side of the priests’
court), until the final destruction of the city.[199] The Temple was
rebuilt, with a new altar of white stones, and was reconsecrated on
Cisleu 25, 164 B. C. The Feast of Dedication has been commemorated ever
since on that day. But hardly had this work been accomplished when
Jerusalem was retaken by Lysias, and the Macedonian garrison relieved.
The year 163 B. C. was a sabbatic year, and no resistance appears to
have been made by the majority of the nation. Judas was defeated at
Beth-zachariah, south of Jerusalem, and his brother Eleazar perished
under one of the elephants of the enemy. The Hasmonæans shut themselves
up in the Temple courts, but fortunately--at the moment of their
greatest need--bad news from the north reached Lysias, and he hastily
made peace, and conceded the main demand that the Jews should be at
liberty to follow the law. The young king Antiochus V. appears to have
been with the army, and when he entered Sion and saw the strength of
the place, he commanded the destruction of the walls.[200]
[Sidenote: DEATH OF JUDAS]
Judas took occasion of the troubles that arose in Syria next year
to expel the Hellenisers from the city. Alcimus (the high-priest
recognised by this party) came back with a force sent by Demetrius
Soter[201] under the command of Bacchides, and the Ḥasidim admitted
the Greeks because they were accompanied by “a priest of the seed of
Aaron.”[202] Bacchides removed his camp to a place called Bezeth, which
has been supposed to be the later Bezetha north of the Temple, not
yet within the city. His successor, Nicanor, was attacked by Judas at
Caphar-salama--perhaps the modern Selmeh near Jaffa--and forced to flee
back to the “city of David”--that is, to Jerusalem. The priests came
out of the temple to “Mount Sion,” but were wrathfully received by the
defeated general, and in the cold winter month of Adar he went forth to
meet the advance of Judas, and was slain at Adasa, north of the city.
The new usurper, Demetrius Soter, had fled from Rome to Antioch, and to
the Romans Judas turned for help, little foreseeing the future results
of this policy, to which his successors also adhered. But Roman armies
were still far away, and in the year 161 B. C. Demetrius sent Bacchides
once more by the north road through Samaria, and Judas was outflanked
and slain at Beth-zetho--apparently the present Bîr ez Zeit, commanding
a pass four miles north-west of Bethel.[203] The Akra garrison was thus
once more relieved.[204]
After this disaster the Hasmonæan party under Jonathan were hunted to
the Jordan marshes, and the Greeks maintained order for two years,
and then made peace with Jonathan, who took up his residence at
Michmash. In the year 152 B. C. another revolution in Syria placed
Alexander Balas on the throne of Antioch.[205] The new ursurper made
Jonathan high-priest, and the only garrisons maintained by the Greeks
were those of Bethzur, and of the Akra in Jerusalem. Yet another
revolution occurred in 147 B. C., when Demetrius Nicator became king
of Syria.[206] Jonathan then struck for freedom once more, capturing
Joppa and Ascalon, and returning to Jerusalem, where he besieged the
Akra. Demetrius granted to him an extension of Judæa at the expense
of Samaria, and the next usurper, Trypho, confirmed his position as
ruler. In 144 B. C. Jonathan and Simon built the wall, or mound, in the
midst of Jerusalem, to separate the Akra from the market-place. They
also repaired the city walls, especially at a place called Caphenatha,
on the east near the brook Kidron. The word “Caphenatha” is Aramaic
for a “heap,” and is thus probably equivalent to the Hebrew ’Ophel, or
“mound.” As regards the wall or mound in the middle of the city, it
should be observed that the only market-place in Jerusalem mentioned
by Josephus is that in the upper city. It is possible, therefore, that
the wall to which he refers was that which defended the upper city on
the north side, running through the middle of the town to the Temple.
But in the history which he follows it was called a “mound,” and not a
wall. It may therefore have been raised as a covered way on the narrow
neck of land near the Jaffa Gate. This would serve to protect those who
came in to the upper market from any attack by the Akra garrison. No
wall on the Ophel spur nor any north of the Temple could be described,
in this age, as being in the “midst of the city,” and this allusion
serves therefore to confirm the supposition that the Akra lay north of
the upper city.[207]
[Sidenote: JEWISH COINS]
The aim of Jonathan, who combined the offices of high-priest and
civil governor, was to restore Hebrew freedom not only in Judæa, but
throughout Palestine, and even to restore the empire of Solomon, to
the Eleutherus River or “entering in to Hamath.” But the usurping
general Trypho enticed him into the city of Accho, and led him prisoner
to Gilead, where he was put to death, in 143 B. C. Thus Simon alone
survived of the five famous brethren. He fortified Jerusalem, against
which Trypho intended to advance, but the city was saved by a heavy
fall of snow, which blocked the roads.[208] The year 142 B. C. was
called--in the commercial contracts of Israel--the “first year of
Simon the high-priest, general and governor of the Jews.”[209] A
bronze tablet recording his treaty with Rome was set up, two years
later, on Mount Sion, in which he was called “high-priest to the army
of God [Ṣaramel],” the great congregation of the priests, the people,
and the chiefs ratifying his action.[210] This term, taken from the
Aramaic original of the First Book of Maccabees, is left untranslated
in our Greek version. Antiochus VII., in 139 B. C., bestowed on Simon
the right to strike a silver coinage,[211] and these coins appear to
have borne the name “Simon” on one side, and the legend “Deliverance
of Jerusalem” on the other, in letters of the old alphabet of Israel,
the forms of which were but slightly modified from those of the
Siloam text, though manifestly later.[212] Simon was thus the most
successful of the Hasmonæan brothers, and his greatest triumph was
the final conquest of the Akra citadel. The garrison was at length
withdrawn from the “city of David in Jerusalem,”[213] and the fortress
was at first occupied by Jews, and--as we have already seen--finally
demolished, about 140 B. C.
When Simon was murdered near Jericho in 135 B. C., his son John
Hyrcanus succeeded him, and manifested the same courage and ability
which distinguished his father. He was unfortunate, however, at first,
for Antiochus VII. attacked Jerusalem in 134 B. C. Josephus relates
that the Greeks established seven camps round the city, and raised
an hundred siege-towers (probably an exaggeration) “about the north
part of the wall, where it happened that it was upon a level with the
outer ground.”[214] This agrees with the supposition that the wall ran
on the spur north of the Tyropœon. It was the time of the Feast of
Tabernacles--in autumn--and the granting of a truce for seven days,
that the festival might be held, produced so favourable an impression
on the Jews that peace was soon made on fair terms. It was on this
occasion that Hyrcanus opened David’s sepulchre, whence--as rumour
said--he took 3,000 talents. Some ten years later he became more
powerful, and destroyed the Samaritan temple on Gerizim. He died in 106
B. C., and the decadence of the race began in the next generation.
[Sidenote: TOMB OF JANNÆUS]
Aristobulus, his eldest son, ruled for one year only. His coins are
still inscribed in Hebrew, but on those of his brother, Alexander
Jannæus, the Greek language for the first time appears on Jewish money.
The more peaceful relations with the later Seleucidæ apparently led to
a revival of Greek influence, and the grandchildren of Simon followed
Greek fashions, Aristobulus being the first of these rulers to set a
diadem on his head,[215] though he retained the old title “High-priest
and Uniter of the Jews,” as is known from his bronze coins. Alexander
Jannæus went further and called himself in Hebrew “Jehonathan the
King,” while the reverse of the coin bears in Greek the words “of
Alexander the King.”[216] His reign (105 to 78 B. C.) was one of very
chequered fortune, and he appears to have been a very ordinary tyrant.
The events immediately connected with Jerusalem include the building
of a wooden partition wall round the Temple and Altar; the riot in
which--at the Feast of Tabernacles--he was pelted with the lemons which
were already carried as sacred emblems by the worshippers; and the
crucifixion of eight hundred Jewish rebels at Jerusalem, which shows us
that he adopted a punishment then in use among Greeks and Romans, as it
had been yet earlier among Carthaginians.[217]
In a later passage[218] Josephus speaks of the defenders of the Temple,
in 70 A. D., as fighting the Romans “from the tower Antonia, and from
the north cloister of the Temple, and ... before the monument of King
Alexander”--an allusion which raises a very interesting question as
to existing antiquities: for the attack on the Temple walls thus met
was evidently that of the tenth legion from Olivet, and the tomb
or monument in question may have been that now called the “Tomb of
Absalom,” belonging to a group of four conspicuous Greco-Jewish tombs
on the east bank of the Kidron, opposite the south part of the eastern
wall of the Ḥaram. The style of the palace of Hyrcanus in Gilead shows
us that these tombs might well be as old as 78 B. C. They resemble the
rock sepulchres of Petra, though the latter may be somewhat later.
“Absalom’s Tomb”[219] is a chamber with two _loculi_, or rock coffins,
one in each side. The block of rock has been cut out from the cliff,
and is 20 feet square. It is adorned with Ionic pillars, and a Greek
frieze, over which is a bold corbelled cornice, and above the cornice
a square masonry base, and a drum supporting a peculiar dome which has
a finial 55 feet above the ground. The dome is a feature of Herodian
architecture half a century later, and may well have been known in
Palestine in the time of Alexander Jannæus, for domes are represented
on Assyrian bas-reliefs even in the seventh century B. C.
South of this monument is the tomb of the Bene Hezir priests,[220]
which has _kokîm_ graves in the Hebrew style, but a porch supported
by two Doric pillars cut out of the rock. The inscription above them,
recording the names of these priests, is in characters which are
practically square Hebrew, but such characters are found in Aramaic
papyri even as early as 200 B. C. It is evident that a monument
to Jewish priests, of such importance, must have been made in the
prosperous times either of the Hasmonæans or of the Herodians, and
could not have been hewn after the fall of Jerusalem in 70 A. D. The
characters are not like those of the coinage of Alexander Jannæus,
though the lettering on these is much less antique than that of
Simon’s coinage. But in this age there were many variations of the
old Aramean alphabet in use, and (according to the Talmud) the square
characters were used for sacred writings in the Hebrew tongue, side
by side with the older script, which was used for Aramaic texts and
civil documents.[221] It thus seems possible that the characters on
a priests’ tomb might differ from those of the contemporary civil
coinage. It may, on the other hand, be thought that this tomb is
somewhat later than 78 B. C.
[Illustration: HEBREW INSCRIPTION.
Tomb of Beni Ḥezir.]
[Sidenote: THE KIDRON TOMBS]
The third monument of this group is yet farther south, and is now
called the “Tomb of Zechariah.” It is entirely rock cut, and similar
to “Absalom’s Tomb” except in having a pyramidal roof. It has also the
same bold corbelled cornice. The fourth tomb is north of the village of
Silwân, and is rarely noticed in early accounts. It was called by de
Vogüé the “Egyptian Tomb,” because it has a corbelled cornice--like the
others--which he regarded as Egyptian. This kind of cornice is not only
found with Greek pillars in the other instances, but it also occurs in
the Ḥaram at Hebron, in connection with Herodian masonry. The tomb has
no other adornment outside; on the inside it has a ridge ceiling.[222]
There is no reason to suppose that it is any older than the other
three. To the left of the door there are two marks cut in the rock. M.
Clermont-Ganneau regards them as letters, and thinks that the height
of the door was increased, cutting off the rest of the text. The marks
are much weathered, and it is doubtful if they are letters at all. Nor
could I find (after careful examination) any sign of the door having
been altered. They are certainly not Egyptian signs, and if accepted
would still prove nothing towards the improbable theory of Egyptian
origin.
A brief account of the Roman conquest of the holy city will close
this narrative of the Greek age in Jerusalem. The power of Rome was
constantly increasing in the north, as she successively defeated
Mithridates of Pontus and Tigranes of Armenia; and Pompey in 65
B. C. deposed Antiochus Asiaticus, last of the Seleucidæ, and set up
Antiochus of Commagene in north-eastern Syria--a ruler half Greek,
half Persian, whose remarkable tomb, with its valuable Greek texts, has
been found on the Taurus north of Samosata.
[Sidenote: POMPEY]
Judea had been wisely ruled for nearly ten years by Salome Alexandra,
the widow of Alexander Jannæus, supported by the Pharisees, who are
first noticed as a Jewish sect in the time of Jonathan, but who now
became the leaders of the nation, adding many traditions--which often
seem to be of Persian rather than of Hebrew origin--to the law of
Moses. The quarrels of the degenerate sons of Alexander Jannæus, after
the death of their mother in 69 B. C., gave a pretext to Pompey for
interference in Jewish affairs. They at first agreed that Aristobulus
the elder should be high-priest, and Hyrcanus the younger king. But
the latter called to his aid the powerful Arab king Aretas (or Ḥârith)
from Petra, and Aristobulus offered Pompey a bribe of 400 talents for
his support. So Scaurus was sent by the great conqueror of Armenia to
settle the affairs of the Jews.[223]
Hyrcanus had been persuaded by Antipater the Idumæan, whom his father
had made commander in Edom,[224] to flee to Petra, and he thence
returned with his Arab allies to besiege his brother in Jerusalem.
Scaurus commanded them to depart, and leaving Aristobulus in the
city, he returned to Damascus. Pompey, having subdued Tigranes, soon
followed and marched to Jericho.[225] Aristobulus was ready to submit
to Pompey’s demand that he should surrender his strongholds, but the
Jerusalem Jews refused to admit the Roman envoy Gabinius within the
walls of Jerusalem. The city at this time is described as having
strong walls, and was only weak on the north, where there was no deep
outer valley. The patriotic party and the unhappy Aristobulus held the
Temple, defended on the north by the citadel afterwards called Antonia,
which had a deep ditch dug beneath great towers, and was also protected
by a natural valley. The ditch still exists, and will be noticed again.
The valley is to the east, and is an affluent of the Kidron, the
existence of which was unknown before the excavations of Sir Charles
Warren on the north and north-east sides of the Ḥaram enclosure. The
defenders also broke down the bridge leading from the upper city to the
Temple hill, and--though the natural slopes of the ridge of Moriah were
still visible on the west side--it is possible that there was already
a wall between the city and the Temple. The voussoirs of this bridge
lie jammed in the rock-cut aqueduct, 20 feet below the later Herodian
pavement.
Pompey attacked on the north, and, having broken in, besieged the
Antonia citadel, partly filling in the fosse. Banks were raised,
and battering-rams and catapults from Tyre battered the wall. On
the fatal day of the fast or 27th of the 3rd month of the year 63
B. C. the Temple fell. But Pompey--unlike the rapacious Crassus, who
plundered its riches in 55 B. C., when on his way to meet his fate in
Parthia--refrained from pillaging it, though he entered the Holy of
Holies, and saw in the holy place, the golden table, golden altar, and
seven-branched lamp, with many other treasures. Jerusalem was made
tributary to Rome; Hyrcanus was set up in the stead of Aristobulus as
high-priest; and five local councils were established in Palestine
under Gabinius, one of these being in the Holy City.
FOOTNOTES TO CHAPTER V
[174] The _Keft_ people, represented in an Egyptian tomb, were
Phœnicians, according to the bilingual “Decree of Canopus,” and not
Cretans. Their art is identical with that of Phœnicians, clearly of
Semitic race in another painting. They were connected with islanders
who were probably the inhabitants of Cyprus. The _Pûrstau_ of a picture
of the time of Rameses III. (about 1200 B. C.) have no connection with
the Philistines, who came from Cappadocia, according to the LXX. The
frescoes and tablets of the palace of Knossos in Crete are probably not
older than about 500 (not 1500) B. C., and the “geometrical” pottery
appears to be Phœnician. The evidence of the Amarna tablets, and of
the Bible alike, shows that the Philistines were a Semitic race akin
to the Babylonians. It is to be preferred to the fancies of Tacitus,
who thought that the Jews must have come from Crete (“Hist.,” v. ii.),
because the words _Idæi_ (people of Mount Ida) and _Ioudaioi_ (Jews)
were similar. The Ionians are not noticed in any of the Amarna tablets.
[175] See Josephus (“Ant.,” XI. viii. 5). The high-priest’s name in 332
B. C. was Jaddua (Neh. xii. 22; “Ant.,” XI. vii. 2). The later rabbis
incorrectly suppose him to have been Simon the Just (Tal. Bab., _Yoma_,
69, _a_; _Megillah Taanith_, ch. ix.).
[176] Josephus, “Ant.,” XII. i. 1. Ptolemy I. reigned from 323 to 285
B. C.
[177] “Ant.,” XII. ii. 1–15. Ptolemy II., 285–47 B. C.
[178] “Ant.,” XII. iii. 3, 4.
[179] _Ibid._, XII. iv. 1.
[180] 1 Macc. i. 14.
[181] “Ant.,” XII. iv. 6, 11. Seleucus IV., 187–75 B. C.
[182] For full details and photographic views, with one of the Aramaic
inscription, see my report in “Mem. East Pal. Survey,” 1889, pp. 65–87.
[183] “Ant.,” XII. v. 3, 4.
[184] Herodotus, ii. 47, 48.
[185] See “Ant.,” XII. v. 4, ix. 3, xi. 1, 2, XIII. v. 11, vi. 7, XV.
xi. 4; “Wars,” I. ii. 2, iii. 2; 1 Macc. i. 33, x. 9, xi. 41, 51, xii.
36, xiii. 52, xiv. 36, 37.
[186] For instance, Dr. G. A. Smith, “Jerusalem,” 1908, i. p. 155, ii.
p. 448, though he only follows earlier writers, with no more than an
occasional passing allusion to the facts due to exploration.
[187] Rev. Selah Merrill follows his distinguished countryman Dr. E.
Robinson; see “Later Bib. Researches,” 1852, p. 216.
[188] i. 33.
[189] ii. 31.
[190] vi. 26.
[191] xii. 36.
[192] xiii. 49.
[193] See the passages already cited, p. 92.
[194] “Ant.,” XIII. v. 11.
[195] _Ibid._, XIII. vi. 7; “Wars,” I. ii. 2, V. iv. 1.
[196] “Ant.,” XV. xi. 5.
[197] The name _Makkabi_ (“hammerer”), applied to the third brother
Judas. His ancestor Ḥasmon (“Ant.,” XII. vi. 1) was of the priestly
family of Johoiarib, the first of the twenty-four courses (1 Chron.
xxiv. 7).
[198] 1 Macc. iv. 38.
[199] Mishnah, _Middoth_, i. 6.
[200] 1 Macc. vi. 48, 49, 53, 62.
[201] 1 Macc. vii. 1–47.
[202] Alcimus, however, is said (1 Macc. ix. 54) to have pulled
down the inner wall of the sanctuary, and the “works of the
prophets”--probably the walls of the courts erected by Zerubbabel in
the days of the prophets Haggai and Zechariah.
[203] 1 Macc. ix. 15; “Ant.,” XII. x. 2, xi. 1.
[204] 1 Macc. ix. 52.
[205] 1 Macc. ix. 64, x. 1, 21; “Ant.,” XIII. i. 4–6, ii. 1.
[206] 1 Macc. x. 67; “Ant.,” XIII. iv. 9.
[207] “Ant.,” XIII. v. 11.; 1 Macc. xii. 36–7. The Akra garrison had
given hostages in 152 B. C. (1 Mace. x. 9), and made peace in 147 B. C.
(xi. 51.)
[208] 1 Macc. xiii. 24; “Ant.,” XIII. vi. 4, 5, 6.
[209] 1 Macc. xiii. 42. Simon’s son, John Hyrcanus, is called
“High-priest and Uniter [_ḥabbar_] of the Jews” on his coins.
[210] 1 Macc. xiv. 28.
[211] 1 Macc. xv. 6.
[212] A copper coin reads “Simon, Prince of Israel,” with “First year
of redemption of Israel.”
[213] 1 Macc. xiv. 36, 37.
[214] “Ant.,” XIII. viii. 2–4.
[215] _Ibid._, XIII. xi. 1.
[216] See De Saulcy, “Numismatique Judaïque,” 1854, pp. 64–74; Madden,
“Jewish Coinage,” 1864, pp. 61–70.
[217] Josephus, “Ant.,” XIII. xiii. 5, xiv. 2. In Mishnah, _Sukkah_,
iv. 9, the same story is told of a priest who was pelted to death.
[218] “Wars,” V. vii 3.
[219] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., pp. 413–16.
[220] See 1 Chron. xxiv. 15.
[221] Tal. Bab., _Sanhed._, 21 _b_, 22 _a_.
[222] Sir C. Wilson, “Ord. Survey Notes,” 1865, p. 64, plate xxiv. fig.
4.
[223] Josephus, “Ant.,” XIII. v. 9, xvi. 1.
[224] _Ibid._, XIV. i. 3, ii. 1, 2.
[225] _Ibid._, XIV. iv. 1–2.
CHAPTER VI
HEROD THE GREAT
The headless corpse of Pompey was tossing in the waves, off the coast
of Egypt, fifteen years after his bloody conquest of Jerusalem, “and
there was none to bury him because he had scorned Him with dishonour:
he remembered not that he was man, and considered not what was to come.
He said, I will be lord of land and sea, and he knew not that God
is great, mighty in His great power.”[226] It is thus that a Jewish
psalmist of Herod’s time draws the moral of vengeance on the desecrator
of the Holy of Holies.
Antipater, the friend of Hyrcanus, helped Julius Cæsar in his advance
on Egypt in the same year, 48 B. C., and was left in charge of
Jewish affairs.[227] His son Herod, who dared the Sanhedrin, and who
distinguished himself by subduing brigands near Tiberias, was set to
govern Galilee. The growing power of this Idumæan family was hateful to
the Hasmonæan party, and when Cæsar was murdered in 44 B. C., Antipater
was poisoned by the butler of Hyrcanus.[228] But they had still to
reckon with Herod, who revenged his father’s death on Malichus, the
Jewish general who had incited the deed. The Idumæans--both father
and son--were singularly astute in taking the right side during all
the troubles that preceded and followed Cæsar’s death. Herod knew how
greedy of money the Romans were, and he bribed in turn Cassius and
Antony, yet succeeded later in holding power under Augustus. For peace,
and strong government in Palestine, were needful to the Roman policy
which made the Mediterranean an Italian lake, and the time was not yet
ripe for direct rule.
[Sidenote: THE PARTHIANS]
The republicans sent Cassius to Syria and Labienus to Parthia before
they met with disaster at Philippi in 42 B. C. The former became the
patron of Antigonus--nephew of Hyrcanus--who thus took the losing side,
while Herod found a friend in Mark Antony. Two years later Labienus
stirred up the Parthians to attack the new triumvir, and they marched
on Palestine under Pacorus, the son of the Parthian king Orodes I.
Herod had expelled Antigonus from Judea, but the latter joined the
invaders and the Idumæan cause seemed hopeless. Herod sent his family
for safety to the great fortress of Masada on the shores of the Dead
Sea, and escaped to Egypt and to Rome, seeking aid from Antony. The
Parthians gave over Hyrcanus to Antigonus as a prisoner, and the
nephew cut off his uncle’s ears, to prevent his ever again officiating
as high-priest, for, when so mutilated, he could not fulfil priestly
offices without breaking the law. Thus for three years Antigonus
reigned in Jerusalem.[229]
Herod in Rome was recognised as king in 40 B. C. by Antony and
Augustus; and Ventidius was sent to drive back the Parthians. These
were the events which led, three years later, to the siege of Jerusalem
by Sosius and Herod, when the hated Idumæan, who was “only a private
man” and only “half a Jew,” was re-established by Roman power.[230] It
would seem clear that Josephus dates the thirty-seven years of Herod’s
reign from the time of his capture of the city in the summer of 37
B. C., his death thus occurring in 1 A. D. For he says that the battle
of Actium--which was fought on September 2, 31 B. C.--took place in
Herod’s seventh year,[231] and that he reigned thirty-four years after
Antony had put Antigonus to death at Antioch.[232] The siege began in
a sabbatic year[233]--consequently in 37 B. C.--and from this year
the reign of Herod should be reckoned. Whiston has been followed by
most modern writers in dating the reign from 40 B. C.; yet, not only
does this conflict with the date of the battle of Actium, but it also
supposes that Antony was in Syria, and about to celebrate his triumph
in Egypt, in 37 B. C., whereas he was then engaged in naval war off the
Italian coast; and, on the other hand, he was in Syria in 34 B. C.,
and held a triumph at Alexandria immediately after. The point is of
great importance because it affects the date of the Nativity, of which
recent writers have treated without any regard to the Gospel statement
that Jesus was about to enter His thirtieth year in the fifteenth year
of Tiberius, or 29 A. D.[234] Matthew and Luke both make the Nativity
precede the death of Herod; and on the “fifteenth of Tiberius” the
Christian era was based by the Roman abbot, Dionysius Exiguus, in 532
A. D. He seems to have considered the evidence more carefully than
Whiston did. An eclipse of the moon happened during the last illness of
Herod, which Whiston identified with a small partial eclipse of March
13, 4 B. C. More probably it was the total eclipse of January 9, 1
B. C., that occurred before Herod’s distemper became serious.[235]
The great army of Sosius and Herod attacked Jerusalem in 37 B. C., and
as usual from the north. Three banks were erected, and engines were
used by the besiegers and also by the besieged, who fought bravely
in spite of famine and of the sabbatic year, mines and countermines
being driven to meet. The north wall fell after forty days, and the
wall of the upper city fifteen days later; but the Temple still held
out till some of the cloisters were set on fire, and the lower city and
outer courts of the sanctuary taken. Antigonus then came down from the
citadel (Antonia), and the siege ended on the same day on which Pompey
had stormed the Temple twenty-six years earlier--that is, on Sivan 27,
which would be early in June.
[Sidenote: HEROD’S BUILDINGS]
Herod’s reign was stained by many cruel crimes, but it cannot be denied
that he was a strong and successful ruler, during whose time Jerusalem
enjoyed prosperity and peace, and was adorned by many new buildings
of great magnificence. His principal works included the new Temple,
and the royal palace in the upper city, defended by the three “royal
towers,” Hippicus, Phasaelus, and Mariamne. Antonia also was rebuilt,
and a theatre was erected in the city. In describing these buildings
we are able to check the accounts given in the works of Josephus and
in the Mishnah by actually existing remains, visible on the surface or
unearthed by explorers. The account of Herod’s Temple in the Mishnah is
so fully detailed as to allow of a plan being made. The statements were
written down at Tiberias in our second century, and in this form are
later than the “Wars of the Jews” composed about 75 A. D., and than the
“Antiquities of the Jews,” written about 93 A. D., both at Rome; but
the Mishnah quotes the words of rabbis who were youths when the Temple
was destroyed in 70 A. D.[236]
As regards Josephus, it is best to found a critical estimate of his
writings on actual facts. Not only have I compared his statements about
Jerusalem with extant remains of the city, but I have measured and
planned other cities and buildings which he describes--at Samaria and
Cæsarea, at the fortress of Masada, and the round castle of Herodium,
and at Jotapata, which he defended. I have carefully studied his
Galilean topography, and his accounts of the palace of Tyrus in Gilead,
and of the spring of Callirrhoe, both of which I visited in 1881. The
impression made by such studies is that the Jewish historian was honest
and well informed; that he had seen the places which he describes, and
gives a generally reliable account. Our present text is often corrupt
in numerals referring to dates and measurements, and Josephus (writing
from memory in Rome, many years after the events described) is not
always accurate in his estimate of dimensions, heights, and distances.
The accounts of the Temple, by rabbis at Jamnia who were able to visit
the ruins left by Titus, are to be preferred as more exact, but they
do not conflict with the general account given by Josephus, and he
could have had no object in misrepresenting the facts, though--like
other historians--he sometimes exaggerates the size of buildings, the
numbers of enemies, and the value of treasures. These are small and
natural blemishes in narratives which must always remain our chief
source for this history. That he wilfully misrepresented facts to
please the Romans, or to excuse his own nation, there is no reason at
all to suppose. His knowledge of Jerusalem topography was personal and
contemporary, and he is more likely to have known the facts than any
scholar writing in the west of Europe or in America to-day.
[Sidenote: THE HERODIAN CITY]
We may consider, therefore, by the light of exact surveys of the city
and exact plans of its remains, and under the guidance of the rabbis
and of Josephus, first the city in general, then the Temple and the
fortress of Antonia, and finally the palaces and other buildings, and
the alterations made in the water-supply in Herod’s time. Our task
has already been lightened by detailed consideration of the earlier
topography.
“The city stood on two opposite ridges, divided from each other by a
central valley where the respective houses ended: of these ridges that
which had the upper city on it was much the highest and widest. So it
was called the citadel by King David, ... but we call it the Upper
Market-place. But the other, called Akra, and defending the lower city,
was gibbous; and opposite this was a third ridge, naturally lower than
the Akra, and at first divided from it by a flat valley.... But the
valley called Turopoiôn was that we have mentioned, separating the
upper city and the lower ridge; it reached to Siloam.... Outside, the
two ridges of the city were girt with deep valleys, and--on account of
the precipices on both sides--access was impossible.”[237]
It is difficult to see how this description can be understood in any
other way than that described in the preceding chapter. The upper city
was David’s citadel, and that to the north was the citadel of the
Macedonian garrison. The account goes on[238] to tell us that: “The
old wall was hard to be taken, both on account of the valleys, and
of the hill above them on which it was built. But besides the great
advantage of situation, it was also very strongly built, because David
and Solomon and the succeeding kings were very zealous about this work.
Now this wall began at the tower called Hippikos, and reached as far
as a place called Xustos, and adjoining the Council-house ended at
the west cloister of the Temple. But if we go the other way, on the
west side, it extended through a place called Bethso to the Gate of
the Essenes, and then on the south side, it bent above the fountain of
Siloam, and there again bent, facing east over the Pool of Solomon, and
reached as far as a certain place which they called Ophla, where it
was joined to the east cloister of the Temple. But the second [wall]
had its beginning from a gate which they called Gennath, being of the
first wall, and encircling the north quarter only, it went on as far as
Antonia.”
[Sidenote: THE TWO WALLS]
Very few words are necessary to explain this account, which agrees
with that of the city walls as rebuilt by Nehemiah. Hippicus was the
most western of the three “royal towers,” and stood at the north-west
angle of the upper city. It defended the narrow neck which separated
the broad Tyropœon from the head of the _Gai_, or Hinnom gorge. The
Hasmonæan Valley joined the Tyropœon from the north, on the west of the
Temple, and the two together descended rapidly to Siloam, separating
the upper city from the Ophel. The north face of the old wall ran on
a precipitous rock, and the Xystos lay north of the great Tyropœon
bridge. The name of the place on the south-west side of the upper
city “called Bethso” is generally supposed to mean “House of Dung,”
being near the old Dung Gate, which seems here to be called the Gate
of the Essenes. The wall ran “above” Siloam; and “Solomon’s Pool”
was the Kidron spring--the Gihon where he was anointed. Ophla is the
Aramaic form of the Hebrew Ophel, and the course of the wall here
coincides with the line of fortification discovered by Sir Charles
Warren. As to the second wall, the description is brief because the
wall was short in extent. The junction with Antonia must have been at
the north-west angle of that fortress, for the great counterscarp of
the fosse which defended it on the north is known to continue some way
west of the fortress, thus forming the counterscarp of the north wall
as well. No bends or angles are noticed, but, on the contrary, it is
said to “encircle” the north ridge. The name of the Gate Gennath is
usually thought to mean “the Garden Gate,” but not impossibly it may
stand for the “Gehenna Gate,” and it answers to the old “Valley Gate.”
The second wall--as already urged--must have crossed the saddle near
Hippicus, but the junction was not exactly at that tower, where was a
smaller postern.[239] As the Gennath Gate was in the first wall, there
was evidently a re-entering angle, and in later times the third wall
started from Hippicus, but was “not joined on” to the second wall.
It is very doubtful whether any remains of the masonry of the two walls
have as yet been found. The precipices on which the north wall of the
upper city stood are traceable, in places, as far as that from which
the Tyropœon bridge started. The scarps on the south-west of the upper
city, and on the south, and at Siloam, have already been described
as they existed in the time of Nehemiah, and earlier. The Ophel wall
discovered by Sir Charles Warren is, in his opinion, later than the
(Herodian) wall of the east cloister of the Temple, near which it was
also found to be based not on rock but on red earth. The stones, as
he states, appear to have belonged to a former wall, and the first 20
feet from the foundation are of “rough rubble of moderate dimensions.”
Similar rough rubble was found by Mr. Bliss at the base of the south
wall of the upper city.[240] This might represent early work, on which
the later Byzantine wall was built; but the drafted masonry shown to
me by Dr. Guthe, in 1881, on Ophel and at Siloam, was certainly not
older than the fourth century A. D., yet appears to be similar in all
respects to that found by Warren and Bliss. It seems to be certain that
the old wall of Jerusalem has disappeared, and that very little can
exist except the wall that Eudocia built about 450 A. D., which did not
follow the line described in the Book of Nehemiah, and by Josephus, as
crossing the Tyropœon “above” Siloam.
In the same way it is also doubtful if any remains of the “second
wall” on the north side of the upper city still exist. The Rev.
Selah Merrill[241] gives a drawing of a wall found south of the Holy
Sepulchre Church, and about 20 feet below the surface, which he thinks
to have been that built by Jonathan (as already noticed) in the middle
of the city. He also claims[242] to have been the discoverer of another
wall which runs northwards to the west of the “Pool of the Bath,” and
which was uncovered in 1885 and reported by Herr Konrad Schick. Both
these walls have drafted masonry, but neither has, unfortunately, been
described in detail, or photographed, so that it is impossible to say
what their age may be. The latter wall runs approximately where we
might expect to find the second wall, but drafted masonry of much this
kind was used both by Romans and by later Byzantines, and these remains
may possibly belong to the city of Hadrian. There is no doubt that--as
at Rome also--the old masonry was re-used later in other buildings; and
when we consider how entirely the mighty Temple fane has disappeared,
not one stone being left on another of the Holy House itself, we must
conclude that the destruction of the city in 70 A. D. was singularly
complete, and the effacement of its remains afterwards increased by
local pillage of the masonry.
[Sidenote: THE TEMPLE STONES]
There are, however, two buildings in which Herodian masonry still
stands _in situ_--namely, first in the great outer walls of the Ḥaram
enclosure, and secondly at the great tower now called “David’s Tower,”
which is probably the Phasaelus tower of Josephus. The Ḥaram walls
claim our special attention.
This magnificent masonry, with stones 3 feet (and in one course 6 feet)
high, and often 20 feet long,[243] beautifully finished with the Greek
draft, and a dressing to the stone[244] which is nowhere else found
except in the sister sanctuary at Hebron, is familiar to visitors. The
joints are exact, and no mortar was used. The wall above the level
of the inner area was adorned (just as at Hebron) by buttresses, at
intervals of 10 cubits. Two of these I discovered in 1873, at the
north-west angle, but elsewhere all the upper rampart was thrown down,
though the lower part resisted all attempts at destruction, and the
strong south-east corner remained--after 70 A. D.--standing up alone
like a “pinnacle.”
There are minor differences in this masonry, according as it was
intended to be visible above ground or hidden under the earth. The
stones have rough bosses, on the east and west walls, where they were
covered over; and spoilt stones were used up in the foundations of the
east wall (near the south-east angle), also below the level of the
red earth outside the wall. The stones were not only finished in the
quarry, but were inspected before they were put in the wall, as Sir
Charles Warren proved, by noticing that the trickle of the red paint
used in the texts written on the stones runs upwards, and not down, on
the stone as it now stands. This masonry is found _in situ_ on three
walls, but not on the north side of the Ḥaram, where a wall of rougher
Roman work runs west to the rocky scarp of Antonia, which bounds the
court on the north-west. Sir Charles Warren also discovered that the
east wall does not stop at the present north-east angle, and that there
was no corner there till the Roman north wall was built--a point of
great importance as regards the study of the Temple area.
[Illustration: HERODIAN GRAFFITI.
From Sir C. Warren’s copies.]
[Sidenote: THE PAINTED TEXTS]
Still more important are the red-paint texts which he found on the
spoilt stones. The two longest of these are on the third stone of
the second course, and on the tenth stone of the fifth course,[245]
respectively, in the east wall, counting from the foundation and from
the south-east angle. They are clearly inscriptions in a Semitic
script, yet they have never been read, partly because they were
supposed to be Phœnician. They, however, present the characters of the
Aramean alphabets used at Jerusalem and among Nabatheans. The first of
these texts probably reads “carelessly chiselled,” and the stone has
no draft at the top but one of double width at the bottom. The second
text may be read, “for covering up, removal of it,” and this stone also
is imperfect, the bottom draft being too narrow. Not only do these
translations agree with the fact that the spoilt stones were covered
over in the foundations, but the characters attest the fact that they
were hewn in the later age of Herod, and not in the earlier time of
Solomon--a conclusion which agrees with the character of the masonry.
Had these texts been written in the clearer alphabet of the Siloam
Inscription or of the Moabite Stone, they would no doubt have been read
long ago; but they are rudely scrawled in the more slovenly script of
the Aramean alphabet used in Herod’s time.[246]
The evidence of the masonry and of the inscriptions thus serves to
confirm the conclusion of de Vogüé that these walls were built by
Herod the Great. The south-west angle of the Ḥaram is identified with
that of Herod’s enclosure by the existence of the Tyropœon bridge,
which led to the south cloister of the Temple in his time. The south
wall is fixed by the existence of the two Ḥuldah (or “Mole”) Gates,
and the south-east corner by the recovery of the line of the Ophel
wall, which joined the east cloister of the Herodian enclosure. The
excavations showed that no ancient city wall existed farther west.
The north-west angle is, in like manner, fixed by the recovery of
the ancient west wall, with its buttresses built against the Antonia
scarp. Only the north wall of the Temple thus remains to be fixed,
and Sir Charles Warren discovered the ancient valley which defended
Antonia on the east, and which runs to the Kidron across the north-east
part of the Ḥaram enclosure. In his recent plan[247] he excludes this
part from the old enclosure, and there can be little doubt that some
5 acres were here added later to the original 30 acres of the outer
courts. The present north wall is Roman or Byzantine, and the cisterns
within it are of modern masonry. Antonia projected as a smaller oblong
quadrangle on the north-west, and thus--as Josephus relates[248]--when
the Antonia cloisters were destroyed the “temple became quadrangular,”
being roughly about 1,000 feet either way. The line of its original
north wall[249] may be best drawn along the line of the north side of
the platform surrounding the Dome of the Rock, where an ancient scarp
with projecting buttresses was found by Sir Charles Warren in 1868; and
the rock outside this scarp is at least 20 feet lower, which makes it
about 40 feet below the level of the Ṣakhrah crest.
[Illustration: DOME AT THE DOUBLE GATE.
From de Vogüé.]
Besides these remains of the walls we have those of the south-west
gatehouse, which is now known as the “Double Gate,” and these are of
peculiar interest as regards the architectural character of Herod’s
Temple; for Fergusson, de Vogüé, and other authorities regard the
interior hall at this gateway as being of the Herodian age. The
original gate was double, with a central pier supporting two great
lintel stones, to which an arched cornice was added above in the
Byzantine age, on the outside. The hall floor is on the level of the
rock outside, and the gate was underground, a passage leading up north
from the back of the gatehouse to the surface of the courts within,
under the royal cloister. The present “Triple Gate,” which was altered
later, seems originally to have had the same plan, and these two gates
were called Ḥuldah (“mole”), because of their subterranean character.
The Double Gate hall has a monolithic pillar in its centre, of such
girth as to agree with the description by Josephus of columns “such
that three men might with their arms extended measure round”[250]--a
fact which I verified by experiment. The hall measures 40 feet (30
cubits) east and west, by 54 feet (40 cubits) north and south. Flat
arches spring from the central pillar on each side, and four flat domes
are thus supported, forming the roof of the hall.[251] The capital of
the pillar is remarkable, with acanthus leaves and lotus leaves in low
relief. One of the domes has also a very interesting ornamentation with
geometrical designs connected by a vine: an outer circle of corn ears
and rosettes, with other details, present just that style which we find
in the Jerusalem tombs of the Herodian age--half Greek, half Jewish.
[Sidenote: THE SI’A TEMPLE]
This interesting hall compares also in general style with another
temple built in the time of Herod the Great. Jehovah was not to him
the One God: at Samaria and Cæsarea he erected shrines to the genius
of the “divine Augustus,” and at Si’a in the east of Bashan he was
honoured in a temple to the Syrian deity Ba’al-shemîn, which still
exists in ruins planned by de Vogüé, with Greek texts and fragments
of others in Nabathean characters (like those just considered), which
were copied by Waddington. This building is of such importance for
comparison that a short description may be given.[252] This temple was
40 cubits (54 feet) square, with steps on the east leading down to a
court of the same size, having a single cloister on each side, except
where the porch of the building opened to the court. The temple gate
(24 cubits wide) was adorned by a vine sculptured above it and on the
sides; a dove perches on the vine, and an eagle spreads its wings under
the soffit of the cornice. The side pillars have semi-Corinthian
capitals with human busts between the volutes, and the design of the
bases is very like that of the capital at the “Double Gate.” The steps
are guarded by small lions. The head of the heaven god (Ba’al-shemin),
surrounded with rays, was over the gate, and flanking pilasters of
Ionic order are surmounted by other busts. Gazelles and a saddled horse
are elsewhere carved, and the whole is clearly a pagan structure,
though in many respects it recalls Herod’s Jerusalem temple. The
masonry is well squared and of good size, but not drafted.
There are here seven Greek texts, the first of which was on a statue
of Herod which has been entirely destroyed by some one who hated the
tyrant. Only a foot remains, whereas other busts at the site have
not been injured. The inscription is complete: “I, Malikath, son of
Mo’aîru, put up this statue at my own costs to the Lord Herod the
King.” No other Herod save the son of Antipater reigned in this part of
Bashan, and the text must (from the word _Kurios_) have been written
during his reign. The second inscription is later, but hardly less
interesting, referring to Agrippa II. (48–100 A. D.). “To the great
king Agrippa, friend of Cæsar, the pious, the friend of Rome, born of
the great king Agrippa, the friend of Cæsar, the pious, the friend of
Rome, Aphareus a freedman and Agrippa a son placed this.” The third
text runs: “The people of the Obaisenes [_dwellers in the dry region_]
in honour of Malikath, son of Mo’aîru, on account of justice and piety,
placed this on the temple.” The fourth says: “The people of Si’a in
common put this up to Malikath, son of Ausu, son of Mo’aîru, because he
made the temple and what surrounds it.” The name of the founder occurs
in two other short texts, on a cornice and above the temple gate.
[Illustration: GREEK TEXT OF HEROD’S TEMPLE.
From the Palestine Exploration Fund Photograph.]
[Sidenote: THE GREEK TEXT]
The extent, the masonry, the inscriptions, and the architecture of
Herod’s Temple at Jerusalem have thus been considered without reference
to literary statements, on the evidence of existing remains, and by
comparison with the style, the arrangement, and the Aramaic and Greek
texts, of a contemporary building. That Greek texts also existed in the
Jerusalem Temple is proved by M. Clermont-Ganneau’s discovery of one
of the very stones mentioned by Josephus.[253] It reads, in fine Greek
lettering and in the Greek language:
“No foreigner is to approach within the balustrade [_truphaktos_] round
the temple and the peribolos. Whosoever is caught will be guilty of his
own death which will follow.”
The Jewish historian says that “when you went through these cloisters
to the second temple there was a balustrade [_druphaktos_], made of
stone, all round, the height of which was 3 cubits. Upon it stood
_stelai_ at equal distances from one another declaring the law of
purity, some in Greek and some in Roman letters, that ‘no foreigner may
go within the sanctuary.’”[253] This comparison serves to increase our
confidence in Josephus. He is also evidently correct in saying that the
pillars of the Royal Cloister were of the Corinthian order, and the
great shafts (3 feet in diameter) re-used--as will appear later--in the
Aḳṣa Mosque, by the Byzantines, may once have belonged to this cloister.
Josephus appears to have supposed that the courts of Solomon’s Temple
extended 400 cubits in length. He says that “Herod took away the old
foundations and laid others,” and that “the cloisters were rebuilt by
Herod from the foundations.” He “encompassed a piece of land about
[the Temple] with a wall, which land was twice as large as that before
enclosed.” This increase, however, may refer to the flat ground,
which was largely increased by banking up earth over vaults within
the ramparts; for in these later times “the people added new banks,
and the hill became a larger plain.” The compass of Herod’s enclosure
Josephus estimates at 4 furlongs (or 600 feet each side), and again,
including Antonia, at 6 furlongs. The increase on the north side, where
was taken in an area apparently as large as that of the inner courts
of the Temple, must have occurred when Baris or Antonia was first
built.[254] If Josephus means by the “four furlongs” the space inside
the dividing balustrade he is not far out, though the measurement of
500 cubits square, given in the Mishnah,[255] and representing about
666 feet, may be more exact. The Temple itself did not stand--according
to the rabbis--exactly in the middle of this space. There was most
distance on the south, secondly on the east, thirdly on the north, and
least naturally on the west, where the Priests’ Court was narrow behind
the Holy House, and where the rock slope was most abrupt. A mediæval
Talmudic commentary even gives us the exact measurements, which are
quite possibly correct, but the authority is not stated.[256] It is,
however, in accordance with the position of the Ṣakhrah that the
surrounding balustrade should have been nearest to the Holy House on
the west and north, as it is described in the Mishnah to have been.
[Sidenote: HEROD’S TEMPLE]
The dimensions of the outer enclosure, corresponding to the present
Haram, are nowhere given by ancient writers. The part outside the
balustrade was the Court of the Gentiles, and the walls enclosed a
quadrangle about 1,000 feet side,[257] roughly speaking. Including
the inner courts of Antonia, the total area was about 30 acres. The
position of the Holy House--already explained--with the Ṣakhrah as
the “foundation stone” of the Holy of Holies, agrees exactly with the
levels of the Temple courts as represented by those of the rock; for
the number of steps to various gates is given in the Mishnah, and
these steps were all half a cubit high,[258] or about 8 inches each.
In addition to this, the subterranean passage from the House Moḳed (on
the north) comes exactly in the right place, as does the tank on the
south of the Priests’ Court. These details require special notice, as
confirming the view here advocated as to the exact site of the Temple.
The measurements given in the tract _Middoth_ (“measures”) are
systematic, and leave no doubt as to the relative size, position, or
levels of the Holy House and its courts. A cubit of 16 inches not
only accords with rabbinical statements, but seems also (from the
dimensions of the stones, and the space between buttresses, the size
of the “Double Gate” hall, and the levels of the rock) to have been
very clearly the unit used in the Temple, as well as in the Siloam
aqueduct. The Holy House stood in the Priests’ Court, with the Altar
before it on the east. Its floor was 8 feet above that of this court,
and the level of the latter was thus 2,432 feet above sea-level, or 8
feet below that of the crest of the Ṣakhrah. This is the actual level
of the rock east of the Ṣakhrah where known, and is just under the
platform pavement. The Priests’ Court measured 187 cubits east and
west, and 135 north and south; ten steps led up to the southern gates,
which shows that the surface outside was here nearly 7 feet lower than
the court. The rock is known to have this level in the mouth of the
tank just outside the court on the south side. East of the Priests’
Court was a narrow walk at a lower level which was called the Court
of Israel, but which was only intended for the representative men of
Israel, whose duty it was to attend the daily services. Beyond this
was the Court of the Women (135 cubits square), where the Jews with
their wives assembled, especially at festivals. It had cloisters on the
north, south, and east, and a gallery for women over that on the east.
The great Gate Nicanor led to this court from the level of the Priests’
Court. It had 15 steps, so that the Court of the Women was 10 feet
lower than that of the Priests. The level of the rock is known--east
of the modern platform--to be about 2,420 feet above the sea, or 12
feet below the Priests’ Court. Thus not more than 2 feet of foundation
and pavement are needed. Beyond this court the rock is somewhat lower,
and the natural surface was no doubt allowed to remain outside the
court for some distance, and was banked up near the outer walls, to the
present levels of the enclosure outside the platform.
It appears, however, that on the north-west side of the Priests’
Court the rock had been cut down to form the inner court of Antonia.
It is everywhere visible on the surface in this direction, at the
level 2,432 feet above the sea, which we have seen to have been that
of the Priests’ Court. The House Moḳed, therefore, required no outer
steps. Josephus seems to allude to this when he speaks of there being
no steps towards the west, and in his account of the final siege of
the Temple[259]; for the Romans battered the wall of the inner court
at this point. Moḳed (“hearth”) was the great north-west gatehouse,
projecting from the wall of the Priests’ Court. From its north-west
chamber a winding staircase (perhaps wooden) led down to a gallery,
which extended to the Gate Ṭadi (or Ṭari) in the outer wall of the
Temple enclosure, and which communicated with the “bath-house.” It is
described as being under the _bîrah_, or “fortress,” and under the
_ḥíl_, or “rampart,” outside the Priests’ Court.[260] If the Temple
stood over the Ṣakhrah, this gallery exactly coincides with an existing
rock passage 24 feet wide (18 cubits), and now 130 feet long, the
bottom being 30 feet beneath the surface of the present platform.
Descending into this gallery--now converted into a tank--I found that
the south wall, as well as those at the sides, was of rock, but that
the north end was blocked by a rough masonry wall, so that the passage
does not extend farther south, but may run north to the line of the old
north wall of the outer rampart. To the west of this gallery is another
curious excavation which probably was the “bath-house.” Producing the
directions of these two galleries, they meet just where the old north
wall ran, and this must be the position of the Gate Ṭadi.
[Sidenote: THE TEMPLE GATES]
The Priests’ Court had three gates on the north and three on the
south,[261] and near the “Water Gate,” on the south, was the “Chamber
of the Draw-well,” where apparently a wheel and rope were used to
draw water. There is a great rock-cut tank still in use just outside
the line of the south wall of the Priests’ Court. Taking these two
indications of position with the levels, it appears to me evident that
the exact position of the Temple is fixed by the existing remains of
its subterranean excavations, as I first suggested in 1878.
The general appearance of the Temple and its courts is best understood
by means of the excellent model made by Miss M. A. Duthoit.[262] The
most striking feature is the manner in which the courts are dwarfed
by the huge square pylon of the Holy House, the flat roof being 150
feet above the level of the Priests’ Court. The roof was finished by a
simple cornice, but the effect of the great mass was unbroken by any
other adornment, save the golden vine running above and at the sides of
the high eastern portal with its heavy veil.
[Illustration: HEROD’S TEMPLE.
Block plan with rock levels.]
All the gates were gilded except that of Nicanor, which stood above the
round flight of fifteen steps on which the “songs of degrees” are said
to have been chanted. This gate was plated with electrum--a mixture of
gold and silver. It was presented by Nicanor, a Jew, and the ossuary
containing the bones of his family was found, a few years since, by
Miss Gladys Dixon in a tomb on the Mount of Olives.[263] It bears a
text in Greek: “Bones of those of the Nicanor Alexandreôs who made the
gates,” with the words “Niḳanor Aleksa” beneath, in Hebrew. This great
gate-house faced the Women’s Court on the west. The court had four
roofless enclosures 40 cubits square, divided off by pillars, one at
each corner. In that to the south-east the Nazirites assembled, and
wood for the altar was stacked in that opposite on the north-east. In
the south-west enclosure the oil for the Temple lamps was stored, and
into that to the north-west lepers were brought from outside, in order
that they might show themselves to the priests at the Gate Nicanor.
[Sidenote: THE OUTER GATES]
The “Mountain of the House,” as the outer rampart is called in the
Mishnah, had five gates--or eight, according to Josephus. On the
south were the two Ḥuldah Gates already described. On the east was
the Gate Shushan opposite the Temple; it is said to have been adorned
by a representation of “Shushan the palace.” On the west was Ḳîpunos,
which bore a Greek name signifying “adornment.” This may have been
the “Beautiful Gate,”[264] and was the main entrance--probably at the
end of the bridge leading to the Royal Cloister. Josephus says that
besides this gate two others led to the “suburbs,” and a fourth to the
“other city” (near the Akra) “where the road descended down the valley
by a great number of steps.”[265] These gates are still to be seen,
one near the Tyropœon bridge, now called the “Prophet’s Gate,” with a
subterranean passage like those of the Ḥuldah Gates; the next to the
north at the present “Gate of the Chain,” where an ancient causeway on
arches was discovered by Sir Charles Warren. The fourth gate--farthest
north--has been converted into a tank, but the opening through the
Herodian wall still exists. It was immediately west of the Holy House,
for it lies between the Ṣakhrah and the “Pool of the Bath,” where there
is now an accumulation of 90 feet of rubbish over the rock. The street
must have here descended rapidly southwards, to pass under the arches
of the causeway and of the Tyropœon bridge--which accounts for the
notice of steps in the roadway.
The gate on the north is called Ṭadi in some texts of the Mishnah, and
Tari in others. The first word means “secret,” and the other “new.”
The secret passage from Antonia to the East Gate of the Temple[266]
no doubt started at this gate, and was identical with that already
described as leading to Ṭadi, and to the bath-house, from Moḳed. The
passage between that gate-house and Nicanor, which would enable Herod
to reach the Court of the Women, is unknown, and perhaps only led along
the north cloister of the Priests’ Court, or outside it. There was also
a secret passage from Herod’s palace in the upper city which has been
traced. This led to the gate at the causeway on the west.[267]
The dread of divine displeasure rendered the service of the Temple one
of fear and trembling.[268] In the darkness, before dawn, the “man
of the mountain of the house” went his rounds to visit the priests
and Levites who guarded the sanctuary by night. At cock-crow the huge
altar was first cleansed, by the priest to whom the lot fell. From the
Gate-house Moḳed he went in the dim light of the three great fires
of fig-tree wood, nut, and pine, which glowed under the ashes. His
brethren listened to hear the creaking of the wheel of the draw-well,
as he sanctified his hands and feet. Then they came running to aid him,
taking away the unburnt fragments of sacrifices, heaping up the ashes,
and feeding the undying flame. As the red light spread behind the dark
mountains of Moab, southwards “towards Hebron,” they brought out and
slew the lamb of the “perpetual” sacrifice each morning, and prepared
the incense and the shew-bread.
[Sidenote: TEMPLE SERVICES]
On the dread Day of Atonement[269] the high-priest was supported to
the Holy House by two priests, while a third laid hold of one of the
jewels on his shoulder. The sound of the golden bells was heard as he
went alone within the inner veil, but priests and people waited in
awe-stricken silence, till he came out to bless them by the very name
of Iahu, and to send forth the goat bearing the sins of the nation to
the grim precipice of Ṣûḳ--a mountain visible from Olivet--which rises
over the Desert of Judah. Yet more rarely--perhaps only seven times in
the period between Ezra and Herod--he left the Temple by the Shushan
Gate, and passing over a high wooden causeway, ascended Olivet to burn
the red heifer. Its ashes were mingled with water from Siloam, brought
to the Temple, it is said, by innocent boys mounted on oxen, with much
fear lest these should tread on some “grave of the depth,” or hidden
tomb, and so defile the children who rode them, and who had been born
in the outer court of the sanctuary. Without these ashes there was no
purification for Israel from defilement by the dead. They were stored
partly on Olivet and partly in the Temple.
The Feast of Booths was a time of rejoicing rather than of fear. It
was then that the king, once a year, read the law to the people from a
pulpit in the Court of the Women, and it is said that Agrippa I. wept
at the words “Thou mayest not set a stranger over thee which is not of
thy brethren,” touching the hearts of the people, who shouted, “Thou
art our brother--thou art our brother.”[270] For did he not yearly
bear the basket of first fruits, when the bull with gilded horns was
brought to the Temple, and “the pipe played before them till they
came to the mountain of the house”? At “Tabernacles” also the pipes
played at the feast of the “water-drawing,” when four golden lamps
lighted up the Court of the Women, and Levites stood on the fifteen
steps of Nicanor chanting the fifteen “songs of degrees,” while “pious
and prudent men danced with torches in their hands, singing psalms
and hymns before the people.” Two priests blew the rams’ horns in the
court, and when they reached the Nicanor Gate they sang:
“Our fathers who were in this place
Turned their backs on the House,
And their faces were towards the east,
And they worshipped the rising sun.[271]
But we turn to Adonai,
On Adonai are our eyes.”
The paganism of Rome penetrated, however, even into the temple of
Jehovah. The golden eagle--emblem of the empire--“erected over the
great gate of the Temple,” was not cut down till rumour arose that
Herod was dying.[272] It perhaps spread its wings on the soffit of
the lintel, as at Ba’albek and Si’a. The money-changers who--for a
small charge--changed old half-shekels for the new ones, which alone
could be given for the Temple tax,[273] and the sellers of doves, were
established in “shops” in the outer cloisters, and made the Holy House
a “den of thieves.” The great fortress, built to defend the Temple on
the north, and to guard the sacred robes of the high-priest, was held
under Idumæans and Romans by a foreign garrison overawing the people.
This fortress of Antonia requires a special description.
[Sidenote: ANTONIA]
The former citadel, Baris, was rebuilt by Herod, and renamed Antonia
after Mark Antony. The ridge rose naturally about 30 feet higher than
the level of the Priests’ Court, stretching on the north to the hill
of Bezetha, or the new north-east quarter of the city, not as yet
walled in. The citadel was divided off from this hill by a trench with
vertical scarps cut in the rock: it was 60 feet deep and 165 feet wide.
A great block of rock was left standing within this fosse; it measures
140 feet north and south, and 352 feet east and west, thus covering
more than a third of the width of the outer Temple court, and rising at
its highest 30 feet above the Priests’ Court. The block was scarped on
all sides, and thus a flat rock surface exists south of it, extending
on the level of the court as far as the north wall and cloister of the
outer Temple. Steps led up--as they still do--from this flat courtyard
to the block above it.
This castle is very clearly described by Josephus.[274] He applies to
it the terms “Acropolis,” “stronghold” (_phrourion_), and “fortress”
(_purgos_); but he never calls it Akra. There were four towers on the
rocky block, one at each corner, that to the south-east being the
highest. The flat space below on the south was paved, and in it were
rooms, courts, bathing-places, and “broad spaces for parades.” Passages
led below the Temple court--as already described in speaking of the
Gate Ṭadi--but this area was on the level of the inner Temple court,
as we learn from the exploit of the rash centurion Julian, during
the siege by Titus; for, leaping down from the scarp, he charged the
defenders of the Temple up to the gates, where his nailed shoes slipped
on the Temple pavement, and he fell with a great clang of armour. Thus,
the whole area of Antonia formed an oblong quadrangle, projecting on
the north, and adjoining the north and west cloisters of the outer
Temple enclosure. It was a citadel overlooking the whole of the
sanctuary, and to the present day it is a barrack for Turkish troops.
The other Herodian citadel, which is also still a barrack, was at
the north-west side of the upper city, by the upper market.[275] It
defended the neck of land where the upper city was always attacked from
the north, and it adjoined Herod’s palace. The three “royal towers”
here strengthened the old wall.[276] Hippicus was farthest west and
was only 25 cubits square. The present north-west tower of the citadel
may be built on its site. Phasaelus was 40 cubits square, according to
Josephus, with a solid base and a _stoa_ round the tower itself. There
can be little doubt that this refers to the present “Tower of David,”
called the “Castle of the Pisans” in the Middle Ages. Its masonry is
still untouched, being Herodian in style, with stones about 4 feet
high and often 8 or 9 feet long.[277] It measures 56 feet (about 41
cubits) north and south, but is 70 feet long east and west. It has a
narrow walk or “berm” outside, on the solid base. A sloping revetment
was added later by the Crusaders, and the upper part of the tower is
modern. The site of the third tower, Mariamne, is as yet unknown, but
its solid base, 20 cubits high, may exist under the pavement of the
present market-place. It was the smallest of the three, being 20 cubits
square. The bases of these towers are probably of rock, now covered
with masonry. The reason why the original masonry of Phasaelus remains
standing is that Titus left these towers, and a bit of the west wall,
standing to show the strength of the fortress he had taken, and to form
a citadel for the legion he left at Jerusalem. The palace, adjoining
the towers inwardly, appears to have been large and magnificent, but
its extent is not described. It had walls which made it a citadel,
large bed-chambers, and wooden roofs. It was adorned with cloisters
and carvings, and had gardens full of trees, canals, cisterns, and
fountains where the water ran from bronze statues, while the doves
fluttered round its pools as they now flutter in the Ḥaram courts. The
pagan character of its adornment must have been sorely repugnant to
Israel in the holy city. Two of its chambers were named after Cæsar and
Marcus Agrippa, the pagan patrons of Herod.[278]
[Sidenote: THE PALACES]
Other palaces were built later in Jerusalem, and Agrippa II. rebuilt
the palace of the Hasmonæans,[279] which was in the north-east part
of the upper city, near the great Tyropœon bridge and the Xystos. The
latter Greek word signifies a covered gymnasium, and there is no reason
to doubt that this building was the same as the gymnasium built by
the high-priest Jason before 170 B. C., which is described as being
“under the Acropolis” or upper city. It lay north of the bridge,[280]
but its remains, and those of the neighbouring council-house, have not
been identified with certainty. There were gates in the west wall of
the Temple above it; and as these seem clearly to be the two central
gates on that side, it must have been south of the ancient causeway,
and down in the Tyropœon Valley. An “ancient hall” discovered by Sir
Charles Warren, which he considers to be “one of the oldest buildings
in Jerusalem,” may have some connection with either the Xystos or the
council-house. It lies partly under the street leading to the Gate of
the Chain, and measured about 23 feet by 20 feet; its floor is about
on the level of the Herodian street pavement; its roof is less ancient
than its walls; at each corner inside there are rude pilaster capitals
of semi-Ionic character. The outer masonry is drafted and resembles
that of Herod’s age. Herod assembled wrestlers and other athletes at
his games every five years, but it is doubtful if his “theatre” was
the same as the gymnasium; a “hippodrome” which lay towards the south
of the Temple may, however, have been connected with the Xystos. It
has been sought farther south by Mr. Bliss, but no remains of such a
building were there found.[281]
Some alterations seem to have occurred in the water-supply in
consequence of the building of the west outer wall of Herod’s Temple,
and these indicate that the wall is later than two rock-cut aqueducts
which it cuts across. The southern one of these ran from the Pool of
the Bath to Siloam, and has been traced in parts by Sir Charles Warren
and Mr. Bliss. The second led from north-west to the Antonia fosse,
where possibly the “Pool Strouthios”[282] was made by Herod when he
rebuilt Antonia. This aqueduct merely served to collect the rain-water
north of the city, and carried it originally to a rock tank which is
included within Herod’s west sanctuary wall. The supply being thus
cut off, the water of the aqueduct would serve to fill the Antonia
fosse, or the Pool Strouthios in that fosse--known later as the “Twin
Pools”--supposing that these were cut as early as Herod’s time. The
great tunnel of this aqueduct under the Antonia rock stops dead at the
Temple wall, and the only use that could afterwards be made of it
would be as a secret exit, through the window which I discovered in
this wall just south of the Antonia scarp.
[Sidenote: THE TEMPLE BRIDGE]
The description of Herod’s Jerusalem may be concluded by notice of the
Tyropœon bridge. The spring of the arch from the west wall of the outer
Temple is still visible. The voussoirs are dressed with the peculiar
criss-cross dressing already described as distinguishing Herodian
masonry. The position and the breadth of the bridge closely agree with
the dimensions given by Josephus (in Greek feet) for the three walks of
the “Royal Cloister,” which ran east and west inside the south wall of
the Temple enclosure[283]: since the south wall is about 9 feet thick,
and the side aisles of the cloister were 30 feet wide, the central
one 45 feet wide, and the pillars about 6 feet in diameter. This
bridge replaced the older one, which was broken down at the time of
Pompey’s siege in 63 B. C. The older voussoirs are under the Herodian
pavement. The fallen voussoirs of Herod’s bridge lie on that pavement.
The bridge, as explored by Sir Charles Warren, consisted of two great
arches (about 42-feet span), with a pier 12 feet thick rising from a
rock foundation in the Tyropœon Valley. The roadway was 95 feet above
the valley bed, or 75 feet above the pavement. This is now buried to a
depth of no less than 40 feet. The cloister within was the finest of
those surrounding the Temple, and its pillars were of the Corinthian
order. All other cloisters of the outer Temple were double, but this
was triple. Those of the inner Temple were single.
Such generally was Jerusalem as Herod built its Temple and palaces,
shortly before the birth of our Lord. The Temple was probably begun
in 22 B. C. and finished eight years later. The fifteenth of Herod is
preferable to the eighteenth,[284] because Herod’s meeting with Marcus
Agrippa appears to have occurred after the completion of the Holy
House, and Agrippa died at Rome in 12 B. C. But additions continued
to be made to the Temple down to 64 A. D.[285] Thus, as we read in
the fourth Gospel, the building had been continued for “forty-and-six
years” before the time when the Jews were speaking to our Lord.
FOOTNOTES TO CHAPTER VI
[226] Lucan, “Pharsalia,” viii. 698–9, x. 380–1; “Psalms of Solomon,”
ii. 30–3; see Drummond, “Jewish Messiah,” 1877, pp. 140–1.
[227] “Ant.,” XIV. viii. 1.
[228] _Ibid._, XIV. xi. 4.
[229] “Ant.,” XIV. xiii. 3–10.
[230] _Ibid._, XIV. xiv. 5, xv. 2, xvi. 1–4.
[231] “Ant.,” XV. v. 2.
[232] _Ibid._, XV. i. 1.
[233] _Ibid._, XIV. xvi. 2. That is eighteen sabbatic cycles after 163
B. C., which was a sabbatic year.
[234] Matt. ii. 1; Luke i. 5, iii. 1, 23. The date of the Crucifixion
depends on whether the Ministry covered one or four years.
[235] “Ant.,” XVII. vi. 4.
[236] Eleazar, son of Jacob, died about 130 A. D., and is quoted in
_Middoth_, i. 9; Rabbi _Meier_ was about the same age (quoted _Midd._,
ii. 2); Rabbi Eleazar, son of Zadok (_Midd._, iii. 8) died about 120
A. D. See Chiarini, “Talmud de Babylone,” 1831, pp. 105–7. Nothing is
said above of the pretended description by Aristeas, as the work is
well known to be a forgery.
[237] “Wars,” V. iv. 1, translated from the Greek.
[238] _Ibid._, iv. 2.
[239] “Wars,” V. vi. 5, vii. 3. This postern may have been the Corner
Gate; see back, chap. iv. p. 82. Distinguishing this from the Valley
Gate, the city had twelve gates in all.
[240] “Recovery of Jer.,” 1871, pp. 149, 299, 300; Bliss, “Excav. at
Jer.,” 1898, p. 29, and plate iv.
[241] “Ancient Jerusalem,” 1908, p. 297.
[242] _Ibid._, p. 23. The remains of an old wall outside the Damascus
Gate date only from the twelfth century, and will be noticed later.
[243] One at south-west angle is 38 feet 9 inches; another at
north-east angle 23 feet 8 inches long.
[244] The drafts, and a border 3 inches wide on the block, are worked
with a comb of eight teeth to the inch in two directions, making a
criss-cross pattern. The remainder is finely finished with a point.
[245] See Sir C. Warren’s plates accompanying the “Memoir” (Jerusalem
vol.).
[246] Text No. 1, _K’a ḳ’aḳ’at_, “carelessness of brand” (Lev. xix.
28). Text No. 2, _Le-’aṭṭ ṣ’an le-u_, “for covering, removal to it.”
The other markings seem to be initials of words--_e.g._ _K_ twice for
_K’a_ (“carelessness”); _Ṣ_ twice for _Ṣ’an_ (“removal”); and _Ḥ_
twice incised, perhaps for _ḥaṭa_ (“error”), or for _ḥaba_ (“hide”).
Altogether ten out of twenty-two letters of the alphabet occur in these
texts.
[247] “Murray’s Bible Dict,” 1908, _s.v._ “Temple,” p. 876.
[248] “Wars,” VI. v. 4.
[249] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., 1883, p. 223; “Recov.
Jer.,” p. 219.
[250] “Ant.,” XV. xi. 5, referring to the royal cloister.
[251] “Ord. Survey Notes,” plate xvi. figs. 1, 2.
[252] For plan, elevation, and details, see plates ii. and iii., de
Vogüé, “Syrie Centrale.” For Greek texts, Waddington, “Inscrip. de
la Syrie,” 1870, pp. 540, 541, Nos. 2364–2369. No. 2366 is specially
valuable as having a bilingual in Aramaic on the base. This gives
_’Abisheth_ (“dry region ”) as the local name--Greek Obeisa--and
_M’aîru_ (“_God_-fearing”) for the Greek Moairos, with _Malikoth_
(“royal”) for Maleichathos. Waddington supposes that the temple may
have been raised by Idumæans (“Ant.,” XVI. ix. 2, 3). We have already
seen that a Malichus lived in the time of Herod.
[253] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jersualem vol., p. 423; Josephus,
“Wars,” V. v. 2. He means that some of the warnings were in Latin,
some in Greek. The expression in the inscription _mêthena allogenê_ is
the same practically as the _médena allophulon_ (“no foreigner”) of
Josephus.
[254] “Ant.,” VIII. iii. 9; “Wars,” V. v. 1, 2; “Ant.,” XV. xi. 3;
“Wars,” I. xxi. 1. Josephus exaggerates the height of the walls, unless
he means the command above the Kidron Valley.
[255] Mishnah, _Middoth_, ii. 1. Abarbanel on this passage says, “The
mountain was indeed much larger than 500 cubits would contain either
way, but the sanctity did not extend outside this.”
[256] See my “Handbook to Bible,” p. 371. _Tosephoth Yom Tob._
[257] The exact measures are: south wall of Ḥaram, 922 feet outside;
east wall, 1,530 to the Roman north-east corner; west wall to Antonia,
1,601 feet; north wall, 1,042 feet. The north-east and south-west
angles are right angles; the south-east angle measures 92½°. The old
scarp on north side of the platform is about 1,180 feet north of the
south wall.
[258] Mishnah, _Middoth_, ii. 3: “All steps were half a cubit high.”
[259] Josephus, “Wars,” V. ii. 5, VI. i. 8, ii. 7, iv. 1. The
south-east part of the platform of the Dome of the Rock is supported
probably by vaults. The entrance to these, on the east, was visible in
1881, though built up.
[260] Mishnah, _Middoth_, i. 6–9.
[261] _Ibid._, i. 4. On north the gates _Niṣúṣ_ (“projecting”), _Ḳorban_
(“gift”), and _Môḳed_ (“hearth”), enumerated from east to west; on the
south _Dalaḳ_ (“burning”), _Ḳorban_ (“gift”), and _Mim_ (“waters”). The
chamber of the draw-well (_gulah_) was on south near the last (v. 4).
See _Tamid_, i. 4.
[262] For plan and details, see Constantine l’Empereur, _Codex
Middoth_, 1630; and Conder’s “Handbook to the Bible” (3rd edit. 1882),
pp. 359–86. For model (Religious Tract Society), see Frontispiece.
[263] _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, April 1903, p. 126, Oct. 1903, p.
326.
[264] Acts iii. 2.
[265] _Middoth_, i. 3; “Ant.,” XV. xi. 5. The Bible mentions the
_Parbharîm_ or “suburbs” (2 Kings xxiii. 11), close to the Temple.
Standard records of the greater and lesser cubit were kept at the Gate
Shushan (Mishnah, _Tohoroth_, xvii. 9).
[266] “Ant.,” XV. xi. 7.
[267] Sir C. Wilson, “Ord. Survey Notes,” 1864, p. 60; “Mem. West Pal.
Survey,” Jerusalem vol., pp. 203–6, 270.
[268] Mishnah, _Middoth_, i. 2; _Yoma_, i. 8, ii. 2; _Tamid_, i. 2-iii.
8, vii. 1.
[269] _Yoma_, iv. 1, v. 2; _Sukkah_, v. 1–3; _Parah_, iii. 2–5, 11;
_Sotah_, i. 5.
[270] Mishnah, _Sotah_, vii. 8.
[271] Ezek. viii. 16.
[272] “Ant.,” XVII. vi. 2; “Wars,” I. xxxiii. 3.
[273] Mishnah, _Sheḳalîm_, i. 3, 6, 7, iii. 2, vi. 4, 5.
[274] “Ant.,” XV. viii. 5, xi. 3, 4, 7, XVIII. iv. 3; “Wars,” I. iii.
3, v. 4, xxi. 1, II. xvi. 5, V. iv. 2, v. 8, ix. 2, VI. i. 5, 8, ii. 5,
9.
[275] “Ant.,” XIII. v. 11; “Wars,” V. iv. 1. The Rabbis (Tosiphta,
_Sanhed._, chap. xiv.) mention an “upper” and a “lower” market.
[276] “Ant.,” XVII. x. 2, 3; “Wars,” II. iii. 1, xvii. 6, 8, V. iv. 3,
v. 8, VI. viii. 1, VII. i. 1; Tacitus, “Hist.,” v. 11.
[277] Sir C. Wilson, “Ord. Survey Notes,” p. 46; “Mem. Survey West
Pal.,” Jerusalem vol., pp. 267–70.
[278] “Wars,” I. xxi. 1.
[279] “Ant.,” XX. viii. 11; “Wars,” II. xvi. 3.
[280] 1 Macc. i. 14; 2 Macc. iv. 9, 12; “Wars,” II. xvi. 3, VI. iii.
2, vi. 2, viii. 1, V. iv. 2; “Mem. Survey West Pal.,” pp. 201, 202;
“Wars,” VI. vi. 3.
[281] “Ant.,” XV. viii. 1, 2, XVII. x. 2; “Wars,” II. iii. 1.
[282] “Wars,” V. xi. 4; “Mem. Survey West Pal.,” Jerusalem vol., pp.
263, 264.
[283] “Ant.,” XV. xi. 5. For the bridge see “Ant.,” XIV. iv. 2; “Wars,”
I. vii. 2, VI. vi. 2, viii. 1. The bridge was 51 feet wide, and at 38
feet 9 inches from its south side was the outside of the south wall at
south-west angle of the Ḥaram.
[284] “Ant.,” XV. xi. 1; “Wars” I. xxi. 1.
[285] “Ant.,” XX. ix. 7; John ii. 20. This date would be 24 or 27
A. D., reckoning from foundation.
CHAPTER VII
THE GOSPEL SITES
Passover being finished, and the Galileans having set out in a pilgrim
caravan for their homes in the north, the Temple courts were no longer
crowded, and the rabbis sat in the spring sunshine on the steps of the
great Gate Nicanor, teaching their pupils as usual.[286] But with them
sate that wondrous Child “in the midst of the doctors, both hearing
them and asking them questions.” Across the broad “Court of the Women”
came the anxious mother, to the gate where twelve years before she had
offered “a sacrifice according to that which is said in the law of the
Lord: a pair of turtle doves or two young pigeons,” and where the Babe
was held in the arms of Simeon, son of the famous Hillel. The gentle
reproach, “Son, why hast thou thus dealt with us? Behold, thy father
and I have sought thee sorrowing,” received the gentle answer, “How
is it that ye sought me? Wist ye not that I must be among my father’s
people?”
This scene in the Temple court is one of the very few as to which we
can have no doubt, though the steps of Nicanor are hidden from us,
under the platform, to-day. Speaking generally, it is notable that
the Gospels do not define the exact position of places, in and near
Jerusalem, to which they refer in passing. The first Christians turned
their eyes up to heaven, not down to earth. They thought of the return
of their Master, not of the Way of Sorrow, the Place of the Skull, or
the empty tomb. They knew, and their first readers knew, where these
were, but to us they have left no indication. We do not know where
was the “upper chamber” in which our Lord ate His last supper of the
Passover. We do not know where was the little “farm” Gethsemane--the
“oil-press”--except that it was a “garden” beyond the valley of the
Kidron. We can only conjecture the sites of the Prætorium, or of the
palaces where Annas and Caiaphas lived, and where Herod Antipas lodged
as a Galilean visitor at the time of the Passover. We are uncertain as
to where the Pool of Bethesda may have been, and we dispute as to the
Way of Sorrow, the Mount of Calvary, and the Sepulchre. It is well that
we should not know; and that we should not localise at any footprint,
or on any rock, that which was meant to be for all the world. Yet we
cannot help guessing and searching, if by any means we may really find
the places where the feet of Jesus must have trodden the hard, rough
rocks, or the smooth pavement of Antonia. We experience the same doubts
and difficulties which early pilgrims felt, and we must not forget that
they had no more to guide them than we have when we study the Gospels.
They had indeed less knowledge, because they did not see, as we do,
that the valleys had been filled by the ruins of the ancient city long
before their day. Some thought that the Prætorium was Antonia, others
thought later that it was on Zion. They changed the site of Bethesda
more than once. They always thought it necessary to suppose that the
city must have been much increased in size by Hadrian, because their
bishops showed them the holy tomb and Calvary within the Jerusalem of
their own time.
[Sidenote: KNOWN SITES]
There are some places mentioned in the Gospels as to which we
have roughly some idea of position. We know that the tables of
the money-changers, and the seats of those that sold doves, were
somewhere in the outer court of the Temple. The “treasury” was one
of those boxes, placed in the Court of the Women, where offerings of
money--even the two mites of the widow--might be made. “Solomon’s
Porch” was apparently the cloister on the eastern wall, and is not to
be confused with the “Beautiful Gate” (Kîpunos) on the west.[287] We
can also picture to ourselves the view of Jerusalem seen from Olivet
when the disciples pointed to the mighty masonry of the Holy House, of
which not one stone is left standing on another.[288] “O Jerusalem,
Jerusalem, that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent
unto thee.... Behold, your House is left unto you desolate.” But it is
because of the history of that day of sin and sorrow, when the three
crosses were raised in the cold morning after Passover night, that we
now read and write so much about the Holy City; and our present inquiry
is the most important of all.
The white chalky slopes of Olivet were terraced and dotted with grey
olive trees then as now, with here and there a fig garden and a
solitary palm. But looking west there was only hard rock under grey
walls--hard and stubborn as the hearts of the people, and as unlike
the purple copses and dove-haunted oak woods of Galilee as was the
sacerdotalism of priests to the teaching of the Son of Man. Above the
mighty ramparts the great “wing wall” (not a “pinnacle”) of the House
itself towered 150 feet over the gate towers and cloisters of the inner
court. The black smoke of the fig-tree logs rose high above the great
Altar. The scarps of Antonia frowned down on the Temple from the north.
Beyond these great buildings were the white-washed domes of the city,
and farther yet the great square towers by Herod’s palace. Perhaps a
glimpse might be caught of the trees in its gardens, and of the wicked
bronze statues from which its fountains poured; of the great halls, and
cloisters, and fluttering doves. And outside, to the north, was the
precipice and rounded summit of the Place of a Skull. Below the feet of
the disciples was the Kidron gorge, the sepulchre of King Alexander cut
in its cliff, and perhaps hard by in the flatter ground to its north
the olive-yard of Gethsemane, and the rocky slope of the Agony to come;
while on the western side was the spring of Bethesda, with its great
reservoir in front, and its five cloisters, near the “Sheep Place,”
where the flocks were gathered to the watering.
[Sidenote: BETHESDA]
As regards this last site there is, of course, much difference of
opinion. Bethesda could not be at Siloam, for that pool is mentioned
by its old name in the same Gospel.[289] Bethesda in Hebrew means “the
house of the stream,” and all we know about it is that it was near the
“Sheep Place,” and that it had “five cloisters.” Here the blind, halt,
and withered lay “waiting for the disturbance of the waters.” It is
remarkable that the text of the three oldest manuscripts of the fourth
Gospel--the Alexandrian, Vatican, and Sinaitic uncials--here differs
in several respects from that of later copies; and the three differ
from one another. The Alexandrian alone has the words, “for an angel
of the Lord washed at a certain season in the pool,” instead of the
verse as it stands in our English Bible. The Sinaitic text calls it “a
sheep pool,” and names it Bethzatha. The Vatican reads Bethsaida; and,
strangely enough, all three uncials omit the words “waiting for the
disturbance of the water,” for it is very unlikely that this remarkable
indication was not given in the original. It evidently existed in
some text as early as 330 A. D. (that is, earlier than either of the
uncials), for the first pilgrim, who places Bethsaida at the “Twin
Pools,” says that “they have five porches where those who had been
ill for many years were healed, and the water was perturbed as though
boiling.” A fifth-century writer speaks of the water as being red, and
probably follows Eusebius and Jerome, who say: “Twin pools are shown,
one of which is usually filled by the winter rains, but the other in
wondrous wise is red, as though the bloody water testified to the
ancient use; for they say that the victims used to be washed therein
by the priests, for which cause it was named”--that is, “the Sheep
Pool.”[290]
It is beyond dispute that the Twin Pools in the Antonia fosse--perhaps
the _Strouthios_, or “Bird’s Pool” of Josephus, already cut by
Herod--were those to which the fourth-century tradition pointed, and
their claims are thus superior to those of the twelfth-century site
farther north, or of the Templars’ site--the modern Birket Isrâîl--to
the east. The latter pretty certainly did not exist till the time of
Hadrian at earliest. It is also clear that the eastern of the two pools
might depend on the rains, and that the western, which was fed by the
aqueduct that led from outside the city walls where, on the north-west,
the rain-water of the northern fosse was collected, may have been
red and muddy from the red surface soil washed down. But this hardly
describes the sudden “disturbance” for which the sick waited. It has
been supposed that the Twin Pools were adorned by pillars, on four
sides and on the central rock wall which divides them; but no remains
of such pillars exist now on the site, and the central wall is less
than 6 feet wide, and would therefore only serve to support a single
line of columns, which does not represent a _stoa_, or “cloister,” such
as is mentioned in the Gospel. Thus even the oldest traditional site
does not fully meet all requirements. There is only one place which
seems to do so--namely, the Kidron spring, now called by Christians
“the Virgin’s Well,” and by Arabs “the Mother of Steps.” Here, as
already described, occurs an intermittent “disturbance of the waters,”
and the Jews still bathe in the cavern when the water suddenly surges
up to fill it. They say that it is a cure for rheumatism. Josephus
calls this spring “Solomon’s Pool,” using the same word (_Kolumbêthra_)
used in the Gospel, and he evidently regarded it as the Gihon where
Solomon was anointed. Till of late it might have been objected that
there was no reservoir here such as might have been surrounded by
five cloisters above the steps which led to the “troubled” waters of
Bethesda. But the excavations of 1902--already noticed--showed that a
large pool formerly existed before the cave, under the present mound
with its two modern flights of steps leading down to the water. The
only real objection to this site thus disappears, and we may regard
Bethesda as having been the later name of the older Gihon, and as one
of the few well-fixed Gospel sites.
[Sidenote: THE COUNCIL HOUSE]
Careful study also serves to cast some light on the sites connected
with our Lord’s Passion, including those of the palaces of Annas and
Caiaphas, the Prætorium, the palace of Herod, and the Golgotha. It
should be noted that the Sanhedrin[291] assembled first in the “Chamber
of Hewn Stone,” which was near the south-west corner of the Priests’
Court. But forty years before the fall of Jerusalem--according to
rabbinical tradition--when the power of life and death had been taken
from this assembly by the procurators, “the Sanhedrin transferred
itself and established itself in vaulted buildings”[292] (or “in a
vaulted building”), by which we may well understand the “Council House”
(_boulê_ or _bouleutêrion_), which--as we have seen--was possibly the
“ancient hall” found by Sir Charles Warren outside the West Gate of
the Temple. Josephus also notices the house of a high-priest (Ananias)
apparently as being near the Hasmonæan palace (rebuilt by Agrippa II.
in the north-east corner of the upper city), or close to the “Council
House.”[293] These indications are valuable, because the time between
the first appearance of Jesus before the procurator and the hour of
crucifixion is limited. If the latter occurred at 9 a.m., and the first
appearance before Pilate “in the morning”--that is to say, after 6
a.m.--we have only three hours, during which time the various events
of the trial occurred. These included the first examination by Pilate,
the transference to Herod’s palace, the mocking, the return to Pilate’s
tribunal, the scourging and crowning with thorns, after a second
examination, and Pilate’s interviews with priests and people; finally,
the slow procession of the cross to Calvary, and the preparations for
crucifixion. When the author of the fourth Gospel speaks of the “sixth
hour” as that when the words “Behold your King” were uttered, we can
only suppose that some clerical error has arisen, as this contradicts
the older Gospel.[294] The time is so short for the various events that
the various places mentioned should be sought in close proximity to one
another.
For this reason we are led to suppose that the Prætorium was the castle
of Antonia.[295] The Greek word (_praitôrion_) borrowed from Latin
means “the house of a prætor,” or more generally the residence of a
governor. We do not actually know where the procurators lived when they
were in Jerusalem, but in 65 A. D. we find that the first object of
Florus, on entering the city, was to establish himself in Antonia, and
it was not till he failed to reach this citadel that he took refuge
in the upper city. Peter’s prison seems also to have been in Antonia,
since the gate opened thence into the city. Paul was certainly taken
to this “castle” (_parembolê_), up the steps whence he spoke to the
mob. The site of these steps is marked by a cutting in the middle of
the south scarp of Antonia which is now walled up, and the mob had
thus invaded the broad court of the citadel, extending from the scarp
to the Temple cloisters. Antonia was the station of an “Italian band”
which policed the excited Temple crowds, and we read that Jesus was
led by the soldiers “to the Praitorian hall.” But the fourth Gospel
gives a yet clearer indication, for it identifies the “pavement” with
the Hebrew Gabbatha, or “height,” where was the _bêma_ or tribune--the
raised pulpit of the judge. It is not at first evident what a
“pavement” has to do with a “height,” but the word (_lithostrôton_)
does not mean a tessellated floor but only something “covered with
stones,” and Josephus tells us that at Antonia “the rock itself was
covered over with smooth pieces of stone from its foundation, both
for ornament, and that any one who would try either to get up or go
down it might not be able to hold his feet upon it.” Thus an apparent
mistranslation of “Gabbatha” is perhaps in reality an indication that
the Prætorium was in the citadel of Antonia.
[Sidenote: THE PALACES]
The “upper palace”--that of Herod the Great, on the west side of the
upper city--seems always to have been held by the procurators as a
fortress, and when Herod Antipas came to Jerusalem he probably--like
Agrippa II.--lived in the old Hasmonæan palace close to the bridge, as
this enabled him to go to the Temple without passing through the city.
These various considerations may perhaps help us to trace the course
of events. In the darkness before dawn the traitor came, with the
servants of the high-priest, to the garden of Gethsemane somewhere on
Olivet beyond the Kidron. Jesus was led thence perhaps across Ophel,
and under the great bridge, to the “hall” of the high-priest, which may
probably have adjoined the Council House. He was seen first by Annas,
who ordered that He should be sent bound to Caiaphas. The latter had
hastily summoned “all the Sanhedrin,”[296] probably in the Council
House. This expression no doubt means the full Sanhedrin of seventy-one
members; for Caiaphas inquired of Jesus concerning “His doctrine,”[297]
and He was arraigned as a false prophet and false Messiah. Many false
witnesses were examined, and the examination may have been long, since,
according to the Mishnah, “every judge who extends examination is
to be commended.” A false prophet, according to the same authority,
could only be judged at Jerusalem and by the full Sanhedrin, and could
be tried and executed on a holiday, which in other cases was not
allowable.[298] Jesus could not, according to law, be condemned as a
blasphemer,[299] for that crime was defined as being the utterance of
the name Jehovah. Yet the fact that the Sanhedrin “rent their clothes”
shows that He was condemned unjustly on this accusation also. Peter
stood in the outer court of the building, where a brazier burned
because of the cold. His denial of his Master probably occurred at
the moment when He was being led from the council chamber to be taken
before Pilate,[300] this being at “cock crow,” though the procurator
was not to be approached till the morning[301]--that is to say, after
sunrise, which took place about 6 a.m.
The power of life and death had been taken from the Sanhedrin by the
procurators, so that it was not lawful for them to put any man to
death. They no longer held their meetings in the Temple court, and
though their decisions were obeyed by Israel, their private assembly,
in the precincts of the high-priest’s “hall,” had no force under Roman
rule. It was necessary to induce the Procurator himself at least to
consent to the punishment of Jesus by death, but the priests had
scruples which forbade their entering Pilate’s Prætorium at Passover
time. They passed through the Temple, where Judas met them and cast
down the thirty pieces of silver, and they waited in the open court
below the stairs and scarp of Antonia, with the gathering crowd of
fanatical Jews, just where (more than twenty years later) another mob
assembled and was addressed by Paul from the same stairs.
Pilate was the favourite of Sejanus, who was the favourite of Tiberius.
The appointment did much to incense the Jews against Rome; for,
judging from the various riots and massacres of Jews, Galileans,
and Samaritans which occurred during his ten years’ rule, he was an
incompetent governor; and from the Gospel narrative it appears that
he was afraid of the mob, and anxious to shift all responsibility on
others, while endeavouring to follow the advice of his wiser wife, who
bade him have “nothing to do with that just man.” He took his seat on
the _bêma_ within the castle, where no doubt the angry roar of the
multitude below the rock could be heard. His first attempt to evade
his duties was made as soon as he learned that Jesus was a Galilean,
and the trial was interrupted in order that the prisoner might be sent
to Herod Antipas. We may suppose, therefore, that Jesus was taken by
the soldiers of the governor down the great stairs, and along the
west cloisters, where a guard was only needed on the left hand, and
so across the great Tyropœon bridge to the neighbouring palace of the
Hasmonæans.
But Antipas had no jurisdiction in Jerusalem, though he was curious
to see the prophet of Nazareth, and “hoped to have seen some miracle
done by Him.” He questioned our Lord with many words, and the priests
and scribes “vehemently accused Him.” But he took no responsibility,
though--with his men of war--he “set Him at nought, and mocked, and
arrayed Him in a brilliant mantle, and sent Him again to Pilate”[302]
by the way whereby He came.
[Sidenote: THE PRÆTORIUM]
Again Pilate took his seat in the Prætorium, and questioned our Lord
whether He was King of the Jews. For the priests brought no charge
of blasphemy against Him before the procurator, but endeavoured to
represent Him as a dangerous rebel against Rome, and as claiming to
be “the King Messiah.” Another mode of escape suggested itself to the
vacillating governor. He “went out” to the stairs, and offered to the
mob the release of their King as a concession at Passover. Again he
failed, for the people began to understand that he was afraid--afraid
of the mob, afraid of what would be said in Rome, afraid of his wife’s
face, afraid to do his duty. He saw that “he could prevail nothing but
rather that a tumult was made.” No one listened to his question, “What
evil hath He done?” They demanded that Jesus be crucified, and Barabbas
released. Meanly Pilate yielded his authority, and vainly he washed
his hands. Barabbas was no doubt in Antonia also, and was brought out
to appease the people. Jesus was scourged, and the soldiers in the
Prætorium clad Him again in the purple robe of Antipas, crowned Him
with thorns, placed in His hand the reed, and mocked Him in the hall
which afterwards became the Christian “Chapel of the Mocking,” still
existing on the Antonia rock. He was brought out and shown to the
multitude below, with the words, “Behold the man.”
Yet again Pilate hesitated, and went in to re-examine his prisoner,
seeking some means of escape from crime. But the power of which he
boasted was gone, and Jesus answered, “He that delivered me unto thee
hath the greater sin”--no doubt meaning Caiaphas, who worked on the
fears of the procurator through the mob that cried, “Thou art not
Cæsar’s friend.” For the last time he came forth to appease the people,
saying, “Behold your King,” and “gave up” Jesus to the Jews, who “had
no king but Cæsar,” conniving at the unlawful death doom (while seeking
not to admit his consent) by providing a guard. The white-robed figure
came down the broad flight of steps to where the cross was already
prepared, and bearing this He passed through the courts of Antonia
to the most northern of the Temple gates, and so down to the rough
pavement of the street, which ran northwards west of the sanctuary to
the city gate. This we may regard as the true Way of Sorrow, lying
below the street to-day.
[Sidenote: CALVARY]
We come therefore to the final question, where we should look for
Golgotha, and for the new tomb in the garden hard by. No one doubts
that these sites lay outside the city. The first and fourth Gospels
and the Epistle to the Hebrews alike make this conclusion quite
certain.[303] The first tells us that the guard of the sepulchre came
“into the city” afterwards; the second that Calvary was “nigh to the
city”; the third that “Jesus ... suffered without the gate.” It was
near this gate apparently that Simon the Cyrenian was found “coming
out of the field,” and forced to carry the cross. The only other
indications of the position of Golgotha are, that it was apparently
near a road and visible to those that “passed by,” and that it was
probably on a height because it was to be seen “afar off.”[304] There
is no reason to doubt that it was the usual place of execution, which
was familiar to the Gospel writers, and the same place outside the city
where Stephen and James were afterwards stoned.[305]
We must remember that although the punishment of crucifixion was not
one of the four death penalties of the Jews, yet it was not exclusively
a Roman mode of torture. It was usual among the Greeks in Alexander’s
age, and among Carthaginians a century later. It had been used by
Alexander Jannæus--as already mentioned--who was a pure Hebrew, and
who crucified eight hundred Jews. It was also customary, according to
the Mishnah, to crucify those who had been stoned: “They sank a beam
into the ground and a cross beam proceeded from it, and they bound his
hands one over the other, and hung him up.”[306] It was thus a Jewish
practice; and Pilate, though he provided the “title” to be borne before
the condemned--“The King of the Jews,” written in Hebrew, in Greek, and
in Latin--did not order the Crucifixion, but “gave up” the Son of Man
to His foes. There also seems to be no reason why a separate place of
execution, other than that generally used, should have been peculiar to
Roman executions at any time.
[Illustration: THE SUPPOSED SITE OF CALVARY.
From the Author’s sketch, looking north-west.]
[Sidenote: THE HOUSE OF STONING]
The “House of Stoning” was the Jewish place of death. It is mentioned
in the Mishnah,[307] and it was not at the judgment hall, but some
distance from it and out of sight; for a man was stationed at the
door of the hall, with a cloth in his hand, “and another man rode a
horse at a distance from him, but so that he might see him.” Thus if
any one desired to bring further evidence at the last moment for the
acquittal of the condemned, the cloth was waved, and the “horseman
galloped” after the prisoner, and brought him back to be tried again.
This description shows that a considerable distance separated the
“House of Stoning” from the vicinity of the Temple. At the place of
execution there was also apparently a precipice, for it was “the height
of two men,” or nearly 12 feet, and the two witnesses who cast the
first two stones seem to have stood above the victim on this cliff. It
must also have been outside the city in accordance with the law,[308]
but unfortunately the Rabbis have not told us in which direction. It
was close to a garden, in which was the private sepulchre of Joseph of
Arimathæa, “wherein was never man yet laid,” and this serves rather
to point to the north, which is the only direction in which we
have any notice of gardens outside Jerusalem[309]--the hill of Gareb
(or “plantations”) mentioned by Jeremiah being also on the north. The
north was regarded by the Jews as the unlucky side, and even down to
the sixteenth century the Ṣahrah, or “plateau” north of the city, is
described by an Arab writer as a place of evil repute,[310] while in
the fifth century the place of Stephen’s death by stoning was thought
to have been outside the north gate of Jerusalem. We have thus a
consensus of Jewish, Christian, and Moslem tradition on this subject.
It is unnecessary to describe the knoll, north of the Damascus Gate,
which is now a Moslem graveyard, or the cliff on its south side in
which is the so-called “Grotto of Jeremiah”; for the place is familiar
to all who have visited the Holy City, and from many well-known
photographs and drawings. It is called the Heidhemîyeh (or “cutting”)
by Syrians, and it was very clearly outside the city in the time of
our Lord, and even later, as we shall see in describing the course of
the third wall. It is a site suitable for a public execution, having
round it a flat amphitheatre of sloping ground. It is visible “afar
off” on either side, and it is immediately east of the great north
road. It is regarded still by the Jews of Jerusalem as being the
ancient “House of Stoning,” and though this tradition cannot be traced
in the scanty notices of the city to be found in the pilgrim texts of
Jewish travellers, yet it is by no means modern, and it exists among
the Sephardim families from Spain who have lived for centuries in
Jerusalem. The circumstances thus enumerated give good grounds for the
conclusion that this remarkable hill is not only the true site of the
“House of Stoning,” but the actual site of Calvary, and as such it has
been long regarded by many who have felt it impossible to accept the
traditional sites shown in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.[311]
This site I advocated in 1878; and it was afterwards pointed out[312]
that others, whose works I have never seen, had fixed on the same
spot, including Otto Thenius in 1849, and Mr. Fisher Rowe in 1871; but
neither of these writers has apparently mentioned the Jewish tradition.
In 1881 Dr. T. Chaplin kindly arranged for me to go, with a respectable
Spanish Jew, to see the reputed tomb of Simon the Just, and this guide
pointed out the hill in question when we passed it as the ancient
“House of Stoning.” After the publication of my suggestion in 1878,
the idea was adopted, first by Mr. Laurence Oliphant, and afterwards
in 1882 by General Gordon. The very general acceptance of the site was
due no doubt to the great influence of the last named; but he added
theories of his own, and thought that a tomb in the cliff--now known as
the “Garden Tomb”--must be the true site of the Holy Sepulchre.
[Sidenote: THE GARDEN TOMB]
General Gordon had not then been long in Palestine, and he was
not aware that this tomb had been described already, and had been
attributed to a much later age than that of our Lord. He was not versed
in Palestine archæology, and the arguments brought forward by the
supporters of this opinion are not convincing. The fourth Gospel[313]
says that “in [or “at”] the place where He was crucified there was a
garden, and in the garden a new sepulchre” which was “nigh at hand,”
but not of necessity in the cliff of Calvary, which would indeed be
a very unlikely position for a private tomb. Others have urged that
since the “deacons of the Church of the Marturion,” named Nonus and
Onesimus,[314] were buried near this place, and one of their texts
speaks of a deacon as “buried near his Lord,” there must have been
an early Christian tradition pointing to this site. But the church
so described was that built by Constantine, and the texts are not
earlier at most than the fourth century, when the whole Christian world
accepted the present traditional sites of Calvary and the Sepulchre.
The “Garden Tomb” is not a Jewish tomb, and there is good reason to
suppose that it is not older than the twelfth century A. D. It was
first excavated in 1873, when I visited and described it.[315] When
opened, it was found to be filled to the roof with bones, and when
these were cleared away by Herr K. Schick, two Latin patriarch’s
crosses, in red paint, were found on the east wall of the inner
chamber. These could not have been painted before the twelfth century,
since the Greek cross is always found alone earlier in Palestine.
East of the tomb there are marks of vaults supported against the rock.
It is well known that the Hospice of the Templars[316] was here built,
for pilgrims visiting Jerusalem, not earlier than the end of the
twelfth century, and it was called the Asnerie, or “place for asses,”
because the asses used by the travellers were here stabled. The remains
of mangers were still visible in 1881, at the south-west corner of this
building, in the flat ground below the cliff to the south. The hospice
thus appears to have been about 200 feet square, and the tomb in all
probability was connected with it, as a sepulchre for pilgrims or for
Templars. The immense accumulation of corpses, here hurriedly buried,
may have been due to the Kharezmian massacre in 1244 A. D. The inner
chamber of this tomb, to the east, had three graves on the floor. It
does not in any way answer to the tomb described in the Gospels, nor is
it at all like the Greco-Jewish tombs of the first century A. D.
[Illustration: TOMB WEST OF CALVARY.
From the Author’s sketch.]
[Sidenote: THE NEW TOMB]
For these reasons, while it is probable that the site is that of
Calvary, we must still say of our Lord as was said of Moses, “No man
knoweth of His sepulchre unto this day.” This indeed is the general
conclusion of recent writers, and even as regards Calvary we have only
probabilities to consider. It is not desirable to create new sacred
places, by the same enthusiasm without knowledge which led to the
creation of those of the fourth century. There is, however, a single
tomb, on the west side of the north road, which passes close to the
“House of Stoning” leaving it to the east; but I should be loath to
describe this as being more than a possible site at most for the “new
tomb.” This sepulchre I examined in 1881, and was led, by comparing
it with the other tombs of about the first century A. D., to the
conclusion that it was a Greco-Jewish tomb.[317] It is cut in the east
face of a rock, and has a chamber for six bodies. Outside, to the north
of its outer court, there is another chamber with a single loculus,
which might conceivably represent the “new tomb”; for though there are
many old Christian tombs in the vicinity, there is no other known which
is Greco-Jewish.[318] A cylindrical rolling stone (like a cheese set up
on its round edge) often closes the door of this class of tomb--as can
still be seen at the tomb of Helena of Adiabene, north of Jerusalem,
and elsewhere. The Garden Tomb can never have had such a stone, but at
the Greco-Jewish tomb in question guard stones outside both chambers
exist, which may have kept such stones in place before the doors.
In Palestine generally there are five kinds of rock tomb. In the north
the Phœnician class has a chamber with _kokîm_, or tunnel graves, at
the bottom of a deep shaft--as in Egypt. The usual Hebrew tomb has a
chamber entered from the face of the rock, with _kokîm_ dug endwise
from the walls. The inner, and therefore later, chambers of such tombs
have a different arrangement in examples which--from the Greek details
of the porches--must belong to the Greek or the Herodian ages. In such
chambers a rock sarcophagus under an arch is cut parallel to the wall
on each side. The “new tomb” was clearly of this class, since we read
that two angels sat, one at the head, the other at the foot of the
grave, which would be impossible in a tomb with _kokîm_ graves. The
Greco-Jewish class of tomb was certainly in use in the first century
A. D. The fourth class consists of rock-sunk graves, with a heavy lid
fitted above: this seems to belong to Roman times. The fifth has two
graves, one each side of a shaft, and this is known from inscriptions
to have been in use in the twelfth century. Leaden coffins were
sometimes used in these later tombs. The sepulchre west of the “House
of Stoning” belongs to the third class--the Greco-Jewish--but, since
similar arrangements are to be found in some later Greek tombs of the
Byzantine age, it is not here intended to be understood that this tomb
of necessity existed at the time of the Crucifixion.
The present chapter has been one of conjecture as to probabilities,
rather than of the description of undoubted monuments. This is rendered
inevitable by the circumstances. The results will not be admitted by
those who are convinced that the traditional sites are to be accepted;
but to those who are not so convinced, the arguments may appear more
suggestive. The only known patristic allusion to Calvary before 326
A. D. is that of Origen in our third century,[319] and he only refers
to a “Hebrew” tradition that Adam was buried at Golgotha. He must mean
Hebrew Christians, as the Jews never mention Golgotha by name at all,
and held that Adam was buried at Hebron, as Jerome also supposed--a
tradition repeated by the Jewish traveller Rabbi Jacob in 1258 A. D.,
and which was based on the old name of Hebron, Kirjath Arb’a, “the city
of four,” who were supposed to be Adam, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.[320]
Even if some Hebrews supposed Adam to have died in Jerusalem, the
tradition is very improbable, and also tells us nothing as to the
position of Calvary.
The events of the Passion have been detailed at some length, with the
object of showing that the accounts in the four Gospels do not disagree
as a whole with one another, and that the close proximity of the sites
fits with the limited time that elapsed between the first trial in the
Prætorium and the Crucifixion of our Lord. Like the early Christians,
we must be content with a very general idea of the localities; and as
regards the “new sepulchre,” we must “let the dead bury their dead.”
FOOTNOTES TO CHAPTER VII
[286] Neubauer, “Géog. du Talmud,” 1868, p. 142, quotes Tal. Jer.,
_Sanhed._, ii. 2 (“et dans d’autres passages”), for the doctors seated
on the steps to teach. Luke ii. 46–50.
[287] The tables (_Sheḳ._, vi. 45); the seats (_Sukkah_, iv. 1); the
boxes (_Sheḳ._, iii. 2); and the stalls (Tal. Bab., _Aboda Zara_, 8
_b._; _Rosh hash-Shanah_, 31 _a_). Matt. xxi. 12; Mark xi. 16; Luke
xix. 45, xxi. 1; John ii. 14, x. 23; Josephus, “Ant.” XX. ix. 7;
“Wars,” V. v. 1; Acts iii. 2.
[288] Matt. xxiii. 37, xxiv. 1–2; Mark xiii. 1–2; Luke xxi. 1–5.
[289] John v. 2–4, ix. 7. The “tower of Siloam” (Luke xiii. 4) was
probably one of those on the city wall near the pool.
[290] Bordeaux Pilgrim (333 A. D.); Eucherius (_c._ 427–40 A. D.);
Onomasticon, s.v. _Bethesda_.
[291] See Derenbourg, “Palestine,” 1867, p. 465; Mishnah, _Middoth_,
iv. 7, and _Seder Olam_, and Tal. Bab., _Aboda Zara_, 8 _b_, _Rosh
hash-Shanah_, 31 _a_, are quoted by Derenbourg.
[292] _Ḥanuioth_, see Gesenius, “Lex.,” Jer. xxxvii. 16; _Ḥanuth_ in
Tal. Bab., _Rosh hash-Shanah_, 31 _a_, in the singular; Josephus,
“Wars,” V., iv. 2, vi. 3.
[293] Josephus, “Wars,” II. xvii. 6.
[294] Mark xv. 25; John xix. 14.
[295] Mark xv. 16; John xviii. 28, xix. 9, 13; Josephus, “Wars,” II.
xv. 5, V. v. 8; Acts xii. 10, xxi. 31, 37, 40.
[296] Matt. xxvi. 59.
[297] John xviii. 19.
[298] _Sanhed._, i. 5, v. 2, x. 4.
[299] _Ibid._, vii. 5.
[300] Luke xxii. 61.
[301] Matt. xxvi. 74, xxvii. 1; Mark xiv. 72, xv. 1; Luke xxii. 66,
xxiii. 1; John xviii. 27, 28.
[302] Luke xxiii. 6–12.
[303] Matt. xxviii. 11; John xix. 20, 41; Heb. xiii. 12.
[304] Matt. xxvii. 32, 39; Mark xv. 21, 29; Luke xxiii. 26, 49.
[305] Acts vii. 58.
[306] Mishnah, _Sanhed._, vi. 4.
[307] _Ibid._, vi. 1–4.
[308] Deut. xxii. 24; John xix. 41.
[309] Josephus, “Wars,” V. ii. 2; Jer. xxxi. 39.
[310] Mejîr ed Dîn (_c._ 1521 A. D.).
[311] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., 1883, pp. 428–35.
[312] Prof. T. Hayter Lewis, “Holy Places of Jerusalem,” 1888, p. 113.
[313] John xix. 41, 42.
[314] See _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, April, 1890, p. 69.
[315] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., p. 385.
[316] “Citez de Jhérusalem,” after 1187 A. D.
[317] See “Ord. Survey Notes,” plate xxv., for the tomb of Helena of
Adiabene; “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., p. 433, for plan of
the tomb in question.
[318] See Matt. xxvii, 60, 66; Mark xv. 46; Luke xxiv. 2; John xx. 1,
12. Herr K. Schick stated that when this tomb was excavated, a slab
was found in it, on which was a Greek cross, with the words _Thêkê
Diapherous(a)_, or “a private sepulchre.” The tomb is very roughly cut,
and may have been hewn as late as the fifth century A. D., unless it
was re-used.
[319] Origen, “Catena” (see Sir C. Wilson’s article, _Pal. Expl. Fund
Quarterly_, January, 1902, p. 71): “As regards the Place of a Skull,
Hebrew tradition has come down to us that Adam’s body was buried
there.” Jerome, on Matt. xxvii., says that Adam was buried at Hebron
(Reland, “Pal.,” ii. p. 709).
[320] Tal. Bab., _Erubin_, 53 _a_.
CHAPTER VIII
THE FALL OF JERUSALEM
Only forty years after the day of the Crucifixion the blood of the
rejected Messiah came on the heads of those who had invoked it on
themselves and on their children; and the soldiers of Titus nailed the
Jewish deserters to crosses outside the city to the north, till “room
was wanting for the crosses and crosses for the bodies.”[321] We may
briefly examine the course of events that led to the final catastrophe.
The death of Herod the Great was the signal for revolt against
Rome.[322] Archelaus and Antipas sailed at once for the imperial city,
to urge their claims before Augustus. In their absence Sabinus acted
as Cæsar’s procurator, under Varus the governor of Syria. He appears
to have exacted money, and to have otherwise oppressed the Jews, and
at the Feast of Pentecost--about the middle of May--the city was
filled with pilgrims from Jericho, Galilee, and beyond Jordan, and
with Idumæans from the south. Their indignation at injuries inflicted
by Sabinus led to revolt, and while some held the west cloister of
the Temple, and others the “Hippodrome” (perhaps the Xystos) towards
the south, a third band besieged the Romans in Herod’s palace on the
west side of the Upper City. Sabinus, from the top of the Phasaelus
tower, directed a sally, and drove the rebels back to the Temple. The
west cloister was set on fire, and the soldiers plundered the Temple
treasure; but the siege closed in again, and the Jews attempted to
undermine the palace walls. Varus hastened to march on Palestine,
which was reduced to anarchy, and he advanced on Samaria, set fire to
Emmaus Nicopolis, and finally reached Jerusalem, reinforced by Arab
auxiliaries sent by Ḥârith, king of Petra. The Jerusalem Jews excused
themselves before him, and the strangers abandoned the siege and
dispersed. Sabinus, fearing to meet his superior, stole away to the
seaside, probably to Cæsarea; the revolt was quelled, and two thousand
of the rebels were seized and crucified. Varus returned to Antioch,
leaving a legion at Jerusalem, and pacified the Jews by allowing them
to send an embassy to Rome, petitioning that they might be permitted to
live according to their own law. Archelaus was given the government of
Judæa and Samaria by Augustus, but only held it for ten years. Antipas
received Galilee, and Peræa (beyond Jordan), which he held till 39
A. D., and Herod Philip had Bashan and Abilene.
The time was, however, now come for direct Roman rule; and when
Archelaus was banished to Vienne, Coponius became the first
procurator,[323] and Pontius Pilatus was the fifth (25 to 35 A. D.).
The character of these governors depended on that of the emperor under
whom they served, and Pilate was a placeman under Tiberius in the
later years of that hated emperor. But, as Tacitus says, the Jews, as
a whole, “had rest” under Tiberius, and the prosperity of the country
increased. Agrippa was a popular ruler, though in his last year he
persecuted the Christians at Jerusalem; and in his time the city was
fortified by a new wall on the north. Tacitus again says that “the Jews
had patience till Gessius Florus was made procurator” (by Nero); “under
him it was that the war began.”
[Sidenote: PILATE’S AQUEDUCT]
Even when Pilate attempted to benefit the city by making an aqueduct,
he roused bitter wrath by appropriating the “sacred money” for the
purpose. He also introduced statues of Cæsar secretly into the Temple,
and was soon forced by Jewish opposition to remove them. He put
down a Samaritan outbreak with cruelty, and Vitellius, governor of
Syria, ordered him to Rome, where he arrived in 37 A. D. to find that
Tiberius was dead. Marcellus was appointed procurator in his stead,
and Vitellius pacified the Jews by granting to them the custody of the
high-priest’s vestments, which were kept till then under Roman custody
in Antonia.[324]
There is no mention of any aqueducts at Jerusalem before the time
of Pilate, except the Siloam one, and the “Conduit of the Upper
Pool,” dating from the reign of Ahaz. Nor do the remains of the great
reservoirs at Etam (near Urṭâs), and of the two aqueducts from the
south, give any indications of construction earlier than the work
of the Romans. The high-level aqueduct indeed was probably not in
existence till the time of Hadrian, as will appear subsequently. It
was the low-level aqueduct that Pilate made.[325] It was fed by the
spring at Etam, south of Bethlehem, by a reservoir farther south, and
by the lowest of the three great tanks near the spring. When in repair
it still carries water to the Temple enclosure, having a serpentine
course of about thirteen miles, and passing through two tunnels at
Bethlehem and near Jerusalem. The three pools at Etam are fed by rain
water, and by the spring known as the “Sealed Fountain.” The channel
crossed the Valley of Hinnom (on arches) above the present Birket es
Sulṭân, and ran on the south slope of the upper city and along its east
side, crossing the Tyropœon, and passing (near the present Gate of the
Chain) through the Herodian west rampart, and thus to a rock-cut tank
south of the inner Temple court. Josephus does not over-estimate its
length, if he refers to that feeder of the “low-level” aqueduct which
runs from the spring of Kueizîba, far south of the Etam pool, to feed
the three reservoirs. Even the shorter distance from near the pool
makes Pilate’s aqueduct much longer than any other known in Palestine.
That it should be attributed to Solomon is due to later traditional
conjecture, and there is no notice in the Bible of any such work as
executed by him. The three reservoirs are now called “Solomon’s Pools,”
but the masonry is Roman. Josephus says that Solomon had gardens
“abounding in rivulets of water” at Etam, but does not speak of any
aqueduct. The legend of the “Sealed Fountain” may be founded on his
allusion, which Christian writers connected with a verse in the Song of
Songs, “A garden enclosed is my one bride, A spring shut up, a fountain
sealed.”[326]
Under Agrippa I. Jerusalem reached the summit of its prosperity, and
as early as ten years after the Crucifixion the city had so greatly
increased in size, on the north, that a new wall was necessary to
defend the new suburbs. This wall was built by Agrippa after 41 A. D.,
but the building was stopped by command of the Emperor Claudius,
whose suspicions were roused by Marcus, the governor of Syria.[327]
Josephus says, “The beginning of the third wall was at the tower
Hippicus, whence it reached as far as the north quarter of the city
and the tower Psephinus. Then it extended opposite the monuments of
Helena, which Helena was queen of Adiabene, the daughter of Izates, and
being prolonged across the Caverns of the Kings, it bent at a corner
tower called the Monument of the Fuller, and joined the old wall at
the valley called the Valley of Kedron.” For a fourth hill, north of
Antonia, had become an inhabited quarter beyond the outer fosse of that
citadel, and this was called “Bezetha” in Aramaic, or in Greek “the
New City.” The word Bezetha comes from a root meaning to “divide,”
and seems to refer to the ridge being here cut across by the fosse.
From other passages we learn that there was a gate opposite Helena’s
monument, with towers called the “Women’s Towers.” Psephinus was a
great octagonal tower at the north-west corner of the wall; it was 70
cubits high, and Josephus says that Arabia, and even the Mediterranean,
could be seen from it. This seems impossible, but at least it may have
had a view of the mountains of Arabia near Petra, which can be seen
from the high ground near the modern Russian buildings, as I have
personally observed in winter when they were covered with snow.
[Sidenote: AGRIPPA’S WALL]
We may consider in detail the positions of the monuments of Helena
and of the Caverns of the Kings, which are the two fixed points on
the line, as well as the question whether any remains of Agrippa’s
wall can be supposed to exist. Helena’s monument is perhaps one of the
best fixed sites at Jerusalem; and, if we may believe Josephus, who
says that it was “no more than three furlongs from the city,”[328] we
have a measurement which determines the position of the Women’s Towers
as being about due west of the “House of Stoning,” described in the
last chapter. The tomb was adorned with three pyramids, and held the
bones of Helena, who had become a convert to Judaism, and of her son
Izates, named after his grandfather. They died about the same time,
apparently not earlier than 50 A. D. Pausanias describes this tomb as
having a rolling stone at its door, and Jerome says that it lay east
of the north road. These indications point to the great Greco-Jewish
rock-sepulchre which is commonly called the “Tombs of the Kings,” or by
Arabs “Tombs of the Sulṭâns.”
[Sidenote: TOMB OF HELENA]
This monument has four chambers, reached from an outer court by a
small door with a rolling stone still before it. There is also a fifth
chamber below, having a secret entrance, and reached by a flight of
steps. The tomb was explored by M. de Saulcy, who made very remarkable
discoveries in it, showing that it was still in use after 79 A. D.,
for all the coins were of the reign of Titus. Izates, however, had
a large family, and some of his children came to Jerusalem when the
throne of Adiabene descended to his brother Monobasus. Cinerary urns,
lamps, glass bottles for unguents, others of alabaster, gold ornaments,
chains, and fibulæ were found, as well as osteophagi like those in
other tombs near Jerusalem, ornamented with incised geometrical
patterns. But the most important find was an unopened sarcophagus, with
a partly legible Aramaic text of two lines, having eight letters in
each. When the cover was removed, a skeleton was seen with the hands
crossed in front; it crumbled away immediately, leaving only the gold
threads which once adorned the winding sheet. But the text (in Aramaic
letters very like the Palmyrene forms) appears clearly to begin with
the name _’Elen malkatha_, for “Helena the queen,” and thus serves to
identify the monument as being actually that of the royal family of
Adiabene.[329]
The “Caverns of the Kings” seem to be clearly those which still exist
under the cliff east of the Damascus Gate. They have been used at some
time as a quarry, but the unfinished stones now remaining in them are
not of very great dimensions. M. Clermont-Ganneau, however, found a
rough sketch of a cherub carved on the wall, and as this appears to be
in the old Phœnician or Babylonian style, it indicates considerable
antiquity for the caverns. There is also a rock fosse with scarps
at and east of this place, defending the present north wall of the
city, which runs apparently on the line of Agrippa’s wall to a corner
tower, and then turning southwards joins the east wall of the Ḥaram.
It is generally agreed that this was the line of Agrippa’s wall on
the north-east and east,[330] but some writers suppose that the
modern north wall represents the farthest extension of Jerusalem in
Agrippa’s time throughout its course, and they have placed Psephinus
at the mediæval “Tancred’s Tower,” within the north-west angle of the
present city. This tower, however, does not suit the description by
Josephus, since it is neither octagonal nor has it an extensive view.
The masonry, even of the oldest part, is of the twelfth century, and
the foundations of an older wall between this tower and the Damascus
Gate have also been proved to be the work of the Crusaders. If we
follow the description of Josephus, Psephinus must have been farther to
the north-west, and outside the present wall. The Women’s Towers must
also have been about 300 yards farther north than the Damascus Gate,
if they were only 3 furlongs from the tomb of Helena; and the broad
fosse, south of the “House of Stoning,” defines the approximate line of
Agrippa’s wall as running from a block of rock west of the north road
where there was an angle, and thence south-east, and then east over the
Caverns of the Kings.
As regards any remains of this wall, large stones, with well-dressed
faces and drafts after the Herodian style, have been found in several
places towards the north-west outside Jerusalem, and these may have
belonged to Agrippa’s wall; but it is very doubtful if any of them are
in their original positions. One group, excavated by Sir Charles Wilson
in 1864, forms the side of a tank, and the stones have evidently been
re-used--probably farther north than the line of the wall to which
they originally belonged. In 1838 there were remains of a wall, and
foundations which Dr. Robinson describes as those of a “large tower,”
extending north-west, beyond the modern city, towards the Russian
cathedral, which was not then built. He describes “large hewn blocks
of stone,” and regards this line as having “belonged very distinctly
to the third wall.” This was still to be seen in 1847, and Herr
Konrad Schick, who saw the remains, speaks of a “strong wall,” but
unfortunately they have now entirely disappeared. Such remains are not
to be found towards the north-east outside the present north wall,
which seems clearly to have been here built on the old line.[331]
[Sidenote: AGRIPPA]
In the time of Agrippa Jerusalem therefore extended over about 300
acres, and--judging from the density of population in the modern
city--it must have had about 30,000 inhabitants. The old city, bounded
by the “second wall,” occupied only 200 acres, and it does not seem
likely that the town would have become half as large again in the
short interval of ten years which elapsed between the Crucifixion and
the accession of Agrippa, especially as these were not particularly
prosperous years. Thus, though the “second wall” was the northern limit
of the fortress in the time of our Lord, it is probable that Bezetha
had already been built over, and that the houses extended on the flat
ground outside the rampart, on the north-west, even before the date of
the Crucifixion. This would involve the abandonment of the traditional
site of Calvary as not being outside the city, but we have already seen
that this site in all probability lay even within the second wall.
The wall of Agrippa appears to have been still unfinished when its
building was stopped by Claudius, and in 70 A. D. Titus found it
incomplete[332] towards the north-west. Josephus says, “The first
fortification was lower, and the second did not join it; the builders
neglecting to build the wall strong where the new city was not much
inhabited.” He is speaking of the west part of the wall, though on the
east as well there seems to have been no very formidable rampart north
of Antonia. The death of Agrippa I., in 44 A. D., marks the beginning
of Jewish troubles, and no later builder attempted to strengthen
Jerusalem farther on the north.
Events hurried on to the final catastrophe during the quarter of a
century that now followed,[333] and the narratives of Josephus are full
of allusions to the city and to its topography. The Christians at
Jerusalem were persecuted by Agrippa just before his death. James the
Less was killed by the sword, and Peter was imprisoned.[334] Cuspius
Fadus, the eighth procurator, was then appointed by Claudius, and he
took away again from the priests the custody of the high-priest’s
vestments, which were kept in Antonia. In 49 A. D., under Ventidius
Cumanus, Roman soldiers insulted the Temple at the Feast of Passover.
A riot followed, and a massacre turned the feast into mourning and
defiled the Holy House with blood. In 52 A. D. Felix replaced Cumanus,
and the discontent of the Jews increased under his rule when Nero
became emperor two years later. Of Felix, who married Drusilla, sister
of Agrippa II., Tacitus says that “he exercised all kind of barbarity
and extravagance, as if he had royal authority with the disposition of
a slave.” “He had been a good while ago set over Judæa, and thought
he might be guilty of all sorts of wickedness with impunity,” relying
on the power of his brother Pallas at Rome. Cumanus was then ruling
Galilee, and Felix, “by the use of unseasonable remedies, blew up the
coals of sedition into a flame, and was imitated by his partner in the
government, Ventidius Cumanus.”[335]
[Sidenote: JAMES THE GREAT]
A short respite of four years, under Porcius Festus and Albinus (60
to 64 A. D.), preceded the fatal selection of Gessius Florus, the
last procurator. During this time the Temple was finished,[336] and
Agrippa II. rebuilt the Hasmonæan palace. This gave great offence
to the priests, because it had a view of the inner Temple; and they
built a screen on the cloister wall which Festus ordered them to
remove. Agrippa had been given authority over the Temple by Claudius,
and refused to expend its treasure on a projected rebuilding of the
eastern cloister, though he did not object to the paving of the city.
Under Albinus,[337] James the “brother of Jesus who was called Christ”
was stoned to death by an illegal order of the Sanhedrin, according to
the famous passage in Josephus, and Agrippa was obliged to depose the
high-priest Ananus, because of the wrath of Albinus, whose consent had
not been given to this third execution at the “House of Stoning.” It
was probably after this persecution, about 64 A. D., that the surviving
disciples left Jerusalem. James the Great was alive at Jerusalem in
58 A. D., so that there is no difficulty as to his martyrdom about
62 A. D. But it is remarkable that, on the occasion of Paul’s last
visit to Jerusalem, Peter is not mentioned, though he was still one
of the “pillars” in 52 A. D. He had perhaps died in the interval, and
the belief in his later martyrdom at Rome is not supported by any
statement in the New Testament. The diminished band of the Apostles
withdrew before the time of the great revolt, and found peace at the
little village of Pella beyond Jordan, escaping the miseries of the
final siege, the “beginning of sorrows” when false Messiahs, such as
Eleazar and the Egyptian prophet, appeared, and when there were “wars
and rumours of wars” throughout Palestine. Within the time of the
first generation they saw the end of their world. “For the days shall
come upon thee that thine enemies shall cast a trench about thee, and
compass thee round, and keep thee in on every side, and shall lay thee
even with the ground and thy children within thee, and they shall not
leave one stone upon another, because thou knewest not the time of thy
visitation.”[338]
The Roman world was not likely to prosper under an emperor like
Nero, who would not trouble himself with its more serious affairs,
and Gessius Florus was a bad procurator under an evil master. Cestius
Gallus, governor of Syria,[339] in vain attempted to restore order
when he visited Jerusalem, and received the appeal of the Jews against
their tyrant, who was accused of appropriating the sacred treasures.
Florus entered Jerusalem in wrath, and allowed his soldiers to pillage
the upper market. He is said to have crucified many Jews, and to have
ordered a massacre, in spite of the entreaties of Berenice, while a
procession of priests preceded by harpers and singers strove to pacify
the insurgents. The Romans drove the mob with clubs to the Bezetha
quarter, but failed to gain entry into Antonia, and Florus withdrew
to the citadel of the upper city. The Jews appear to have barricaded
the approach to the Temple by cutting down the cloisters on the north.
The citizens, supported by Berenice, appealed to Cestius, and Florus
retreated to Cæsarea.
[Sidenote: THE REVOLT]
Agrippa II. now returned from Egypt to Jamnia, near Joppa, and to him
the Jews also appealed. Cestius sent his envoy Neapolitanus, who was
received at Siloam, escorted round the walls, and after worshipping
in the Temple returned to Syria. Agrippa from his palace addressed
the crowd, and Berenice wept before them. But when he attempted to
collect the arrears of taxation he was stoned, and left Jerusalem in
disgust. The fanatical spirit of the rioters was fanned by Eleazar,
son of the high-priest, and the more moderate and peaceful party were
forced to seek refuge with the Romans in the upper city fortress. The
fierce “siccarii,” or “dagger men,” drove the soldiers of Agrippa into
this citadel. They burned the house of the high-priest, the palaces of
Agrippa and Berenice, and the place of the “archives” where the legal
contracts were stored: they thus destroyed any records of their debts
or agreements. Some of the priests were forced to hide in underground
vaults, while others fled to the “upper palace” built by Herod the
Great. The rebels attacked Antonia, which fell into their hands
after two days, and was set on fire; they then attacked the western
citadel, driving the Romans to the three towers Hippicus, Phasaelus,
and Mariamne. They were led by a certain Menahem, who for the moment
eclipsed Eleazar: he was the son of Judas the Galilean, and assumed
royal state. The high-priest was found hidden in the aqueduct tunnel
and was killed, which roused his son Eleazar to attack Menahem, who
fled to Ophel. Metellius, the Roman commander, reduced to extremities
when one of the towers of the western fortress had been undermined, at
length was forced to treat with Eleazar. The Romans laid down their
shields and swords, but some were then slain, and others compelled to
become Jews. There seems to have been no more than a single cohort
(perhaps 1,000 men) in the city, which thus fell entirely into the
hands of the fanatical party.
The Roman governors, selected by emperors like Nero, were no doubt both
corrupt and incapable; but the hatred of Semitic peoples was a survival
of the ancient hatred of Carthage. The Romans despised a civilisation
and a religion which were far more ancient and more lofty than their
own. The Jews, when governed honestly, were content to remain under
the empire; they only asked for freedom to follow their own law, as
they had asked the Greeks in earlier days. But Roman prejudices against
them can best be understood by reading Tacitus, who hated them, or
the poets, who knew only the more degraded class of Jewish hucksters
crowded in the ghetto in Rome. Tacitus says that “the Jews were the
only people who stood out, which increased the rage” of the Roman
race. He supposed that they came originally from Crete, or from Libya,
or from Assyria, and he repeats the libels which are attributed to
Manetho the Egyptian priest. He had heard of Moses as a law-giver,
but his belief that the image of an ass was adored in the Temple may
have arisen from some distorted account of the Cherubim, if these may
be regarded as having had animal forms, as in the vision of Ezekiel.
He admits that “among themselves there is an unalterable fidelity and
kindness always ready at hand,” yet adds, “but bitter enmity against
all others.” “The Jews have no idea of more than one divine being,” is
his comment on the religion of the race, and he contradicts himself
when he says, “They have no images in their cities, much less in their
temples.” But the enmity felt against Israel was political rather than
religious. Jerusalem was the last stronghold of a nation which refused
to be absorbed in the cosmopolitan system of the empire.
[Sidenote: ROUT OF CESTIUS]
Against this rebellious city Cestius Gallus now hastened from
Syria,[340] and with the 12th legion from Cæsarea he reached Beth-horon
and Gibeon, where Simon, son of Gioras, attacked him in rear on a
sabbath day. This caused three days’ delay, after which he encamped
at Skopos (“the view”), which was 7 furlongs north of Jerusalem, at
the high ridge where the city first becomes fully visible on the north
road. No attempt was made by the rebels to defend the unfinished wall
of Agrippa, or the northern suburbs, and the Romans set fire to Bezetha
and to the wood market. Cestius then attacked the upper city at the
high saddle by the royal towers but desisted after five days. Intrigue
and treachery are the bane of generals, and Florus desired apparently
that Cestius should fail, with 10,000 men, to retake the city which he
had deserted, leaving only 1,000 to guard it. According to Josephus,
Florus intrigued with officers of the auxiliary cavalry; and a certain
Tyrannius Priscus induced Cestius to attack Antonia and the Temple
instead of the upper city. The commander found his troops unreliable
and his officers untrustworthy. He was also perhaps ill himself, for he
died (according to Tacitus) shortly after, “whether by fate or that he
was weary of life is uncertain.” He gave up when probably on the eve of
success, and retreated to Gibeon to await reinforcements. But he was
vigorously pursued, and after two days the retreat became a rout, and
he lost half the legion and all his cavalry. The remnant fled down the
Beth-horon pass to Antipatris and Cæsarea. This second defeat of Rome
occurred in the twelfth year of Nero, some time in October, so that
further operations became difficult till the next spring.
The disasters thus brought on the empire by Florus and Nero cost
Rome four years of effort to repair, and entailed the systematic
reduction of the whole of Palestine. On the death of Cestius, Vespasian
was ordered to the east in the year 66 A. D. His ability had been
shown twenty years before, when, at the age of thirty-seven, he was
commanding in Britain, where he subdued the isle of Vectis. He was now
pro-consul in Africa, and had thus a wide experience of war in the west
and in the east alike. He made his base in Syria, and gathered a force
of four legions, ordering reinforcements from Egypt to fill the ranks
of the 5th and 10th, or Macedonian and Fretensis, legions.[341] His
plan was to conquer the country completely from the north, in order
finally to march on Jerusalem from all sides except the south. The war
thus began in Galilee, and it was not till February, 68 A. D., that
Gadara submitted, and allowed of his advance to Jericho in May. This
success gained him the confidence of the Romans; and the 5th, 10th, and
15th legions, whom he met in Syria, knew him well, having served under
him before. The 12th legion was made up to strength by drafts from the
22nd and 23rd legions stationed at Alexandria. On July 1, 69 A. D.,
Vespasian was proclaimed emperor, and left for Italy. The final triumph
was thus reserved for his brave and able son Titus.
A Roman legion, at this period of history, answered to a division,
consisting of 5,000 to 6,000 regular infantry, with the same number
of auxiliaries, and 300 cavalry. In addition to a force of at least
40,000 men, Titus had also a number of native allies. The Arabs sent
5,000 archers and 1,000 horsemen, and Agrippa--who joined the army in
Galilee--brought 1,000 foot and 1,000 horse. Thus Josephus is probably
right in estimating the total at about 60,000 in all. This army indeed
represented a very moderate force for the reduction of the whole
country and for the conquest of the difficult mountain region round
Jerusalem, though the Crusaders afterwards took the city with 40,000
men. It was very important, not only for the Flavian family, but for
the peace of the world, that there should be no further defeat of Rome,
and a margin of safety was desirable. The fighting force in Jerusalem
did not probably exceed 20,000 in all, and though a proportion of three
to one was barely sufficient for the besiegers of so strong a fortress,
the Romans were far superior in discipline and in the use of engines of
war.
The final concentration began in the spring of 70 A. D. The 5th, or
Macedonian, legion came up from Emmaus Nicopolis on the west; the 10th
(Fretensis) from Jericho to the Mount of Olives; the 15th (Apollinaris)
marched on Gophna, north of Bethel; and the disgraced 12th legion
(Fulminata) joined them from Cæsarea. Thus in the final advance the
last named was in the centre--at Skopos--with the 10th to its left and
the 15th to its right, the 5th and the auxiliaries forming the reserve
in rear. In this order the forces remained till the later stages of the
siege, when the 5th legion came into the fighting line against Antonia,
and the 10th was transferred to the right centre, joining the 15th in
the attack on the upper city.
[Sidenote: THE FACTIONS]
The defenders of the city were divided into three factions,[342] which
fought one another within the walls. The Zealots, under the command of
John of Gischala, and Eleazar son of Simon, sent in 68 A. D. to the
Idumæans for assistance, and these wild warriors were admitted during
a terrible storm by the fanatics, who sawed the bars of the city gate,
closed by order of the high-priest. They passed through the city to the
Temple, where they surprised the guards; and the high-priest himself
was slain. But after creating anarchy by the murder of many of the
moderate party, and of Zachariah, son of Baruch, who was accused--like
Jeremiah--of being a friend of the foe, and who fell in the middle of
the Temple, the Idumæans--like other Arabs--got tired of the war, and
desired to return home with their plunder. The better class of the
inhabitants preferred the Romans to the Zealots, and many of them also
deserted the city. Vespasian, who had heard of the death of Nero, which
occurred on June 16, 68 A. D., showed no signs of advance on the town,
and John of Gischala was left for a time to tyrannise over Jerusalem.
But, in April of the next year, Simon, son of Gioras, brought back the
Idumæans in the third year of the war, and drove John into the Temple,
where he erected four towers in the cloisters, one on the north-west
above the lower city, another on the north-east, a third as a signal
tower on the top of the Pastophoria (or “Chamber of Offerings”[343]),
where a priest used to stand to announce the sabbath by blowing a
trumpet, and the fourth near the Xystos, apparently at the east end
of the Tyropœon bridge. Simon made another tower at its west end, to
prevent the faction of John having access to the upper city. John soon
quarrelled with Eleazar, who held the inner temple, and, when the
Romans appeared at Passover time in 70 A. D., he succeeded in obtaining
entrance into the courts, and treacherously made himself master of the
whole. His forces, including the Zealots, are reckoned at 8,400 men by
Josephus. He defended the eastern hill from Bezetha to Ophel, while
Simon, with a total force of 15,000 men, including 5,000 Idumæans, held
the rest of the city to the west.
[Illustration: JERUSALEM IN 70 A. D.
REFERENCES
1 _The Xystos_
2 _The Council House_
3 _The Pool Strouthios_
4 _The Tower Hippicus_
5 _The Tower Phasaelus_
6 _The Tower Mariamne_
7 _The Bridge_
8 _The Double Gate_
9 _The Triple Gate_
10 _The Shushan Gate_
11 _The Gate Tadi_
G = Gate]
The Romans were first seen three days before the Passover, when
Titus camped on Skopos; but the siege is only reckoned by Josephus
as beginning after the feast, on Abib 23. It lasted for 134 days, or
more than four months, and ended in the heat of summer some time in
August.[344] The details are important, as illustrating the topography
of the city, and can be easily understood by the light of our previous
studies: some of the places mentioned appear, however, to have been
built after the time of Herod the Great. Thus, in addition to the
two palaces of the upper city, we now find in the lower city two
others built by the royal family of Adiabene during their residence
in Jerusalem. The first of these was the palace of Queen Helena in
“the middle of Akra,” and the other that of her son Monobasus near
Siloam. The sons and brothers of Izates--Helena’s eldest son--were
in Jerusalem during the siege, but gave themselves up to Titus after
the fall of the Temple.[345] We also learn that there was a monument of
John Hyrcanus in the west part of the lower city, and one of Alexander
Jannæus, probably east of the Temple. We hear for the first time of
the pools Strouthios and Amygdalon, and of the Serpent’s Pool outside
the city, as also of Herod’s monuments and the tomb of Ananus, with
other places that have been already mentioned. But the fortifications
remained much in the same condition in which they had been left by
Agrippa I. nearly thirty years before the siege.
[Sidenote: THE RECONNAISSANCE]
The first reconnaissance of the city by Titus nearly led to disaster,
probably because he underestimated the daring of the defenders. He
came down the north road to the tomb of Helena,[346] where he began
to diverge to the right in order to examine the tower Psephinus. In
the neighbourhood of Agrippa’s wall there were enclosed gardens, with
stone walls and ditches, and the Romans were entangled in the narrow
lanes outside the city. Titus was not even wearing his armour when the
Jews sallied suddenly out of the Women’s Towers, and, under cover of
the garden walls, cut off the advanced party of horsemen from their
supports on the north road, and showered darts at Titus, who, however,
escaped unwounded. The legions now began to make their camps at and
in rear of Skopos, and on the Mount of Olives, probably not very far
east of the central or Skopos camp.[347] A second sally[348] astonished
the 10th legion while so employed, at a distance of 6 furlongs from
the city. The Romans were here twice thrown into confusion by the
first surprise and by a second daring attack, and were twice rallied
by Titus himself, whose courage saved a serious defeat on his left
flank, and taught his soldiers confidence and discipline. After this
he began to clear the approaches by levelling the garden walls and
hedges, and cutting down the fig and olive trees to the very foot of
Agrippa’s wall, and on the west to “Herod’s monuments,” which have
now disappeared, but which were close to the Serpent’s Pool, which
seems to have been that now known as the Birket Mâmilla. This work was
interrupted by another desperate sally from the Women’s Towers; but
after four days’ labour the besieging force took up its positions, the
intention of Titus being to break in on the north-west, and thus, as
in former sieges, to attack the upper city at the saddle north of the
royal towers, and the Temple at Antonia. The headquarters were advanced
to within 2 furlongs of the north-west angle at Psephinus, and by Abib
24 the banks defending the siege engines were completed.
Cestius Gallus had left his rams and catapults behind him in his
hurried flight, and these were now used by the defenders, who were
instructed by those legionaries who had been saved by becoming Jews
when the cohort left by Florus laid down its arms. They were, however,
ill-accustomed to the use of the balistæ, which threw stones and darts;
and the engines of the besiegers (rams, balistæ, and siege towers) were
superior to those of the defence, some engines of the 10th legion being
able to throw a stone of one and a half hundredweight for a quarter of
a mile. The Jews watched the white stones soaring through the air, and
warned the defenders, crying in Aramaic, “The stone is coming”[349];
but the Romans afterwards discoloured the projectiles to make them less
visible.
[Sidenote: AGRIPPA’S WALL TAKEN]
The description of Jerusalem at the time of its fall, given by
Tacitus,[350] is brief, but so like the longer accounts of Josephus
as to have been supposed to be founded on them; it contains, however,
details which seem original. He says that “there were other walls
beneath the royal palace, besides the tower of Antonia, with its top
particularly conspicuous.... The temple was like a citadel, having
walls of its own.... The cloisters wherewith the temple was enclosed
were an excellent fortification. They had a fountain of water that ran
perpetually, and the mountains were hollowed underground; they had,
moreover, pools and cisterns for the preservation of rain water....
Moreover, the covetous temper that prevailed in the time of Claudius
gave the Jews an opportunity of purchasing with money leave to fortify
Jerusalem. So they built walls in time of peace.” The estimate of
population by Tacitus is, however, not much less exaggerated than the
incredible calculations of Josephus; but the latter gives a very fair
idea of the proportion between the actual combatants and of their
respective numbers.
On the fifteenth day of the siege, after the corner of a tower was
shaken by the battering ram of the 15th legion, and a sally from the
“secret gate” near Hippicus had been repulsed, the wall of Agrippa was
taken, in spite of the destruction of three siege towers. The defenders
apparently found the line of defence too extended for their numbers,
and many--grown weary of fighting and watching--had retired to the
inner city to sleep. The Romans demolished the rampart, and wasted the
north quarter of the town, which had already been partly destroyed by
Cestius Gallus. The camp of Titus was moved within Agrippa’s wall to a
place on the north-west of the second wall known as the “Camp of the
Assyrians,” in memory of the attack made on Hezekiah in 703 B. C.,
when the Assyrian leaders stood outside the wall by the “Conduit of the
Upper Pool.” Simon therefore endeavoured to prevent the building of new
banks by sallies from Hippicus on this side, at the gate by which “the
water was brought in” to that tower by the ancient conduit of Ahaz, as
it is still brought in to the citadel even now.
On the twentieth day of the siege the second wall was breached, and the
Romans broke in on the north at “a place where were the merchants of
wool, the braziers, the market for cloth, and where the narrow streets
led obliquely to the wall.” They were, however, driven out again, and
the wall was not finally taken till three days later, when a truce was
called to see if the Jews would submit. As no overtures were made by
the defenders, the new banks against the upper city and Antonia were
begun on the twenty-eighth day, and finished on the thirty-seventh day
of the siege, when the struggle again became desperate.[351]
The bank erected by the 10th legion is described as being near the Pool
Amygdalon, and that of the 15th legion was 30 cubits from it--evidently
on the west--at the monument of the high-priest John Hyrcanus. A
few words may be spared to discuss these sites.[352] Josephus wrote
his “Wars of the Jews” in Aramaic,[353] but whether he personally
translated this work into Greek may be doubted, as the translator shows
signs of imperfect acquaintance with the language of the original. Thus
it is probable that Amygdalon (“the almond”) is only a transliteration
really for _Ha-Migdolon_ (“the great tower”). The pool is not noticed
till after the second wall had been taken, at its weakest point on
the north-west, where (as described in 134 B. C.) the ground was on
the same level inside and outside the rampart.[354] It seems clear
therefore that this pool was the tank now known as “Hezekiah’s Pool,”
near the great tower of Phasaelus. The monument of John Hyrcanus must
have been to its west, and is described as being outside the second
wall, though only about 40 feet either from the pool or from the
Roman bank, which must have been on the saddle west of the pool. This
description defines pretty closely the line of the second wall at this
point. The banks raised by the Romans were for the protection of those
who worked the rams, balistæ, and siege towers, and for this reason
John’s monument could not have been far north of the wall of the upper
city. All the notices agree in placing it somewhere near the Pool
Amygdalon to the west.
[Sidenote: SPEECH BY JOSEPHUS]
Titus appears to have been anxious to save his men, and even to save
the besieged; he now endeavoured to induce them to submit, while
afterwards he preferred the slower method of blockade to the chances
of assault on the two remaining strongholds. Josephus was commissioned
to address the defenders, which he did at some danger to himself.[355]
Though he was a priest, and a Pharisee, he was hated by the Zealots
because he belonged to the moderate party, and to the liberal school of
educated Jews who agreed with Gamaliel in Jerusalem and Philo in Egypt.
He had fought bravely in Galilee, but was disgusted with the Zealot
leaders, John and Eleazar. He had a wider knowledge of the world than
they had, and his embassy to Poppea--nearly twenty years before--had
made him favourably known at Rome.[356] Vespasian spared his life
when he was captured after the fall of Jotapata; and from that time,
knowing that the struggle for freedom was hopeless, he endeavoured
to save his country from further misery. His speech to the besieged
was on the familiar lines of which we have instances in the New
Testament, rehearsing Hebrew history from Abraham down to Herod. Its
most interesting passage, however, is that which refers to Siloam. He
regarded the Romans as being now in the right, though in the wrong when
Sosius was defeated, and that they were consequently favoured by God
in the supply of water due to the abundant rain of the season. “As for
Titus, those springs which were formerly almost dried up when they were
under your power, since he has come, run more plentifully than they
did before; accordingly you know that Siloam, as well as all the other
springs that were without the city, did so far fail that water was
strictly sold by measure, whereas they now have such a great quantity
of water, for your enemies, as is sufficient not only for drink both
for themselves and their beasts, but even to water their gardens.” This
passage agrees with the accounts of the south wall already mentioned in
placing Siloam outside its line. It is also remarkable that, while the
besieged suffered long agonies from famine, they are not said to have
suffered from thirst. No doubt the rains also filled their cisterns,
and the great tanks would have been filled up from the aqueducts before
the latter were cut off by the Romans.
The horrors of the siege, famine, rapine, and dissension within,
crucifixion and torture for those who deserted, are detailed by
Josephus. “A deep silence also and a kind of deadly night had seized
on the city; while yet the robbers were still more terrible than these
miseries were themselves”; yet there was no thought of submission among
those desperate men who fought on for all that was dear to them--for
faith and freedom as of old. They had been goaded to rebellion after
years of oppression, and Nero was as guilty of the burning of Jerusalem
as he was of the burning of Rome. Yet without the miseries of those
four months the new world could not begin. The Christian and the Jew
alike were set free from the shackles of the past when the undying fire
went out for ever on Tammuz 17--thenceforth a fast-day in Israel.[357]
[Sidenote: THE ROMAN WALL]
All through May the struggle for Antonia went on, from the
thirty-eighth day of the siege till the sixty-eighth day. The Roman
banks in the fosse were undermined--no doubt by use of the rock tunnel
leading to the Pool Strouthios--and the Romans were forced for a time
to abandon their engines. The banks against the upper city were also
destroyed, and Titus, after these repulses, determined to surround
the city with a blockading wall, and so to starve out the defenders.
The length of 40 furlongs, or 5 miles, given by Josephus for this
vallum[358] appears to be fairly correct. It had thirteen small forts
along its line. Its appearance may be judged from the existing remains
of a similar wall, built by Silva round Masada[359] a little later,
on which I have looked down from the heights of that desert fortress
near the Dead Sea. It is a dry-stone rampart, with two large camps
behind it on the north-west and north-east. Its length is less than
3,000 yards, and in part of this distance there are six small forts on
the line at intervals of 500 feet on the average. The vallum of Titus
began near his own headquarters at the “Camp of the Assyrians,” and
stretched east through Bezetha and over the Kidron to Olivet, where it
bent at the “Rock of the Dovecote.” This point seems to be fixed by
the description of an existing rock cutting noted[360] by Sir Charles
Wilson in 1864: “Entering the village of Siloam on the north, there
is on the left a high cliff which bears evident signs of having been
worked as a quarry, and on the summit of which is a curious place
which appears to have been an old dovecote cut in the rock.” Thence
the wall went to the “other hill” (the south summit of Olivet), “over
the valley which reaches to Siloam.” It then crossed the “Valley of
the Fountain,” by which perhaps we may understand the present “Well of
Job,” and climbed the south precipice of Hinnom, near the “monument of
Ananus the high-priest,” which was probably the fine tomb now called
the “Retreat of the Apostles,” which was converted later into a chapel
with a frescoed roof.[361] The wall ran along the cliff to the west
side of the city, and turned north near a hamlet called the “House of
Erebinthi,”[362] and thus reached Herod’s monuments near the present
Mâmilla pool, and its original starting-place farther north-east. This
work is said to have been completed in three days.
[Sidenote: THE TEMPLE TAKEN]
Meanwhile, the banks were repaired, and were ready by the sixty-sixth
day of the siege, when the summer sun was beating down mercilessly on
besiegers and besieged. Four days later the Syrian soldier Sabinus
attempted to lead a forlorn hope against Antonia. “His complexion was
black, his flesh was lean and spare and well knit, but there was a
certain heroic soul that dwelt in this small body.” He perished in
the attempt, but two nights later, about 3 a.m., the standard-bearer
of the 5th legion, with two cavalry-men and a trumpeter, surprised
the citadel, clambered up the ruins of the breach, and slew the
sentries. The Romans poured in, and the “top of the hill”--or scarp
of Antonia--being occupied, the key of the Temple fortress was in
their hands. Yet the inner Temple resisted still for thirty-five
days, till the fatal ninth of Ab,[363] the day on which, according to
the rabbis, the Holy House had been ruined by the Babylonians, and
the day also on which Bêther fell sixty-five years later. The daily
sacrifice had ceased three weeks before, also on a day of evil memory
on which Antiochus Epiphanes had burned the scroll of the Law. The
formal siege of the inner courts entailed the clearance of the Antonia
courtyard, and the erection of four banks on the north side, one at the
north-west corner of the Priests’ Court, a second at Moked, and two
others outside the Court of the Women. The outer cloisters were set on
fire, and burned fiercely in the dry season, especially because the
gilding that adorned the roofs was spread over a wax covering of the
timbers. The great gatehouse was battered, the golden gates were set on
fire. The bodies of the defenders were piled round the altar, and the
blood--not of bulls or goats, but of men--ran down the steps. Yet the
survivors still fought from the roof of the Temple itself, hurling the
leaden spikes which kept birds from nesting on the Holy House upon the
Romans below, until the fire reached them, and a few submitted and were
spared, except the priests, whom Titus ordered to be slain.
The capture of the Temple placed the lower city at the mercy of the
victors, and the soldiers plundered the Akra, the Council House, and
the Ophel, setting the whole on fire to Siloam. Yet the upper city
still held out under Simon, son of Gioras, the last left of the rebel
leaders. Eleven days after the Temple was fired, banks were begun
against this last citadel, and the siege dragged on yet for eighteen
days more,[364] till at length the rampart was breached on the west,
and the upper city also fell, after a siege of 134 days, on Elul 8,
in August. The few survivors fled to Siloam and hid in the tunnel.
Simon concealed himself in a “certain subterranean cavern,” and John in
another. The latter was forced by hunger to give himself up, and was
sentenced to imprisonment for life. The whole city was burned and the
walls entirely demolished, except the three “royal towers” and part of
the wall on the west side of the upper city, where the 10th legion was
left under Terentius Rufus. A little later, while Titus was still at
Cæsarea, “Simon, thinking he might be able to astonish and delude the
Romans--”after he had failed to mine his way out of the cavern--“put on
a white dress and buttoned on him a purple robe, and appeared out of
the ground in the place where the Temple had formerly been.” He thus
seems to have been hidden in the cave under the Ṣakhrah. He was taken
alive, and afterwards walked the Via Sacra at Rome, to meet his death
in the triumph of Titus.
[Sidenote: “LET US DEPART”]
The captives were condemned to fight wild beasts at Cæsarea. The golden
lamp, the golden table, the trumpets of Jubilee, and the Temple copy
of the law[365] (afterwards given to Josephus), were borne in triumph
on that day, as the arch of Titus still bears witness. Medals were
struck recording the great victory,[366] with the head of Vespasian
on one side and on the other Israel mourning under the palm, with the
Latin legend “Judæa Capta.” Well might they remember the prophecies
of Jesus, son of Ananus, who for eight years had walked the streets,
crying, “Woe, woe, to Jerusalem!” till the stone from an engine slew
him; and the prediction that the temple should perish when it became a
quadrangle; and, above all, that awful night[367] of the last Pentecost
ever celebrated in the sanctuary, to which Tacitus and Josephus alike
refer. “As the priests were going by night to the inner Temple as their
custom was, to perform their sacred ministrations, they said that
first of all they felt a quaking and heard a great noise”--the sound
of the great doors of Nicanor as they swung suddenly open--“and after
that they heard a sound as of a great multitude saying, Let us depart
hence.”
FOOTNOTES TO CHAPTER VIII
[321] “Wars,” V. xi. 1.
[322] “Ant.,” XVII. x. 1–10; “Wars,” II. iii. 1–4.
[323] The rulers of Jerusalem were procurators except Agrippa I., who
was king. They were as follows: Coponius, from 10 A. D.; M. Ambivius,
_c._ 12 A. D.; Annius Rufus, _c._ 13 A. D.; V. Gratus, 14 A. D.; P.
Pilatus, 25 A. D.; Marcellus, 35 A. D.; Marullus, 37 A. D.; Agrippa
I., 41 A. D.; Cuspius Fadus, 44 A. D.; Tib. Alexander, 47 A. D.; V.
Cumanus, 49 A. D.; Felix, 52 A. D.; P. Festus, 60 A. D.; Albinus, 62
A. D.; Gessius Florus, 64 A. D. The final revolt began in 65 A. D.
[324] “Ant.,” XVIII. iii. 1, 2, 3, iv. 1–3.
[325] “Ord. Survey Notes,” pp. 80–3; “Mem. Survey West Pal.,” vol. iii.
pp. 89–91; Bliss, “Excavat. at Jer.,” pp. 53–6, 332.
[326] “Ant.,” VIII. vii. 3; Cant. iv. 12.
[327] “Wars,” V. iv. 2, 3. See “Ant.,” XIX. vii. 2; and for the Women’s
Towers, “Wars,” V. ii. 2, iii. 3; for Helena’s tomb, “Ant.,” XX. iv. 3;
Pausanias, “Greciæ Descript.,” viii. 16; Jerome (“Epist. Paulæ”).
[328] “Ant.,” XX. iv. 3.
[329] “Ord. Survey Notes,” p. 66 and pl. xxv.; de Saulcy, “Voyage en
Terre Sainte,” 1865, vol. i. De Saulcy misread the inscription as
“Queen Sarah.”
[330] The Rev. Selah Merrill follows Robinson as to the course of this
wall, and as to most of the other disputed questions.
[331] Robinson, “Bib. Res.,” 1838, i. p. 315; “Ord. Survey Notes,”
1864, p. 72, and pl. xxxi.; Schick in _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_,
1895, p. 30.
[332] “Wars,” V. vi. 2.
[333] “Ant.,” XX. i. 1, v. 2, vii. 1, viii. 5, 9, 11, ix. 1, 2, xi. 2;
“Wars,” II. xii. 1, xiii. 2, xiv. 1, 2, 6, xv. 1–6, xvi. 1–3, xvii.
1–10, xviii. 1, down to xix. 9.
[334] Acts xii. 1–23.
[335] Tacitus, “Hist.,” V. ix., “Annals,” xii., as quoted by Whiston.
[336] “Ant.,” XX. ix. 7, viii. 11; “Wars,” V. i. 5.
[337] “Ant.,” XX. ix. 1; Acts xxi. 18; 1 Cor. ix. 5; Gal. ii. 9.
[338] Matt. xxiv. 4–42; Mark xiii. 5–37; Luke xix. 42–4, xxi. 5–36.
[339] “Wars,” II. xiv. 2-xix. 9.
[340] “Wars,” II. xviii. 10-xix. 9; Tacitus, “Hist.,” V. x.
[341] “Wars,” V. i. 6; Tacitus, “Hist.,” V. i.
[342] “Wars,” IV. iv. 1, v. 1, vi. 1, vii. 1, 2, ix. 3–12, V. i. 4.
[343] No doubt at the Gate Korban (“of the offering”).
[344] See journal of siege, “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol.,
p. 4. Canon Williams made the curious mistake of reckoning by solar
months, for the details show that lunar months, of alternately 30 and
29 days, are intended by Josephus.
[345] “Wars,” V. vi. 1, VI. vi. 4.
[346] See back, p. 164.
[347] The old camp at Tellilia above a valley west of Skopos is quite
possibly one of those made in 70 A. D. See my description (“Mem. Survey
West Pal.,” iii. p. 161).
[348] “Wars,” V. ii. 3–5, iii. 2.
[349] This passage (“Wars,” V. vi. 3) indicates the Aramaic original of
the book. The Greek translator renders _eben_ “son,” instead of “stone.”
[350] “Hist.,” V. xi. xii.
[351] “Wars,” V. vii. 2-xi. 4.
[352] _Ibid._, V. vi. 2, vii. 3, ix. 2, xi. 4.
[353] _Ibid._, Preface, 1.
[354] “Ant.,” XIII. viii. 2.
[355] “Wars,” V. ix. 3, 4.
[356] “Life,” 3; “Wars,” III. vii. 2-viii. 9.
[357] “Wars,” VI. ii. 1; Mishnah, _Taanith_, iv. 6.
[358] “Wars,” V. xii. 2.
[359] See my plan and account, “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” iii. p. 417.
[360] “Ord. Survey Notes,” p. 64.
[361] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., p. 419.
[362] Perhaps the Aramaic really read _Beth ha Rababthi_ (_B_ and _N_
being much alike), thus connecting the place with the present Valley of
_Rabâbeh_--the Hinnom gorge.
[363] “Wars,” VI. i. 6-iv. 6; Mishnah, _Taanith_, iv. 6, 7.
[364] “Wars,” VI. viii. 1–4.
[365] Josephus, “Life,” 75.
[366] Madden, “Coins of the Jews,” pp. 183–97.
[367] Tacitus, “Hist.,” V. xiii.; Josephus, “Wars,” VI. v. 3.
CHAPTER IX
THE ROMAN CITY
When the last smouldering fires had burned out among the ruins, the
silence of death came over the desolate heaps which had once been
Jerusalem, nor does it appear certain that any buildings were erected,
or any native population allowed to dwell on the site, for sixty-five
years after the fall of the city. The camp of the 10th legion was
built on the plateau of the upper city, and was defended by the three
great towers, which would form a citadel still in case of need. The
demolition of the walls appears otherwise to have been so complete as
to leave no traces of their lines thereafter, though the huge blocks
lay on the ground, and were used again when the Roman colonial city,
Ælia Capitolina, was built. Every stone of the Holy House seems to have
been deliberately removed. The outer Temple ramparts were overthrown
into the valleys, down to the level of the plateau formed by Herod
within them. Two buttresses only were left on the north-west, close to
Antonia, while on the south-east the corner of the wall stood up alone,
as it was seen by the pilgrims down to the time of Justinian in our
sixth century, with the spring of a huge arch which supported vaults
at this angle. The great bridge was broken down to the ground, and the
stones of its arch still lie on the Herodian pavement of the street
that passed under it. Zion was a “ploughed field,” and the rabbis
who ventured to visit the desolate sanctuary mourned as they saw the
jackals prowling in its ruins.[368]
[Sidenote: THE EARLY BISHOPS]
The Sanhedrin established itself at Bureir, in Philistia, and
afterwards at Jamnia, south of Joppa, where a famous school of
doctors studied the Scriptures down to the time of the later revolt
in 135 A. D.; but it would seem that the Jews were not allowed to
approach their Holy City, and only visited it by stealth. Nor have we
any certain indication that the Christians returned till after the
Roman city was built. Eusebius[369] gives a list of fourteen bishops
following James the Just; but the first of these (St. Simeon) must
have left Jerusalem in 64 A. D. The second is supposed to have been
consecrated in 107 A. D. They all bear Jewish names, except Seneca (125
A. D.) and his successor Justus. As to this “line of the circumcision,”
which was supposed to end in 135 A. D., Eusebius himself says, “The
space of time which the bishops of Jerusalem spent in their see I could
in no wise find preserved in writing ... but this much I have been
informed from records, until the siege of the Jews in Hadrian’s time
there were fifteen bishops.”
The presence of the 10th legion, Fretensis, is, on the other hand,
shown by the recovery of inscribed objects found by Mr. Bliss,[370]
namely, three fragments of Roman tiles bearing the abbreviated title
of the “Legio X Fretensis,” and in one case a representation of the
boar, which was the emblem of this legion. But at some time before the
year 117 A. D. this garrison was changed and the 3rd legion, Cyrenaica,
took its place. It was also perhaps during this period that the Jews
and Jewish Christians began to adopt a custom which continued in use
down to the Middle Ages. The “lovers of Zion” desired that their bones
might rest at the Holy City, and it became a pious duty to gather them,
and to rebury them near it. There was also, in later times at least,
a superstitious belief that those who were not buried in the “Valley
of Decision” (Jehoshaphat) would have to find their way there through
Sheol from their graves[371]--a survival of the ancient Egyptian
belief in the journey of the soul through Amenti to the judgment hall
of Osiris. It is said that, to the present day in Russia, Jewish
cemeteries are called “Jehoshaphat,” and that this ancient superstition
still survives. Stone caskets, adorned by geometrical patterns engraved
on the sides, were prepared to bring the bones from other regions.
Rabbi Benjamin of Tudela (about 1163 A. D.) speaks of these as existing
in the cave of Machpelah at Hebron: “You there see caskets filled with
the bones of Israelites; for unto this day it is a custom in the house
of Israel to bring thither the bones of their relicts, and of their
forefathers, and to leave them there.”
[Sidenote: THE OSSUARIES]
We have already seen that the bones of the family of Nicanor were so
buried on Olivet, and that similar caskets (or ossuaries) were found
in the tomb of Helena of Adiabene[372]; these latter may belong to the
first century, as the only coins found with them were of the reign of
Titus. Several other examples were found buried on the south spur of
Olivet in 1873, and were studied by M. Clermont-Ganneau. Hebrew names
are scratched upon them, and in one instance a rough cross, as though
marking the presence of a Hebrew Christian from Pella or from Kaukabah
in Bashan, where Ebionite Christians were living down to our fourth
century. The exact age of these examples is uncertain, and the presence
of the cross--an emblem only used in secret before 326 A. D.--rather
favours the supposition that they are late. In 1900 other Jewish tombs
were explored on the north of Olivet, and similar ossuaries were found;
three of these bore Greek texts, and another was inscribed in Hebrew.
The names Protas and Papos are clearly written, and that of “Yehoḥanan
bar Ṣabia” seems to be decipherable. Quite recently also Jewish texts
have been found in a tomb near the village of Silwân, with the names of
“Abishalom father of Yehoḥanan,” and of “Shemra.” They are cut in soft
rock and blacked in, but the last letter of the second name is painted
in red. To the same class belong probably the graffiti in the so-called
“Tombs of the Prophets” on Olivet, one of which was discovered by de
Vogüé with the words “Phlôrianos Astaros” in Greek, and the Hebrew
broken text “Peace be to ’Ab...” There are, however, fragments of Greek
Christian graffiti at this site,[373] and though the expression “father
of Yehoḥanan” points to burial or re-burial by a son, it seems probable
that these interments of the bones of ancestors may be supposed to be
of very various ages. The tombs in which they occur are certainly old,
for they contain _kokîm_ tunnels as graves instead of the _loculi_ of
the Greco-Jewish age.
In the reign of Trajan[374] the Jews of Mesopotamia and of Egypt broke
out into revolt and were subdued, but there is no notice of any such
rebellion in Palestine. We have evidence that Jerusalem was then held
by the 3rd legion, which was originally called Augusta, but afterwards
Cyrenaica on account of its success against the Jewish rebels at
Cyrene; for a Latin text was found in 1895, built into the Turkish wall
near the south or Sion Gate. “To Jove the best and greatest, Serapis,
for the health and victory of the Emperor Nerva Trajanus Cæsar, the
best, the august, the German, Dacian, Parthian [victor]; and to the
Roman people, the standard bearer of the third Cyrenaic legion made”
(this). This text cannot be earlier than 116 A. D., and Trajan died the
next year.
The invocation of Serapis is interesting because the Jerusalem coins
of Hadrian, the next emperor, represent a temple with a statue which
seems clearly to be that of Serapis as Jove. Serapis, though adored at
Alexandria with Isis, was not an Egyptian god. He was worshipped by
the Romans in the second century as a supreme deity, but his image was
brought from Pontus by the first Ptolemy, in the third century B. C.,
to Alexandria, where was his most famous temple.[375] His statues
and his busts on coins represent him as a bearded Jupiter sometimes
accompanied by the infernal dog Cerberus; on his head appears the
_modius_, or “measure,” which may perhaps mean that he was the god of
measurement and retribution. The name is probably very ancient and
even of Akkadian origin, _Sar-api_ being “the king of the waves” or of
the “depth.”[376] He thus answers to the ancient sea-god Ea, who was
supreme in the depths and who also resembled Pluto, being the judge
of the dead in the under-world. His original temple at Sinope was on
the shore of the Black Sea. Nothing could more remarkably illustrate
the substitution of pagan worship at Jerusalem for that of Jehovah
than this remarkable text, and the site of the Temple was soon after
consecrated to this Asiatic Jove.
[Sidenote: ÆLIA CAPITOLINA]
Much confusion as to the history of Jerusalem under Hadrian has been
caused by following the later statements of Byzantine historians, and
by the anachronisms of the Talmud, as also by a strange theory which
attributes the stamping of certain coins to the time of the revolt at
Bêther in 135 A. D. Jerome[377] says that “remains of the city existed
even to the time of prince Hadrian throughout fifty years”--a statement
which is evidently true since they remain still, but which does not
suggest that any town had been built over the ruins till the time of
this emperor. It was the policy of Trajan and of Hadrian to break up
the nationality of the Jews, who were recovering from the catastrophe
of the fall of Jerusalem, and showed signs of determination to revive
their ancient independence in regions where they were numerous,
and had grown rich by trade. Hadrian acceded in 117 A. D., and may
possibly have visited Palestine in 130 A. D. It was then probably that
he conceived the idea of refounding Jerusalem as an ordinary Roman
colonial city. Dion Cassius,[378] writing less than a century later,
says of Hadrian that he “stirred up a war ... by founding a city at
Jerusalem which he named Ælia Capitolina, and by setting up another
temple to Jupiter on the site of the Lord’s Temple.” But it would seem
more correct to say that the intention thus to paganise the Holy City
was the immediate cause of the desperate revolt at Bêther. Renan[379]
very truly remarks that “the really historic texts do not speak of
a taking and destruction of Jerusalem” (at this time), “but by the
way they read exclude such an event.” Eusebius, when following the
contemporary account of the war by Ariston of Pella, says nothing at
all about Jerusalem. Tertullian, Jerome, and Chrysostom, who believed
in a siege of Jerusalem by Hadrian, are late authorities. References to
the exclusion of the Jews from Jerusalem, to be found in the writings
of Justin Martyr and Eusebius, may belong to the time after 135 A. D.,
and the prohibition of circumcision in 132 A. D. was quite sufficient
to account for Jewish rebellion.
[Sidenote: THE BÊTHER REVOLT]
The story of this rebellion is overgrown with legend, and the
Rabbinical references seem sometimes to confuse the events of the
great siege by Titus with those of the war against Hadrian. Bêther was
identified by Canon Williams at the present village Bittîr, six miles
south-west of Jerusalem, and its proximity to the capital may have
led to some confusion between the siege of this fortress and that of
Jerusalem. The place is still a village[380] on a cliff, with a fine
spring, and a Latin inscription, while the name “ruin of the Jew,”
close by, may preserve some memory of the desperate struggle led by
Bar Cocheba and Rabbi ’Aḳîbah. Jerusalem, on the other hand, according
to Jerome,[381] “was razed and burned to the ground after fifty years,
under Ælius Hadrianus, so that it even lost its former name.” The
siege and capture of Bêther put an end to further attempts of the Jews
to become free from Rome, especially because an age of toleration
and good government followed. The Cyrenaic legion was probably used
against them, which accounts for the text found in Rome speaking of the
employment of Getulæ from Mauritania in this Jewish war, which took
place when Lucius Quietus had been murdered, and replaced by Tineius
Rufus as governor of Palestine. During its course the latter was
superseded by Sextus Julius Severus, who was summoned as legate from
Britain to put down this formidable revolt.[382]
In the Mishnah we read that on Ab 9 “Bêther was taken and the city was
ploughed up.” Later commentators refer the latter statement to the time
when “Turannus Rufus ploughed up Sion.” Jerome says that “the city
Bethel [Bêther] being taken, ... the Temple was ignominiously ploughed,
the people being oppressed by Titus Annius Rufus.” The Mishnah,
again, speaks of the “wars of Vespasian and of Ḳîṭus” (Quietus), and
apparently means by the latter the war of 135 A. D. There thus seems
to be a confusion between the demolition of Jerusalem by Terennius
(or Terentius) Rufus in 70 A. D., and the later war which began under
Tineius Rufus,[383] and which had nothing to do with any ploughing up
either of the Temple or of Sion. As regards the exclusion of the Jews
from Jerusalem, it appears from Eusebius that after 135 A. D. they
purchased the right to weep at the ruins of the temple, for “after
the Jewish disturbance the place became inaccessible to Jews.” Justin
Martyr, speaking to a Jew about Jerusalem, says “that it is guarded
from you, that none should be in it; and it is death” to enter.
Sulpicius Severus relates that a cohort of soldiers was placed as a
guard, to forbid the entry of any Jew into the city. This edict seems
to have fallen into disuse under the tolerant Antonines and in the
third century, but it was renewed by Constantius II. after the revolt
of the Jews in Galilee in 339 A. D.; and Jerome says, “Still you may
see a sad crowd, a wretched people, who fail to gain pity, assemble and
draw nigh. Decrepit women, old men in rags ... all weeping; and while
tears drown their cheeks, while they raise their livid arms and tear
their locks, the soldier comes and demands money to allow them to weep
a little more.”[384] This pathetic account reminds us of scenes which
may still be witnessed at Jerusalem, but none of these passages serve
to show that it was an inhabited place, once more besieged and ruined
by Hadrian, nor that it was ever occupied by the rebels of 135 A. D.
The leaders of the revolt were Bar Cocheba (_Kôkeba_), “the Son of
the Star,” and Rabbi ’Aḳîbah, who believed this pretender to be the
true Messiah, in spite of the warning of Rabbi Jehoḥanan, “’Aḳîbah,
the grass will be growing between thy jaws before the Son of David
comes.”[385] The rabbinical accounts of the Bêther war are late
and legendary, and the “Son of the Star” is called in the Talmudic
allusions “the son of falsehood”--_Bar Kôzîba_--probably as a term of
contempt. The theory according to which he struck coins in Jerusalem
demands notice, in connection with the history of the city, but it
appears to be one of those learned fallacies which are very long in
dying.[386]
[Sidenote: COINS OF SIMON]
Certain silver coins of “Eleazar the Priest,” marked (by the alphabetic
characters used) as being of the Hasmonæan age, have been rashly
attributed to Eleazar, who defended the Temple in 70 A. D. In at least
one instance the coin is regarded as a forgery by both de Vogüé and
de Saulcy, and this appears to apply to all the so-called “coins of
the revolts.” The copper ones bear blundered imitations of genuine
inscriptions from coins of Simon the Hasmonæan. They have been struck
on much defaced Roman coins of Vespasian, Titus, Domitian, and Trajan,
but more probably in the nineteenth century than in the second
century. One such coin bears the name Simon, and is struck on a silver
tetradrachm of Antioch attributed to Vespasian. It does not seem to
have occurred to the scholars who suppose it to have been struck by
Simon, son of Gioras, in 70 A. D., that as Vespasian had then only
been emperor a few months, and as Jerusalem was besieged, it is quite
impossible that an old coin of his reign could have been found in the
city in the year of its fall. The forgery of Jewish coins is still
common in Palestine, and the forgers did not foresee that the remains
of the original legend on a coin would be read by the trained eye of
some European specialist, while they thought that the worn surface of
the coin would show its antiquity, but that its value would be much
higher if it was regarded as being Jewish. The same observation applies
to all the restruck copper coins, which have been variously attributed
to Simon son of Gioras, to Simon son of Gamaliel, and to Bar Cocheba,
who has been conjectured to have been also named Simon--of which there
is no proof at all. The latter assumption was necessitated by the fact
that some of the coins used by the forgers were as late as the reigns
of Domitian and Trajan. It may, however, be remarked that if the Jews,
in 135 A. D., struck any coins at all, the lettering is not likely to
have been in the same characters used about 139 B. C., but would have
been in those used at the time, that is to say, practically in square
Hebrew. We may regard these coins, therefore, as forged imitations of
those of Simon the Hasmonæan, and they have no bearing on the question
whether Jerusalem had been rebuilt before 135 A. D. Appian[387] was a
contemporary historian, but says nothing about any siege of Jerusalem,
which city he tells us was “razed to the ground by Vespasian.” He adds,
“And anew by Hadrian in my time”--the word “built” having perhaps
dropped out, unless further demolitions were needed to clear the site
for the new city.
[Sidenote: FORGED COINS]
There is no allusion to any coins of Bar Cocheba in the Mishnah, and
certain passages in the Aramaic commentaries which are supposed to
support this theory seem to have been ill translated,[388] and belong
to later ages. Thus in the Tosiphta (after 500 A. D.) a passage
referring to “second tithes” appears to say that they are “not to
be redeemed by coins of persecution [_marud_] not current, or not
engraved. How is this to be understood? When they have false coins,
even coins of Jerusalem, they must not redeem with them ... yet they
might redeem with coins of former kings.”[389] This statement, at
most, indicates the existence of forged Jewish coins in our sixth
century. Again, in the Jerusalem Talmud--a little earlier--the passage
on which the above is a comment runs: “Coins of persecution, or of a
son of falsehood [_Ben Kôzîba_, that is, “a forger”], cannot be used
for release. Depreciated coin, according to the decision of a case by
Rabbi Ime, is to be thrown into the Salt Sea.”[390] A third passage,
yet later, reads: “They durst not release with coins not current, as
for instance false coins of Jerusalem, or of former kings.”[391] The
last passage quoted by scholars is equally indefinite: “They wanted to
retain denarii of Hadriana Turiyina, coins for Jerusalem.”[392] This
passage might, however, have been in the mind of a later Jewish coiner
when he used coins of Trajan. It does not clearly refer, any more than
the other passages, to Bar Cocheba.
These questions have been noticed in some detail because they effect
our conclusions as to the history of Jerusalem before the revolt of
Bêther. Christian historians, writing two centuries later, believed
in a second destruction of the city by Hadrian. Eusebius, though in
one passage he speaks of Jerusalem as in ruins, yet in another says
it was half destroyed by Titus and half by Hadrian. Jerome also says
that Hadrian “threw down the walls.” They regarded this as a fulfilment
of prophecy,[393] especially in connection with that of Daniel, and
with the expectation of an approaching end of the world; but a modern
student of the passages to which they allude would be more apt to
conclude that the history had been misunderstood, and that the true
facts did not accord with such interpretations of the prophets.
It is at least generally agreed that Hadrian rebuilt Jerusalem in
or after the year 135 A. D. The fear, mentioned by Dion Cassius as
bringing on the war, that foreigners would dwell in the Holy City,
and that strange gods would be there set up, was then justified. The
emperor, who was very sarcastic about both Jewish and Christian
religions, as we learn from a letter of his own, seems to have
recognised the strength of the site, and to have regarded a modernised
city as likely to dispel the ancient ideal of Israel, though that was
for ever preserved by the “mourners of Zion.” Throughout the second
century Roman cities continued to spring up in Palestine and Syria,
each built complete at one time by some imperial command, as at
Gerasa and Philadelphia, or later at Ba’albek and Palmyra. They were
constructed on a definite plan, with a central street of pillars and
surrounding city walls. The theatre, the civil basilica, the music
hall, and the temples were near the main street and the forum; and the
side-streets ran at right angles, while an arch of triumph commemorated
the founder. At Jerusalem also this plan was adopted as far as the site
and the huge blocks of Herod’s towers and Temple allowed, and some of
the remains of Hadrian’s city are still traceable by aid of an ancient
map.
[Illustration: (West)
THE MEDEBA MOSAIC.
Outline from Dr. Guthe’s facsimile.]
[Sidenote: HADRIAN’S WALLS]
The map in question was discovered a few years ago at Medeba in
Moab.[394] It is a fragment of a mosaic which was laid on the floor
of the cathedral, representing Palestine as far north as Shechem,
both east and west of Jordan, with the Sinaitic Desert and the Nile
Delta. It was evidently constructed before the Moslem Conquest, and is
supposed to date earlier than the building by Eudocia of a new wall at
Jerusalem about 450 A. D. It shows the basilica of Constantine, which
perished in 614 A. D., and all its inscriptions are in Byzantine Greek
characters earlier than those in use in the Middle Ages. It is the most
remarkable discovery of recent years as affecting the contemporary
history of the Holy City, and, though many of the buildings shown
are not earlier than the fourth century, it still indicates the plan of
the Roman city as built by Hadrian. A street of pillars runs through
the town from north to south, and of these two shafts still remain in
a vault, west of the bazaar and east of the Holy Sepulchre Cathedral.
A second pillared street, diverging on the east, represents the old
Herodian street which ran parallel to the western rampart of the
Temple enclosure; and at its south end steps seem to be represented,
descending the Tyropœon towards Siloam; but the mosaic is unfortunately
broken away in this part, and it is not very clear whether the south
wall is drawn out of scale, and intended really to enclose the whole of
the upper city hill (as Eudocia built it), or whether it is intended
to run on the line of the present south wall, excluding the south part
of the hill called Sion in and after the fourth century, and excluding
Ophel. It is certain, however, that this must have been the line of
Hadrian’s wall, since the earliest pilgrim[395] found part of Sion
and the Pool of Siloam outside the wall, while the supposed palace
of David on Sion--near the so-called “Tower of David”--was inside.
The map is also interesting because it shows a great pillar--such as
the Romans erected for a statue to stand on--in the middle of an open
space just inside the North Gate. The present name of this gate (_Bâb
el ’Amûd_, “gate of the pillar”) seems to preserve a tradition of this
column, and the wall of Hadrian evidently ran on the line followed by
the present wall on the north, though on the west it seems not to have
included quite as much ground as at present north of the Jaffa Gate.
This plan must be further considered in dealing with the Jerusalem of
Constantine. Our pilgrim[396] seems to agree with the map, placing the
Prætorium to the right of those who went from Sion out of the city by
the Neapolis (or northern) Gate.
[Sidenote: HADRIAN’S STATUE]
The coins of Hadrian and of his successors, and the actual remains of
the Roman age, including the head of Hadrian’s statue, the inscription
which once belonged to it, and the arch of triumph which he--or some
later emperor--built, exist in illustration of the statements made
by early Christian writers as to the erection of pagan shrines in
Jerusalem. The statues set up in Ælia Capitolina were still standing
in the fourth century. Jerome[397] tells us that “where once was the
Temple and the religion of God there stands the statue of Hadrian and
the idol of Jove”; and again: “A statue of Hadrian on horseback stood,
till the present day, in the very place of the Holy of Holies.” The
Bordeaux Pilgrim (in 333 A. D.) mentions the existence in the temple
court of “two statues of Hadrian, and not far from the statues is the
Pierced Stone.” These two were perhaps one of Hadrian himself and one
of Jove, and they were clearly erected on the site of the Holy House
near the Ṣakhrah rock. The head of a statue representing a Roman,
crowned with bay leaves and with the imperial eagle in front, was
picked up by a peasant in 1873 near the tomb of Helena of Adiabene,
lying on its face in the road among the stones.[398] It is believed to
represent Hadrian by comparison with his known portraits, and may have
belonged to his statue in the Temple. In the south wall of the Ḥaram,
at the Double Gate, a Latin inscription has been built in upside-down,
and reads: “To Titus Ælius Hadrianus Antoninus Augustus Pius, father
of his country, pontif, augur, by decree of the decurions.”[399] This
no doubt was the dedicatory text of the Temple statue of Hadrian. None
of these indications show that any temple of Jupiter was erected on
Mount Moriah, though the so-called “Cradle of Christ,” in the vault at
the south-east angle of the Ḥaram, is very clearly a Roman niche to
hold a statue. The coins of Hadrian and of his successors, however,
show a shrine of Jupiter Capitolinus as if existing somewhere at
Jerusalem, which was renamed Ælia Capitolina after Ælius Hadrianus and
Jupiter Capitolinus. There may have been a small arcaded building near
the Ṣakhrah which had been pulled down before 333 A. D., leaving the
statues standing; or the temple of Jove may have been elsewhere in the
city. Dion Cassius[400] says that Hadrian “called it Ælia Capitolina,
and in the place of the shrine [_naos_] of God he erected in opposition
another shrine to Zeus”; but this rhetorical sentence need not perhaps
be read in a very literal sense.
The coins of the period appear to show that Serapis, as Jove, was
the deity adored in the new shrine, wherever it may have been.[401]
A coin of Hadrian’s, representing him crowned with bay leaves,
bears on the reverse the words “Æl. Col.,” and represents a seated
Jupiter with two attendant nymphs or goddesses in a temple. Others of
Antoninus Pius, also struck at Jerusalem, give the head of Serapis,
or represent a deity standing in a temple, or again with a dog, or
have a representation of the city itself as a tower-crowned female.
The Serapis head recurs later under Marcus Aurelius, Caracalla, and
Elagabalus, and the temple, with an arched nave and two side cloisters,
under a pediment, again contains a deity standing, with attendants on
either side. We can hardly doubt, therefore, the existence of a Serapis
temple at Jerusalem as early as Hadrian’s time.
Jerome, however, indicates the existence of a temple built by this
emperor in the city itself. He speaks of a marble statue of Venus on
the “rock of the cross,” and of an image of Jupiter over the “place of
the resurrection.” Later historians do not attribute these to Hadrian,
and Eusebius only says that “impious men” had founded, above the Holy
Sepulchre, a “dark shrine of the unchaste demon Aphrodite.”[402] But it
is very likely that Jerome is right, for Serapis and Isis (as Jove and
Aphrodite) were adored together in Rome, and the site of Constantine’s
great basilica, where this shrine of Venus was still standing early
in the fourth century, was one very probable for a temple in a Roman
city such as Ælia Capitolina, facing east towards the central pillared
street of the city. It is this temple, perhaps, which is represented on
the coins above noticed.
[Sidenote: HADRIAN’S CITY]
Eusebius speaks of Sion--the hill of the upper city--as a “ploughed
field” in fulfilment of prophecy, and Cyril of Jerusalem says the
same[403]; but Epiphanius believed that Hadrian had found seven
synagogues and a small church on Mount Sion; and the Bordeaux
Pilgrim--probably influenced by this tradition--thought that one
synagogue still remained in his own time, though the rest had
disappeared, having been covered by ploughed and sown lands. The
existence of these synagogues in Hadrian’s time is extremely unlikely.
That his wall ran over the top of the hill is further confirmed by the
fact that this was the line of defence even in 680 A. D., after the
outer wall of Eudocia had been built to include Siloam. The actual
buildings, inside the city, according to the Paschal Chronicle (though
this is rather a late authority), were pagan. The passage reads thus:
“Pulling down the shrine of the Jews in Jerusalem, he [Hadrian]
established the two markets, the theatre, the mint, the _trikameron_
[or “three-roomed” building], the _tetranumphon_ [or “four-nymph”
place], the _dodeka-pulon_ [or “twelve-gate” place], which was formerly
called the steps, and the quadrant, and he divided the city into seven
quarters.”
We cannot, unfortunately, recognise under their new names these
features of Roman Jerusalem, but the streets were on the old lines,
and these give three quarters west of the central street of pillars,
and two to its east; the sixth would be on Bezetha, and the seventh
was the Temple enclosure.[404] The principal monument of the period,
still standing, is the triumphal arch west of Antonia, now called the
Ecce Homo arch. The central archway spans the Via Dolorosa, and the
smaller one to the north is seen in the chapel of the Sisters of Zion,
while the corresponding one to the south has been destroyed. A similar
arch is still standing at Gerasa in Gilead--a city also of the second
century A. D. It is possible that the north wall of the Ḥaram, which
is of large Roman masonry, was built at this time, unless it is to
be regarded as the work of Julian or of Justinian. Other fragments of
Roman times, recently found,[405] include a Roman bath near Siloam,
with tesseræ of the 5th legion, and a fresco in a tomb near that of
Queen Helena. We may also attribute to this period the pagan epitaph in
the “Cave of St. Pelagia” on Olivet[406] reading “Courage, Dometila, no
one is immortal”--a sentiment found, in other cases, in texts of Bashan
and Syria of the same age. No doubt there are many other relics of
Hadrian’s city hidden beneath the surface of the present town, and the
wall west of “Hezekiah’s Pool”[407] may have been the west wall of Ælia
Capitolina.
The “high-level” aqueduct, from a well (now dry) in Wâdy el Bîâr, south
of Solomon’s Pool, appears to be of this period. Its course near the
pool is lost, but it was carried over the hill near Bethlehem on stone
pipes. It disappears a little farther north, but probably fed the
Birket Mâmilla. Inscriptions in Latin along its course refer to the
Centuria of Valerius Æmilianus and the Centuria Natalis, and show that
it was made, or repaired, at some period later than 70 A. D.[408]
[Sidenote: THE CHRISTIANS]
The age of Hadrian was followed by that of the Antonines (138–80
A. D.), when the Jews lived content and prospered as traders. The
Sanhedrin, leaving Jamnia after 135 A. D., finally settled at Tiberias,
and synagogues in Roman style--but with Hebrew texts--were built
in Galilee. Under Severus (193–211) the Jews were granted civil
immunities, and they did not again revolt till 339 A. D. According to
Eusebius, a new line of Christian bishops began to rule the church at
Jerusalem in Hadrian’s time, though more probably they would not have
returned to the city till somewhat later. Under Marcus Aurelius the
Christians had become numerous in the Roman world, and in the third
century--after the persecution by Decius--their bishops began to be
recognised by the State, while a congregation under one in Jerusalem
certainly existed in Cyprian’s time. He also mentions a female pilgrim
to the Holy City, and speaks of Bishop Alexander, who--according to
Eusebius--succeeded Narcissus,[409] having previously ruled a church
in Cappadocia. But during this age of prosperity we hear nothing else
about the restored city, nor have we any account of sacred Christian
sites. For three generations the Christians were absent from the ruined
town, and when they did return it was entirely altered. There is a
break of at least seventy years in their connection with Jerusalem, and
it is not probable that the new generation knew anything of the old
city or of the Gospel sites.
FOOTNOTES TO CHAPTER IX
[368] Jer. xxvi. 18; Tal. Bab., _Makkoth_, 24 _b_.
[369] The list of bishops from Eusebius (“Hist. Eccl.,” iv. 5) is given
by Canon Williams (“Holy City,” 1849, i. p. 487).
[370] “Excav. at Jer.,” p. 265. Another text by Sabinus, an officer
of the 10th (Fretensis) legion, was supposed by M. Clermont-Ganneau
(_Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, 1871, p. 103) to be as late as the time
of Caracalla, which now seems doubtful, as the 3rd legion had replaced
the 10th in 117 A. D.
[371] See Tal. Bab., _Ketuboth_, 111 _a_; Joel iii. 2, 12.
[372] See back, pp. 128, 164. Clermont-Ganneau, in _Revue
Archéologique_, May-June, 1883; “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem
vol., p. 404; _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, Jan. 1900, p. 75, report by
Mr. C. A. Hornstein; Oct. 1908, p. 342, report by Mr. R. A. Stewart
Macalister.
[373] Clermont-Ganneau, in _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, 1871, p. 102;
de Vogüé, “Temple de Jérusalem,” pl. xxxviii. fig. 2.
[374] Canon Dalton, in _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, April 1896, p. 133;
Bliss, “Excav. at Jer.,” pp. 249–53.
[375] Tacitus, “Hist.,” iv. 83; see Gibbon, ch. xxviii.
[376] Akkadian _sar_, “king,” and _ap_, “sea”; Turkish _ab_. _Api_ is
also “water” in ancient Persian--Sanskrit _ap_, modern Persian _ab_.
[377] “Epist. ad Dardanum.”
[378] Dion Cassius, lxix. 12; see Robinson, “Bib. Res.,” i. p. 367.
[379] “L’Église Chrétienne,” 1879, p. 541; Euseb., “Hist. Eccl.,” iv.
6; Tertullian, “Contra Jud.,” 13; Chrysostom, “In Judæos Hom.,” v. 11.
[380] “Survey West Pal.,” iii. pp. 20, 21, 128; _Pal. Expl. Fund
Quarterly_, 1900, p. 168. Eusebius, “Hist. Eccl.,” iv. 2, places Bêther
near Jerusalem.
[381] On Ezek. v. 1. This passage was perhaps misunderstood by later
writers.
[382] See Derenbourg, “Pal.,” p. 117; Renan, “Église Chrétienne,” 1879,
p. 205; Robinson, “Bib. Res.,” i. p. 368; Eusebius, “Hist. Eccl.,”
iv 6; Mishnah, _Ḥalah_, iv. 10, _Taanith_, iv. 7, _Sotah_, viii. 14;
Jerome on Zech. viii. 191, “In Ruf.” ii. 8, Tal. Jer., _Taanith_, iv.
[383] Renan, “Église Chrétienne,” 1879, p. 193, quotes “Corpus
Inscript. Lat.,” iii. 2, to show that Tineius Rufus was not Legate of
Judæa after the war, and gives the various spellings. See Dion Cassius,
lxix. 13.
[384] Justin Martyr, “Apol.,” i. 47; Eusebius, “Demonstr. Evang.,” vi.
18; “Hist. Eccl.,” iv. 6; Jerome on Zeph. i., Jer. xviii., xx., xxx.;
Sulpic. Severus, “Hist. Sac.,” ii. 45; Renan, “Église Chrétienne,”
1879, p. 222; Eutychius “Annales,” i. 416.
[385] Midrash, _Eka_, ii. 2; Tal. Jer., _Taanith_, iv. 7.
[386] Munter (“Jüdischen Krieg,” p. 57) quoted by Munk (“Pal.,” 1863,
p. 605). Munk and Renan regard this theory as unsound. It was advocated
by de Saulcy (“Numismatique Judaique,” 1854, pp. 157–70) and by Madden
(“Jewish Coinage,” 1864, pp. 154–210).
[387] “De Rebus Syriac.,” 50. He wrote in Rome--though an
Alexandrian--in 130–47 A. D.
[388] The Aramaic texts are given by Madden, pp. 329–33.
[389] Tosiphta, _Ma’aser Sheni_, i. 5.
[390] Tal. Jer., _Ma’aser Sheni_, i. 2.
[391] Tal. Bab., _Baba Kama_, 97 _b_.
[392] Ibid., _Bekoroth_, 50 _a_, _Aboda Zara_, 52 _b_.
[393] “Hist. Eccl.,” iv. 6; “Demonstr. Evang.,” vi. 18; Jerome on Joel
i. 4, on Dan. ix. 27, and on Ezek. xxiv. 14.
[394] “Die Mosaikkarte von Madeba,” 1906, by Prof. Dr. Guthe, and the
architect P. Palmer. Count G. T. Rivoira, “Architettura Lombarda,”
1908, p. 328, suggests the time of Justinian for this map.
[395] Bordeaux Pilgrim, 333 A. D. “Item exeunti Hierusalem ut ascendas
Sion in parte sinistra et deorsum in valle, juxta murum, est piscina
quæ dicitur Siloa”; “intus autem, intra murum Sion, paret locus ubi
palatium habuit David.”
[396] Bordeaux Pilgrim. “Inde ut eas foris murum de Sion euntibus ad
portam Napolitanam ad partem dextram deorsum in valle sunt parites
[_sic_] ubi domus fuit, sive Prætorium Ponti Pilati.” Napolis
(_Nea-polis_) was the later Greco-Roman name for Shechem, north of
Jerusalem.
[397] On Isa. ii. 8 and Matt. xxi. 15.
[398] See my drawing in “Mem. Survey West Pal.,” Jerusalem vol., p. 406.
[399] The Latin is given in “Mem. Survey West Pal.,” Jerusalem vol., p.
427.
[400] Dion Cassius, lxix. 12.
[401] They are reproduced by Madden, from de Saulcy, “Numismatique
Judaīque,” plates xv.-xviii.
[402] Jerome, “Epist.,” 49, _ad Paulin._; Eusebius, “Life of
Constantine,” iii. 25.
[403] Eusebius, “Demonstr. Evang.,” viii. 3; Cyril, “Catech. Lect.,”
xvi. 18; Mic. iii. 12.
[404] The ancient wall south of the Holy Sepulchre Cathedral may be of
this age. It is of large stones, some of which are drafted. It runs
east and west, but is not founded on rock, though the base is 18 feet
below the present surface. Probably the rock is 20 or 30 feet lower
still on this line, and the wall is described as standing on debris.
_Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, April 1894, p. 146. It is not of necessity
a wall of the city.
[405] Bliss, “Excav. at Jer.,” 1898, pp. 228, 249.
[406] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., p. 424; Waddington,
“Inscript.,” Nos. 1829, 1854, 1897, 2032. Another occurs in the Tombs
of the Prophets, “Courage, Eutherius, no one is immortal.” _Pal. Expl.
Fund Quarterly_, Jan. 1901, p. 22.
[407] See back, p. 63.
[408] See back, p. 161, and _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, Oct. 1904, p.
296, Jan. 1905, p. 74.
[409] Cypr., “Epist.,” 75; Euseb., “Hist. Eccl.,” vi. 11.
CHAPTER X
THE BYZANTINES
The Romans policed the western world for the benefit of Italy alone.
We have made them our model, but the progress of higher thought in
the past was due to the Hebrew, the Greek, the Norman, and the Frank,
rather than to the Roman, whose only culture was Greek, or to his Saxon
disciples. Before Marcus Aurelius died, in 180 A. D., the empire had
become cosmopolitan. Signs of decay then appeared under Commodus, and
the heart of Italy withered. Constantine substituted the hereditary
principle for the elective method dear to the old free republic, but
he only delayed the doom to which Roman supremacy and centralisation
now hastened. An ignorant plutocracy, corrupted by luxury, destroyed
the ancient yeomanry by absorbing the small holdings of the “coloni,”
and ruined agriculture by laying the land under grass. They sapped
the sources of their own power, and substituted foreign slaves for
native freedmen. The plebeian settled as a legionary in distant lands,
forming colonies, military and civil, of crossbred descendants, and the
colonial emperors had little regard to the selfish prejudices of Rome.
The Church was also changing, like the empire. Under the philosophic
Aurelius, Christians were becoming numerous, and before the end of
the second century Tertullian wrote as follows[410]: “The cry is
that the State is full of Christians; that they are in the field, in
the citadels, in the islands; men lament, as if for some calamity,
that both sexes, every age and condition, even high rank, are passing
over to the profession of the Christian faith; and yet, for all this,
their minds are not awakened to the thought of some good that they
have failed to notice in it.” “We are but of yesterday, but we have
filled every place among you--cities, islands, fortresses, towns,
market-places, the very camp, tribes, companies, palace, senate,
forum: we have left nothing to you but the temples of your gods.” Yet
Truth cannot keep her robe spotless when she walks the market with
the crowd. The Church was becoming Romanised, the “sacerdos” began
to be distinguished in his “ordo” from the laity or “people.” Men
of high rank, like Cyprian (or like the later Ambrose), were being
elected as bishops in the third century, and their influence was very
different from that of the humble “overseers” of earlier days. After
the Decian persecution the federated Churches were strong enough to
demand toleration, and received it from the dying Galerius after 300
A. D. Sacerdotal organisation was more welcome to Roman rulers than the
teaching of the Master, but it also rendered the leaders of the Church
more willing to regard worldly expedience.
[Sidenote: CONSTANTINE]
The adoption of Christianity as the imperial cultus by Constantine
revolutionised Church and Empire. Eusebius is enthusiastic in praising
(or flattering) the newly converted master of the West, but his hero’s
memory is stained by cruel deeds of tyranny; and, though his heart may
have been touched by the Gospel, it is more probable that his policy
was due to considerations of worldly state-craft. Flavius Valerius
Aurelius Constantinus was the son of Constantius Chlorus, the emperor
who died at York. Constantine was born in Mœsia, served in Persia,
and became sole emperor in 323 A. D. at about fifty years of age. He
was a shrewd statesman, with experiences gained in many lands, and
perceived the trend of his time, which permitted him to convert the
Italian republic into a European monarchy. The change of capital, which
Italy had dreaded even in the days of Julius Cæsar, recognised the
Asiatic conquests as being the richest and most valuable provinces of
the empire, and broke down the Roman supremacy. Constantine also cast
his eyes on the Christian Churches, and perceived in them a power which
might become a mighty engine in his hands--a cultus better organised
and more popular than any other, and a society which he might sway by
securing the nomination of its bishops.
But to the Christian faith this recognition was a misfortune lamented
by all the great men of the fourth century--by Jerome and Chrysostom,
Gregory and Basil, if not so by the courtly Eusebius. The Council of
Nicæa, called in 325 A. D., produced the great Arian schism; but the
cultus of the “divine emperor” was eagerly adopted by the masses,
and the Catholic Church was suddenly swamped by the conversion of
innumerable ignorant and superstitious pagans, while, as State
officials, the bishops lost their freedom, and were selected rather
on account of their loyalty to the emperor than because of the purity
of their faith. Palestine became a holy land, and was filled with
wonder-loving pilgrims. Cyril of Jerusalem was obliged to exhort his
neophytes against “things done to honour lifeless idols, the lighting
of lamps, or burning incense by fountains or rivers, watching of birds,
divination, omens, amulets, charms on leaves, and sorceries.”[411]
[Sidenote: THE HOLY SEPULCHRE]
It was under such circumstances that Constantine took steps to show
his zeal for the Catholic party, and--as usual with former emperors--to
found a shrine at the most appropriate place in honour of his own
peculiar cultus. According to Eusebius, after the Council, the new
“bishop of bishops,” who had then presided, “desired to perform a
glorious work in Palestine by adorning and consecrating the place of
our Lord’s resurrection, not without God, but moved by the spirit
of the Saviour Himself.”[412] Crowds of pilgrims were then visiting
Olivet,[413] and among them was the emperor’s mother, Helena. It
would seem from the letter which Constantine wrote to Macarius,[414]
who became bishop of Jerusalem in the year of the edict of Milan
(313 A. D.), that the establishment of the Church had at once been
signalised (perhaps with imperial permission) by the destruction of
the Aphrodite temple in the Holy City, which was hateful to Jews and
Christians alike. It was entirely removed, and even the earth was
carried away and the rock laid bare. During these operations an ancient
sepulchre--which (as before suggested) was probably that of the family
of David--was found, and was no doubt recognised at once as being
Jewish. Moreover, a rock grave was discovered 15 yards farther west,
and it was this that Macarius declared to be the true tomb of Christ.
We are not told why he made this announcement. Eusebius does not speak
of any tradition, nor does it seem possible that the tomb of Joseph
of Arimathæa should have been known to the Christians who returned to
Jerusalem seventy or a hundred years after the fall of the city, buried
as it was under the foundations of a heathen temple. We learn nothing
except that Constantine was inspired to seek the site, and that the
bishop of Jerusalem informed him of its discovery.
The announcement was received[415] with enthusiasm by Constantine, who
wrote of the discovery as being miraculous, according to the copy of
his letter given by Eusebius: “Truly that the evidence [_gnórisma_]
of His most holy Passion, hidden of old under the earth for so many
periods of years, should be anew manifested to the faithful ... is a
prodigy defying all admiration.” For, as Eusebius says, “the awful
and most holy witness [_marturion_] of the Saviour’s resurrection
was discovered beyond all hope.” The letter goes on to declare the
confirmation of the emperor’s belief by “all those supernatural events
which daily occur to demonstrate the truth of the faith,” and it
says that his “first wish now, and after having by God’s leave freed
from the heavy load of impious idols the place holy from the first
by God’s will, holier yet since it has thrown a vivid light on the
Passion of the Saviour, my wish I say is to adorn this holy place by
the construction of splendid buildings.” The rest of the letter gives
directions for this purpose. It does not, however, enlighten us as to
the reasons for selecting the site. The emperor, like his people at
large, seems to have been quite satisfied to rest on the authority of
Macarius.
[Sidenote: THE SEPULCHRE]
We are now more critical than men were in the fourth century; and
besides all the difficulties (already noticed) in accepting this
site as appropriate, there is another--namely, that the rock grave
found by the bishop cannot apparently have been like that described
in the Gospels. Our only contemporary witness is Eusebius, and the
turgid language of his eulogy on Constantine gives us little accurate
information. He died in 340 A. D., and Cyril wrote twenty years after
the supposed discovery occurred.[416] He says that the stone still
lay in his time beside the Holy Sepulchre, and that “the hollow place
which was then at the door of the salutary tomb, and was hewn out of
the rock itself as is customary here in the front of sepulchres, now
appears not, the outer cave having been hewn away for the sake of the
present adornment; for before the sepulchre was decorated by royal zeal
there was a cave in the face of the rock; but where is the rock that
has in it this hollow place?” We may echo these words to-day, and may
well ask, Was there ever any such cave?
Quaresmius (writing in 1616 A. D.) preserves a letter from Father
Boniface of Raguza, who was present in 1555 when the building over
the Holy Sepulchre was repaired. We must accept his statement that,
when the covering (of marble) was taken off, “the sepulchre of our
Lord appeared in its original state hewn in the rock.” But he does not
speak of there being any rock cave over it. On the contrary, there
were walls decorated by two ancient frescoes of angels, together with
a parchment bearing the name “Helena Magna” in Latin capitals, which
was probably much later than her time. When the great basilica was
first built, the rock was levelled sufficiently to form a flat floor
for the great apse; but a little to the south-east the cliff supposed
to be Calvary was allowed to stand up 15 feet above this floor, with
the cavern of Golgotha beneath its flat summit. The rock face in which
the door of the Jewish tomb, west of the Sepulchre, was cut stood up
6 feet above the floor, and it appears that the rock surface sloped
gently eastwards, so that the existence of a cave at least 7 feet high,
with rock above it, seems to have been impossible at the spot where the
Holy Sepulchre itself was found. That grave must have been simply a
rock-sunk tomb, covered probably by a large and heavy stone, and when
the floor was levelled it stood up as a trough, with rock walls, about
2 feet above the pavement of the apse.
Such graves are not uncommon in Palestine, being sometimes single,
sometimes three or more in a row, each covered by a hewn stone like the
lid of a sarcophagus. I have described one group which I found in 1872
at Sepphoris, north of Nazareth; and in another case at Mithilia--a
ruin not far off--a rock sarcophagus stands up alone on a rock which
has been scarped on each side below it. At Umm el Buruk, in Gilead,
there are other examples which I described in 1881, and this site
is the ruin of a Roman town, with a Greek inscription stating that
“Antonius Rufus” made something (apparently a tomb) “for himself at
his own cost.”[417] There can be little doubt that graves of this
kind belong to the Roman period, and they are neither Hebrew nor even
Greco-Jewish. The “new tomb” in the garden was of the last-named class,
with a _loculus_ so placed in the cave that the two angels could be
seen from the door sitting at the head and foot of the grave itself.
Macarius cannot apparently have found such a tomb, but he discovered a
rock-sunk grave which, as it was single and also near a Hebrew tomb, he
rashly assumed to be the sepulchre which he hoped to find. He was not
an archæologist, nor was he well acquainted with the topography of the
ancient city which Hadrian had transformed into a modern town. We need
not doubt that he was as honestly convinced about the matter as General
Gordon was convinced about the “Garden Tomb.” But they both appear to
have been misled by enthusiasm without knowledge, and they both created
sacred sites which were eagerly adopted by those who accepted their
authority.
[Sidenote: CONSTANTINE’S CHURCH]
The result of fixing the site, which has now become traditional, was
that a Christian church was built where a heathen temple had stood.
This was the case also at Ba’albek, at Gerasa, possibly at Bethlehem,
and in many other cases, such as the basilica of St. Clement at Rome.
There is no doubt that Constantine’s sites were the same as now shown.
Not only are they described as lying “north of Sion”--that is, of
the upper city, which is so called by all the pilgrims--and also as
being to the “left hand” of those who went north to the Nâblus Gate,
while the east gates of the basilica opened on the market,[418] but we
have now the mosaic map already described, which shows the position
of Constantine’s great Church of the Resurrection, and enables us to
understand the rather vague description by Eusebius.[419]
The sepulchre was first adorned by the chamber built over it. This
stood in a great apse which had in its wall three smaller apses, one
on the west, the others on the north and south. They still exist,
though the apse has been converted into the rotunda. De Vogüé remarked
that the north and south apses have their east sides tangential to
the diameter of the great apse, which clearly shows that it was not
originally built as a rotunda. His restoration of the whole cathedral
has been proved to be the best of several suggestions by the discovery
of the mosaic map. The apse had no roof, and the paved, pillared
court round the sepulchre was open to the sky. East of this was a
roofed basilica, like that still existing at Bethlehem, which was also
founded by Constantine. The site of Calvary was in the south-west part
of this basilica, which had a nave and aisles--probably four, as at
Bethlehem--with a clerestory above, and a gilt ceiling. East of the
basilica was an atrium, or entrance hall, and beyond this the pillared
porch, with gates opening on the central pillared street of the city.
To the south of the basilica was the great tank used as a baptistery,
and still traceable. It was fed from reservoirs, of which the most
important--now called “Helena’s Cistern”--is 66 feet deep, and measures
60 feet by 30 feet, being immediately east of Calvary. The total length
of these buildings was 350 feet east and west, and the breadth 120 feet
north and south.
One of the most remarkable ceremonies of the year was connected
with the baptistery; and Cyril[420] describes how the christenings
were carried out at Eastertide. In the evening before the Day of
Resurrection the neophytes assembled in the dark porch--apparently
by torch-light--and, turning to the west, renounced Satan and all
the practices of pagan superstition. The women were separately
assembled by deaconesses. Every neophyte was naked, and was anointed
with oil from head to foot. They were led to the “holy pool,” and
thrice descended its steps into the water, confessing their belief
in Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. They were then clothed in white, and
the bishop confirmed them by the chrism, marking with the sign of the
cross, in holy oil, the forehead, ears, nostrils, and breast of each
new member of the Church, after which they partook of the Eucharist
at the Easter Communion. The bishop preached to them, and St. Silvia
says, “So loud are the voices of those applauding that they are heard
outside the church.” This applause by congregations is also mentioned
by Chrysostom. The other ceremonies--both daily and annual--including
processions to Olivet and to Sion, which are described in some detail
by St. Silvia, with the exhortations to pilgrims delivered in Greek,
Syriac, and Latin, need not now detain us.
The oldest church in Jerusalem seems to have been that of “Holy Sion,”
which the Crusaders rebuilt, and which is now the Nebi Dâûd Mosque,
outside the south wall of the city. A small chapel may have been built
here towards the close of the third century, and by the fifth it had
come to be regarded as having been built by the apostles.[421] The
Temple enclosure remained in ruins till the time of Justinian, but a
basilica was also built by Constantine on the summit of Olivet, and
the Pool of Siloam was surrounded by a cloister. The other traditional
sites, including the Prætorium, the House of Caiaphas, and Bethesda,
have been already sufficiently noticed.[422]
[Sidenote: JULIAN]
The accession of Julian, after the death of his uncle Constantine
in 337 A. D., and of his cousin Constantius in 353 A. D., checked
the progress of Christian church building for ten years, and obliged
Catholics and Arians for the moment to lay aside their differences
in defence of their common faith. The Jews had rebelled against
Constantius in the second year of his reign, when Sepphoris was
razed to the ground. In the last six months before his death, on the
borders of Persia, the philosophic Julian is said to have endeavoured
to win their loyalty by rebuilding their Temple. According to a
contemporary statement, the work was abandoned soon after it was
begun, the labourers “fearing globes of flames” which burst out of the
foundations--miraculously, according to Gregory of Nazianzen.[423]
The Jews were now allowed to return to Jerusalem, and are said to
have contributed largely to the funds raised by Alypius, governor of
Palestine.
It is very doubtful whether any remains of this work are to be
recognised, though some writers have thought that the “Golden Gate,” on
the east wall of the Ḥaram, was built by Julian. It seems to have taken
its name (_Porta Aurea_) from a misunderstanding of the Greek _hôraia_,
and to have been thus identified by later writers with the “Beautiful
Gate” of the Temple. It certainly existed in the sixth century,[424]
but according to architectural authority the style of the arched
cornices is not as early as the time of Julian, while the gate-house
within is supported on great columns which seem clearly to be as
late as the sixth century, when the Temple walls appear to have been
still in ruins. It is more probable, therefore, that the Golden Gate,
which is unnoticed by pilgrims before the time of Justinian, is to be
attributed to the period of his restoration of the Temple enclosure.
[Sidenote: EUDOCIA’S WALL]
The city remained at peace under the emperors of the East for three
centuries after the Christian religion had been tolerated at Milan in
313 A. D. The next great building period was in the time of Eudocia,
widow of Theodosius II. She lived sixteen years in the Holy City, and
died there, at the age of sixty-seven, about 460 A. D. She built (as
already noticed) the Church of St. Stephen outside the north gate, and
here she was buried; she also built a wall on the south side of the
upper city to include the Church of St. Sion, and carried it over the
Tyropœon Valley (enclosing for the first time the Pool of Siloam),
running it north, on the ancient line on Ophel, to the south-east
angle of the Temple enclosure. The ruins of this wall have now been
excavated.[425]
The reasons for supposing that the wall excavated by Mr. Bliss is not
older than the time of Eudocia are purely antiquarian, and require
notice because it has been assumed, by recent writers, that it
represents the “old wall” described by Josephus, though its course is
not that which he mentions, since--in 70 A. D.--the rampart crossed the
Tyropœon “above Siloam,” and left the pool outside. The wall was partly
rebuilt for a short distance on the slope of Sion, at some later period
(before 680 A. D.), but it is substantially all of one character, and
fragments of Roman and Byzantine work have been built into its masonry.
A new gate was made near its south-west angle, the threshold stones
of which were more than once renewed. A pilaster with Roman letters
and numerals was here used up, and the drain under the lowest pavement
of the street was covered with flat stones. “One of these,” says Mr.
Bliss, “has a large plain Greek cross carved on its under side,” which
clearly indicates that even the oldest part of the wall is later than
the fourth century.
The style of fortification, with buttresses at intervals, is also
distinctively Byzantine, and the masonry is “roughly set in coarse
lime,” and (near Siloam) is “covered with plaster.” The masonry does
not resemble that of even Herod’s time, but (as seen by myself and as
shown in the drawings supplied by Mr. Bliss) it may confidently be
ascribed to the fifth century. Similar masonry is common in the walls
of chapels and monasteries throughout Palestine and Syria belonging to
that age, and it is certain that this was hewn at the time, and was not
merely re-used material. It was a rude imitation of the older Greek and
Roman style, but the work is very inferior in execution. The stones
are generally less than 2 feet square, the joints are wide, and mortar
is used, while in some cases small fragments of stone are packed in
on the face of the joint. The courses are irregular, and some stones
are rudely drafted, while others are not. This masonry is constantly
associated with barrel vaults having graduated voussoirs--the keystone
narrow, and the haunch-stones broad--which is also distinctive
of Byzantine architecture. No one who has examined the Palestine
monasteries of the Byzantine age could doubt that the wall in question
must be of the same period, and it appears that it was the work of
Eudocia, though it was repaired and strengthened, in the same style,
rather later--probably by Justinian. Soon after his time Antoninus
Martyr says, “The fountain of Siloam is at the present day within the
walls of the city, because the Empress Eudocia herself added these
walls to the city, and built the basilica and tomb of St. Stephen.”[426]
[Illustration: SPECIMENS OF MASONRY, SHOWING THE COMPARATIVE SIZE AND
FINISH.
1. Palace of Hyrcanus.
2. Herod’s Temple, Jerusalem.
3. Byzantine wall on Sion, at Jerusalem.
4. Norman wall on Sion, at Jerusalem.
5. From the Templars’ Castle of Tortosa.
6. From the Castle of Krak des Chevaliers.
]
The chapel which has been found on the north side of the Pool of Siloam
appears to be somewhat later than this wall. It is not mentioned by any
writer before 570 A. D., and it may have been built under Justinian.
The pool--as described by Antoninus Martyr--was then converted into
a baptistery, and the chapel was no doubt used in connection with
the rites. The reservoir was divided into two parts by rails. In one
part men were washed, in the other women, “for a blessing,” and the
intermittent flow from the tunnel was awaited. The waters were said
to cure leprosy--no doubt with reference to the Gospel story.[427]
As late as the eleventh century[428] a Moslem writer informs us,
in speaking of Siloam, “there are at this spring many buildings for
charitable purposes, richly endowed”; but these were apparently not
kept up, and the chapel is not noticed in the accounts of the Middle
Ages. The institution is mentioned by Nâṣr-i-Khosrau in connection
with the hospice in the city itself (afterwards that of St. John),
which dated from about 800 A. D. It is, however, possible that both
these charitable institutions originated with Justinian, who certainly
erected others on the Temple hill.
[Sidenote: THE MOSAIC MAP]
The mosaic map of Jerusalem, perhaps about 450 A. D., has already
been noticed.[429] It shows very clearly Constantine’s Church of the
Anastasis, with the great roofless apse on the west, the basilica to
its east having a pitched roof, while the atrium seems also to be
roofless, and the porch gates stand above steps leading down to the
pillared street close by to the east. The representation of the city is
a rude perspective, and the main buildings are quite out of scale. The
pillared street ascends to Zion by steps at right angles to its course,
which is north and south through the middle of the city. The walls are
strengthened by towers such as have been actually unearthed on the
south. Three city gates are shown on west, north, and east. The only
building on the Temple site is at the south-east corner--apparently the
“Chapel of St. Simeon” in the old Herodian vault, where the “Cradle
of Christ” was early shown. The second pillared street, west of the
Temple, descends towards Siloam by steps, and Antoninus Martyr,[430] in
the sixth century, speaks of descending this street under the “arch”
of the causeway, which then led to the central gate of the west Temple
wall, and “by many steps” down to Siloam. The Church of St. Anne is
shown in the north-east part of the city, and a large church inside
the wall on the south-west is probably St. Sion.[431] The House of
Annas appears to its north, with three other buildings--two east of the
central street.
At the time when Eudocia retired to Jerusalem the terror of the Huns
had fallen on Europe and on Asia. Before his death, her husband,
Theodosius II., was forced to make peace with Attila. Last of the
Spanish emperors of Byzantium, he was succeeded in 457 A. D. by Leo of
Thrace. The Roman Empire was broken up by the Goths, who were driven
from their homes by the Huns, and who invaded the Balkan peninsula
and Asia Minor. Theodoric the Ostrogoth nearly won Byzantium from
Zeno the Isaurian, and then conquered Italy and sacked Rome. The rude
civilisation of the Goths was fatal to the ancient culture of Greeks
and Latins, and the Arians triumphed over the Catholics. Asia was Arian
at heart, and the Eastern Churches refused the new definitions and the
Mariolatry of the imperial orthodoxy. After the Council of Chalcedon
(in 451 A. D.), when Jerusalem became the seat of a patriarch, Syrians,
Copts, Armenians, and Chaldeans alike were separated from the Greeks
and Romans. The superstitions which Chrysostom denounced at Antioch
even in the fourth century degraded Christianity, and learning hid
itself in remote monasteries, while education was ruined by Gothic
barbarism. From this welter of confusion rose the new empire of
Justinian--himself of Gothic descent--which restored the glories of
Constantine’s monarchy for forty years after 527 A. D. But the ancient
world was entirely changed, and Byzantine power lingered only half a
century after Justinian’s death.
[Sidenote: JUSTINIAN]
Justinian was a great builder, and did much for Jerusalem. If the
architectural style of his work on the Temple hill is sometimes more
classical than that of his great Cathedral of St. Sophia in his
capital, this may be attributed--in an age of novelty--to the later
selection of Theodorus as his architect.[432] The fine, square,
undrafted masonry which stands on the Herodian work in the outer Temple
walls is certainly later than Hadrian’s time, since his inscription has
been built into it upside-down at the Double Gate. It is attributed
by de Vogüé to Justinian, who was the first to restore the ramparts
destroyed by Titus. Similar masonry is also found in connection with
the wall of Eudocia, but this is less well hewn than Justinian’s work.
His great building was the Church of St. Mary on the south side of
the Temple enclosure, and besides this he appears to have founded the
Church of the Virgin’s Tomb, as well as one to St. Sophia, and two
hospitals.
We owe our knowledge of Justinian’s works to Procopius, but his
description of the St. Mary Church is so vague as to lead some writers
to state that its position cannot be identified. Procopius[433] says
that the “temple to the Virgin, ... called by natives the New Church,”
was ordered to be built “on the most prominent of the hills.” It was
begun by the Patriarch Elias, and completed by Justinian about 532
A. D. It was found that there was not enough flat ground to allow of
the emperor’s design being carried out, without raising the foundations
on vaults under about a quarter of the area towards the south-east,
so that it was evidently on the narrower part of the Temple ridge.
Antoninus Martyr tells us that a footprint of Christ was shown in this
church, which later writers identify with the present Aḳṣa Mosque,[434]
where the “footprint of Jesus” is still shown. In the twelfth century
the Templars’ Church occupied the south part of this mosque, and had
an apse on the east, the wall of which is still visible. It consisted
of a nave and two aisles, and the mosque dome is still supported on
fine columns which appear to be of the time of Justinian. The building
stands partly on the rock and partly on the vaulted passage from the
Double Gate, which passage is also of masonry attributable to the age
of Justinian, its barrel vault being Byzantine.
On the south-east the rock is 40 feet lower than the floor of the
mosque, and the surface is banked up above it, and is partly supported
by the west wall and the vaulted roof of the Triple Gateway. The site
thus answers to that described by Procopius, and the Templars’ apse
very probably marks the site of that which belonged to Justinian’s
church, and which is described as being on the east. The building
had two side apses--as was usual in this age--and on the west was a
_narthex_, or narrow porch, with a square atrium or outer court, and
beyond this again the western gates. The great apse was flanked by two
tall pillars, and the church appears to have had a clerestory. The
atrium, as well as the aisles, was adorned with large pillars, and it
is supposed that some of the massive columns now used in the north part
of the mosque have been cut down in height, and originally belonged
to the church. They have Corinthian capitals, but are evidently not
standing _in situ_,[435] and in style they are not as early as the
pillars of Constantine’s basilica at Bethlehem.[436]
We may suppose, therefore, that the new Church of the Virgin occupied
what is called the “transept” of the Aḳṣa, thus including the
“footprint of Christ” in its south-west part. It was thus about 160
feet long and 100 feet wide, with an atrium 100 feet square on the
west. It resembled in plan the Holy Sepulchre basilica, except that it
had three apses on the east instead of one large apse on the west. This
building became the first mosque in Jerusalem a century after it was
built.
[Sidenote: ST. SOPHIA]
Besides building this church and repairing the outer walls of the
Temple, Justinian very probably enclosed the five acres on the
north-east, which (as already said[437]) formed no part of Herod’s
enclosure. He adorned the Double Gate with an arched cornice outside,
and probably built the Golden Gate in the same style, as well as the
fine gate-house within. The Ṣakhrah rock--as the site of the Jewish
Temple--was purposely left desolate, as it was in Constantine’s time;
but a Church of St. Sophia was built, and is described by Theodorus
(who was perhaps the same person who built the church for Justinian) as
being in the Prætorium. It is thus to be identified with the “Chapel
of the Mocking,” which still exists inside the Turkish barracks on the
Antonia scarp. Antoninus Martyr also describes it at the same site, and
calls it a basilica.[438]
It is not clear from the account by Procopius where the two hospitals
built by Justinian stood, nor are any remains of them known to
exist. They flanked some entry, and may have been near the west
central gate of the enclosure (now the “Gate of the Chain”), where
the ancient causeway was repaired, and ran on Byzantine arches over
the street leading from the Gate of St. Stephen to Siloam. Cyril of
Scythopolis[439] mentions Justinian’s hospital for sick pilgrims as
having one hundred beds, to which another hundred were added later.
Procopius speaks of one hospice as being a lodging for visitors coming
from a distance, and of the other as being a resting-place for the sick
poor. Antoninus Martyr, forty years later, says: “From Sion we came to
the Basilica of the Blessed Mary, where is a large company of monks,
and where also are hospices for men and women. There I was received as
a pilgrim: there were countless tables, and more than three thousand
beds for sick persons.” The hospices may have been enlarged by his
time, but Antoninus is not a very reliable writer, and is given to
exaggeration, besides being extremely credulous.
To Justinian we may also, perhaps, ascribe the building of the
underground chapel at Gethsemane, which was supposed to be the site
of the Virgin’s Tomb. It is first mentioned by Theodorus, and though
St. John of Damascus speaks of the Empress Pulcheria (after 450 A. D.)
as desiring relics from this tomb, he only wrote three centuries
later. Yet a third church in honour of the Virgin first appears in
the accounts of Theodorus and Antoninus. This was close to the “Sheep
Pool,” and its site is perhaps marked by the present Latin chapel of
the “Flagellation.”
[Illustration: JERUSALEM IN 530 A. D.]
[Sidenote: KHOSRAU II.]
After the death of Justinian, whose power held at bay the Vandals
and the Goths, the Persians, and the Turks of the Volga, and after
the peaceful times of his nephew, Justin II., and of Tiberius II.,
who married the widow of Justin, Maurice the Cappadocian--of Roman
origin--was emperor for twenty years, till he was murdered in 602
A. D. by the centurion Phocas, elected emperor by the discontented
army, and attacked by Khosrau II., the Sassanian ruler of Persia. The
Byzantine empire had fallen on evil days, and Heraclius, the exarch
of Africa, refused tribute to Phocas. Khosrau I. had conceived the
ambitious idea of conquering Western Asia; but he was held in check by
Justinian, who was allied to the Turks on his north and to the Sabean
kings on the south. The grandson (Khosrau II.) took advantage of the
weakness of Phocas, and attacked Aleppo and Antioch in 610 A. D., while
Heraclius, son of the exarch, was besieging the upstart centurion in
Byzantium. For ten years Khosrau II. held Chalcedon, and the Persian
forces faced the new Greek emperor at Constantinople. The victorious
Sassanian entered Alexandria, and in 614 A. D. the Persians besieged
Jerusalem. Muhammad at Mekkah watched the war, and predicted that
in spite of the defeat of the Greeks they would triumph a few years
later.[440] Meanwhile, the Holy City fell to the Persians in June[441];
and, according to a contemporary account in the Paschal Chronicle, a
terrible massacre of monks and nuns followed. The churches were laid in
ruins; the Holy Sepulchre basilica, built by Constantine, was burned
down; the Patriarch Zacharias and the True Cross were taken away to
Persia as hostages. Mediæval writers state that the corpses of the
martyrs were buried at the “Charnel House [or, Cave] of the Lion,”
beside the Mâmilla Pool outside Jerusalem, on the west,[442] where a
subterranean chapel still exists.
The prediction of Muḥammad was speedily fulfilled. Heraclius drove the
Persians out of Asia Minor in 622 A. D.--the year of the Hejirah--and
struck boldly at the heart of their empire. He advanced nearly to
Ispahan, and in five years he so ruined Sassanian power as to leave
Persia a prey to the Moslems ten years later. His advance forced
Khosrau II. to retreat from Palestine, and early in 628 the latter was
murdered by his son Siroes, who made an ignominious peace with the
Byzantines. Thus, in the following year, Heraclius made a triumphal
entry by the Golden Gate into Jerusalem, at the Feast of the Exaltation
of the Cross on September 14, and bore the sacred relic on his
shoulder, while the patriarch, having died in captivity, was succeeded
by Modestus, his vicar.
[Sidenote: MODESTUS]
Even before this last triumph of the Byzantine emperor, steps had been
taken to rebuild the ruined churches, as soon as the Persians had
retired. John Eleemon, Patriarch of Alexandria, raised funds and sent a
thousand workmen from Egypt.[443] The monk Modestus, appointed vicar to
the captive Patriarch Zacharias, superintended the building work.
The churches destroyed by Khosrau II. included (according to Eutychius,
who, however, wrote three centuries later) the church of Gethsemane
(or of the Virgin’s Tomb), and those of Constantine and Helena, with
Golgotha and the Holy Sepulchre. About sixty years after these were
rebuilt, the Gaulish bishop Arculphus described the new churches to
Adamnan, bishop of Iona, to which island he had been driven by a
storm. Rough sketch-plans were also made by Adamnan from his accounts,
representing the sites near the Holy Sepulchre, the square church of
Holy Sion, and the round church on the summit of Olivet. Before these
were in turn destroyed (in 1010 A. D.), they were also visited by St.
Willibald in the eighth century, and by Bernard, “the wise monk,” in
the ninth century. From these accounts,[444] and from existing remains,
we may conclude that the new buildings were very inferior to those of
Constantine’s time, but that they were on the same sites.
The chapel or chamber over the Holy Sepulchre was now apparently a
round _tugurium_ or “cabin,” without any ante-chamber. The great
apse in which it stood was converted into a rotunda, and a circular
wall, or fence, was built outside it. The central drum, supported on
pillars, was roofless just as it was later. Three altars stood in the
three small apses of the rotunda. The “cabin” was covered with marble
slabs, and had a gold cross on its roof. The Calvary rock was enclosed
in a second (square) chapel, which was separated by a porch from the
small “Church of Constantine,” which in part replaced the old basilica
proper. Under this was a rock-cut crypt reached by steps--as it still
is--and shown as the place where the three crosses were found hidden
by St. Helena. Besides these three churches there was a fourth to the
south of the rotunda of the Holy Sepulchre. It was dedicated to St.
Mary, and is said to have been large and square. Its exact position is
not very clear, and no remains survived the second destruction in 1010
A. D., unless it was on the site of the chapel afterwards built, and
also dedicated to the Virgin, rather farther west than the position on
the map of Adamnan. The open court, or “Paradise,” east of the rotunda
was paved with marble, and the walls shone with gold. It was supposed
to represent the garden in which the “new tomb” had been hewn in the
rock.[445] In or near its centre was a pillar said to mark the “middle
of the world,” which was proved by its casting no shadow at the summer
solstice; but this, of course, was impossible. Four chains hung from
this pillar, connecting the four churches to it (according to Bernard
in 867 A. D.); on the north-east side of the Paradise was a wooden
table on which alms were received; and south of this (between Calvary
and the basilica) was a chamber where the silver cup of the Last Supper
was shown.
[Sidenote: CHURCHES OF MODESTUS]
The only remains attributable to these buildings are those which have
recently been found west of the old pillared street,[446] and east of
the cave “Chapel of Helena,” together with the columns supporting the
roof of the latter, and perhaps one capital which has been built into
the wall of the Chapel of the Virgin south of the rotunda, and which
the visitor passes (on his left) when going from Christian Street to
the south entrance of the present cathedral. The capitals in the Chapel
of Helena, with their heavy outline and basket-work ornament, are
evidently Byzantine work of about the seventh century, and the capital
of the built-in pillar is in the same style. The wall and gate recently
described by Mr. Dickie may have belonged to the renovated basilica
built by Modestus, and ancient masonry here appears to have been
re-used, perhaps more than once. As this wall is not at right angles to
the axis of the original basilica, it probably belonged to the detached
building erected by Modestus, or to that which superseded it in 1028
A. D. The “Prison of Christ,” east of the rotunda, is not noticed in
any account of the period when the buildings of Modestus were standing
(622–1010 A. D.), and this with its arcade seems to have belonged to
the third period of building to be described later.
Other churches which may have been rebuilt by Modestus include the
“double church” of the Virgin’s Tomb (a subterranean chapel with a
round roofless building over it), and the remarkable round church on
the summit of Olivet. These, like the four churches above described,
were rebuilt by the Franks in the twelfth century. The Armenian
account (already noticed[447]) speaks of the Virgin’s Tomb as reached
by two hundred and fifty steps, having above it a cupola on four
marble columns covered with copper crosses. It also mentions St. Sion
apparently as having a crypt, and a wooden cupola on which the Last
Supper was painted. The Church of the Ascension was also roofless,
and had apparently a central drum, supported on pillars and pierced
by eight windows on the west side: these were glazed, and lamps were
hung in them which could be seen shining by night from the city. A
circular double cloister surrounded the drum, and in the centre was a
bronze cylinder,[448] with a glazed door through which could be seen
the rock marked by the two footprints of Christ. The pilgrims used
to be admitted within, and carried away with them the dust lying on
the rock. A strange superstition was also connected, in the eighth
century, with two pillars which apparently stood in the east gate
of the outer cloister; for St. Willibald says that “the man who can
squeeze between the pillars and the wall becomes free from his sins.”
The same superstition still clung to two pillars in the Aḳṣa Mosque
as late as 1881 A. D.; for it was said by Moslems that any one who
squeezed between them would go to heaven. In consequence, perhaps, of
my having passed through them, an iron bar was placed across by order
of the pasha to prevent this old custom being followed any more. It is
a survival of the widespread peasant belief in the virtue of “passing
through” holed stones, creeping under dolmens, or altars, or arches,
which we find all over the world, from Ireland to China and Japan.
The works of Modestus had only been completed about a dozen years
before the Moslem Conquest, and were the last carried out under
Christian domination until the time of the first Crusade, though other
churches were built in 1028 A. D., as will appear later. The gradual
growth of Christian buildings in Jerusalem, down to the era of the
downfall of Christian power in Palestine, has been described in the
historical sequence of their construction to the time immediately
preceding the triumph of Islâm.
FOOTNOTES TO CHAPTER X
[410] “Apologeticus,” i. 37.
[411] “Catech. Lect.,” xix. 8, delivered in the new Church of the
Anastasis in 348 A. D. Cyril was a semi-Arian.
[412] “Life of Constant.” (in Greek), iii. 25.
[413] “Demonstr. Evang.,” vi. 18.
[414] “Life of Constant.,” iii. 30.
[415] “Life of Constant.,” iii. 28.
[416] “Catech. Lect.,” xiii. 9.
[417] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” vol. , pp. 316, 330; “Mem. East Pal.
Survey,” p. 244. In the latter instance there are several groups of
rock-sunk graves.
[418] Onomasticon, s.v. _Golgotha_; Bordeaux Pilgrim; St. Silvia (385
A. D.).
[419] Eusebius, “Life of Constant.,” iii. 34–9; Willis, “Ch. of Holy
Sep.,” 1849; de Vogüé, “Églises de la Terre Sainte,” 1860; Prof. Hayter
Lewis, “Holy Places of Jer.,” 1888.
[420] “Catech. Lect.,” xix. 1-xxi. 4. See Tertullian, “In Prax.,” 26,
“De Corona,” 3.
[421] “Primitiva et ecclesiarum mater sancta Sion,” “Will. Tyre.,” xv.
4; Eucherius (_c._ 427–40 A. D.), “Ut fertur ab apostolis fundata”;
Theodorus (_c._ 530 A. D.), “Mater omnium ecclesiarum.”
[422] See back, pp. 14–17.
[423] Ammianus Marcellinus, xxiii. 1; Julian, “Epist.,” xxix., xxx.;
Greg. Nazianzen, “Orat.,” iv.
[424] Antoninus Martyr (_c._ 570 A. D.), “The [east] gate of the
city which adjoins what was once the Beautiful Gate of the Temple,
the thresholds and posts of which still stand.” See Prof. Hayter
Lewis, “Holy Places of Jerusalem,” 1888, p. 94. This statement may be
explained by the conclusion reached by de Vogüé (“Temple de Jérusalem,”
chap. v.) that remains of an earlier gate are traceable at the Golden
Gate.
[425] See back, p. 91; Bliss, “Excav. at Jer.,” 1898, pp. 9–128.
[426] Ant. Mart., xxv. Theodorus (530 A. D.) places the site outside
the “Galilee Gate.” He also says that Siloam “is within the wall.”
[427] John ix. 11.
[428] Nâṣr-i-Khosrau, 1047 A. D.
[429] See back, p. 200.
[430] Ant. Mart., xxiv.
[431] The great corner tower on south-west seems to be that at the
present Protestant Cemetery. The other chapels may be the House of
Caiaphas, the Church of St. Giles (near the Causeway), and that of the
Spasm in the Via Dolorosa.
[432] The arched cornices at the Double and Golden Gates are attributed
by de Vogüé to about the sixth century. The different style of the
interior gate-house at the latter gate, and of the Byzantine pillars
in the Aḳṣa, may be explained by the work having been begun by the
Patriarch Elias, and finished by Justinian in a style more like that in
use at Byzantium.
[433] “De Ædificiis Justiniani,” v. 6; Antoninus Mart., xxiii.
[434] Robinson, “Bib. Res.,” i. pp. 296, 384.
[435] Prof. Hayter Lewis, “Holy Places of Jer.,” 1888, pp. 74–9.
[436] The suggestion that the Bethlehem basilica is later than
Constantine’s age seems to be only true in part. Much of the building
is undoubtedly later. The mosaics date only from the twelfth century,
and the roof of the transept from 1482. But the pillars of the basilica
appear to be of Constantine’s age, and to be still _in situ_ (see “Mem.
West Pal. Survey,” 1883, vol. iii. p. 85).
[437] See back, p. 119.
[438] Theodorus (_c._ 530 A. D.), “Pretorium Pilati ... ibi est
ecclesia Sanctæ Sophiæ”; Antoninus Mart., xxiii.
[439] Cyril of Scythopolis, “Vita Sabæ.”
[440] Ḳorân, xxx. 1.
[441] See Robinson, “Bib. Res.,” i. p. 387.
[442] Eutychius, “Annales,” ii.; John of Würzburg (_c._ 1160 A. D.);
“Citez de Jhérusalem”; “Ord. Survey Notes,” p. 68. The pool is perhaps
the Beth Mamil of the Talmud (Tal. Bab., _Erubin_, 51 _b_; _Sanhed._,
24 _a_; Bereshith, _Rabḅa_, ch. li.) though some pilgrims connect it
with St. Babylas. The legend of the pious lion who buried these martyrs
may have arisen from a corruption of the name Mamilla (“filled”) as
_M’aun-el-lawi_ (“den of the lion”). The cemetery near the pool is
now Moslem, but the _Ḳubbet el ’Abd_, or “slave’s dome,” is an old
Crusader’s tomb in its midst.
[443] Leontius, “Life of John Eleemon.”
[444] There is also a short Armenian account, probably of the seventh
century. N. Bain in _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, Oct. 1896; “Archives
de l’Orient Latin,” ii. p. 394. The rotunda is here stated to have had
an upper arcade of twelve pillars.
[445] St. Willibald (_c._ 754 A. D.).
[446] _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, Oct. 1907, p. 297, Oct. 1908, pp.
298–310, report by Mr. A. C. Dickie.
[447] See back, p. 229.
[448] So Arculphus in 680 A. D.; but in 754 A. D. Willibald describes
it as being square.
CHAPTER XI
THE ARABS
Among the texts, from the Ḳorân, of the mosaics in the Dome of the Rock
occurs one which reads, “Jesus the son of Mary is one sent by God,
and His Word whom He sent upon Mary, and His Spirit.”[449] Muḥammad
did not regard our Lord as being simply a human being, and Carlyle
was not wrong in calling Islâm a kind of Christianity. But it was
the Christianity of Syrian and Arab Gnostics, not of the Gospels,
just as Muḥammad’s ideas about the faith of Israel were taken from
Talmudic Jews, and not from the Old Testament. Islâm was a revolt, not
only from the savage superstitions of Arabia but from the formalism
of Jews and Byzantine Christians, who, as Muḥammad said truly, had
corrupted the truth by teaching the traditions of men. He denied all
the doctrines concerning the Trinity which, in his time, preoccupied
the minds of Christians, and which had rent the seamless robe into
seven pieces, by the schisms of Latins, Greeks, Armenians, Chaldeans,
Maronites, Syrians, and Copts, who had replaced the Catholic Church
of Constantine. Politically, Islâm set free the Semitic race from the
feeble tyrannies of Greeks and Persians. History repeated itself, for
the Arab is always eager to swarm from his deserts when the rulers of
the rich lands to the north are weakened by strife among themselves.
About 650 B. C., when the king of Assyria was fighting Babylon, the
Arabs conquered Eastern Palestine for a few years till driven back by
Assur-bani-pal. In the time of our Lord, the Arab king of Petra ruled
also in Damascus, and among the earliest Christian converts were the
Beni Ghassan Arabs of Bashan. Thus, when Muḥammad had united Arabia,
there was already a large Semitic population ready to join the Moslems
in the north, and a large Gnostic and Ebionite school of thought as
weary as were the Jews of oppression by monks and bishops, weary also
of endless disputes among the churches, and ready to accept a simpler
belief in one God, and in a living prophet who said that there was but
one faith taught by all who came before him, and common to Christian
and Jew. It was not a persecuting faith, and the tolerance of Islâm,
under the Arab khalifs, was not changed into fanaticism till later
Turks arose to give their captives the stern choice between the sword
and the Ḳorân.
[Sidenote: OMAR]
It needed, therefore, only one great defeat for the decayed power of
Byzantium to crumble away, and for the ruined Sassanians to lose their
sway over races mainly Semitic. This victory was won on the precipitous
banks of the Yermûḳ stream in Bashan, four years after the death of
Muḥammad, which took place in his house at Medînah on June 8, 632 A. D.
The capture of Jerusalem by the forces of Omar, in 637 A. D., was
merely an incident in that story of wonderful conquests, which, within
three-quarters of a century, united West Asia, North Africa, and Spain
under the Arab khalîfah of Damascus, as “successor” of the prophet.
We have, however, no contemporary account of the siege of Jerusalem,
which lasted at least four months. The Moslem histories were--at
earliest--written six centuries later, though based on older sources.
The earliest Christian account is that of Theophanes, two hundred
years after the event, and the narrative of Eutychius (about 930 A. D.)
is inaccurate: this writer was chiefly interested in showing that
Heraclius was defeated because he had become a Maronite, deserting
the orthodoxy of the Greek Church.[450] There is, however, a general
agreement as to the main features of the story. When the patriarch
Sophronius capitulated to Abu ’Obeidah, a lean Arab about fifty-five
years of age, clad in a coarse cotton shirt and sheepskin jacket, was
seen approaching on his camel, accompanied by his victorious general
on a little dromedary with a rude halter of hair, his camel-hair
cloak folded on the wooden saddle. Such was the early simplicity of
the conquerors of Asia--of Abu ’Obeidah, and of his master Omar the
second khalîfah. To the patriarch it was a sure sign of the end of the
world, and Theophanes says that he exclaimed, “This is of a truth the
abomination of desolation spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing
in the holy place.” Eutychius preserves what seems to be the original
written promise to the city, faithfully fulfilled by Omar: “In the
name of God merciful and pitying, from ’Amr ibn el Khaṭṭâb to the
dwellers in the city Ailia, that they may be safe as to their lives,
their children, their possessions, and their churches, that these shall
neither be pulled down nor occupied.” Yet a place must be set aside
where Moslems should pray in future, and it was agreed that this should
be at the site of Solomon’s Temple, which still stood desolate at the
Ṣakhrah rock.[451]
Omar therefore entered the Ḥaram, and--according to tradition--entered
by the “Prophet’s Gate” towards the south part of the west wall. He
prayed in Justinian’s basilica of the Virgin, and the place now shown
as his “station” (_Maḳâm ’Amr_) did not then exist, being the vestry of
the later Templar Church adorned with twisted Gothic pillars.[452] He
is said to have visited the Ṣakhrah, which he purified. Eutychius says
that in Constantine’s time “the Rock and the parts adjacent thereto
were ruinous, and were thus left alone. They cast dirt on the stone,
so that a great dunghill was piled upon it, wherefore the Romans (or
Byzantines) neglected it, and did not pay it the honour which the
Israelites were wont to do, neither did they build a church over it,
for that our Lord Jesus Christ said in the Gospel, ‘Behold your House
shall be left unto you desolate.’” Omar caused it to be purified, and
“then some one said, ‘Let us build a temple with the stone for Ḳiblah’
(or direction for ‘fronting’ in prayer); but Omar answered, ‘Not so,
but let us build the shrine so as to place the stone behind it.’ So
Omar built a shrine and set the stone in its back part.” With this
account the later Moslem historians of the fourteenth and fifteenth
centuries A. D. agree.[453]
[Sidenote: OMAR’S MOSQUE]
As regards this Mosque of Omar, which no longer exists, a very common
error is due to the mistakes of later Christian historians,[454] and
the Dome of the Rock--which did not exist till half a century after
Omar’s entry--is called the “Mosque of Omar” in popular literature.
Theophanes says that “Omar began to restore the Temple at Jerusalem,
for indeed the building no longer then stood firmly founded, but had
fallen into ruin.” William of Tyre, in the twelfth century, thought
that the old Ḳufic texts in the Dome of the Rock attributed the
building to Omar. The Franks could not read them, or they would have
found out their mistake. This great historian of their victories speaks
of “mosaic work with most ancient monuments in letters of the Arabic
idiom, which are believed to be of his [Omar’s] time.” But the first
khalifs were warriors and not builders. Muḥammad’s mosque at Medînah
was made of mud and palm-tree posts, and the real Mosque of Omar, which
was still standing about 680 A. D., before it was replaced by the Dome
of the Rock, was near the east wall of the Ḥaram. It is described by
Arculphus in such a manner as to agree with the later statement of
Eutychius, leaving no reasonable doubt on the question. As recorded by
Adamnan, his guest (Arculphus) said: “Also in that famous place where,
before, the temple had been magnificently built, the Saracens frequent
a square house of prayer placed near the east wall, building it
themselves--a poor work with upright beams and great planks--on certain
remains of ruins; which house is said to hold as many as three thousand
men together.”[455] This rude wooden mosque stood, therefore, east of
the Ṣakhrah, amid the ruins of the Temple courts, of which traces only
were left.
The triumphs of the khalifs of Damascus were preceded by fierce
internal dissensions in Islâm. When ’Othmân, the third khalîfah,
died, in 644 A. D., Muawîyah, the son of Abu Ṣofiân--Muḥammad’s old
enemy, head of the elder branch of that Ḳoreish family to which the
prophet belonged--was ruler of Syria. He refused to recognise ’Aly,
the son-in-law of Muḥammad, as the fourth khalîfah, and war between
the two parties ensued. In 660 ’Aly was assassinated at Ḳufa by the
poisoned sword of an anarchist, and his son Ḥasan abdicated six months
later in favour of Muawîyah. The Persian legend of Ḥasan and Ḥosein
has no true foundation. Ḥasan was poisoned by his wife in 667 A. D.,
at the instigation, it is said, of Yezîd, son of Muawîyah. The latter
was still khalîfah at Damascus till 680 A. D. Ḥosein, whom the Persian
story represents as being a boy, was about fifty-four when he fell at
the battle of Kerbela in the same year. Ḥasan is said to have left
fifteen sons and five daughters, and among these were the children of
Fâṭimah, the prophet’s daughter, from whom the later Khalifs of Egypt
claimed descent. The struggle between the two parties of the Ḳeis and
the Yemini--or Syrians, and Arabs of the Yemen--went on yet later, and
the memory of these factions is indeed not yet dead[456] even to-day in
Palestine. ’Abd el Melek was the fifth khalîfah of Damascus (685–705
A. D.) of the family of Muawîyah, and for eight years before his
accession Islâm was rent by internecine quarrels. ’Abd-Allah ibn Zobeir
led the Yemen faction, and Arabia and Africa refused to acknowledge
the Omawîyah family as khalifs. It was at this time that ’Abd el Melek
conceived the idea of making Jerusalem the Ḳiblah for the faithful,
and--as he had no access to the Black Stone at Mekkah--of inducing
them to perambulate the Ṣakhrah rock instead. It was then probably
that Muḥammad was first said to have been miraculously borne by the
lightning cherub to Jerusalem, and to have ascended from the holy
rock to heaven. The legend grew out of a single verse in the Ḳorân:
“Glory to Him who carried His servant by night from the Ḥaram place of
prayer to the place of prayer that is more remote.”[457] This probably
referred to the Medînah mosque, but was now understood to mean the one
at Jerusalem--the great enclosure where Justinian’s church still stood,
as a Moslem place of prayer; and it thus received the name _Masjid el
Aḳṣa_, or “the more distant mosque.” These events preceded, and account
for, the building of a Moslem shrine over the site of the Temple
itself, which had been unoccupied for six hundred years.
[Sidenote: ’ABD EL MELEK]
In the time of ’Abd el Melek Jerusalem remained much as it had been
under Justinian, except that Eudocia’s wall seems to have been allowed
to fall into ruins. It was probably found to be indefensible from
catapults on the south cliff of Hinnom, and the Sion wall, as early at
least as 680 A. D., ran on its present line on the south.[458] Perhaps,
indeed, Hadrian’s wall had never been destroyed, and the great re-used
Herodian blocks, which are now visible at the base of the Turkish
wall, may have been there since 135 A. D. The city was smaller and
less prosperous than it had been under the Christians: the smaller
buildings of Modestus had replaced the great basilica of Constantine;
and, by agreement with Omar, no new churches were built. ’Abd el Melek
now attempted to make the Holy City the sacred centre of his empire. El
Y’aḳûbi, who wrote two centuries later, says of this khalîfah that he
“built a dome over the Ṣakhrah”; and Eutychius (in 930 A. D.) says the
same.[459]
We do not, however, depend solely on any literary statement as to the
origin of this building. Round its octagonal screen, above the arcade,
run the original Ḳufic texts which preserve passages from the Ḳorân
written, in mosaic letters, only about fifty-eight years after Muḥammad
died.[460] The passages selected refer specially to the “unity” of God
and to the nature of Jesus the Messiah, and seem to have been chosen
specially for record in a Christian city. They are connected together
by the ordinary “testimony” to the oneness of God and to Muḥammad as
His messenger. Amid these texts comes the historic statement: “Built
this dome the servant of God ’Abd [Allah the Imâm El Mâmûn], emir of
the faithful, in the year seventy-two; may God accept it and be pleased
with him. Amen. The restoration is complete, and glory be to God.” This
text would seem to be evidence at first that the Dome was built by the
’Abbaside khalîfah El Mâmûn (808–33 A. D.); but the letters of his name
are on a blue ground of a different shade to that of the original,
and are squeezed into the space which was once occupied by the name
of ’Abd [el Melek ibn Merwan], as is proved by the date 72 A. H. (or
690–1 A. D.), which has been left unchanged. The statement that “the
restoration is complete” refers to El Mâmûn’s restoration of ’Abd el
Melek’s original work. The ancient enmity between the Omawîyah and
’Abbas dynasties accounts for the obliteration of the real founder’s
name.
[Sidenote: THE DOME OF THE ROCK]
El Muḳaddasi, in describing the Dome of the Rock three centuries later,
says that he had “never heard tell of anything built in the times of
ignorance that could rival the grace of this dome,” and it remains one
of the most beautiful buildings in the world. The original chapel
consisted of a great drum with a gilded dome supported on pillars and
piers, with round arches above them. Round this circle, which covered
the Ṣakhrah, is the octagonal arcade with similar round arches on
similar pillars and piers. These arches are covered with glass mosaics,
and the Ḳufic texts run above them, with gold letters on a blue ground,
belonging to the original building. The mosaics of the drum, with their
rich arabesque designs, are probably later, and the enamelled tiles
of the interior bear the date answering to 1027 A. D. The dome itself
fell down in 1016 A. D., and a fine text in the Ḳarmathian characters
of this age records its restoration in 1022 A. D.[461] Another text in
more modern Arabic mentions “renewal of the gilding” by Ṣalâḥ-ed-Dîn
Yûsef (Saladin) in 1190 A. D.[462] The building thus bears witness to
its own history, by dated inscriptions in various characters belonging
to various ages; for the Ḳufic (used in the seventh century A. D.) is
an older script than the Ḳarmathian, and this again is older than the
Neskhi Arabic of Saladin’s time.
According to tradition, the small Dome of the Chain, immediately east
of the Dome of the Rock, was the model first erected by ’Abd el Melek
for the larger building.[463] This statement is, however, very late.
The Dome of the Chain is in the proportion of 2 to 5 as compared with
the Dome of the Rock in its original state, before the outer octagonal
wall was built in 831 A. D.; but it is a decagon and not an octagon,
and no great importance is to be ascribed to the tradition, though
there is a considerable resemblance in general style between the two
buildings. The pillars of the Dome of the Rock[464] are none of them
_in situ_, but have all been taken from some former building. I made
careful drawings of them in 1872, and found that of the twelve under
the drum no two had similar capitals. The capitals do not belong,
in some cases, to the shafts, nor do the bases, which are also of
different forms, and their height made up by thick layers of lead.
These pillars, moreover, once belonged to a Christian building, and the
cross is still visible on one of the capitals. The columns were taken
either from the ruined basilica of Constantine in the city, or more
probably from the cloisters with which Justinian adorned the vicinity
of his Church of the Virgin, according to Procopius; for the style is
much that of the pillars in the part of the Aḳṣa which appears to have
been originally Justinian’s basilica.
This robbery of a Christian building has given a somewhat Byzantine
character to the Dome of the Rock, and the extensive use of glass
mosaic work also recalls Byzantine art. The mosaics of the Dome of the
Rock differ, however, in this respect, that they are entirely confined
to arabesques, and never represent human (or animal) figures, such as
appear in the Greek mosaics at Bethlehem and elsewhere: this shows that
they were intended for a Moslem, and not for a Christian building. The
Arabs had no native style of architecture. Muḥammad and Omar built
rude wooden structures, and it is recorded of El Welîd--son of ’Abd el
Melek--that he employed skilled workmen from Persia and Byzantium to
build his great mosque at Damascus. Thus arose the Saracenic style,
created by Greek and Persian architects, and using round arches even
as late as the ninth century A. D., instead of those horseshoes which
became distinctive later of Moslem art. The models for the Dome of the
Rock are to be found in the Sassanian architecture of Persia, in the
round churches built by Justinian and Modestus at Jerusalem, or the
octagonal church of Zeno on Gerizim, and in the Byzantine decoration
of St. Sophia at Constantinople; but the heavy wooden beams which
tie together the pillars of the arcade, above the capitals, are not
a Byzantine feature, but are found in early mosques at Cairo and in
Spain. They are survivals of the wooden architecture of Omar’s age, and
they are never found in Roman or Greek buildings.
[Sidenote: THE AḲṢA MOSQUE]
There is no early statement to the effect that ’Abd el Melek did any
building in the mosque proper, or “covered part” (_mughaṭṭah_), of the
Aḳṣa. An Arabic history of the fourteenth century gives what purports
to be the report sent to ’Abd el Melek, at Damascus, as to the work
done at Jerusalem: “God has vouchsafed completion to what the emîr of
the faithful commanded, concerning the building of the Dome over the
Ṣakhrah of the Holy City, and the Aḳṣa Mosque also, and not a word can
be said to suggest improvement thereto”[465]; but the term _masjid_, or
“mosque,” may refer--as elsewhere--to the Ḥaram enclosure generally,
and the only definite statement (by the same authority), that “in
the days of ’Abd el Melek all the gates of the mosque were covered
with plates of gold and silver,” may (if true) have the same extended
meaning. It seems probable that until the accession of the ’Abbas
family, as khalifs at Baghdâd, the mosque proper at Jerusalem continued
to be the ancient Church of the Virgin where Omar had prayed.
The Omawîyah, or descendants of Muawîyah, retained the khalifate for
less than a century (661–750 A. D.); their strength lay in Syria and
Egypt, and their weakness in Arabia and in the East. The battle of the
Zâb was fatal to Ibrahîm, the thirteenth and last khalîfah of Damascus,
and the white banner of this great house fell before the black ensign
of Abu el ’Abbas, who was yet more closely connected with the prophet
as a descendant of Muḥammad’s uncle. Thus the political centre of Islâm
was transferred to Baghdâd, and the influence of Persia and India,
under the ’Abbasides, began to mingle with that of Greek philosophy,
which had been learned from the Syrian and Chaldean monks who preserved
in their monasteries the works of Plato and Aristotle, which were
lost in Europe. The Ṣûfi bore a Greek name (_sophos_, or “wise”), and
the term originally denoted an Arab student of Greek science; but the
mysticism of India attracted the cultivated Moslem, and undermined
gradually the simple faith of the first century, causing a deep
schism between the Sunnî, or follower of “tradition,” and the Persian
Shi’ah, or “sectarian.” Philosophic scepticism, concealed at first,
developed under the ’Abbasides with the growth of a culture learned by
the Arab from the ancient Aryan races whom he had conquered, and was
only repressed by the reaction which began when the Turks superseded
the Arabs as masters of Islâm. The age of the ’Abbasides, for about
a century (750–860 A. D.), was the culminating period of Moslem
civilisation, at a time when Europe was sunk in Gothic barbarism; and
though Spain never acknowledged the ruler of Baghdâd as suzerain, Egypt
and the whole of Western Asia obeyed these khalifs till the rise of the
Fâṭemite dynasty in 916 A. D. at Ḳairwân.
[Sidenote: THE AḲṢA MOSQUE]
The revolution of 750 A. D. was heralded and followed by earthquakes,
which were no doubt regarded as omens. The Dome of the Rock, standing
on sure foundations, appears to have escaped any serious damage,
but the Aḳṣa Mosque was ruined, the west wall falling--according
to later accounts[466]--about 746 A. D., and the east wall about
755 A. D. We may probably understand by these statements that the
great apse and the atrium of Justinian’s church, not being founded
on rock, were overthrown; and the mosque was still in ruins in 770
A. D. The restoration was begun by El Manṣûr, the second of the
khalifs of Baghdâd, and was mainly carried out under his son and
successor El Mahdy, after 775 A. D. The fourteenth-century account
of this restoration states that El Mahdy made the building “shorter
and broader”; and El Muḳaddasi, describing it two centuries after its
restoration, says that “the more ancient portion remained like a beauty
spot in the midst of the new, and it extends as far as the limit of
the marble columns; for beyond, where the columns are of concrete (or
plaster), the later building begins.” This account seems clearly to
apply to the present Aḳṣa Mosque, which, as de Vogüé perceived,[467]
was “preceded by a Christian church, of which the ruins were the
nucleus for the Arab constructions.” For there is a marked contrast
between what is called the “transept,” or south part of the mosque,
and the ruder work of the northern nave and aisles. The building was
made shorter by the disappearance of the great atrium on the west,
and broader by building the nave on the north. The only subsequent
alterations of plan were those of the Templars in the twelfth century.
They added a great refectory to the west, on the site of the south part
of the original atrium, with a fine Norman porch still standing on
the north, and a long vestry on the south Ḥaram wall just east of the
church.
The building, as it exists,[468] presents a dome supported by white
marble Corinthian pillars, and this probably replaced the original dome
of the Church of the Virgin. The pillars are of the same character with
those in the Dome of the Rock. The north part of the mosque consists of
a nave and six aisles, the roof supported by huge Byzantine pillars,
which are certainly not in their original position, but have been
re-used. Sir Charles Wilson remarks that “some of the building inside
is very bad; in several places rough pieces of masonry have been built
up by the side of the columns, to gain sufficient support for the
piers” of the walls above. One column is enclosed in a polygonal pier,
and some capitals are rude plaster imitations of the old Corinthian
capitals on other pillars. The shafts of the pillars seem to have been
cut shorter, and they thus present clumsy proportions. The arches of
the arcades above them are pointed, and the clerestory has two rows
of windows one above the other, but this superstructure may belong to
the later restoration in 1187 A. D., or even to that recorded in an
inscription, on the porch, as effected by ’Aisa, Saladin’s nephew, in
1236 A. D. The pillars are very rudely tied together by heavy wooden
beams--as in the Dome of the Rock--and these may have belonged to the
original work of El Mahdy. The history of this building, which is
a patchwork of various dates, not to be compared for architectural
beauty with the more purely Arab Dome of the Rock, seems clearly to
be indicated by the preceding statements. The church of Justinian was
partly ruined before 770 A. D., and El Mahdy restored it, using up the
pillars of its atrium and cloisters to build a long addition to the
mosque on the north, which addition was of very inferior workmanship as
compared with that of the church to which it was annexed. Each of the
six aisles and the nave--running north and south--had a double gate on
the north, and each of the six bays had a double gate on the east.[469]
[Sidenote: CHRISTIANS AND MOSLEMS]
The justice and tolerance of the great khalifs of Baghdâd is admitted
by Bernard, the pilgrim monk of the ninth century who visited Egypt and
Palestine in the time of El Mut’azz, the thirteenth ’Abbaside khalîfah,
just before the Turks became powerful in the East. He says that “the
Christians and the pagans have there such peace between them that if I
should go a journey, and in the journey my camel or ass which carries
my baggage should die, and I should leave everything there without a
guard, and go to the next town to get another, on my return I should
find all my goods untouched. The law of public safety is there such
that if they find in the city, or on the sea, or on the road, any man
journeying by night or by day without a letter, or some mark of a king
or prince of that land, he is at once thrown into prison, till such
time as he can give good account whether he be a spy or not.” The
Jerusalem Christians benefited by this peaceful rule in the East, and
we have evidence of their undisturbed possession of property, in the
Greek inscriptions of the rock tombs on the south precipice of the
Hinnom Valley.
[Sidenote: CHRISTIAN TEXTS]
In these tombs there are fifteen inscriptions in Greek uncial
characters, which have recently been copied again with great care
by Mr. R. A. Stewart Macalister.[470] Their translation has puzzled
many scholars, and remains still doubtful in some details; but the
following interpretations may perhaps be found more satisfactory than
those as yet proposed. The texts begin and sometimes end with Greek
crosses, showing their Byzantine character. Five of them read only
“of Holy Sion,” and two more “monument of Holy Sion.” These seven
seem to mark tombs belonging to priests or monks connected with the
ancient Sion Church. Another text in red paint is now illegible, but
the remaining seven inscriptions are more important. Pilgrims from the
West were numerous in this age: St. Willibald (about 722 A. D.) came
from Hampshire, and Bernard the Wise (about 867 A. D.) was a Breton
monk from Mont St. Michel; we are therefore not surprised to read over
one tomb, “Private monument of Thekla, daughter of Mærwulf the German.”
She may have been a pilgrim, or a nun who took this Greek name as her
title in religion, and who died in the hospice about to be mentioned;
or she may have come from Byzantium, where Teutonic mercenaries were
employed, and no doubt married Greeks. The next text is that of “The
private monument of Ouroros [perhaps for Auroros] of Holy Sion,”
probably a monk, and possibly also a Teuton. Another, inscribed in red
paint now much defaced by weather, is that of “The common tomb of the
Patriarch’s Hospital,” which was apparently consecrated for pilgrims
dying in Justinian’s hospital, or in that which was founded about 800
A. D. by Charlemagne, as will appear immediately. A fourth text is of
great value, as giving a date: “Pachomios was buried singly in the year
718” A. D.[471] He was thus not consigned to the “common monument” with
other pilgrims. The fifth inscription is also in red paint, over the
door of a tomb, and is much defaced. It seems, however, to read, “The
private grave of the beloved offspring of holy Sergius, beneath his own
coffin.” The sixth text, inside the same tomb, refers to this beloved
son, the words “nineteen years” being legible, and no doubt giving
his age. It is probable that “holy Sergius” was the Greek patriarch
of Jerusalem who died _c._ 858 A. D., or the second of the name dying
911 A. D. The seventh inscription is boldly cut on the front of the
tomb, round a Greek cross,[472] and appears to run thus: “A private
monument holding Thekla, abbess of the monastery of Job in the city
[or, lot] of George.” De Vogüé (misreading the contracted word _thes_
as _seb_) supposed this to be the tomb of Thekla Sebastê (or Augusta),
the eldest daughter of Theodosius and Theodora, shut up in a convent
by her brother Michael III. of Byzantium, and still alive under Basil
the Macedonian (867–86 A. D.); but this now seems to be uncertain. If
the contracted word _As_ stands for “city,” her monastery must have
been in Lydda, the city of St. George; but if it stands for _Aisa_,
“lot” (the diphthongs being often omitted in texts of this age), it
is more probable that the grave was in the property of the Church of
St. George in Jerusalem. There was more than one Monastery of Job in
Palestine, the most famous being that in Bashan, while another (_Deir
Aiyûb_) was on the Jaffa road near the foot of the mountains. There may
have been a third at Jerusalem itself, for in 1129 A. D. the “Casale
of St. Job” belonged to the Church of the Virgin’s Tomb,[473] and this
might be near the “well of Job,” not far East of the tomb. Another
possible explanation is that the “Lot of George” was the property of
the patriarch George, who died about 807 A. D., before the time of
Thekla Augusta. Whatever be the true explanation of this and of the
other texts, we see at least that in the eighth and ninth centuries
the patriarchs of Jerusalem and the priests and monks of St. Sion
held peaceful possession of their properties under the Moslems, and
that the pilgrims from the Christian hospitals were buried, not only
in a “common tomb” such as the great excavation at Aceldama, which
existed[474] for their use at least as early as 680 A. D., but also in
“private monuments” hard by.
[Sidenote: CHARLEMAGNE]
The “golden prime of good Hârûn er Rashîd” brought East and West
into friendly intercourse.[475] Charlemagne sent ambassadors to him,
and they distributed alms in Jerusalem. The khalîfah received them
courteously, and granted their requests in favour of his Christian
subjects, sending them back with his own envoys, who bore rich presents
of vestments and spices. He made over to the new Emperor of the West
the charge of the Holy Sepulchre; and the keys of Jerusalem were sent
to him as an emblem of possession of the sacred Christian sites. Hârûn,
at Charlemagne’s request, is said to have sent to him the only elephant
he possessed, which arrived in Europe in 802 A. D. Alms continued to be
sent to the Holy City by Charlemagne, and by his son and grandson, and
the famous hospital of Charles the Great was now founded in the centre
of Jerusalem. Bernard the Wise in 867 A. D. says, “We were received in
the hospital of the most glorious emperor Charles, where are lodged all
those who go to that place for devout cause and speak the Roman tongue;
near which is a most noble church in honour of St. Mary, having, by
the zeal of the aforesaid emperor, a library together with twelve
mansions, fields, vineyards, and gardens, in the Valley of Josaphat.
Before the hospital itself is the forum (or market) where every one who
deals there pays two aurei yearly to him who supplies it.” The hospital
therefore faced the bazaar, and occupied apparently the same site where
the Benedictines of Amalfi were afterwards found by the Crusaders. It
is not clear whether the Church of St. Mary was that built by Modestus
south of the Holy Sepulchre rotunda, or--as is more probable--was on
the site of St. Mary Latin, built by Amalfi merchants beside their
hospice. This church has now become the German Cathedral, and the
hospital of the great German emperor was the original foundation which
developed into the famous home of the Knights of St. John. The historic
fact of this foundation originated the legend according to which
Charles the Great himself visited Jerusalem to see the monastery, as we
read in the “Chanson du Voyage de Charlemagne,” written in 1075 A. D.,
of which there is also an Anglo-Saxon version.[476]
Mult fu liez Charlemagne Very glad Charlemagne
De cel grant beltet Of this great beauty
Vit du clères colurs Saw in clear colours
Le mustier painturet The monastery painted
De Martyrs et de Virgenes With Martyrs and Virgins
Et de Granz Majistez And the Great Majesty
E les curs de la lune And the moon’s courses
E les festes anvels And annual festivals
E les lavacres curre And running fountains
E les peisons par mer. And fish at sea.
[Sidenote: EL MÂMÛN]
The son of Hârûn er Rashîd was the last of the great ’Abbasides and
the same Mâmûn (808–833 A. D.) whose name is found in the Dome of the
Rock, not only in the Ḳufic text over the arcade, but also on the four
fine bronze gates of the outer octagonal wall, where it accompanies
his true date, answering to 831 A. D. The beams of the roof above
this wall bear a yet later date, answering to 913 A. D., and it seems
probable that El Mâmûn built this wall, and that it did not form part
of ’Abd el Melek’s original design. It certainly existed in 985 A. D.,
and is noticed by Ibn el Fâḳîḥ in 902 A. D., but El Y’aḳûbi says that
’Abd el Melek “built a dome over the Ṣakhrah and hung it round with
curtains of brocade,” on the occasion when--according to the letter
preserved by later writers--this khalîfah desired “to build a dome over
the Holy Rock in order to shelter Moslems from the inclemency of the
weather.”[477]
The outer wall in question is adorned with fine windows, which were
filled with coloured glass in 1528 A. D. It has a parapet with round
arches, supported by coupled dwarf pillars, and with recesses under
the arches, as was discovered in 1873. These, and the upper part of
the wall outside, were covered with glass mosaics of which traces have
been found; while the lower part, according to various accounts from
the tenth to the twelfth century, was adorned as now with marble.[478]
The arcade of the parapet was still visible in 1486 A. D., when
Breidenbach made his sketch of the building; but the whole of the upper
part of the wall and parapet was covered over later with the beautiful
Kishâni tiles, which bear the date 1561 A. D. In its original condition
the octagonal wall and the arcaded parapet resembled in style the
Sassanian buildings at Ctesiphon and Takht-i-Bostân in Persia; and
an exactly similar arcade with recessed panels, under round arches
on coupled dwarf pillars, exists in the beautiful kiosque at ’Ammân
in Gilead, which--in plan--is similar to the Persian buildings above
mentioned. This kiosque is probably Moslem work, and an early mosque
exists close by.[479] Thus while the original work of ’Abd el Melek
shows the influence of Byzantine art, the additions made by the Baghdâd
khalîfah El Mâmûn, in 831 A. D., very naturally show Persian style.
The same Mâmûn also restored the Aḳṣa Mosque and the Ḥaram generally at
the same time. Nâṣr-i-Khosrau (in 1047) says[480] that this khalîfah
sent from Baghdâd, for the Aḳṣa, a beautiful bronze gate looking like
gold, set in “fired silver,” and chased. It thus resembled those which
still bear his name in the four porches of the Dome of the Rock. The
Ḥaram contained several other small domes which still exist on the
platform, and which date back to this great age of Moslem civilisation
and prosperity. These include the “Dome of the Prophet” and the “Dome
of Gabriel,” to the north-west of the Ṣakhrah chapel; but the “Dome
of Spirits,” farther north, is not noticed in early accounts, for the
“Dome of Solomon” is probably the building on the east wall of the
Ḥaram north of the Golden Gate, now called the “Throne of Solomon,” to
which a legend attaches (borrowed from the Talmud) concerning Solomon’s
power over demons, and his burial on the spot seated on his throne, so
that his death was not perceived by the genii, whom he ruled by aid
of his ring, until a worm gnawed the wood of his staff and the corpse
fell to the ground. The “Dome of the Roll” in the south-west corner of
the platform seems to have disappeared, unless the reference is to the
underground chamber at this corner, which in 1873 was inhabited by a
Moslem hermit.
[Sidenote: MOSLEM LEGENDS]
Many legends had grown up during the two centuries since Omar visited
the Ḥaram. The Holy Rock was believed--no doubt because of the Talmudic
legend which made it the foundation of the Temple and of the world--to
be a rock of Paradise, wondrously suspended over the abyss. Upon its
surface was shown the footprint of Muḥammad, and in the cave beneath
he was said to have prayed with all the prophets who preceded him
from Abraham downwards. Through the pierced shaft in the roof of the
cave he ascended to Heaven. The rock would fain have followed him
back to Paradise, but the finger-marks of Gabriel show how it was
held down. In the last days the Black Stone of Mekkah--according to
Syrian Moslems--is to fly to Jerusalem to greet the Ṣakhrah, and the
“tongue of the rock” is that which it will use to salute its sister of
Paradise. North of the rock itself are still shown the tomb of Solomon,
and the nails in a slab (perhaps once covering a Templar’s grave) which
fall through into the abyss, and mark the lapse of centuries preceding
the last day. Beneath the cave there was said to be a well descending
to Hades, called the “Well of Souls” (_Bîr el Arwâḥ_) to the present
day. The “Well of the Leaf” (_Bîr el Waraḳah_), a tank under the Aḳṣa,
was so called because--according to a tradition mentioned by Mejîr
ed Dîn--a certain Arab, descending to find his bucket in Omar’s time,
found here also an entrance to Paradise, and brought back with him
a leaf from the “Tree of the Limit” on which the fates of men are
written. In the gatehouse towards the south part of the west Ḥaram wall
was shown--as now--the ring to which, in the “Gate of the Prophet,”
the wondrous cherub horse with wings was haltered, to await the return
of Muḥammad from Heaven, and to carry him back to Mekkah. This steed
(El Boraḳ, “the glittering”) had the wings and tail of a peacock, and
a shining face. The “Dome of the Chain” was named from a legend of
the chain that David hung in it, which none but those who told the
truth could grasp. Nâṣr-i-Khosrau speaks of the “print on stone of the
great shield of Ḥamzah,” which was not apparently the Persian mirror
shown in the Dome of the Rock down to 1886, and said to be now at
Constantinople, which used to be called “Ḥamzah’s Buckler.”
Such was Jerusalem--Christian and Moslem--in the peaceful days of Islâm
under El Mâmûn. But many troubles were to come before the pilgrims,
who now began to be more numerous, could find security once more under
Latin rulers; and to the history of their oppression by Turks and
Egyptians we must now turn.
FOOTNOTES TO CHAPTER XI
[449] De Vogüé, “Temple de Jérusalem,” 1863, p. 84; see Ḳorân iv. 169,
xix. 34–7.
[450] Extracts from Eutychius, “Annales,” bk. ii., in the series of
Pal. Pilgrims’ Texts Society, 1895.
[451] Besant and Palmer, “Jerusalem,” 1871, p. 71; Theophanes,
“Chronographia” (see Robinson, “Bib. Res.,” i. p. 389); Eutychius
“Annales,” ii.
[452] See Suyûti, as quoted by Guy le Strange, “Pal. under Moslems,”
1890, p. 112.
[453] Guy le Strange, “Palestine under the Moslems,” 1890, pp. 138–44.
[454] _Ibid._, p. 91; Theophanes, “Chronographia”; William of Tyre,
I. ii., “Ex opere musaico Arabici idiomatis, literarum vetustissime
monumenta quæ illius (Omar) tempore esse credentur.”
[455] “Ceterum in illo famoso loco ubi quondam templum magnifice
constructum fuerat, in vicinia muri ab oriente locatum, nunc Saraceni
quadrangulam orationis domum quam subrectis tabulis et magnis trabibus
super quasdam ruinarum reliquias construentes, vili fabricati sunt
opere, ipsi frequentant, que utique domus tria hominum millia simul ut
fertur capere potest.”
[456] See my volume, “Heth and Moab,” 1st edit., p. 377; Besant and
Palmer, “Jer.,” p. 78; El Y’aḳûbi (c. 874 A. D.).
[457] Ḳorân, xvii. 1.
[458] Arculphus, “Situs quippe ipsius urbis a supercilio aquilonali
montis Sion incipiens.”
[459] Prof. Hayter Lewis, “Holy Places of Jer.,” 1888, p. 64. Eutychius
is there quoted as saying, “Abdil Maleci Ebn Mervan mittens hic
Hierosolyma, templum auxit donec petram in ipsum inferet, hominesque
Hierosolyma peregrinari jussit.” Before this the “templum” was the Aḳṣa
only.
[460] Ḳorân, cxii., lvii. 2, iv. 169, xix. 34–7, xvii. in. See de
Vogüé, “Temple de Jérusalem,” p. 84; Besant and Palmer, “Jerusalem,”
pp. 86–8.
[461] De Vogüé, “Temple de Jérusalem,” pl. xxxvii.
[462] _Ibid._, pp. 91, 92.
[463] Mejîr el Dîn (_c._ 1520 A. D.). See Guy le Strange, “Pal. under
Moslems,” p. 153.
[464] See “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., 1883, pp. 246–50.
[465] Guy le Strange, “Pal. under Moslems,” pp. 91, 144–5, quoting the
“Muthîr el Ghirâm,” 1351 A. D., ch. vi.
[466] Guy le Strange, “Pal. under Moslems,” pp. 92, 93, 98.
[467] De Vogüé, “Temple de Jérusalem,” 1863, p. 69.
[468] Prof. Hayter Lewis, “Holy Places of Jer.,” 1888, p. 78; Sir
C. Wilson, “Ord. Survey Notes,” 1865, p. 40; El Muḳaddasi (_c._ 985
A. D.). The account by Nâṣr-i-Khosrau, in 1047 A. D., is unreliable,
or at least confused. He makes the length 420 _arsh_ (about 630 feet),
and the breadth 150 _arsh_ (about 225 feet), which is quite impossible
if referring to the _maḳṣurah_ or roofed building, which measures about
250 feet north and south by 180 feet east and west. He also speaks of
280 marble columns in the _masjid_, but the Aḳṣa itself has only 76
columns. No traces of any larger building exist.
[469] The present mosque has 3 doors on north, 3 on east, and 3 on
west, but El Muḳaddasi speaks of 11 on east and 15 on north--perhaps
including double doors, _i. e._ 6 on east, and 7 on north (for the nave
and 6 aisles). Nâṣr-i-Khosrau says 17 gates in all, 7 on north and 10
on east.
[470] _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, July 1900, p. 225, _seq._ My own
copies were imperfect, and de Vogüé’s appear to be wrong as to a few
letters.
[471] _Tou ekostou_ is probably a mistaken spelling for _tou ekastou_.
[472] De Vogüé, “Temple de Jérusalem,” p. 134. The words are
abbreviated: _Thes_ is for _Theisa_, and _As_ for _Astu_ or for _Aisa_.
[473] Rohricht, “Regesta Regni Hierosol.,” No. 131.
[474] Arculphus says that pilgrims were buried in Aceldama.
[475] Robinson, “Bib. Res.,” 1838, p. 392; Eginhard, “Vita Car.
Magni.,” v.
[476] “Publications de la Société de l’Orient Latin,” Serie
Géographique, 1882.
[477] Prof. Hayter Lewis, “Holy Places of Jerusalem,” p. 33; “Mem. West
Pal. Survey,” 1883, Jerusalem vol., pp. 248, 249, 307–17; _Pal. Expl.
Fund Quarterly_, 1873, p. 155. The beam with the date answering to
913–14 A. D. was found in 1873, on removal of the wooden ceiling put up
in 1776 A. D.
[478] Carved slabs from some other building have been used up in this
marble casing. One of them bears, in Greek uncial characters, the words
“Huper Sotêrias Marias” being evidently Christian. “Ord. Survey Notes,”
p. 33, and plates xiii., xiv. A Byzantine tombstone is also re-used
in the paving of the floor of the Dome of the Rock. “Mem. West Pal.
Survey,” Jerusalem vol., p. 426.
[479] See my volume, “Syrian Stone Lore,” 1st edit. 1886, pp. 352–62.
In “Mem. East Pal. Survey,” 1889, pp. 57–63, I have given a full
account, with the plans and drawings which I made of the kiosque and
mosque in 1881.
[480] Guy le Strange, “Pal. under the Moslems,” 1890, p. 107.
CHAPTER XII
THE TURKS
[Sidenote: THE EARLY TURKS]
The Turks,[481] or “settlers,” were a branch of that strong Mongol race
which first created civilisation in Mesopotamia, and which, through the
courage and masterfulness that have always characterised this sturdy
people, ruled Western Asia at least a thousand years before Abraham, as
Akkadians and Hittites, who, though dominated by the Aryan and Semitic
races after 1500 B. C., still clung, under their “tarkhans,” to North
Syria as late as the time of Nebuchadnezzar. The Turks proper had
penetrated, or had been driven, into Central Asia at some early period,
and the home of the tribes--Huns, Uigurs, Khitai, and others--was
beyond the Oxus. They were long held at bay by the Byzantines and the
Persians, but broke out east into China, and west into Hungary as Huns
in the fifth century. Justinian was allied with the Turks, called
Khozars, on the Volga. In Turkestan they protected the silk caravans,
and about 580 A. D. Dizavul (“the orderer”) sent his ambassadors to
Justin II. of Byzantium. The civilisation of the Turks was primitive
until they came under the influence of Buddhists from India, of Jews
(who established a great trade in Central Asia), and of Chaldean
Christians who had churches at Samarkand about 900 A. D. The old Uigur
alphabet is evidence of the wide range of the race, which drove a
wedge of Yakuts into Siberia. Their letters were those of the Aramean
alphabet of Persia, and Uigur texts are found on the banks of the
Yenissei; while farther east this alphabet reached Manchuria and China.
Farther west the Khozars were converted to Judaism about 750 A. D., and
are even said to have been ruled by Jewish kings. More than one empress
of Byzantium was a Turkish princess, and the blood of the race thus ran
in the veins of the Isaurian dynasty, Constantine VI. being the son of
a Khozar mother.
After the death of El Mâmûn, the seventh of the ’Abbaside khalifs,
the Arab empire began to crumble away. In his reign Crete and Sicily
were conquered, and the power of Islâm extended to the borders of
India. But the simple creed of Muḥammad was undermined by philosophy,
scepticism, and mysticism in the East, while the Turkish mercenaries
who guarded the khalîfah at Baghdâd soon became his masters. To the
Turk the civilisation and philosophy of the age were of little value.
He understood the Ḳorân, and became a fanatical Moslem on conversion;
his influence was reactionary, and where he ruled, civilisation made
little progress. Revolts in the provinces were frequent, and the
khalifs became mere religious figure-heads. One of the first secret
sects in Islâm appeared near Merv in 767 A. D., where El Moḳann’a,
the “veiled” prophet, was joined by the Turks. A yet more formidable
society was that of El Ḳarmat of Ḳûfa, appearing in 890 A. D. The
Ḳarmathians pillaged Mekkah in 929 A. D., and their secret scepticism
with exoteric mysticism was the origin of later Druze heresies which
affected the history of Jerusalem. For two centuries the power of the
Turks continued to increase in the East till Togrul entered Baghdâd in
1055 A. D.
In the West also the employment of Turks as governors led to the
disruption of the Arab empire. Ibn Tulûn in Egypt renounced fealty
to the khalîfah in 868 A. D., and his family reigned in Syria till
905 A. D. Again in 934 A. D. Ikshîd--also a Turk--revolted, and his
successors held Egypt and Palestine till they were conquered by
Mu’ezz-li-Dîn-Allah, the fourth of the Fâṭemites of Ḳairwân and the
founder of Cairo. Thus in the last year of his reign (969 A. D.)
Jerusalem came under the rule of this Egyptian Arab khalîfah, who
claimed descent from the prophet’s daughter.
The city, and especially the Ḥaram, are described in this age by El
Muḳaddasi (“the man of the very holy city”), who was a native Moslem,
and a great admirer of his home. He wrote under El ’Azîz, the fifth
Fâṭemite, in 985 A. D. He says that the Syrians lived in fear of the
Greeks; for the new Armenian emperor of Byzantium also took advantage
of the weakness of Islâm. Nicephorus Phocas had been murdered by
Zemisces, who reigned as John I. Nicephorus had recovered Tarsus,
Antioch, and Aleppo; and Zemisces took Damascus, and marched nearly
to Baghdâd. Antioch, Cilicia, and Cyprus were retained by the Greeks
till just before the first Crusade. El Muḳaddasi, as a devout Moslem,
was much troubled by the independent manners of Jews and Christians
in Jerusalem, but bears witness to the prosperity of the town. The
city was celebrated for enormous grapes and incomparable peaches, for
excellent apples, bananas, raisins, cheeses, and cotton, almonds,
oranges, figs, dates, and nuts, “besides milk in plenty and honey
and sugar.” “In Jerusalem there are all manner of learned men and
doctors,” yet he adds, “you will not find baths more filthy than those
of the Holy City, nor in any town are provisions dearer. Learned men
[of Islâm] are few, and the Christians numerous, and the same are
unmannerly in public places.... Everywhere the Christians and the Jews
have the upper hand, and the mosque is void of either congregation
or assembly of learned men.” He refers to El Mâmûn’s work on the
Aḳṣa Mosque, and to a “colonnade supported on marble pillars lately
erected by ’Abdallah, son of Ṭahir” (that is to say, nephew of El
Mâmûn), as also to the fine dome and pitched roof. Cedar doors, covered
with bronze, had been sent by the mother of Muḳtadir-bi-Allah--the
eighteenth ’Abbaside khalîfah--shortly before the Egyptian conquest,
for he reigned (at intervals) till 932 A. D. This writer gives a
correct account of the Ḥaram buildings, and of the measurements of the
surrounding walls.
[Sidenote: EL ḤÂKIM]
It was perhaps on account of the growing power and independence of the
Christians that the successor of El ’Azîz determined to destroy the
Holy Sepulchre Church; but the excuse was that the “holy fire” was a
scandalous imposture. El Ḥakim-bi-amr-Allah was the sixth Fâṭemite
khalîfah, and acceded in Cairo in 996 A. D. There seems to be no doubt
that he was insane--driven mad probably by mysticism--and about 1005
A. D. his eccentricities disgusted all his subjects. He was finally
strangled by order of his sister in 1021 A. D., and was succeeded by
his son Ed Ḍâher-li-’azaz-Dîn-Allah, who was followed by his son El
Mostanṣir-bi-Allah; both these khalifs are connected with Jerusalem
history.
The Fâṭemites were not orthodox Moslems, but belonged to the secret
sect of the Ism’ailîyeh--one of the heresies which sprang up in Persia
under the influence of Indian mysticism; and they held the doctrine
of successive Imâms who were incarnations of God in various ages,
accompanied by successive incarnations of the Word of God in the
persons of successive prophets. The sect was closely connected with
that of the Ḳarmathians, and recognised all the Fâṭemites as Imâms or
divine incarnations, the founder of the dynasty being the eighth of
these mystic personages. Ḥâkim accordingly proclaimed himself divine,
but the strangest feature of these systems was that they were not the
real beliefs of the higher initiates. ’Abdallah, the founder of the
Ism’ailîyeh sect, was a sceptic, and while--like the leaders of many
such secret societies back to Ḥasan of Baṣrah, who was hanged by ’Abd
el Melek in 704 A. D.--he endeavoured to unite Jews, Christians, and
Moslems by teaching the doctrine of successive revelations, which
Muḥammad had proclaimed, he in reality renounced all creeds, and sought
to rule men by what he regarded as their superstitions. Like all secret
societies, these mystics failed in the end, but under the Fâṭemites
they had real power, though the Sunnî subjects of Ḥâkim were deeply
offended by his blasphemous heresies. He sought to propitiate them by
concessions to their orthodoxy, but he did not extend his toleration
to Christians, who were persecuted for several years. Finally, in 1010
A. D., as stated by Moslem and Christian accounts alike, the churches
of Modestus were burned to the ground.[482]
[Sidenote: THE DRUZES]
The memory of Ḥâkim is kept alive to the present day in Palestine among
the Druzes, who still regard him as having been an incarnation of
God, and as destined to appear again in the last days.[483] Neshtakîn
ed Derazi, from whom this remarkable sect are named, was a disciple
of Ḥamzah Ibn ’Aly, one of the Ism’ailîyeh of Khorasan. He went to
Egypt and preached the divinity of Ḥâkim, but being expelled by the
orthodox, retired to Hermon, where he gathered disciples, most of whom
seem to have been Persians. Ḥamzah himself remained in Cairo till the
murder of Ḥâkim, after which he disappeared; for the khalîfah’s son was
an orthodox Moslem. It is still the belief of some 100,000 Druzes that
Ḥâkim and Ḥamzah, as incarnations of God and of the Word, will return
in triumph from China at the end of the world; and this strange idea
shows the connection of the Druzes with the Mongol mystics of Central
Asia, and with the later school of Buddhism. Yet Ḥamzah himself and
his higher initiates had no such belief, and their secret teaching
substituted seven laws for the seven taught to the lower grade,
including “economy of truth,” mutual aid, the denial of all creeds,
separation from others, the unity of God, submission to His will, and
resignation to the appointed _ḳismah_ or “lot.”
When this strange episode in Moslem history ended in 1021 A. D., the
relations between Christians and Fâṭemites improved. Palestine had been
torn by civil wars under Ḥâkim; by riots at Damascus; and by rebellion
at Tyre, where a Greek fleet appeared to aid the oppressed Sunnîs, but
suffered defeat from the Ḳarmathian governor. The Greek emperor Romanus
III. obtained, in 1028 A. D., the consent of Ed Ḍâher, son of Ḥâkim, to
the rebuilding of the churches.[484] The news of the destruction of the
Holy Sepulchre had spread with returning pilgrims to Europe, and had
excited great indignation. Funds were no doubt easily collected for the
restoration, but it seems that the new buildings were small and poor,
as compared with those that preceded them. They were still standing in
1099 A. D., when the Crusaders arrived, and were included in the new
cathedral later. They were complete by 1048 A. D. under El Mustanṣir,
but William of Tyre[485] speaks of the Golgotha Chapel as “a very small
oratory”; and the Russian abbot Daniel (about 1106 A. D.) says, “This
was once a large church, but is now only a small one.”
From these accounts, and that of Sæwulf, we find that several additions
were made to the four churches of Modestus. The sepulchre still
stood in a rotunda, and south of this were three chapels, while to
the north was a fourth, all of which now exist, with apses to the
east. The northern one is now the Latin Chapel of Mary Magdalene.
The chapel nearest the rotunda on the south, over which the Norman
belfry--built later--still rises, was then consecrated to the Trinity,
and became the Latin baptistery. South of this was the Chapel of St.
John, and the fourth, at the extreme south end of the buildings, was
the Chapel of St. Mary, having a great fresco of the Virgin painted
outside on its west wall. East of the north side of the rotunda was an
arcade of pillars, which may have belonged to the “Paradise” of the
seventh-century church. It does not run quite parallel to the axis of
the Norman cathedral, and the later piers can still be seen added on
the line of the Norman choir. At the end of this arcade, on the east,
was the small chapel of the “Prison,” which is now mentioned for the
first time. Calvary was a separate chapel on the old site, and another
square building stood over the crypt, where the crosses were said to
have been found by Helena.
[Sidenote: THE ROTUNDA MOSAICS]
The rotunda was decorated by the munificence of the Byzantine emperor,
Romanus III. The Russian abbot Daniel says that the dome--supported on
twelve pillars and six piers--was open to the sky above, as before, and
as it continued to be in the Norman cathedral. There were galleries
round the building, and the walls of the rotunda were adorned with
mosaics, as were those of the Golgotha Chapel. The tomb itself was
surmounted by a cupola, on which the Franks afterwards placed a silver
statue of Christ, which must have been a grievance to the Greeks. The
mosaic design on the east wall of the Golgotha Chapel represented
the Crucifixion, the figures being larger than life. But the most
remarkable mosaics seem to have been those on the drum just below the
dome of the round church.[486] These were still visible as late as
1586, as described by Zuallardo. On the east was a figure of Christ as
a child, with the Virgin on one side and the Angel Gabriel on the other
(the Annunciation); on the left was Saint Helena, with six prophets
holding scrolls on either side, the thirteenth prophet (probably
Isaiah) thus facing the Christ, side by side with the archangel
Michael, next the apostles. On the right was Constantine enthroned, and
flanked by six apostles on either hand. The names were written to these
pictures in Greek and in Latin. The new buildings were completed just
before the Turks took possession of Jerusalem.
The earthquake of 1016 A. D., which caused the fall of the wooden dome
over the Rock, was no doubt regarded by Christians as the revenge of
Heaven on those who had destroyed the Holy Sepulchre. But six years
later it was restored by Ed Ḍâher, and still stands with its fine
Ḳarmathian text beginning, “In the name of God merciful and pitying:
truly he who believes in God restores God’s places of prayer.” Another
earthquake did damage to the mosque and to the walls of Jerusalem in
1034, and in 1060 the great lantern, hung from the dome and lighting
the building with five hundred lamps, fell with a crash on the
Ṣakhrah--an omen of new troubles falling on Islâm.[487]
Under El Mustanṣir, in 1047, Jerusalem was visited by the Persian
pilgrim Nâṣr-i-Khosrau, who mentions the inscription still extant,
giving actual measurements of the length and breadth of the Ḥaram
enclosure. He says that there were no buildings along the south wall
east of the Aḳṣa. In the city he found “an excellent hospital, which
is provided for by considerable sums which were given for the purpose:
great numbers of people are here served with draughts and lotions; for
there are physicians who receive a fixed stipend to attend at this
place for the sick.” This probably was Charlemagne’s Hospice. This
Moslem pilgrim also says, “From all the countries of the Greeks, and
also from other lands, the Christians and the Jews come up to Jerusalem
in great numbers, in order to visit the church and the synagogue that
is there.” The Jews prospered under Moslem rule, and the trade of the
East was now to a great extent in their hands. In the twelfth century
they deserted a Palestine under Christian rulers, but were found
farther east in great numbers, wherever the Moslems remained dominant.
[Sidenote: THE SELJUKS]
In 1077 A. D. Jerusalem fell into the hands of the Seljuk Turks, and
was pillaged by Atsiz. The history of this fateful change of masters,
which, within a generation, gave cause for the first Crusade, demands a
brief notice. The history of Persia and Baktria, since 874 A. D., had
been one of constantly reinforced Turkish aggression. The Saman family
was said to be descended from the Sassanians, but their forces were
Turkish Moslems. Bokhara, under Ism’aîl, in 895 A. D., was the capital
of a kingdom stretching from the Tien-shan Mountains to the Persian
Gulf, and from ’Irâḳ to the borders of India. It was said to be “the
seat of all the sciences.” A century later (in 976) the Samanides were
attacked by the Uigurs, and Ilik Khan entered the city in 999 A. D.
Ilik (“the prince”) ruled from China to the Caspian in Central Asia,
while the great Ghuznî dynasty was founded by Sebuktekin, who sought to
aid the Samanides. Ilik, in turn, was attacked by an outlawed general
of Bogu Khan (“the stag”), who was named Seljuk, son of Tokmak. It
would seem that this family had been converted by the Jews of Central
Asia, for among the names of early Seljuks we find those of Moses,
Jonah, Israel, and Michael. But they now appeared as devout Moslems.
Their tribesmen were still nomads when Togrul (“the slayer”) and
Tchakar (“the brilliant”), grandsons of Seljuk, fought Ilik in Bokhara
and Boghra Khan in Kashgar. On the death of the great Maḥmûd of Ghuznî
in 1030 A. D. they attacked his heir, Mas’aûd, and Tchakar--ruling in
Merv--totally defeated him nine years later. The united brothers then
conquered Kharezm, and finally defeated the Buyîds, who had ruled in
Azerbijân (or South Media) since 935 A. D., and who were all-powerful
in Baghdâd. Thus in 1055 A. D. Togrul entered the Moslem capital, and
was made “Emîr of Emîrs” as the protector of Kaîm, the twenty-sixth of
the Abbaside khalifs. The ambition of the Seljuks aimed at establishing
their empire over the whole of West Asia, and they thus at once came
into collision with Byzantium.
[Sidenote: MELEK SHAH]
The great family of the Comneni, who were to play an important part in
future history, came from Castamona, on the Euxine, but claimed Roman
descent. They were the successors of the Macedonian emperors, Isaac
Comnenos being elected by the army in 1057. On his death his brother
John declined the throne, and it was given to his friend Constantine
XI., Ducas, in 1059. The latter died eight years later, and his widow,
Eudocia--left guardian of three sons--married Romanus Diogenes, who
became emperor in 1068 A. D. Togrul had already sent an embassy to
Byzantium demanding tribute. He died in 1063 at the age of seventy,
his brother Tchakar having died five years before. In 1071 A. D.
Alp-Arslân (“the brave lion”), the next sultân, son of Tchakar, crossed
the Euphrates; and Diogenes, who had just taken Malazkerd, between
Erzerûm and Van, was obliged to retreat to Cæsarea in Cappodocia. His
army included Frank and Norman mercenaries, and the Byzantines were
deserted by these.[488] The Byzantine phalanx was broken by the Turkish
archers, and Diogenes was defeated and taken prisoner. He was well
treated by Alp-Arslân, and released on promising an annual tribute
of 60,000 aurei. But he never regained his throne at Constantinople,
and his son Michael was deposed by Nicephorus III., who usurped power
in 1078, but who was superseded by Alexius I. (Comnenos) in 1081.
Alp-Arslân was fighting in Kharezm as early as 1065, and seven years
later, while attacking Bokhara, he was stabbed by a certain Yûsef, whom
he had ordered to be crucified. He died when only forty-four years
old, and was succeeded by his famous son Melek Shah. This greatest of
the Seljuks was at first involved in war with his father-in-law at
Samarkand; after 1077 his empire extended from the Oxus to Yemen, and
he bestowed Syria and Palestine as a fief on his brother Tutush, having
organised eight great provinces under his relations. In 1075 Melek Shah
had sent Atsiz, a Kharezmian, against the Fâṭemite khalîfah. He took
Damascus, but was defeated near Cairo, and in his retreat he reached
Jerusalem, which his mutinous soldiers pillaged. Tutush besieged Aleppo
in 1078, gained Damascus by treachery, and--having conquered from
Antioch to the borders of Egypt--was humbly received by Atsiz at the
gate of the Holy City, but immediately ordered him to be beheaded. In
1083 Jerusalem was given by Tutush to his general Ortok, son of Eksek,
and on the death of the latter, in 1091, his sons Elghâzi and Sukmân
became rulers, Tutush himself being assassinated at Damascus in 1095.
The Turks thus held Jerusalem for about twenty years, during which they
greatly oppressed the native Christians and the pilgrims. About 1096,
or rather later, when the advance of the Crusaders engaged all the
Turkish forces in the north, while Radhwân and Dekak, sons of Tutush,
disputed the succession, the Fâṭemite khalîfah El Must’aîla-bi-Allah
took advantage of their weakness to seize Jerusalem and Damascus; the
Holy City was thus in possession of the Egyptians when the Crusaders
appeared before its walls in 1099 A. D., and the Seljuk princes and
generals were at discord among themselves.
The great Melek Shah had then been dead seven years, and his kingdom
split up--though his son at Baghdâd (Borḳiyaruk, “the very brilliant”)
was nominal suzerain of the eight kingdoms, or provinces, which were
practically independent. Melek Shah also fell a victim to an assassin,
and such a fate appears to have been common in Turkish history. The
sect of the Assassins (Ḥashshâshîn, or “hemp smokers”) was, indeed,
founded in this reign by Ḥasan el Ḥomeiri, who was a friend of the
celebrated poet ’Omar el Khâyyâm (“the tent maker”), and of Nizâm
el Mulk, the prime minister of Melek Shah. These three were of the
Ism’ailîyeh sect, and the scepticism of that school finds expression in
the well-known quatrains of Omar.
“There was a door to which I found no key,
There was a veil past which I could not see,
Some little talk awhile of me and Thee
There seemed--and then no more of Thee and me.”
The friendship of the three sceptics did not long endure. The vizier
found out that Ḥasan was bent on supplanting him, and the latter
was exiled to Ḳasbîn, near which was the castle of the “Eagle’s
Nest,” where--according to Marco Polo--Ḥasan’s earthly Paradise was
established, to lure the youths who vowed implicit obedience to his
commands. The first victims of the new order were Nizâm el Mulk (who
fell into disgrace), and Melek Shah himself. The Assassins organised
a huge secret society which, in the twelfth century, spread from
Khorasan to Syria, and was feared by Moslem and Christian alike. It was
suppressed in 1254 A. D. by Mengku Khan, but yet later the “Sheikh of
the Mountain” was powerful in the Lebanon. Saladin and Edward I. alike
were marked as victims, and to the present day the Nuṣeirîyeh of Syria
retain the mystic beliefs of the order founded by Ḥasan in 1090 A. D.
[Sidenote: ITALIAN TRADE]
Although we have no pilgrim diaries of the century during which the
Turks became rulers of Western Asia, we know that the Latins were
visiting the Holy City in ever-increasing numbers. Trade with Asia
was carried on by French and Italian merchants.[489] A fair was
held annually at Jerusalem on September 15, and the traders of Pisa,
Venice, Genoa, and Marseilles bought cloves, nutmeg, and mace brought
from India, pepper, ginger, and frankincense from Aden, silk from
China--whether by overland caravan or by the Chinese junks[490] which
appeared in the Red Sea during the Middle Ages--sugar from Syria, flax
from Egypt, with quicksilver, coral, and metals, glass from Tyre,
almonds, mastic, saffron, with rich stuffs and weapons, from Damascus.
The Jews paid a heavy tax to secure the monopoly as dyers, and Jewish
dyers still lived near the Tower of David in 1163 A. D., as mentioned
by Benjamin of Tudela. The sugar-cane of Tripoli is noticed by Albert
of Aix, and sugar-mills, set up by Moslems and afterwards used by the
Franks, still remain in ruins at Jericho. Jerusalem was famous for its
sugar as early, indeed, as the tenth century.
Among these traders were the merchants of Amalfi. The little town
in the Bay of Salerno, south of Naples, had a port sheltered by the
hills from the mighty _tramontana_--the north wind which blows with
almost hurricane force in winter. They kept up the ancient hospital
in Jerusalem founded by Charlemagne. They apparently built beside it
a monastery for Benedictines in 1048 A. D., and a Benedictine nunnery
was added later. These were close to the Church of St. Mary Latin,
for the hospice was intended for Latin pilgrims. The patron saint
was originally the Egyptian patriarch of the seventh century, St.
John Eleemon, but afterwards St. John Baptist when the order of the
Hospitallers grew out of the Benedictines as Knights of St. John.
They retained the black Benedictine robe, with a white cross. Geraud
of Amalfi, the first master of the order, was found presiding at the
hospice when the Crusaders arrived.[491] Pope Paschal II. took this
institution under his protection on February 15, 1113 A. D., and it is
described as “the Hospice of Geraud in the city of Jerusalem, near the
Church of St. John Baptist, instituted with all the properties which do
or shall belong to the said hospice this side or beyond the sea.” It
remained independent of the Latin patriarch down to 1120 A. D., and the
order was always specially under the Popes.[492]
It was perhaps on account of the increased facilities for transit,
afforded by the Italian fleets, that the numbers of the Latin pilgrims
began now to increase so greatly. Europe was still plunged in Gothic
ignorance, but the traders brought home tales which fired the
imagination of artistic peoples such as the Provençals, the Normans,
and the Kelts were by nature. They heard, as they sat in their grim
castles frowning down on some walled village, of great cities in the
East full of treasure, and brightened with glorious works of art. They
contrasted the splendours of the sunny South, in Italy and in Syria,
with the gloom of the North. They learned from the palmer, or the
Jewish trader, wonderful legends of Indian and Arab origin, and heard
of sacred places and miraculous relics. Palestine was a fairy-land to
them; Damascus was a city to sack. They learned also that Christians in
the East were persecuted, and trade obstructed, by savage Tartars who
demanded endless taxes, who danced on the altar of the Holy Sepulchre,
and pulled the patriarch by the beard. Their wrath was roused, and
they desired to aid the emperor of Byzantium, who was appealing to them
for help.
[Sidenote: POPE HILDEBRAND]
The Church also was recovering from the utter degradation into which
it had fallen after the time of Charlemagne. Hildebrand appeared as a
great Pope in 1073 A. D.--an Italian probably of Gothic origin, who
reformed the Latin episcopacy, and freed himself, by aid of Normans,
from the German emperor (whom he brought to his knees at Canossa), yet
who died in exile at Salerno in 1085 A. D. The dreamers of dreams are
the makers of history. Hildebrand dreamed of an united feudal Europe,
under the Pope of Rome as its head. He saw the danger to Christendom of
the great Moslem empire under Melek Shah which threatened Byzantium.
He was the first to urge on princes the necessity of union, and of a
“general passage” beyond the sea for the support of the Greek empire,
and for the rescue of the holy places. Appeal had been made to Pope
Sylvester II. as early as 1000 A. D., and he had written a letter[493]
in favour of the Eastern Christians, but nothing could then be done.
The dream of Hildebrand was fulfilled within a generation.
The Latin nations were still half savage, and the masses lived in
fear of Hell, of the Last Day, and of the Pope--fears which were
alike inculcated by their priests. It was expected that the world
would come to an end in the year 1000 after the Nativity,[494] and
wills and legal documents of the tenth century begin with the words
“Appropinquante etenim mundi termino, et ruinis crescentibus jam certa
signa manifestantur, pertimescens tremendi judicii diem.” Though the
year passed without fulfilment of these fears, the idea of immediate
ending of earthly history continued to be a real motive of action even
at the close of the twelfth century, when Geoffrey de Vinsauf says that
the world “waxes old.” The pilgrim received remission of his sins at
the holy places, and if he died at Jerusalem he was ready to appear in
the “Valley of Decision” on the day of doom.
Jerusalem, which then measured nearly a third of a square mile in area,
seems a small town to us, but to the pilgrims from the West it must
have appeared large and magnificent, though Damascus and Constantinople
were much larger. In the middle of the twelfth century Winchester, as
the capital of England, under king Stephen, was only a third of the
size of the Holy City; and though the beauties of the Ḥaram buildings
could not be seen, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, with its mosaics,
its lamps of gold and silver, and many other gifts of princes, must
have impressed the wild Normans with a sense of Oriental wealth.
The Norsemen who accompanied Sigurd, soon after Jerusalem was taken
by Godfrey, scorned to show their astonishment at the civilisation
of Asia, yet even the smaller town of Sidon was a prize, as Halldor
Skualldre sang.
“He who for wolves provides a feast
Seized on the city of the East,
The heathen’s nest; and honour drew,
And gold for gifts, from those he slew.”
[Sidenote: LATIN PILGRIMS]
After the completion of the new churches, in 1048 A. D., crowds of
pilgrims came rejoicing to see them, as Roderick Glaber (“the bald”)
relates: “And then from all the world an incredible multitude of men
entered Jerusalem, with exultation, bringing gifts for the restoration
of the house of God.” Yet earlier, in 1033, he says, “An innumerable
multitude began to flow together to the Saviour’s tomb at Jerusalem,
whom none might hope to number. First the class of the lower people,
then the middle class, afterwards the greatest--kings, counts, and
nobles--lastly, which had never happened before, many women, noble and
poor, arrived there. Many, indeed, desired at heart to die before they
went home.”
Among these pilgrims of high rank was Fulk the Black, Count of Anjou,
ancestor of a future king of Jerusalem, who came to expiate many deeds
of violence. When he returned he built a church at Loche in imitation
of the Sepulchre at Jerusalem. He made two more pilgrimages to the
Holy City, and died in 1040 at Metz, returning from the last. Robert
of Normandy, father of the Conqueror, also went by the land route to
Palestine in 1035 A. D. In Asia Minor he met a Norman pilgrim returning
home. Robert was sick, and was carried in a litter by Saracens. He
bade his subject tell his barons “that you saw me where I was being
borne by devils to Paradise.” Before the gate of Jerusalem he found a
crowd of poor pilgrims, denied admission by the Egyptian guard because
they could not pay the tax of one aureus each. He paid the gold bezant
demanded for every one of them. This munificence of the Norman was
well appreciated by the Moslem governor, who sent back the money which
Robert distributed among the poor. The duke died on his return journey
at Nicæa before reaching Byzantium.
The conversion of the Hungarian Mongols to Latin Christianity, in the
end of the tenth century, opened a new safe route to Constantinople.
Richard, abbot of St. Vitou in Normandy, led a band of seven hundred
pilgrims to Jerusalem; and in 1054 the bishop of Cambray was attended
by a great host, who were called “the army of the Lord,” but they only
got to Laodicæa in Syria, and then returned home. Four other German
bishops were accompanied by seven thousand pilgrims, and Ingulphus,
the secretary of William the Conqueror, was among the leaders. They
are said to have been served on vessels of gold and silver, and the
tents of the bishops were hung with costly tapestry. They were attacked
by an Arab sheikh at Ramleh, and were for a time in danger of their
lives. But bishop Gunther of Bamburg felled the insolent brigand
with one blow, and he was seized and bound. The Egyptian governor
hurried to their assistance, and declared the sheikh to be an outlaw
of whom the settled population were afraid. The bishops presented
the governor with 500 gold bezants (or about £250), and were safely
escorted to Jerusalem. They saw the holy places, and Ingulphus went
back by sea to Italy. Bishop Gunther died in Hungary, and only two
thousand out of seven thousand ever saw their homes again. Of his own
comrades Ingulphus says “that they sallied from Normandy thirty stout
and well-appointed horsemen, but that they repassed the Alps twenty
wretched palmers, with staff in hand and wallet on back.”
Such were the pilgrims who explored the way for the Crusaders half a
century before Peter the Hermit. Whether they continued to come in
equal numbers after the Turks took Jerusalem in 1077 A. D. is not
known, but, as we shall now see, the dangers and difficulties of
pilgrimage then became far greater, and a cry of wrath and misery
echoed from the Holy City over all the Latin world.
FOOTNOTES TO CHAPTER XII
[481] See Gibbon, ch. lii.; Vámbéry, “Hist. of Bokhara,” 2nd edit.
1873; Yule, “Marco Polo,” 1871, p. 172; Carmoly, “Itinéraires de la
Terre Sainte,” 1847, “Des Khozars au X^e Siècle,” pp. 1–104. For the
name “Turk,” see Vámbéry, “Turko-Tatarischen Sprachen,” 1878, pp. 184,
185.
[482] Will. of Tyre, i. 4, 5; Makrizi, etc.; see Guy le Strange, “Pal.
under the Moslems,” p. 204.
[483] See Churchill, “Mt. Lebanon,” 1853, with an account of Druze
beliefs abstracted from Silvestre de Sacy, “Exposé de la Religion des
Druzes.”
[484] Will. of Tyre, i. 6; Robinson, “Bib. Res.,” 1838, pp. 394–6;
“Chron. Adhemari.”
[485] viii. 3.
[486] Abbot Daniel (_c._ 1106 A. D.); John of Würzburg (_c._ 1160
A. D.); Theodorich (_c._ 1172 A. D.).
[487] Besant and Palmer, “Jerusalem,” p. 108; Guy le Strange, “Pal.
under the Moslems,” p. 130. Another Ḳarmathian text, forbidding the
“protected” (Jews and Christians) to enter a mosque in the city,
probably belongs to this period, but it is not clear under which of the
Fâṭemites it was set up. _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, Oct. 1897, p.
302, April 1898, p. 86.
[488] El Makîn says that Alp-Arslân had 40,000 horsemen. The Byzantines
numbered 100,000, including Phrygians, Cappadocians, Macedonians,
Bulgarians, Uzi of Moldavia (who mutinied, and who were Turks), Franks,
and Normans, commanded by Ursel of Baliol, ancestor of the Scottish
king John Baliol; the family came to Durham from Normandy.
[489] “Mémoires de l’Académie des Inscriptions,” de Guignes, “Sur
l’état du commerce des François dans le Levant avant les Croisades,”
quoted in Besant and Palmer’s “Jerusalem,” 1871, p. 127.
[490] Ibn Batuta.
[491] Foucher of Chartres, “Hic fuit repertus ibidem quando Godefridus
... ceperunt eandem.” He died on September 3, 1120 A. D. The
Xenodochium of Geraud (“Regesta,” No. 71) was “prope ecclesiam S.
Johannis Baptistæ.” In 1118 A. D. (“Regesta,” No. 86) Roger of Antioch
gave houses in Jerusalem and three villages to the hospital: “sitam
quam Hierosolymis moratus Guiraldo dederat.”
[492] See Röhricht, “Regesta Regni Hierosolymitani,” 1893, Nos. 71, 86;
Albert of Aix, vi. 25; William of Tyre, xviii. 4, 5.
[493] “Acta Sanctorum,” iv. p. 39; see Robinson, “Bib. Res.,” 1838, i.
p. 394.
[494] Roderick Glaber, iii. 7, iv. 6; “Bib. Res.,” i. pp. 396–400;
Besant and Palmer, “Jerusalem,” 1871, p. 133; Geof. de Vinsauf, “Itin.
Ric.,” II. v.
CHAPTER XIII
THE LATIN KINGDOM
Peter the Hermit was a knight of gentle birth from Picardy: “dwarfish,
of mean figure, quick-witted, and with a sharp but kindly eye, he was
free spoken, and not wanting in eloquence”[495]--a man better fitted
for the cloister, in which the shy and sensitive found refuge in those
rough times, than for the shock of battle. At the age of forty-four he
left his monastery at Huy, near Liége, in the year 1094 A. D., and went
as a pilgrim to Jerusalem, which was then in the power of the Turk.
The misery which Eastern Christians and Western pilgrims had suffered
for seventeen years from the wild Tartars and Kharezmians who formed
the Seljuk garrison was approaching its culmination. It is said that
the Turks often invaded the churches, dancing on the altars, treading
under foot the sacred chalices, wrecking their fury on the marble
of the sepulchre, and dragging the patriarch from his throne by the
beard.[496] The only hope for Christians lay in help from Europe. “When
the cup of tribulation is full,” said the patriarch Simeon to Peter,
“God will send the Christians of the West to help the Holy City.” The
time and the man were at hand; and as the little hermit knelt before
the sepulchre there came to him a voice that said, “Arise, Peter; the
time is come. Go forth and tell the tribulations of My people. The time
is come that My servants should be succoured, and that My holy places
should be free.”
We all know what was the effect on the history of the world that
followed Peter’s determination to obey the Voice: how his passionate
faith and “eloquence” set Western Europe on fire; how at the Council
of Clermont, in November 1095, the “truce of God” was proclaimed among
princes; how the letters from the Eastern Christians were read; how
Peter testified to their wrongs; how Pope Urban II. sanctioned his
mission; and how the assembly rang with the shout of “Diex el volt.”
I have devoted another volume to the story of the Latin kingdom of
Jerusalem, and it is here proposed to treat only the history of the
city itself under its Latin kings.[497] A few words are, however,
needed to give the thread of events preceding the conquest.
Like all great popular movements, the Crusade was due to many motives
affecting various classes of men. Faith, and sympathy with the wronged,
roused the enthusiasm of those who listened to the passionate appeals
of Peter, who was known to have served bravely in 1071 under the Count
of Boulogne in Flanders. He was a selfless man; for after his day of
triumph, when he was acclaimed as the saviour of Jerusalem by five
years of suffering, he returned to his cell at Huy, where he died on
July 7, 1115 A. D. But besides outraging Christianity, the Turks had
endangered the trade of Italy, which, as we have seen, had prospered
under the Egyptian Moslems; and the merchant class had a vital interest
in the pacification of the East. To the statesmen of Europe it was
also known that the time was favourable for an attempt to crush Turkish
power, which threatened the West, because the Seljuk princes were
engaged in internecine quarrels, and were the enemies of the Arab and
Egyptian Moslems. Pope Urban II. saw also in this popular excitement
the means of uniting all Catholic princes under himself, and of
extending the power of the Roman Church over the whole of Christendom
by reuniting the various Churches of the East. He had been made a
cardinal by the great Hildebrand, and was elected Pope on March 12,
1088, but in the struggle with the empire he had been driven out of
Rome, in 1091, by Guibert the Anti-pope who was called Celestin III.,
and he had only regained possession of the sacred city in December
1093, after crowning Conrad, the rebel son of the emperor Henry IV.,
at Milan. He lived to carry out, in part, the dream of Hildebrand, and
died in the year that saw the conquest of Jerusalem.
[Sidenote: THE NORMANS]
The ambition of the Normans in Italy was not satisfied with the
capture of the south from the Greeks, or of Sicily from the Moslems.
They aimed at conquest of far lands, where the younger sons of their
princes might carve out kingdoms. Robert Guiscard (“the wily”), a
valvassour (or gentleman) of Hauteville in Normandy, had crossed the
Alps in 1053, with five knights and thirty men, to join his brothers
who were among the mercenaries invited (as early as 1017) by the Pope
to conquer Apulia. He became the feudal overlord of the barons of
Calabria and Apulia, as duke, in 1058 A. D. He became also the Pope’s
master, but the champion of Hildebrand against the German emperor. His
brother Roger reigned in Sicily till 1090, and he himself died warring
in Greece five years earlier. His eldest son Bœmund was now fighting
for possession of Amalfi, when the opportunity arose for winning a new
kingdom in Asia. He and his cousin Tancred agreed to lead a force of
10,000 knights and 20,000 foot soldiers to the East. Bœmund became
Prince of Antioch, which he left in 1104, and died in Italy seven years
later. Tancred became Prince of Galilee, and died at Antioch a year
after his cousin.
[Sidenote: THE FIRST CRUSADE]
Godfrey of Bouillon (in the Ardennes) was descended on his mother’s
side from Charlemagne. He was the eldest son of Count Eustace II. of
Boulogne, and nephew of the duke of Lorraine. He was about thirty-five
years old, and had distinguished himself fighting for the emperor Henry
IV. against the Pope, but now vowed as penance to aid the Christian
cause. Like Bœmund, he was taller than most men, strong and ruddy
bearded, loved and respected by all--a true knight, faithful and pure
of life, brave and just, courteous to all, and humble of heart. With
him came his brother Baldwin, who was the first to establish a Latin
province in Asia as Count of Edessa, and who succeeded him as King of
Jerusalem. The Lorrainers whom they led numbered 10,000 knights and
24,000 foot. Raymond of Toulouse, who had fought in Spain beside the
Cid, led 100,000 men by land to Byzantium with Godfrey. He became Count
of Tripoli, and died fighting there on February 28, 1105. Besides these
future princes, Robert of Flanders and Robert of Normandy took part in
the conquest, and the total force of trained fighting men, assembled
at Constantinople in the winter of 1096 A. D., numbered about 200,000
in all. To them fell all the honour and profit, and the wild mobs of
100,000 pilgrims who preceded them, under Peter the Hermit and Walter
Lackland, with 20,000 Germans besides, never reached Palestine at all,
being massacred by the Turks near Nicæa.
Such were the great actors and such their motives. They knew not what
they did, and the results of enthusiasm and of ambition alike were far
different from what they hoped. The masses may have found consolation
in absolution from their sins, but no priestly blessing could alter
the nemesis of conduct that came on them and on their children. The
traders who hoped to dominate the commerce of Asia found it necessary,
in the end, to make treaties with Moslem rulers. The proud princes
of the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem were, within a century, to become
outcasts dependent on their kinsmen at home. The emperors of Byzantium
found, not allies, but masters, in the Franks. The Eastern Churches
were dispossessed of their chapels and property by Latin bishops. The
power of the Papacy was not in the end secured, nor was the union of
Christendom, under the bishop of Rome as its feudal head, established
more than a hundred years. Pride led to the fall of the Roman Church;
and education gained in Asia led to the Renaissance and to the
Reformation. The Eternal Purpose which works for the rise of man guided
these unwitting agents by ways which they followed with unwilling
feet, and a half-savage Europe became a new centre of civilisation in
consequence mainly of the Crusades.
It is remarkable, also, that the success of the Latins was not due
solely to hard fighting, but was also brought about by the policy of
their leaders. Melek el Afḍal, the vizier of the Fâṭemite khalîfah El
Must’aîla, was eager to ally himself with the Latins against the Turks,
but was dissuaded by the emperor Alexius Comnenos.[498] El Ghâzi, son
of Ortok, sought aid of the Crusaders, at Mardîn, against Radhwân,
son of Tutush, his rightful lord at Aleppo. Tancred took the side of
Radhwân, but Baldwin I. (in 1110 A. D.) accepted the aid of El Ghâzi
against the Seljuks of Môsul; and Roger of Antioch was allied, in 1115,
to this same son of Ortok, whose misgovernment of Jerusalem had been
the immediate cause of the Crusade. Treaties with Moslems were made
by Godfrey and by his successors, and after the fall of the county of
Edessa, in 1146 A. D., the Latins were often in peaceful relations with
the sulṭân of Aleppo and Damascus. In 1127 ’Imâd ed Dîn Zanghi, the
atabek (or “father chief”) who had become Emîr of Emîrs, as protector
of the ’Abbaside khalîfah, was a formidable foe of the Latins,[499] and
under his son Nûr ed Dîn (1146–74 A. D.), who ruled the West, while his
elder brother Ḳutb ed Dîn ruled in Môsul, it became evident that there
was no prospect of enlarging the borders of the kingdom of Jerusalem.
There was a tacit understanding that the Afrîn, the Orontes, and the
Jordan, were to mark the boundaries of the Franks, who never occupied
Aleppo or Damascus, but held a precarious sway in Gilead and Moab.
[Sidenote: THE CITY STORMED]
The Crusaders took Nicæa from the Seljuk prince Ḳilij-Arslân on May 5,
1097; and, when Antioch was betrayed on June 2 of the next year, they
defeated the Turks of Môsul under Kerbogha, the general of Borḳiyaruk,
after which they set out for Jerusalem, and reached it unopposed in
June 1099 A. D. The force sent south did not exceed 1,500 knights and
20,000 foot-soldiers; but, including camp-followers and irregulars,
it amounted to about 40,000 men in all. Jerusalem was protected by a
single wall, apparently on the lines of Hadrian’s fortification, and it
was attacked as usual from the north.[500] The forces of Godfrey were
arrayed towards the east, and were separated by those of Count Robert
of Flanders and Duke Robert of Normandy from Tancred’s Italians, with
whom the men of Lorraine had quarrelled at Tarsus. Tancred attacked
on the north-west, at the tower which afterwards bore his name.
Raymond of Toulouse was opposite the west wall; and part of his force
afterwards took up a position on Sion, opposite the south wall of the
city. Tancred’s mad attempt to take Jerusalem by assault, using only a
single ladder, failed, and regular siege works became necessary for the
reduction of the Egyptian garrison. Wood for siege machines was brought
from a valley six miles away, but was found small and useless. In the
heat of summer the Franks suffered terribly from want of water: for
the wells were choked, and some said were poisoned; the Siloam stream
was insufficient and difficult of access; and the foraging parties,
sent to Bethlehem and Tekoa, were often cut off by the Saracens, who
sallied southwards till they were invested on Sion. The cattle and
horses died in great numbers, and a pestilence was caused by their
unburied corpses. At length the Genoese fleet reached Jaffa, and sent
wood and artificers to aid the exhausted besiegers. Storming towers
were made, and were covered with the hides of the dead beasts. After
four weeks all was ready for the assault, and on July 12 (the Feast of
the Visitation) a solemn procession was made to the ruined church on
the summit of Olivet, where Peter the Hermit and Arnold, the ambitious
chaplain of Robert of Normandy, preached to the army. The first
assault, on July 14, was repelled; for the heavy towers stuck fast, and
three witches, weaving spells on the ramparts, were believed to have
succeeded, though they were slain, while an apparition of St. George,
seen by Godfrey and his brother Eustace, failed to excite the valour of
their men. But during the night Godfrey took down his tower, and moved
it farther west to the postern of the Magdalen (now called “Herod’s
Gate”) where the ditch was less deep. Here it was re-erected, and at 3
p.m. in the afternoon of Friday, July 15 (the Moslem day of rest), the
bridge fell on the rampart, and Godfrey stood on the wall--the first
to enter the captured city, which, by the custom of the age, he could
claim for his own, as Baldwin claimed Edessa and Bœmund claimed Antioch.
A terrible scene of carnage followed when the gates were opened, and
the wild Franks, Normans, and Italians poured into the town. lt is said
that--in strange contrast to the clemency of Omar and (afterwards) of
Saladin--10,000 Moslems were slain in the Ḥaram, when the knights rode
in on a pavement soaked with blood. The massacre went on for seven
days. Tancred in vain promised security to fugitives in the Aḳṣa, for
all were slain by the lawless soldiers. Only those who took refuge in
the Tower of David were saved by Raymond of Toulouse, and sent with
their families and baggage to Ascalon, which long remained an outpost
of the Egyptians in Palestine. After this conquest the success of the
Latins was so complete that no Moslem foe appeared before the walls
of Jerusalem for eighty-eight years; and when Saladin began to become
formidable in 1178 A. D., nine years before the fall of the kingdom, it
was found that the ramparts had fallen into ruins through age, and they
were hastily repaired.[501] The Frank rule in Palestine, from 1099 to
1187 A. D., was strong and prosperous, and gaps of many years occur in
the chronicles, during which we read of no wars, even on the frontiers,
which were secured by a line of mighty castles. Notices of Jerusalem,
in chronicles and legal documents and letters, thus refer mainly to
gifts of land made to the churches and to the military orders, or to
internal disputes between the regulars and the patriarchs.
[Sidenote: THE FRANK KINGS]
Godfrey, being elected, refused to take the title of king in a city
where his Master had only worn a crown of thorns. Within a year he died
of fever at the early age of forty on July 18, 1100, and was succeeded
by his brother Baldwin, the first Latin king, who ruled successfully
till 1117 A. D.[502] The third king was Baldwin II. (de Burg), a cousin
of Godfrey, who married an Armenian princess. He was captive from May
30, 1123, to August 24, 1124, at Ḥarrân, having been seized by Balak,
nephew of El Ghâzi, the lord of Mardîn, and was only delivered after
Balak had been slain by Jocelyn of Edessa. But this event did not
affect Jerusalem. He left four half Armenian daughters, the eldest
(Melisinda or Milicent) being a famous queen, married to Fulk of
Anjou, under whom Palestine reached the summit of its prosperity as a
Christian kingdom. Fulk[503] reigned from 1131 to 1144, and left two
sons, of whom the elder, Baldwin III., was a gallant youth, long held
in ward by his crowned mother Melisinda. She founded the Benedictine
nunnery at Bethany--of which the tower still dominates the hamlet--in
1147, and rebuilt the Church of the Virgin’s Tomb in the last year of
her life; for she died at Nâblus on September 11, 1161, and was buried
on the stairs leading down to the cave-chapel of this restored church.
Her son survived her only five months, and died on February 10, 1162.
He was succeeded by his gloomy brother Amaury, who weakened the kingdom
by making war on Egypt. His son Baldwin IV. was only eleven when Amaury
died in 1173, and had already been found to be afflicted with leprosy.
His reign was rendered miserable by the quarrels and intrigues of the
decadent Latins, and he died in 1185, leaving no child. His elder
sister Sibyl[504] married William of Montferrat, and afterwards Guy
of Lusignan, the unfortunate last king of Jerusalem, whom Saladin
defeated at Ḥaṭṭîn on July 3, 1187. The victorious sulṭân hastened to
Jerusalem, which thus after eight days of siege fell again into Moslem
hands, on Friday, October 2, 1187 A. D.
The old French account, called the “Citez de Jhérusalem,” gives us
a very full description of the Holy City “au jor que li Sarrazin et
Salahadinz la conquistrent sur les Chrestienz”--in the “day when the
Saracens and Saladin conquered it from the Christians”; and, taken
with other contemporary documents, and with the earlier accounts by
Sæwulf, John of Würzburg, Theodorich, and several more, it enables us
to recover the names of every main street, every gate and important
building that existed in Jerusalem in the latter part of the twelfth
century. Further information as to the churches of the Greeks within
the town is also afforded by the accounts of the Russian abbot Daniel,
and of the Greek pilgrim John Phocas. To the description of the city we
may thus now turn.
[Illustration: JERUSALEM IN 1187 A. D.
REFERENCES
1 _The Templum_
2 _St. James_
3 _The Golden Gate_
4 _The School of the Virgin_
5 _The Templar’s Church_
6 _The Templar’s Stables_
7 _St. Simeon_
8 _Postern_
9 _Chapel of the Mocking_
10 _Bethesda_
11 _Josaphat Gate_
12 _Chapel of the Flagellation_
13 _The Repose (Arch)_
14 _St. Anne_
15 _The Inner Pool_
16 _The House of Herod_
17 _St. Mary Magdalene_
18 _Postern of the Magdalen_
19 _St. Stephen’s Gate_
20 _The Lazarus Postern_
21 _Chapel of the Spasm_
22 _The Syrian Exchange_
23 _Holy Sepulchre Cathedral_
24 _St. Chariton_
25 _St. Mary Latin_
26 _St. Mary Magna_
27 _St. John Baptist_
28 _Herb Street_
29 _The Covered Street_
30 _The Latin Exchange_
31 _Pool of the Baths_
32 _Bethlehem Gate_
33 _The Tower of David_
34 _Chapel of the Three Maries_
35 _St. James (Latin)_
36 _St. Thomas_
37 _St. James (Armenian)_
38 _St. George (Greek)_
39 _The House of Annas_
40 _St. Thomas of the Germans_
41 _The German Hospice_
42 _Bridge (Causeway)_
43 _The Postern of the Tannery_
44 _The Sion Gate_
45 _The House of Caiaphas_
46 _The Cœnaculum_
47 _The Tomb of Absalom_
48 _The Tomb of St. James_
P = Postern G = Gate]
[Sidenote: THE POPULATION]
The pilgrim could enter the Bethlehem Gate (now called the Jaffa Gate)
freely; for the grievous toll was taken off by Baldwin II., at the
request of the Latin patriarch Guarmund.[505] He saw on his right
the “Tower of David,” or as it was called later the “Castle of the
Pisans,” and in the market square, to its east, he mingled with a crowd
such as had never before been seen in the Holy City.[506] Knights of
four orders rode by on hardy Armenian or Cyprian steeds, clad in long
hauberks of chain mail, with iron caps and shoes, and mail leggings,
wielding the long Norman sword and the lance, their shields painted
with simple blazons. Over the hauberk the Templars wore a long belted
white dress with red cross, the Hospitallers wore black with a white
eight-pointed cross, the Teutonic order white with black cross; and
the Knights of St. Lazarus--who tended the lepers at their hospital
outside the city--had black and white robes with a green cross. The
tall noble from Normandy was dressed in silk and miniver (the skin of
the grey Siberian squirrel); he wore his hair and beard long under his
furred cap. The tall, slim Norman ladies were robed in white samite and
cloth-of-gold. The pages with them had slashed doublets of yellow and
crimson. The men-at-arms wore the quilted gambison which, when steeped
in vinegar, was said to resist iron weapons; with them marched the
Turcopoles--a mixed race, Turko-Greek, in origin--who made excellent
light horsemen, not despised like the “Poulains,” or half-bred
Syro-Greeks, who had an evil reputation as extortionate inn-keepers and
cowards. The Europeans were mainly Franks and Italians, with a smaller
proportion of Germans, but you might also see Hungarians, Navarese,
Bretons, Scots, Englishmen, Ruthenians, Bohemians, Greeks, and
Bulgarians,[507] mingling with the red-sashed Armenian in camlet cloth,
the Georgian, the Nestorian, and the Syrian Christian, the Moslem
Fellâḥ and the Arab from the desert who were contented serfs, the
scowling Mullah, the Egyptian in his blue gown, the Persian and Hindu,
with ruddy Maronites from Lebanon, and dark Copts from the Delta. All
these were ruled, according to the feudal laws of the kingdom, in
fiefs held by the Norman, Italian, Frank, and Provençal knights from
Lorraine, Auvergne, Burgundy, Apulia, and Sicily. The peasant market
was inspected by the mutaḥaseb or “accountant”; the traders from
Venice, Genoa, Pisa, Amalfi, and Marseilles had their privileges and
agreements with the king. The Church established in the kingdom was
that of Rome, and its rites and vestments were Latin. The Oriental
bishops were only at most recognised as suffragans, and bitterly
resented the dominance of the “intruding” hierarchy from the West. But
they too were under the protection of the king, like the Jewish dyer
in his yellow turban, his hands stained blue with indigo, who still
clung to his sacred city; “two hundred,” says Rabbi Benjamin of Tudela
(in 1163 A. D.), “dwell in one corner of the city under the Tower of
David.” But there must have been others, for the north-east quarter
(the ancient Bezetha) was called the “Juiverie”--a ghetto transferred
later to the present Jews’ quarter on the south-east.[508] The Jews
were both Sephardim from Spain and Africa and also probably Ashkenazim
from Eastern Europe. They were ranked lower than the Moslems, but the
nobles were often in debt to Jewish bankers.
The new rulers brought with them a new and beautiful style of
architecture from Italy and Sicily. It was distinguished by its
lightness and its boldly carved ornamentation, with a finish to the
hewn ashlar more perfect than any other. It was based on the Lombard
Romanesque, but was influenced by Saracen art. The clustering pillars,
groined roofs, and ribbed arches, the coupled dwarf columns, and even
the “dog-tooth” moulding, of which a bold example remains in the west
window of the cloister south of St. Mary Latin, had appeared earlier
among Saracens, and--as we have seen--in some cases these were features
of Arab art as early as the ninth century.[509] Fine examples of this
Italian-Norman style--which we find also at Palermo in 1185 A. D.--are
still to be seen at the south entrance of the Holy Sepulchre
Cathedral, or in the Hospital close by, in the Templar’s porch added
to the Aḳṣa Mosque, as well as at Gaza, Ramleh, Nâblus, Tortosa, and
elsewhere in Palestine and in Syria. The arches at first were round,
but after 1130 A. D. the pointed Saracenic arch was used. The general
appearance was lighter than that of our Norman architecture in England:
for the glories of the style wrongly called “Gothic” in France and
Britain and Germany, developed (from this earlier art of Italians
and Normans) in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. The “mason’s
marks,” or lucky signs on the stones, which distinguish Norman work in
Palestine, are the same that we find in French and English cathedrals,
after the return of Templars and others to the West, when Acre fell in
1291, and the orders were expelled from Syria.
[Sidenote: THE STREETS]
From the Bethlehem Gate, David Street descended east, leaving on its
left Patriarch Street (now called “Christian Street”), named from the
Patriarch’s house farther north; and farther east there were three
roofed streets to the left, which are the present bazaars: they were
called “Herb Street,” “Covered Street,” and “Malquisinat.”[510] In
the latter cooked food was sold to pilgrims. The groined and ribbed
vaulting over the bazaar is Norman work here still standing, and the
short Latin text, “Sca Anna,” carved on a wall, shows that one of the
shops once belonged to the Church of St. Anne.
Beyond these cross streets, after a short sharp turn to the right,
David Street became Temple Street, and ran to the “bridge”--Justinian’s
old causeway then rebuilt, leading to the “Beautiful Gate” of the
Temple, now called the Gate of the Chain. The streets to the right,
leading south, were--first, Sion Street, which was the old pillared
street, a continuation of the line of Herb Street, leading to the Sion
Gate; secondly, the Street of Judas’ Arch (where Judas hanged himself);
and, thirdly, farther east, German Street, leading to the German (or
Teutonic) Hospice in the east part of the upper city. Herb Street
continued north as St. Stephen Street, passing east of the cathedral
to the north gate of St. Stephen. On the south side of the cathedral
a street ran east from Patriarch Street to Herb Street, passing north
of St. Mary Latin. This was called Palmers’ Street, where the pilgrims
bought palms. The parallel street north of the cathedral was the Street
of the Holy Sepulchre. The name Via Dolorosa was as yet unknown, and
the east part of this line was called “Street of the Repose”--from the
legend of the Virgin’s rest under the arch of Hadrian--leading to the
Gate of Jehosaphat in the east wall of the city, and passing on its
right the “Gate Dolorous,” which was that of the Antonia citadel. The
old street running south, on the west side of the Temple area, was that
of the Tannery, leading to the gate now called (wrongly) the “Dung
Gate,” but then known as the “Postern of the Tannery.” Besides these
main streets, and that which led south past David’s Tower to St. Sion,
there were others called “Marshal’s Street” (or that of St. Anastasia),
Tresmailles, Gerard, and Cocatrice Street, the positions of which are
not very clear.[511]
The main gates of the city[512] were four, including the Bethlehem Gate
on the west, and the “Gate of St. Stephen of the Column” on the north,
the latter bearing a name which shows that the pillar marked on the
fifth-century mosaic map was still known: this gate is called “the Gate
of the Pillar” to the present day.[513] On the east was the “Gate of
Jehosaphat,” now called St. Stephen’s Gate, and on the south the Sion
Gate in its present position. Between these there were posterns, that
of St. Lazarus being west of the north gate and no longer existing.
It led to the Lepers’ Hospital, close to the city outside. East of
the north gate was the Postern of the Magdalen, so called from the
church of the same name inside the walls in this quarter: it is now
called “Herod’s Gate,” or by Moslems, Bâb ez Zahirah (“Flower Gate”),
a corruption of the old Bâb es Ṣahrah, or “Gate of the Plateau,” which
in the fifteenth century was the title for the flat ground north of the
city towards the east. The Golden Gate was closed, but to its south was
a little postern in the east wall which still exists.[514] The fourth
postern was that of the Tannery already mentioned.
[Sidenote: THE WALLS]
The walls of the city ran practically on the present line--Tancred’s
Tower[515] (now called “Goliath’s Castle”) on the north-west being
inside the Turkish line, while farther east the foundations of the
Crusader’s wall appear just outside the present one. They show that
kind of rubble set in hard cement which was used in the twelfth
century as the core of a wall, and which was faced with cut stones
drafted with a bold rough boss. At the north gate Sir Charles Warren
excavated the remains of the older entrance just outside the modern
one, and concluded that it represented the work of Crusaders who used
older materials; a stone was found with a Templar’s cross cut upon it,
which belonged to this older wall.[516] This is important, because the
remains in question have been rashly assumed to be those of the “second
wall” described by Josephus.
We have seen that, on the south, part of Sion was outside the city
(as in 680 A. D. also), when the Crusaders beleaguered Jerusalem. Mr.
Bliss,[517] however, discovered a wall which, starting from that of
Eudocia on Sion, was carried north on the east side of the hill to the
present wall, thus enclosing the Cœnaculum Church and the “House of
Caiaphas.” He supposes this to have been built by Frederic II. in 1229
A. D. There is no doubt that it is mediæval work of the twelfth or
thirteenth century, but it might be as late as 1243. A Norman moulding
has been built in among the stones, and they have the characteristic
diagonal dressing of Norman work. This wall is shown on the old map of
1308 A. D., and its ruins seem to have been still traceable in 1586,
according to Zuallardo’s picture. It may, however, have existed even
in the twelfth century, for Theodorich clearly describes a “barbican,”
or fortified out-work, on Sion, added to the main wall, with a ditch
and towers, which account answers well to the remains of this extra
wall.[518]
[Sidenote: THE CATHEDRAL]
The pilgrim naturally first went to visit the Holy Sepulchre. The
fullest account of the cathedral, which was probably built in the time
of Baldwin II. to include all the eleventh-century chapels described in
the preceding chapter, is that of Theodorich. The main entrance was, as
now, on the south, where the fine double gate, with two windows above,
led into the church. Under the pointed arches, supported by clustered
pillars, we still see the two carved lintels, one representing the
entry into Jerusalem, the raising of Lazarus, and the Last Supper,
to the left, and the other with a centaur and various figures
surrounded by elaborate arabesques, being an allegorical subject, as
explained by de Vogüé. The later pilgrim custom, which dates back
to the fourteenth century, of carving names on these pillars, was
probably not permitted in the twelfth century. The later visitors used
to sketch their coats-of-arms on the walls (as can still be seen at
Bethlehem), but this was regarded as an objectionable practice by the
better educated.[519] The courtyard in front of the gate, having on
its west the three chapels built in 1048, and on its east the Coptic
and Armenian chapels, and that supposed to mark the site of Abraham’s
sacrifice, was entered through a screen, formed by arches on six
pillars, of which only the bases now remain. It did not yet contain the
tomb of Philip d’Aubigny (before the gate), over which so many feet
have trodden, for he only died in 1236 A. D.[520] The belfry tower was,
however, built early in the twelfth century, and the domed Chapel of
St. Mary of Egypt, with its large window and outside steps, is of the
same age with the façade of the cathedral.
The cathedral included the old “Paradise” under its roof. A fine
“choir of canons” east of the rotunda occupied part of the site of
Constantine’s basilica. It had an apse to the east, and part of the
rotunda wall was removed, and an arch, called “Arch of the Emperors,”
built to give free passage to this choir, which had a semi-circular
walk behind the apse; three apses, forming small chapels, were made in
the outer wall of this walk, and the “pillar of derision” was shown,
as it still is by Greeks, in the southern of the three apses close to
Calvary: between this and the central apse the steps led down to the
crypt, where the three crosses were said to have been found. This was
now under the cloisters of the canons’ houses, and a dome in the middle
of these cloisters lighted the cave-chapel below. The groined roof of
the choir still shows remains of fresco painting, representing the vine
of David, which are probably ancient.
[Sidenote: THE PALACE]
The building over the sepulchre itself remained till 1808, and was very
different in style from the neo-Byzantine chapel now standing.[521] The
often-copied picture by Zuallardo, taken with his description, shows
that the building was pentagonal, the walls, adorned by ten pillars,
forming five recessed panels under round arches. On the flat lead
roof rose an open cupola, with clustered columns at the four corners,
supporting a copper dome, which was first covered with silver, but
in later years with gold.[522] According to Abbot Daniel, the silver
statue of Christ was on this cupola. It was no doubt taken down by the
Greeks after 1187 A. D., and it does not appear in Zuallardo’s picture.
The ante-chapel of the Angel, to the east, had also a flat roof,
supported on groined arches, the stone on which the angel sat being
shown in the centre. The whole building was Romanesque in style, and
remarkable for its severe beauty. It was probably as old as 1048 A. D.
There was an altar on the west side of the pentagon, surrounded by
painted iron rails and reticulated screens of cypress wood, where now
the Coptic altar stands within its iron grille. The dome of the rotunda
above was funnel-shaped and open to the air, being also made of cypress
wood. The rain thus fell on the sepulchre chapel, and gutters on the
roof carried it off below. On the inside there was an ancient fresco of
the Resurrection.
The high altar of the choir, on the east, had behind it the throne
of the patriarch--according to the Greek and ancient Latin custom.
Images of the Virgin, the Baptist, and the angel Gabriel stood under
the arches which opened into the ambulatorium, or walk; and above the
altar, on the ceiling, was the great picture of the exaltation of
Adam: “Our Lord Jesus Christ Himself, bearing the cross in His left
hand, holding Adam with His right, leading majestically to heaven with
a giant’s stride, His left foot raised, His right still planted on
earth.”[523] Beneath this picture were verses in Latin. The rotunda
had a gallery, with a door on the west leading to the palace.[524]
Godfrey and Baldwin I. had lived in the Aḳṣa Mosque, but after the
establishment of the Templars the Latin kings held their court where
the Greek patriarch now lives, west of the cathedral. An arch over
Patriarch Street seems to have led to the gallery door (still visible,
though now blocked up), and through a window the kings could look down
on the sepulchre. The palace had many vaulted rooms, and a courtyard
filled with orange trees and pomegranates. It could contain a household
of an hundred persons.
The present groined roof of the Calvary Chapel, supported on heavy
piers, is also probably Crusaders’ work. Two pictures in this chapel
represented the Crucifixion and the Descent from the Cross. The
ante-chapel of Golgotha beneath (built in 1808) did not exist, nor
apparently did the flights of steps now leading up on the west from the
floor of the church. For, facing Calvary, the first two rulers of the
Latin kingdom were buried, and the monuments of their six successors
were against the south wall of the choir. Godfrey’s tomb was to the
right, and that of his brother Baldwin I. to the left, in front of the
Golgotha Cave. The former was marked by a plain block on which stood a
stone roof or pediment, supported by four twisted dwarf pillars at the
corners, according to Zuallardo’s picture. It bore the simple Latin
text, in “Lombard” letters, “Hic jacet inclitus Dux Godefridus de
Bullion, qui totam istam terram acquisivit cultui divino. Cujus anima
requiescat in pace. Amen.” The tomb of Baldwin I. was probably much
like Godfrey’s, with the inscription:
Rex Balduinus, Judas alter Maccabæus
Spes patriæ: vigor ecclesiæ: virtus utriusque
Quem formidabant, cui dona tributa ferebant
Cedar, Ægypti, Dan, ac homicida Damascus
Proh dolor, in modicó clauditur hoc tumulo.
These tombs apparently escaped the fury of the Kharezmians, and were
only removed by the Greeks in 1808, but they were ransacked in 1244
A. D. There is some doubt as to the exact position of the six later
tombs, but the description by Theodorich (about 1172 A. D.) seems to
show that Baldwin II. lay immediately north of Baldwin I., in the same
line with Godfrey, and the remaining five kings were to the west, in
line with Baldwin II., in proper order, Fulk next to him, followed by
Baldwin III., Amaury, Baldwin IV., and Baldwin V., the latter being a
child, and placed farthest from Calvary. Their graves are distinctly
stated to have been “contiguous to the choir.” The same writer says
that the vaulted roof of Calvary was painted with representations of
David, Solomon, Isaiah, and other prophets, and that the pilgrims laid
wooden crosses on the rock, where the holes for the three crosses were
shown (as now); these votive offerings were removed and burned in a
great bonfire at Easter-time.
[Sidenote: THE HOLY FIRE]
The Easter ceremony of the Holy Fire is described by the Russian
abbot Daniel in the reign of Baldwin I. On Good Friday the church was
cleansed, and all the lamps put out and filled with fresh oil. Every
candle in Jerusalem was extinguished, and on Easter Eve the rotunda was
crowded with pilgrims holding unlighted tapers. The cathedral rang with
their cry, “Lord, have mercy upon us,” and the Syrians perhaps already
sang as they still do:
“The eve of fire’s our feast-day;
This is the tomb of the Saviour.
O thou Jew, O thou Jew,
A feast of apes is the feast for you.”
The abbot of St. Saba stood before the sepulchre, while services in
Greek and in Latin went on. The Fire was sometimes delayed three days,
or appeared in the Temple or in the Hospital. It was believed to fall
from heaven through the open roof. On the occasion described a fine
rain was falling on the densely packed crowd round the tomb. They sang
the Song of Moses, and at length “a small cloud coming suddenly from
the East rested over the open dome of the church.... It was at that
moment that the Holy Light illuminated the Holy Sepulchre, shining with
an awful and splendid brightness. The bishop and four deacons then
opened the doors of the tomb, and entered with the taper of Prince
Baldwin.”
The canons of the Holy Sepulchre were of the Augustinian order. They
received from Godfrey twenty-one villages lying near Jerusalem on
the north in the royal domain, but other kings and barons added many
other lands “for the saving of their souls” till they numbered seventy
“casales” in all, besides fishing rights on the Sea of Galilee, and
churches at Bari, Brindisi, and in Sicily.[525] Five of the villages
were in Lower Galilee, and all the other Palestine property of this
church was lost for ever in 1187 A. D.
[Sidenote: THE HOSPITAL]
South of the cathedral was the large block of buildings belonging to
the Knights of St. John. It occupied an area of 500 feet side, or
nearly 55 acres. It was bounded by Patriarch Street on the west, Herb
Street on the east, Palmer Street on the north, and David Street on
the south, while a narrow lane (in which the Latin goldsmiths had
shops) ran north and south in the middle of the area. The east half
was excavated by the German Government in 1872, and the west half by
the Greek patriarch some thirty years later. Thus the whole of the
remaining buildings are now visible. In the north wall the fine Norman
gateway, with an arch carved with the signs of the twelve months,
still remains, and in the north-east corner is the Church of St. Mary
Latin, now rebuilt and consecrated as the German cathedral. Under its
foundations, rock was found at a level 60 feet lower than that of
the Calvary rock, showing how steeply the north bank of the Tyropœon
Valley here falls south. The cloisters of the Benedictine monastery,
with their fine west window, are to the south of this church, and in
the south-east part of the area was the Benedictine nunnery, under
which is a great tank, the rock floor in the bed of the valley being
more than 70 feet lower than Calvary. In the west half of the area
the remains of a larger church--St. Mary Magna--exist, with buildings
belonging to the Hospital proper. The Chapel of St. John Baptist[526]
is in the south-west part of the block, close to Patriarch Street and
David Street. It is a basilica, with a narthex on the west, an apse on
the east, and two other apses facing north and south respectively. The
stone altar is still _in situ_, and the building forms the crypt of
the later Greek church of St. John the Forerunner. The floor of this
chapel of the knights is on the same level as that of the cathedral,
and 10 feet above the rock; but the rubbish of later demolitions has
now raised the street 25 feet higher, and the mediæval buildings were,
till recently, quite covered over above their roofs.
Such was the home of the most popular of the military orders.[527] It
was first supported by tithes granted by the Church in the diocese of
Cæsarea, in Tripoli, Nazareth, and Acre. Baldwin I., in 1110, made a
large grant of lands, and the master owned villages in the plains,
and bought property in Nâblus. The knights were even given “tents of
Beduins” by Baldwin III., and one of the results of the distribution
of their lands was, that while the canons of the Holy Sepulchre lost
all their villages in the mountains, the Hospitallers retained their
property in the plains for nearly another century, and were not greatly
concerned in imperilling this, in 1192, for the recovery of the Holy
City by the Church. Even as early as 1155 they were at feud with the
patriarch, and rang all their bells to annoy him when he preached in
the cathedral.
Near the hospital were the two exchanges: that of the Latins (called
Khân es Ṣerf--“inn of exchange”--by Mejîr ed Dîn in the sixteenth
century) at the turn where David Street joined Temple Street; and that
of the Syrians (now Khân ez Zeit, “the oil inn”), east of the Street of
St. Stephen.[528] Other churches in the north part of the city included
St. Chariton, north of the cathedral, the Chapel of the Spasm farther
east, with St. Mary Magdalen and St. Anne in the Jews’ quarter. All
these still remain, showing Norman origin by their style. The tank
west of St. Anne, in which traces of frescoes on the walls are still
visible, was, as already said, shown as the Pool of Bethesda. The
Chapel of the Flagellation, opposite Antonia, already existed, and a
Chapel of St. Gilles was at the causeway near the “Beautiful Gate” of
the Temple.
The order of the Templars[529] grew out of the Augustinians. The canons
of this order were established in the Temple by Godfrey; and in the
reign of Baldwin II., in 1118 A. D., eight Burgundian knights, under
Hugh de Payen, vowed to poverty, obedience, and chastity as tonsured
monks, were established in the Aḳṣa Mosque as their hospice. A rule was
given them by Pope Honorius in 1128. The Templars were the richest and
proudest of the four orders, and it is curious that they were always
unpopular, and constantly suspected of treachery. They seem to have
been willing to establish good relations with Moslems in time of peace,
and to have studied Oriental philosophy; and for such reasons, as
also because they were independent of the patriarch, they were coldly
regarded by the Church. Their records were destroyed when the order was
suppressed in 1312 A. D., but their possessions in Europe were yet more
numerous than in Palestine or Syria. They held castles near the coast,
and escorted pilgrims. They had also a castle on the Jericho road, and
built ’Athlit under Carmel in 1218, or seventy-three years before the
fall of Acre. They acted as bankers, and they were given, or bought,
many properties in the later times when the barons of Palestine and
Syria were eager to get rid of their lands.
[Sidenote: THE STABLES]
The Templars carried out considerable works in the Ḥaram area. They
added a Norman porch to the Aḳṣa Mosque, and a refectory, on the west
of that building which was converted into a church with three apses
on the east; and a long hall south of them was perhaps the vestry,
with windows on the south Ḥaram wall, and pillars with braided shafts
and elaborate capitals. John of Würzburg, about 1160 A. D., says that
“the new and large church is not yet finished.” Their hospice was
called “the Palace of Solomon,” and the same writer says, “There is
the wonderful stable, of such size as to be able to hold two thousand
horses, or five hundred camels.” He evidently means the vaults now
called “Solomon’s Stables,” near the south-east part of the Ḥaram,
for he says, “Near the Templar buildings, on the city wall, was the
house of Simeon the Just.... In this house [converted into a church]
blessed Simeon lies buried. In the same church, in the crypt below, ...
is the wooden Cradle of Christ.” The crypt in question still exists
at the south-east angle of the Ḥaram, and a cradle (a Roman statue
niche) is still shown. The stables were formed by setting on end the
great Herodian stones (drafted on one side) which formed stout piers
with barrel vaults for roof. The holes made for the halters of the
horses can still be seen, and the so-called “Single Gate,” in the south
wall east of the Triple Gate, now walled up, shows its late date by
its pointed arch. This was one entry to the Templars’ stables, and
a larger one was made by altering the Triple Gateway itself, at the
west end of the vaults. Theodorich says that the stables would hold
ten thousand horses, and that the Templar Hospice included “gardens,
halls, vestibules, consistories, rain-water tanks, splendid cisterns
hewn beneath, baths, barns, granaries, wood-houses, ... and on the west
the new house of the Templars with cells and refectories.... The roof,
contrary to the custom of the country, has a high-pitched ridge.” There
was a garden near the Chapel of the Cradle, and the city wall outside
the Aḳṣa formed an “out-work” as it does now. The church itself had a
dome--probably the Arab dome of the mosque.
The Dome of the Rock was not altered, but the octagonal wall was
painted inside in fresco; and remains of this work were still visible
when the marble facing was removed in part in 1873. The holy rock was
covered with marble flags, and an altar erected on it. The footprint of
Muhammad was shown as that of Christ. Ibn el Athîr, writing of 1187,
says that Saladin ordered this marble pavement to be removed. He also
covered up the frescoes, which represented Jacob’s Vision at Bethel and
the Presentation in the Temple, with Latin verses inscribed beneath or
around. The beautiful grille of French hammered iron-work, with lily
heads between the spikes, was also now carried round the circle of
the drum, between the piers and pillars. The cave under the rock was
called “Confessio,” and was said to be the place where our Lord met the
woman taken in adultery. It still contains a Norman altar with twisted
pillars. Above this was an image of Christ, and a picture of Zacharias
and the Angel.[530] The Templar churches in Europe were built round
or polygonal in imitation of the Templum Domini, or “Temple of the
Lord,” which was the new name for the Dome of the Rock now surmounted
by a cross. The “Cloisters of the Canons” (now removed) appear to have
occupied the north part of the platform. The Dome of the Chain was
called the “Chapel of St. James,” and the “Dome of the Roll” became
the “School of the Virgin”; for the legends of the apocryphal gospels
created several new sites in the Ḥaram. Another image of Christ also
stood over the porch of the west door, built, in 831 A. D., by El Mâmûn.
[Sidenote: THE GERMAN HOSPICE]
The upper city and the environs of Jerusalem remain to be described as
they were in the latter part of the twelfth century. The Hospice of
St. Mary of the Germans stood on the east side of German Street, just
about where Agrippa’s palace had been, in the north-east corner of
the upper city. The Chapel of St. Thomas of the Germans was probably
the small one to be found in a Jew’s house west of the same street. I
explored these sites in 1881, and found remains of a large mediæval
building[531] which was newly built about 1160 A. D., according to John
of Würzburg, who complains that before that date “no part of the city
even in the smallest street had been given to the Germans,” and that
the “new” St. Mary of the Germans “received hardly any benefactions
from other nations.” The constant struggle between the emperor and
the Pope discouraged German colonisation; for the kings of Jerusalem
were vassals of the Pope alone. The Teutonic order was at first only a
branch of that of the Hospital, and it is not known when they became
independent.[532] On December 9, 1143, Celestin II.--who was Pope
for only six months--wrote to Raymund the master of the Hospital of
St. John as to “the new Hospital for Germans in Jerusalem,” placing
it under him and all future masters, but directing that the prior
and attendants should be of Teutonic race. The order did not become
important till 1229, when the knights took the side of Frederic II.
against the commands of Pope Gregory IX.; and they had little property
of their own till John of Brienne (in 1220) gave them lands in Galilee.
But there were Germans in Jerusalem of the sub-order before the city
fell to Saladin, as will appear immediately.
To the left (or west) of the Street of Judas’ Arch was St. Martin.
This may have been where the name “House of the Holy Ghost” still
applies to a Jewish house, as it is noticed next to “St. Peter of the
Chains,” which was the name then given to the House of Annas near the
Sion Gate--now the Armenian nunnery, or “Convent of the Olive Tree,” as
already noticed[533] with St. Thomas, at the Syrian monastery, which
has a fine Norman gateway on the north side. St. James the Less--east
of the present Protestant Church--is also of this age. St. George,
north of the House of Annas, now belongs to the Greeks, and apparently
belonged to them in 1167 A. D.[534] The “Church of the Three Maries”
also still exists, east of David’s Tower, as does St. Mark north of St.
George. In the barbican were the House of Caiaphas (or St. Saviour) and
the Cœnaculum (now _Nebi Dâûd_), which latter was a large church built
on the site of the ancient St. Sion. The upper storey was the supposed
site of the “upper chamber” of the Last Supper, and in the lower
storey, or crypt, the Holy Ghost was believed to have descended on the
Apostles at Pentecost. The home of St. John, where the Virgin died, was
just south of the House of Caiaphas.
[Sidenote: ST. JAMES]
The Latin descriptions never mention the churches of the Greeks,
Syrians, Georgians, Armenians, or Copts in the Holy City. The Latins
had appropriated all the principal holy places. The abbot Daniel speaks
of a monastery of St. Saba, apparently near the Tower of David; and
John Phocas (in 1185 A. D.) mentions the Georgian hermits who lived in
the tombs and caves on the east side of the Kidron Valley. The crosses
that these and other recluses[535] cut on the walls can still be seen.
The large Armenian Church of St. James on Sion probably existed in
the twelfth century. The interior is now cased with porcelain tiles,
and the floor is covered with fine carpets. The shrine on the north,
supposed to contain the head of James the Less, is adorned with
tortoise-shell, and in the great hall to the south is a remarkable
fresco which may be of the twelfth or thirteenth century, representing
Hell (as was then customary) as a monster with a huge mouth, into which
naked souls are driven by the pitchforks of devils.
We hear very little about the water-supply of the city, except that
there were large tanks in the Ḥaram. The “Lake of Baths,” mentioned
in 1137,[536] is probably the present “Patriarch’s Bath,” or Pool of
Hezekiah, and the Piscina Interior--or supposed Bethesda--near St.
Anne has been already mentioned. Outside the city the Mâmilla Pool was
called the Lake of St. Egerius; and, about 1172, the Germans (that is
to say, probably the Teutonic Order) constructed the present Birket
es Sulṭân under the west wall of the upper city.[537] It was for “the
common use of the town,” and was called the German Lake. On the old
map of 1308 these two reservoirs already bear the titles “Upper” and
“Lower Gihon.” The Well of Job, as already explained,[538] was reopened
in 1184 by the Franks. Pilate’s aqueduct does not appear to be ever
mentioned.
[Sidenote: ST. STEPHEN]
It is necessary to distinguish Queen Melisinda’s nunnery of St.
Lazarus, founded in 1147, at Bethany, from another St. Lazarus--the
Lepers’ Hospital, served by the Order of St. Lazarus--which was
established outside the north wall, near the postern of the same
name. No traces of this building are known as yet to exist. It is
mentioned as early as 1130 A. D., and in 1144 Baldwin III.--whose
nephew was a leper--confirmed the grant of a vineyard made by King Fulk
to “the lepers of St. Lazarus.” In 1150 he gave another to the same
establishment, “situated on the plains of Bethlehem”; and Humphrey
of Toron settled upon it thirty bezants annually, from the tithes of
Toron, in the next year. It existed down to 1186, and it is always
described as being “near,” or even “touching,” the wall.[539] East of
this, but still west of the great north road, was the old Church of
St. Stephen, founded by Eudocia; and under the cliff of “Jeremiah’s
Grotto” was the Templars’ Hospice already noticed. The chapel north
of the cliff, though evidently Norman work, does not appear to be
ever mentioned. I have described the fresco of Christ and the twelve
Apostles which it contained.[540] Many Crusaders’ tombs occur on
this side of the city, especially east of the Gate of St. Stephen,
and near the Postern of the Magdalen.[541] Outside the gate, south
of the Templars’ Hospice, there was also an important cemetery,
about 500 feet from the wall and east of the main road.[542] It was
evidently for laymen, because the bodies are laid with the head to
the west, whereas priests were buried with head to the east. Thus at
the resurrection the congregation was supposed to stand up facing the
clergy, who accompanied the hosts of heaven. Under a pavement at this
site were found lamps, crosses, and coins, and on the flagstones were
coins of Justinian, Maurice, Justin, and Justinian II., with a fine
pectoral cross having an evangelist represented on each arm. These
remains bring us down to the seventh century, but above them were
found Saracen coins, and others of the Latin kingdom. This graveyard
may have belonged to the Church of St. Stephen, like the tomb farther
west (about 120 yards from the wall) which I described in 1881. A very
remarkable mosaic pavement also occurs, some 700 feet north-west of
the same Gate of St. Stephen, and may have belonged to the church. In
design it so closely resembles pictures in the Roman catacombs that
it might be supposed to be as old as the third or fourth century.
It represents an Orpheus harping to beasts, with figures of a satyr
and a centaur. But two smaller figures of Theodosia and Georgia are
introduced, with their names, and are clearly Byzantine in style. The
property of the Church of St. Stephen (according to a deed dated 1163
A. D.) adjoined that of the Hospital--probably to its west--and, as we
have seen, had the Templar Hospice to its east.[543] Another tomb close
by[544] is inscribed in Greek with words from the first verse of the
91st Psalm, according to the Septuagint version: “He that dwelleth in
the help of the Most High.”
Leaving this group of buildings north of the wall, we may now pass
east to the “Church of the Virgin’s Tomb,” or “Our Lady of Josaphat,”
as it was called in the twelfth century, close to Gethsemane. The fine
Norman arch of its facade, on the south side, is that of the church as
restored by Queen Melisinda in 1161 A. D.[545] This church, wherein she
was buried the same year, was perhaps the most richly endowed of any
except the cathedral. A bull of Pope Alexander IV., dated January 30,
1255, recapitulates the names of forty-eight villages belonging to St.
Mary of Jehosaphat, and the church had lands also in Calabria, Apulia,
and Sicily, on which to rely when all the Palestine revenues ceased.
It was, however, deserted in 1254 A. D., and lapsed once more into the
power of the Greek patriarch. John of Würzburg states that the cave
chapel, at the bottom of the steps, was adorned by a cenotaph of the
Virgin, having beautiful marble casing, a many-coloured picture, and a
dome above it covered with silver and gold, and Latin verses. An image
of St. Basil stood to the right of the entrance, with other verses in
honour of Mary.
The history of the Church of the Ascension is less easily
followed.[546] The abbot Daniel, about 1106 A. D., found only a small
church here, but says that it had formerly been a large one. Probably a
chapel was erected after the destruction of the seventh-century church
in 1010 A. D., but this was afterwards replaced by a “large church,”
according to John of Würzburg, having a dome open to the sky in the
middle, like the rotunda of the Holy Sepulchre, and like the old
Church of Ascension described in 680 A. D., which replaced the original
basilica of Constantine. The existing remains of Norman pillars in
the irregular boundary wall show that the site was surrounded by a
circular building 95 feet in diameter. Probably in plan it was not
unlike the Dome of the Rock, but this mediæval church has been entirely
destroyed. The little domed building in the centre, covering the
footprint of Christ, was erected in 1617 by the Moslems, who still are
in possession, and was restored in 1834. A minaret not more than three
centuries old rises on the west side of the enclosure, and beneath is
the Cave of St. Pelagia, also now in the hands of the Moslems. The
church itself belonged to the Augustinian order.
[Sidenote: ACELDAMA]
Our pilgrimage round mediæval Jerusalem thus ends at the appropriate
site of Chaudemar (Aceldama), where the powdered dust of the bones of
countless pilgrims still covers the floor of the great pit, on the
south precipice of Hinnom. The rock fosse measured 30 feet by 20 feet,
and the vaulted roof, supported on two stout piers of masonry--drafted
and with rustic bosses--is 34 feet above the floor. The rock to the
west is carved with endless rows of crosses. Zuallardo, in 1586,
pictures this building as covered with four small domes which do not
now exist. As early as 1143, William, patriarch of Jerusalem, took
charge of the “church in the field Acheldamach, where the bodies of
pilgrims are buried, with all the land of the field, granted facing it
by ancient Syrians.”[547] It continued to be used for pilgrim burials
even two centuries later.
Such was the Holy City in the day when Saladin won it from the
Christians, and destroyed the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem.
FOOTNOTES TO CHAPTER XIII
[495] Will. of Tyre, “Hist. Bel. Sacr.,” i. 11. “Pusillus, persona
contemptilis, vivacis ingenii, et occulum habens perspicuum, gratumque,
et sponte fluens ei non deerat eloquentia.”
[496] _Ibid._, i. 8–10.
[497] See “The Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem,” 1897, published by Pal.
Expl. Fund, 1 vol. octavo, 443 pp.
[498] Röhricht, “Regesta,” Nos. 4, 8.
[499] “Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem,” pp. 95–8, 107–8.
[500] Will. of Tyre, iii. 1-viii. 24; Albert of Aix, ii. 20-vi. 50.
[501] Will. of Tyre, xxi. 25.
[502] Röhricht, “Regesta,” No. 85.
[503] _Ibid._, Nos. 137, 225, 226.
[504] Her son, Baldwin V., died as a child a year after his uncle
Baldwin IV.
[505] Röhricht, “Regesta,” No. 92, 1120 A. D.
[506] “Latin Kingdom,” pp. 175–80.
[507] John of Würzburg, xiii. and xxviii.
[508] “Citez de Jhérusalem,” “e ces rues apeloit un la juerie”; see
Röhricht (1130 A. D.), “Regesta,” No. 133, “in parte Hierosolymorum quæ
specialiter Judæaria vocatur.”
[509] Count Rivoira, “Arch. Lomb.,” 1908, p. 630, remarks: “Sospetto
che gli artefici di Sicilia lo sfoggiassero direttamente per influenza
moresca.”
[510] Apparently a _lingua Franca_ term, _Umm-el-Kuzinât_, “mother of
kitchens,” otherwise _Coquinati_; “Citez de Jhér.,” and “Regesta,” No.
431.
[511] Röhricht, “Regesta,” No. 421.
[512] See map (“Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., 1883, p. 383),
“Jerusalem in 1187 A. D.”
[513] “Regesta,” No. 421.
[514] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., pp. 237–9.
[515] _Ibid._, pp. 264–7.
[516] _Ibid._, pp. 235–6.
[517] “Excav. at Jer.,” 1898, pp. 68–75, 336.
[518] Zuallardo, “Devot. Viag.,” p. 131; Theodorich (_c._ 1172
A. D.), “Vallum quoque sive fossatum extrinsecum, muro appositum, et
propugnaculis atque minis munitum existit, quod barbicanam vocant.”
[519] For coats-of-arms on pillars at Bethlehem see “Mem. West Pal.
Survey,” iii. p. 84. By an unfortunate error the graffiti which I
copied on pillars of south door of the cathedral have been printed
(together with a tombstone from the Hospital) in the wrong place
(“Mem.,” iii. p. 137); they include the names “Isaak,” “David,” “Anton
Pico 1636,” and “Piero Vandam 1384.”
[520] Rev. J. Hamlet in _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, April 1887, p. 76.
[521] Zuallardo, “Devot. Viag.,” 1586, p. 207.
[522] John Phocas (1185 A. D.) says that the emperor Manuel (1143–80)
adorned the Holy Sepulchre with gold.
[523] Theodorich.
[524] Felix Fabri (_c._ 1480 A. D.), vol. i. pt. ii. p. 394,
translation in the series of the “Pal. Pilgr. Texts Soc.”
[525] “Regesta,” Nos. 142, 189, etc.
[526] _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, Jan. 1899, p. 43, Jan. 1902, pp.
42–56; Robinson, “Later Bib. Res.,” 1852, p. 184, quoting Tobler, who
examined this church in 1840.
[527] See “Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem,” pp. 203–7.
[528] _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, Jan. 1897, p. 29.
[529] See “Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem,” pp. 202–3; “Regesta,” Nos. 347,
447, 462, 568, 572, 630.
[530] John of Würzburg; Theodorich; Ibn el Athîr, quoted by Guy le
Strange, “Pal. under the Moslems,” 1890, p. 134.
[531] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., 1883, p. 272.
[532] Röhricht, “Regesta,” No. 214 note, p. 55. The German hospice is
noticed in 1173 (No. 496) and 1177 (No. 548).
[533] See back, p. 15; _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, July 1895, p. 251.
[534] “Regesta,” No. 461. Besides this, and the Coptic St. George
north-west of Hezekiah’s Pool, there was another St. George north-west
of the cathedral, north of the Greek Convent of St. Demetrius (Herr
Schick, _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, July 1900, p. 253).
[535] Such as Eugenius, Elpidius, and Euphratas, mentioned in a mosaic
text as “hermits” on the Mount of Olives. _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_,
Jan. 1895.
[536] “Regesta,” No. 170.
[537] _Ibid._, Nos. 543 (Lacus Legerii); 504, 537 (L. Germani),
“The new cistern” (John of Würzburg), also noticed in the “Citez de
Jhérusalem.”
[538] See back, p. 43.
[539] “Regesta,” Nos. 136, 227, 259, 266, 397, 487, 628, 656. The
convent is noticed as endowed by King Amaury in 1155 (Nos. 284, 303,
308) before his accession: see Nos. 327, 338.
[540] See back, p. 155; “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., pp.
388–91.
[541] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., pp. 297–301; _Pal. Expl.
Fund Quarterly_, April 1902, p. 120.
[542] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., p. 385; _Pal. Expl. Fund
Quarterly_, April 1897, p. 105, Oct. 1902, p. 404.
[543] _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, July 1901, p. 233; “Regesta,” No.
391.
[544] _Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly_, 1890, pp. 158, 306.
[545] “Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem,” pp. 194, 195, 404.
[546] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., pp. 398, 399; _Pal.
Expl. Fund Quarterly_, Oct. 1896, p. 311.
[547] “Regesta,” No. 215.
CHAPTER XIV
FRANKS AND MOSLEMS
There is no more charming character in Moslem history than Saladin,
the brave and generous sulṭân who settled the Eastern question with
Richard Lion-heart of England, and whose life was lovingly written
by his faithful follower Beha-ed-Dîn, the ḳâḍdî of Jerusalem.[548]
_Ṣalâḥ-ed-Dîn Yûsef el Aiyûbi_, “the benefactor of the Faith, Joseph,
son of Job,” was born in 1137, and was therefore about fifty years
old when he took the Holy City. His father, Aiyûb, son of Shâdi, was
a Kurd in the service of the Atabek dynasty, being first governor of
Tekrît and afterwards of Ba’albek. Nûr-ed-Dîn of Damascus sent Shirkoh,
Saladin’s uncle, to assist Egypt in 1163, and Saladin accompanied him.
A series of remarkable events placed him at the head of Islâm in 1174
A. D.; for his uncle died in 1169, and was followed by the Fâṭemite
khalîfah El ’Adid, and by Nûr-ed-Dîn himself,[549] whose widow Saladin
married. Thus, at a time when Europe was torn by the great quarrel
between the emperor Frederick Barbarossa and Pope Alexander III., Islâm
was at length united under Saladin as the protector of the ’Abbaside
khalîfah.
[Sidenote: THE BATTLE OF ḤAṬṬÎN]
The raids which Saladin made on the Latin kingdom met at first with
little success. He was defeated at Gezer in 1177, and his incursions
to Jezreel in 1183 and to Nâblus in 1184 had no permanent effect, nor
was he able to take the strong fortress of Kerak, east of the Dead
Sea. He was involved in a struggle with the Atabeks at Môsul, and not
until he had signed peace with them, on March 3, 1186, was he free
to turn his whole force against the Franks. They were well aware of
his intentions, and early in the following year King Guy summoned his
feudatories to assemble at the great springs a mile west of Sepphoris
in Lower Galilee. In March, Renaud of Chatillon broke the truce by
capturing a Moslem caravan from Mekkah, and leading his prisoners to
Kerak. Saladin marched against him, and meantime an advanced guard of
his army, under his son Melek el Afḍal, raided the neighbourhood of
Nazareth. On May 1 they encountered near Kefr Kenna the masters of the
Temple and Hospital, who had only an hundred and forty knights with
them. The knights were defeated, and the master of the Hospital with
the marshal of the Temple Order were slain. Saladin at once joined his
son, and 50,000 fighting men gathered at the Fountain of Sepphoris to
oppose him. The fatal battle of Ḥaṭṭîn was lost by King Guy through
a strategical mistake. He was warned by Raymond of Tripoli not to
advance, because there was no water on the route. But the Templars were
burning with rage at their recent defeat, and the master over-persuaded
the king to attack the position which Saladin held covering the springs
on the plateau west of Tiberias. The Christians perished from heat and
thirst; and, excepting Raymond of Tripoli and Balian of Ibelin, who
cut their way out, all the Frank leaders were taken prisoners. They
were all well treated except Renaud, whom Saladin slew, as the cause of
the war and the most dangerous of the enemies of Islâm. Like Titus, he
also considered that priests must die when conquered, and he therefore
commanded the execution of all the Templars (except the master) and the
Hospitallers. Thus two hundred of the most dreaded defenders of the
Latin kingdom, all the surviving knights of both orders, were beheaded
as being under religious vows.
So rapid were Saladin’s marches after this victory that all Palestine
and Syria--except the seaboard cities of Tyre and Tripoli, and the
northern capital of Antioch--fell into his hands before any help could
come from Europe.[550]
[Sidenote: SALADIN’S SIEGE]
On December 20, 1187, the Moslems appeared on the west side of
Jerusalem, but the sulṭân afterwards shifted his camp to the north.
We have two accounts of the siege, one by Bernard the Treasurer, the
other by Beha-ed-Dîn. Balian of Ibelin had thrown himself into the
city, where he found not a single knight. He made fifty new ones, and
stripped off the silver ornaments of the Holy Sepulchre, coining them
to pay his troops. Saladin offered terms, which were refused. The
chronicler records an extraordinary incident, which casts a strange
light on the superstitions of the age. “The ladies of Jerusalem took
cauldrons, and placed them before Mount Calvary, and having filled
them with cold water, put their daughters in them up to the neck, and
cut off their tresses and threw them away.”[551] This hair-offering
to an offended Deity was a survival of that ancient sacrifice of the
first-born which, among Canaanites and Phœnicians, was common in
seasons of dire distress, as when the king of Moab slew his son on
the wall. On the eighth day of the siege Saladin camped opposite St.
Stephen’s Gate, and thus attacked the north wall of the city with
mangonels and mines. A breach was effected at the north-east angle
of the rampart, but the storming party was repulsed, and at length
Balian yielded, and Saladin was only too willing to grant favourable
terms. The city was full of starving women and children, and of priests
who made processions in vain. On Friday, October 2--the day on which
Muḥammad was believed to have ascended to heaven--Jerusalem was given
up, and all the lives of the inhabitants were spared. They numbered
7,000 men, besides women and children--probably at least 30,000 in
all. The ransom agreed upon is variously stated[552] at 30 and at 70
shillings for each man, payable within 50 days. Meanwhile, all gates
were closed except that on the west, where Saracens were admitted to
buy what Christians wished to sell. Balian and the patriarch seized
the treasure of the Hospital to pay the ransom of the poor; but, as
this did not suffice, Seif-ed-Dîn (Saladin’s brother) begged for 1,000
captives, who would remain as slaves, and released them all. Saladin
gave 700 others as a present to the patriarch, and 500 to Balian;
the remainder of the poor he allowed to depart by the Postern of St.
Lazarus without payment. He restored many prisoners to their wives,
and “gave largely, from his own private purse, to all the ladies and
noble maidens, so that they gave thanks to God for the honour and
wealth that Saladin bestowed upon them.” This is the statement of the
Christian chronicler. The Moslem account says that--after the ancient
manner of Arab princes--the sulṭân bestowed all the treasure he
received, amounting to over £100,000, on his emîrs and soldiers, and
on the ’Ulema, and dervishes who accompanied the army, keeping nothing
for himself. The Christians were safely escorted to Tyre, and 3,000
Moslems who were captives in the city were set free.
The first act of Saladin, entering the city on Friday--the Moslem day
of rest--was to attend public prayer in the Aḳṣa Mosque, and to hear
a sermon from the khâṭib. He caused the great cross above the Dome of
the Rock to be pulled down, and afterwards removed the altar and the
marble flagstones from the Ṣakhrah, with the images of Christ already
described. He caused a beautiful mimbâr, or pulpit of wood inlaid
with ebony and ivory, to be brought from Aleppo. It still stands in
the Aḳṣa Mosque, with an inscription giving the name of Nûr-ed-Dîn,
and a date answering to 1168 A. D. The mihrâb, or prayer recess, was
found covered over by a wall in the Templar Church, and was now again
brought to light and cased with marble. The frescoes in the Dome of
the Rock were effaced, and covered also with marble veneering on the
inside of the outer wall. According to a later account, the Ḥaram was
not only swept and purified, but was even washed with rose-water. Two
extant inscriptions refer to Saladin’s restorations, and, being very
characteristic of Moslem style, may be here given. The first[553] is
over the chief mihrâb of the Aḳṣa Mosque, dating from 1188 A. D.:
“In the name of God merciful and pitying. Has ordered the repair of
this holy mihrâb, and the restoration of the Aḳṣa Mosque--piously
founded--the servant of God, and His regent, Yûsef, son of Aiyûb,
the father of victory, the conquering king, Ṣalâḥ-ed-dunya-wa-ed-Dîn
[benefactor of the world and of the faith], after God had conquered by
his hand during the [seventh] month of the year 583. And he asks God
to inspire him with thankfulness for this favour, and to make him a
partaker of pardon through His mercy and forgiveness.”
[Sidenote: TEXTS OF SALADIN]
The other text, two years later,[554] is on the tiles inside the drum
of the Dome of the Rock: “In the name of God merciful and pitying. Has
commanded the renewal of the gilding of this noble dome our lord the
sultan, the conquering king, the wise, the just, Ṣalâḥ-ed-Dîn Yûsef. In
the name of God the merciful the pitying ... in the latter third of the
month Rejeb,[555] in the year 585, by the hand of God’s poor servant
Ṣalâḥ-ed-Dîn Yûsef, son of Aiyûb, son of Shâdi, may God enfold him in
His mercy.”
The disappearance of the Franks was regarded with satisfaction by the
Eastern Churches: for Saladin followed the commands of the prophet
in tolerating their presence; and the sites of which they had been
robbed by the Latins fell again into their power. It is said that St.
Anne was now converted into a college for ’Ulema (or learned men), of
the Shaf’ii sect of orthodox Moslems, and it remained in their hands
until 1856, when the site was given to the emperor Napoleon III., who
caused the church to be rebuilt, in Norman style, a few years later.
The Church of St. Chariton, north of the Holy Sepulchre, was also
taken and (according to Mejîr ed Dîn) was endowed by Saladin as a
khanḳah or “cloister.” Yâkût (in 1225) says that it was the place of
prayer of the Kerrâmi sect.[556] It still bears the name of “Saladin’s
Cloister,” and remains in Moslem possession, being on the south side
of the old “Street of the Sepulchre,” north of the Latin Chapel of the
Apparition, not far from the corner where the street crosses the north
end of Patriarch Street. But the great churches remained undisturbed;
and such was the bitterness of feeling against the Latin hierarchy that
the Armenian Catholicus of Ani wrote to Saladin to report the advance
of Frederick Barbarossa, while the emperor Isaac Angelus also allied
himself with the sultan, and wrote to say that the Germans would never
reach Syria, and could do no harm even if they did.[557]
The sudden collapse of the kingdom of Jerusalem was announced to
Europe, and was received with consternation. It was due in great
measure to the degeneracy of the third generation of Frank colonists,
and to the decay of the ancient just rule which, at first, made native
Christians and Moslems alike willing to live under the feudal laws.
The third Crusade[558] was at once undertaken as being necessary for
the peace of Europe. The hero of this campaign was Richard Lion-heart,
and the treaty which he finally made with Saladin, being often renewed
later, formed the basis of agreements between Franks and Moslems for
nearly a century. Frederick Barbarossa was the first in the field, but
he died of a chill in Asia Minor in 1189 A. D., and only some 5,000
Germans reached Acre, out of 200,000 who left Germany, having been much
harassed by the Turks on their way by land to Antioch. The French king
Philip Augustus brought perhaps 60,000 men to aid King Guy at the siege
of Acre in the spring of 1191 A. D., but after the capture of the city
he went home, and the French were never very cordial supporters of
the English, who, for the first time, appeared in force in Palestine
under Richard.[559] After the great battle of Arsûf (between Cæsarea
and Jaffa), in which Saladin was badly beaten by Richard, the sulṭân
retired with his disheartened army to Jerusalem, where he passed the
winter of 1191–2 A. D. On April 13 of the next year the Christian army
again advanced to Beit Nûba, at the foot of the Jerusalem hills, and
the French were eager to undertake the re-conquest of the Holy City.
But Richard knew that Saladin had stopped up all the wells and springs
outside, and he remembered the cause of disaster at Ḥaṭṭîn, as did the
Templars and Hospitallers, who advised him to march on Egypt. They
were only 12 miles from Jerusalem, but the discordant counsels of the
leaders led to a final breach with the French, who refused to serve
any longer under Richard. Had he known the despondency of the defeated
Moslems, the result might have been different; but the lands of the two
great Orders were now secured, and the seaports contented the great
trading republics of Italy. Richard and Saladin--both exhausted by the
conflict--were both anxious to arrive at a settlement, and negotiations
went on during the whole winter preceding the final advance now
interrupted.
[Sidenote: SALADIN’S PRAYER]
Beha-ed-Dîn tells a remarkable story connected with this episode.[560]
Saladin, in Jerusalem, was in deep anxiety as to the future of his
empire, when this faithful friend advised him to, visit the Aḳṣa
Mosque, and to pray humbly for aid, which he did “in a low voice, his
tears rolling down on the prayer-carpet.” “In the evening of the same
day (a Friday), we were on duty with him as usual, when behold, he
received a despatch from Jurdîk, who was then commanding the advanced
guard. It was in the following words: ‘The whole of the enemy’s force
came out on horseback, and took up their position on the top of a
_tell_, after which they returned to their camp. We have sent spies to
see what is going on.’ On Saturday morning another despatch came, which
ran thus: ‘Our spy has returned, and brings news that discord is rife
among the enemy. One party is anxious to push on to the Holy City; the
others wish to return to their own territory. The French insist on
advancing on Jerusalem.’” This was the great debate already mentioned,
and “on the following day ... they broke up their camp.” It was thus
not the Christians only who believed that Providence was on their
side. King Richard was ill and discouraged, and in his absence at Acre
Saladin captured Jaffa, but was soon driven back on return of the great
champion of Christendom. At length the two leaders agreed to a truce,
to last for three years and eight months from September 2, 1192. The
plains were to remain in undisturbed possession of the Christians--that
is, of the two Orders, and of the Italian republics, which had their
quarters in each seaside town--and two Latin priests, with two deacons,
were to be allowed to remain in Jerusalem, with a like number in
Bethlehem. All those of the Christian army who desired were allowed to
visit the Holy City as pilgrims before returning home, that in this
manner their vows might be fulfilled.
Thus King Richard left Palestine for ever, but his name is even now
not forgotten in villages along the line of his great flank march from
Acre to Jaffa. His words, as he gazed on the half-reconquered land from
his ship, are said to have been, “O Holy Land, I commend thy people
to God. May He permit me to visit thee again, and to aid thee.” But
only once again was any Christian king to be crowned in Jerusalem, and
only one other interesting historic episode remains to be described.
Saladin died, worn out, at the age of fifty-six, on February 21, 1193,
and Richard, after two years of captivity in Austria, died before the
fortress of Chalus in Normandy in 1199 A. D. The next champion of
Christendom was of a very different stamp, and the heroic age had now
passed away. Saladin’s dying advice to his son gives us the secret of
his success, which had enduring results. “I commend you,” he said,
“to the Most High, the giver of all good. Do thou His will, for that
is the way of peace. Beware of blood: trust not in that, for spilt
blood never sleeps; and seek the hearts of thy people, and care for
them.... I have become great because I won men’s hearts by gentleness
and kindness. Nourish no hatred of any, for death spares none. Deal
prudently with men, for God will not pardon if they do not forgive.
Yet, as between Him and thee, He will pardon if thou dost repent, for
He is most gracious.”
[Sidenote: FREDERICK II.]
Jerusalem plays no part in the history of the Frankish occupation of
the Palestine plains during the thirteenth century, except in the time
of the emperor Frederick II. Saladin had repaired the walls of the city
in 1192, but his nephew Melek el Mu’aẓẓam, ruling in Damascus, feared
that the Franks fighting in Egypt would succeed in capturing the Holy
City, and would hold it as a fortress in future. In 1219 he ordered all
the walls and towers to be demolished, except those of the Ḥaram and of
the citadel.[561] Jerusalem thus remained defenceless for ten years,
till the arrival of Frederick II. This brilliant emperor was a type of
the most advanced culture of his age--a culture which Europe owed to
nearly a century and a half of contact with the ancient civilisation of
Byzantium and Syria. On November 9, 1225, he married Yolande, daughter
of John of Brienne, who, as husband of Mary the rightful heiress,
claimed to be king of Jerusalem. Yolande died within three years, but
Frederick II. disputed with John the right to the kingdom. The emperor
was a good Arabic scholar, and was in communication with Melek el Kâmil
(Saladin’s nephew), the sultan of Egypt, on questions of science and
philosophy. The successors of Saladin were at strife, and the rulers
of Cairo and Damascus were equally anxious to secure alliance with
the Christians. As early as 1226 we find the emperor encouraging the
Teutonic Order in Germany.[562] They had acquired a large property
in Upper Galilee six years before, and were now given “free use of
waters, grazing, and wood,” throughout the empire. In spite of papal
excommunications, constantly renewed, Frederick II. reached Acre on
September 7, 1228; and on February 18 next year he made a treaty, near
Jaffa, with his friend Melek el Kâmil, which was to last till 1240
A. D. Jerusalem and Bethlehem were given up to the Christians, with
all the lands of the three Orders, in the plains and in Galilee; but
it was stipulated that the walls of Jerusalem should not be rebuilt,
and that the mosque should remain in Moslem possession.[563] On March
17, 1229, Frederick entered Jerusalem, and crowned himself king of the
Latin kingdom, thus peacefully regained, on the following day. In April
of the same year he sealed a deed, at Acre, which gave to the Teutonic
Order “the house, in the city of Jerusalem, that is in the quarter of
the Armenians, near the Church of St. Thomas [of the Germans], which
was formerly the garden of King Baldwin; six acres of land and a house,
which the brothers of the Order possessed in the said city before the
loss of the Holy Land.” This clearly applies to the German Hospice
already described in the preceding chapter.
Frederick II. was obliged to hurry home to Europe on May 1, having
been in Palestine less than eight months; for John of Brienne resented
this usurpation of his throne, and as the vassal of the Pope invaded
the emperor’s possessions in Apulia. The emperor did nothing for the
Templars nor the Hospitallers, because they had obeyed Pope Gregory
IX., and had refused to help him. Thus the ancient Templars’ Hospice
remained a mosque in Jerusalem, and a text dating 1236 A. D. speaks
of the restoration of part of the Aḳṣa by Melek el Mu’aẓẓam ’Aisa of
Damascus, during the ten years of Christian occupation of the Holy City.
[Sidenote: THE KHAREZMIANS]
In the last year of the peace thus established, the Templars began to
arrange for alliance with Damascus against Egypt, thus reversing the
policy of Frederick II. Hermann, the grand master, explained[564] to
the lord of Cæsarea that, the Saracen princes being engaged in civil
war, one of them was ready even to become a Christian; and he broke
the treaty, which he regarded as having expired with the death of
Melek el Kâmil the year before, in favour of the new alliance. The
Christians began to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem, but Dâûd Emîr
of Kerak fell upon them,[565] and a massacre followed; all that had
been erected was overthrown, and the Tower of David was dismantled.
In 1240 Count Thibaud of Champagne came to the rescue of the Orders,
though forbidden to go by both Pope and emperor. He was entirely
defeated at Gaza, but Hermann succeeded in making his treaty with Ṣâleḥ
’Imâd-ed-Dîn of Damascus.[566] The Egyptians then called to their aid
the wild Kharezmian Turks, who were being pressed west by the Mongols,
and thus wrought a terrible vengeance on their Syrian kinsmen. In 1244
these hordes advanced through Syria pillaging and slaying. Templars,
Hospitallers, and all other Christians fled before them from Jerusalem,
leaving only the poor and the sick. The city had been given up to them
without conditions under the new treaty, and the walls appear to have
been hastily rebuilt; but they were easily stormed, and not only were
all the remaining Christians murdered, but it is said that, by ringing
the bells, the Kharezmians lured back others, who, seeing banners with
crosses displayed on the walls, supposed that some unexpected rescue
had come, but who, thus deceived, were also massacred.[567] The tombs
of the Latin kings were desecrated, probably in search of treasure;
but they were not--as is often stated--destroyed, for they were still
visible in the sixteenth century, and were only removed after the great
fire of 1808.
The Kharezmians joined their Egyptian allies at Gaza, where a great
battle was fought against the Christians and the Syrian Moslems, who
met with a crushing defeat. The victors proceeded to take Damascus, but
here the Turks and Egyptians fell out, and after two pitched battles
the Kharezmians fled north, and dispersed in Asia Minor. Jerusalem was
not restored to the Christians, but was occupied by Melek es Ṣâleḥ
Nejm ed Dîn, the sulṭân of Egypt. Frederick II. was indignant with the
Templars, and laid all the blame on them for not having accepted the
treaty which Richard, Count of Cornwall (who afterwards became titular
emperor in 1257), had made with Melek es Ṣâleḥ of Egypt in 1241,[568]
instead of that which Hermann the grand master contracted in 1244 with
Melek es Ṣâleḥ Ism’aîl of Damascus. Frederick had already protested
against the conduct of the Order because “they took away from the
dominion of the Emperor the Temple of the Lord in Jerusalem, intending
to build in it a fortress contrary to the emperor’s honour”; for he
considered himself still bound by his agreement not to fortify the
Holy City, and he therefore commanded the Templars to desist from the
work. After the Gaza defeat they never had any further opportunity of
disobeying his orders; and, in 1146, Melek es Ṣâleḥ of Egypt wrote to
Pope Innocent IV. to say “that he was sorry the Holy Sepulchre had
been destroyed, and promised to punish the malefactors, and would give
the keys of the said sepulchre to his faithful ones, who would never
open it except to pilgrims, and that he desired to contribute to its
restoration and adornment.”[569]
[Sidenote: THE FALL OF ACRE]
Jerusalem was never again in the hands of the Christians, and is little
noticed in the latter half of the thirteenth century. St. Louis never
even attempted its conquest, during the four years that he spent in
the East from 1250 A. D. Ten years later Bibars usurped the throne of
Saladin’s family, and proceeded victoriously to drive the Franks out
of Syria. He was arrested in his designs by Prince Edward, afterwards
Edward I. of England,[570] with whom he made a truce for ten years
and ten months, which secured what remained of their possessions in
Palestine to the Christians; but it did not include the recession of
Jerusalem. Bibars was succeeded in Egypt by Ḳalâ’un, who had been a
slave, but who became sulṭân about 1279 A. D. With him other truces
were made, but the lands held by Templars and Hospitallers dwindled
gradually, and the county of Tripoli met the same fate that had
overtaken Antioch in the reign of Bibars. On the death of Ḳalâ’un the
various agreements lapsed; and a massacre of Moslems, in March 1291,
led to the siege of Acre by his son Melek el Ashraf, and to the fall of
this last city held by the Franks on May 18 in the same year.
The old Crusader spirit had quite died out after the departure of
Prince Edward in 1272. The Popes continued to oppose the policy of
permanent agreements with the Moslems of Syria and Egypt. They fixed
their hopes on the Mongols, who were popularly supposed to be ruled
by Christians. For the Mongol khâns were educated as Confucians, and
tolerated every religion of their subjects. They never succeeded
in overcoming the power of the sulṭâns of Egypt, and the policy of
Frederick II. would have been more favourable to the Christian cause in
the East than that of the Popes proved to be. The failure of Nicholas
IV. to arouse enthusiasm when Acre was about to fall was due partly to
the increased education of Europe which had undermined the ancient zeal
for the Church, partly to the fact that when money for a Crusade was
raised, it was used for other purposes than the recovery of Jerusalem,
and spent in wars against Constantinople and Egypt, and partly to its
being found practically simpler for the three great Orders and the
Italian republics to make their own separate treaties with Moslem
rulers. It had become a recognised custom to permit the presence of
priests and Franciscans in Jerusalem, and the pilgrims were a source
of revenue to the Moslems, who allowed them to visit the holy places
lying beyond the lands held by the Templars. There was also great
discontent already, roused by the pride and tyranny of the Church of
Rome. At the time when Acre fell, Pope Nicholas IV. was refusing to
recognise the heir of the reigning emperor, Rudolph of Hapsburg, while
Edward I. of England and Philip IV. of France were about to declare war
on one another. Melek el Ashraf thus reaped the advantage of the great
struggles which were preparing the way in Europe for the Reformation.
[Illustration: (West)
MAP OF JERUSALEM.
About 1308 A. D.]
Jerusalem was disappearing from history, being now regarded as a city
chiefly precious to the pilgrims and the devout Moslems. The only new
buildings to be described are additions made to the mosque. Either
Ḳalâ’un or his son built the north-west minaret of the Ḥaram; and the
latter, whose name was Muḥammad, rebuilt the south wall, and added the
existing cloisters on the west side of the enclosure. He has left a
text in the Dome of the Rock, dating about 1319 A. D., recording
further restorations of Saladin’s work; while the dome of the Aḳṣa also
bears one of his inscriptions dating 1327 A. D. The north-east minaret
was not added till thirty years later, according to an extant text.[571]
[Sidenote: MARINO SANUDO]
The ancient map of the city in the early years of the fourteenth
century, which is to be found in the elaborate work of Marino Sanudo,
has been already mentioned. This writer presented his book to the Pope,
and was zealous in endeavouring to revive the enthusiasm of Europe
for the recovery of Palestine, but his efforts met with no success.
His map represents the Holy City much as it was in Saladin’s time.
The House of Caiaphas and the Cœnaculum appear surrounded by the wall
of the barbican. The Pool of Bethesda is shown in its present site at
the Birket Isrâïl, and St. Stephen’s Gate is on the east instead of on
the north; but the mediæval pool west of St. Anne is also marked as
a “piscina.” The apocryphal “Upper and Lower Gihon” are shown on the
west; the Church of the “Spasm” is at the corner where the Via Dolorosa
bends south, just where its remains have now been found. These are the
chief features of the map demanding notice.
The later history of Jerusalem may be very briefly summed up.[572]
Immediately after the loss of Acre, the Turks of Asia Minor began to
become powerful. The Osmanli sulṭâns of Iconium were descended from
’Othmân, a Kharezmian vassal of the Seljuk family, which, down to
1288, retained power in Asia Minor. The new dynasty made their capital
at Broussa, and already threatened Constantinople before they were
crushed by Timur at Angora in 1402. The Osmanlis soon recovered, and
when they at length conquered Byzantium, in 1453, the terror of the
Turk fell on Europe, and led incidentally to the toleration of the
Protestants in Germany. In 1516 the sulṭân Selîm invaded Syria, and in
the next year he entered Cairo. He thus attained a practical right to
the title of Khalîfah of the Prophet, because that office was always
purely elective, and was bestowed on the “guardian of the two shrines”
(_Ḥâmi el Ḥaramein_) of Mekkah and Jerusalem, which the present sulṭân
still is. Besides this claim, Selîm was acknowledged by El Mutawakkil,
son of ’Amr el Ḥakîm, a descendant of the ’Abbaside khalifs found
living, as titular khalîfah, in the Egyptian capital, as well as by
the sherîf of Mekkah. The walls of Jerusalem were rebuilt, in 1542, by
Sulṭân Suleimân, and are noticed by Pierre Belon, the naturalist, in
the following year, as being “new.” They are those which still exist,
and Suleimân’s name is recorded in an inscription upon them at the
Jaffa Gate, as also in another which shows that he restored the Birket
es Sulṭân, or old “Pool of the Germans,” in the upper Hinnom Valley.
His gift of beautiful windows, and his other work, in the Dome of the
Rock have already been noted. In 1555 the Franciscans were allowed to
place a new roof on the Holy Sepulchre, and to execute repairs in the
interior of the chapel, as already mentioned.
[Sidenote: ZUALLARDO]
The most interesting description of the Holy City under the early
Turkish sulṭâns is that of Zuallardo[573] in 1586. He was a Fleming,
long resident at Rome, and was made a knight of the papal Order of
the Holy Sepulchre in the Church itself, by means of the sword and
gilt spurs supposed to have belonged to Godfrey of Bouillon, which
are still shown in the Latin Chapel. His work is remarkable for its
illustrations, which, though very rough, are of considerable value, as
has already been shown. His sketch of the south façade of the cathedral
is, however, very inaccurate, as it does not show the windows over
the double entrance gates, while the view of the rotunda, showing the
mosaics of the eleventh century still remaining on the drum, above the
gallery, has been considerably touched up by the engraver. Zuallardo
represents the present minaret at the Jaffa Gate, which was probably
erected in 1542, but does not show any minaret at the mosque on the
summit of Olivet, which had replaced the Church of the Ascension.
He speaks of the “House of Herod,” which (as noticed in the first
chapter of this book) is not now one of the holy places. His drawings
of the House of Caiaphas and House of Annas suggest that they have
been altered since his time. The Church of St. John--now called the
“Dormition of the Virgin”--which was recently granted to Catholics
by the present German emperor, is mentioned. It was not a very early
sacred site, though noticed about 1321 A. D. by Marino Sanudo.
Zuallardo also speaks of the “Retreat of the Apostles”--the tomb
probably of Ananus--and of anchorites in the Kidron Valley. The Jews
were in the habit of throwing stones at Absalom’s tomb, and he shows
the stone-heaps there, which still remain. The carved lions at the east
gate were already there--no doubt since 1542; the old Church of the
Spasm was still visible, and the “Chapel of the Mocking” (St. Sophia)
in the Antonia citadel is noticed, as well as the extant “Chapel of
the Flagellation.” Several other sites, as described or pictured in
this account, have been already mentioned, such as the tombs of the
Crusader kings, and the Sepulchre itself. The remains of the chapel at
Siloam were not yet covered with earth, and are described as those of a
church of the Salvatore Illuminatore.
In 1808 occurred the disastrous fire in the cathedral which destroyed
much of the twelfth-century work. The dome was again restored about
1860 by the emperor of the French. In 1831 Jerusalem submitted to ’Aly
Pasha of Egypt, and a revolt of the Bedawîn against him was quelled in
1834. Six years later the Holy City reverted to the Turkish sulṭân ’Abd
el Mejîd. Since that time the most remarkable event has been the large
increase of 40,000 Jews to its population, due mainly to the Russian
persecutions of 1881.
We have thus traversed the long ages during which Jerusalem has been,
for four thousand years, a holy city. It can never be anything else.
Whatever be the outcome of the regeneration of the Turkish empire,
Jerusalem can never be a very great centre of trade. It will remain
what it has been for so many centuries--the Holy City. To the Jew it is
the city of David and Solomon, to the Christian the city where our Lord
was crucified, to the Moslem also a city sanctified by many traditions,
and by the memory of the proud days when it was won for Islâm by Omar
and by Saladin. Perhaps, in the distant future, we may learn more of
the ancient remains now hidden under the platform of the Ḥaram, or
of those beneath the houses of the present town; in these pages all
that has been so far discovered of importance has, in the author’s
belief, been described, and the very sanctity of the place makes it as
yet impossible to explore some of its most interesting remains. But
the Holy City may still be described in the words of the Psalmist:
“Jerusalem is builded as a city of gathering together to itself; for
thither the tribes go up” (Psalm cxxii. 3).
FOOTNOTES TO CHAPTER XIV
[548] Schultens’s edition, 1735, in Arabic and Latin, was used by me in
annotating the English translation for Pal. Pil. Texts Society in 1897.
[549] Shirkoh died early in Jan., 1169; El ’Adid, Sept. 13, 1171; and
Nûr-ed-Dîn on May 15, 1174.
[550] See “Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem,” pp. 146–60.
[551] Quoted in Besant and Palmer’s “Jerusalem,” 1871, p. 356.
[552] The Christian account makes it about 4¼ bezants (30 shillings)
and the Moslem account 10 dinars (70 shillings) for a man. They agree
that two women or ten children paid the same as one man. Perhaps the 30
shillings was the ransom for a poor man, and 70 shillings for the rich.
[553] De Vogüé, “Temple de Jerusalem,” p. 101.
[554] _Ibid._, pp. 91, 92.
[555] The seventh month of the Moslem lunar year, answering to October
about this time.
[556] Guy le Strange, “Palestine under the Moslems,” p. 484.
[557] “Regesta,” Nos. 681, 685, 688; Beha-ed-Dîn, II. lxxi. pp. 185–9,
English translation.
[558] The second Crusade was an armed pilgrimage of King Louis VII. of
France in 1147 A. D., with a futile attack on Damascus (“Latin Kingdom
of Jer.,” pp. 108–12).
[559] Perhaps 50,000 men.
[560] English translation, 1897, pp. 12, 350.
[561] Robinson, “Bib. Res.,” 1838, i. p. 317.
[562] “Regesta,” Nos. 934, 940, 974.
[563] _Ibid._, Nos. 997, 1010; “Latin Kingdom of Jer.,” p. 313; A.
Socin (“Baedeker’s Guide,” 1876, p. 177).
[564] “Regesta,” No. 1088.
[565] Robinson, “Bib. Res.,” 1838, i. p. 317.
[566] “Regesta,” Nos. 1094, 1095; “Makrizi,” see “Latin Kingdom of
Jer.,” pp. 316–18.
[567] Besant and Palmer, “Jer.,” 1871, p. 459.
[568] “Regesta,” Nos. 1101, 1114, 1119.
[569] “Regesta,” No. 1144.
[570] “Latin Kingdom of Jer.,” pp. 390–400.
[571] The roof of the Dome of the Rock was destroyed by fire in 1448
(Mejîr ed Dîn), but this does not mean the Dome. Later texts refer to
the work of Turkish sulṭâns. Suleimân in 1520 cased the bases and upper
blocks of the pillars in the Dome of the Rock with marble, and gave the
beautiful coloured windows in 1528. The doors were restored in 1564,
and the wooden ceiling of the outer arcade was renewed in 1776. The
latest restorations were those of Sulṭân Maḥmûd in 1830, and of ’Abd el
’Azîz in 1873–5. The Kishâni tiles of the exterior bear the date 1561
A. D. (see back, p. 253).
[572] For minor events, see Besant and Palmer, “Jerusalem,” 1871, pp.
434–42.
[573] “Il Devotissimo Viaggio di Gerusalemme,” published in Rome in
1587, with editions in 1595 and 1597; an enlarged French edition dates
1608.
AUTHORITIES CONSULTED
F. Oberthür, “Flavii Josephi Hebraei Opera Omnia,” 3 vols., 1782.
W. Surenhuse, “Mischna,” 6 vols., 1698.
Constantine l’Empereur, “Codex Middoth,” 1630.
John Buxtorf, “Lexicon Chaldaicum,” 1639.
A. Neubauer, “La Géographie du Talmud,” 1868.
F. Larstow and G. Parthey, “Eusebii Pamphili Onomasticon,” 1862.
T. Tobler, “Theodoricus de Locis Sanctis,” 1865.
„ “Itinerarium Burdigala Hierosolymam usque,” 1869.
„ “Perigrinatio S. Paulæ,” 1869.
„ “S. Eucherii Epitome,” 1869.
„ “Theodori Liber de Situ Terræ Sanctæ,” 1869.
„ “S. Willibaldi Vita seu Hodæporicon,” 1874.
„ “Bernardi Sapientis Monachi Itinerarium,” 1874.
„ “Johannis Wirziburgensis descriptio Terræ Sanctæ,” 1874.
J. Bongars, “Gesta Dei per Francos,” 1611.
Publications of Palestine Pilgrims’ Text Society (32 Nos.), 1884–97.
T. Wright, “Early Travels in Palestine” (Bohn’s edit.), 1848.
“Chronicles of the Crusades” (Bohn’s trans.), 1871.
A. Schultens, “Vita et Res Gesta Saladini,” 1735.
“La Citez de Jhérusalem” (C. R. Conder’s trans.), 1888.
E. Carmoly, “Itinéraires de la Terre Sainte,” 1847.
H. Reland, “Palestina ex Monumentis Veteribus Illustrata,” 2 vols.,
1714.
F. de Saulcy, “Recherches sur la Numismatique Judaïque,” 1854.
„ “Voyage en Terre Sainte,” 1865.
F. W. Madden, “History of Jewish Coinage,” 1864.
R. Röhricht, “Regesta Regni Hierosolymitani,” 1893.
E. Robinson, “Biblical Researches in Palestine, 1838 and 1852,”
3 vols., 1856.
Prof. Dr. Guthe and P. Palmer, “Die Mosaikkarte von Madeba,” 1906.
Rev. R. Willis, “Church of the Holy Sepulchre,” 1849.
T. Hayter Lewis, “The Holy Places of Jerusalem,” 1888.
M. de Vogüé, “Églises de la Terre Sainte,” 1860.
„ „ “Le Temple de Jérusalem,” 1863.
G. Zuallardo, “Il Devotissimo Viaggio di Gerusalemme,” 1587.
P. Belon, “Observations en Grèce, Asie, etc.,” 1553.
J. Derenbourg, “L’Histoire et la Géographie de la Palestine,” 1867.
W. H. Waddington, “Inscriptions Grecques et Latines de la Syrie,”
1870.
A. Vámbéry, “History of Bokhara,” 1873.
Sir C. W. Wilson, “Ordnance Survey of Jerusalem,” 1865.
Sir C. Warren and Colonel C. R. Conder, “The Survey of Western
Palestine: Jerusalem,” 1884.
Sir C. Warren, “Underground Jerusalem,” 1877.
F. J. Bliss, “Excavations at Jerusalem,” 1898.
_Quarterly Statements, Palestine Exploration Fund_, 1865–1908.
G. le Strange, “Palestine under the Moslems,” 1890.
Various Authors, “The Recovery of Jerusalem,” 1871.
W. Besant and E. H. Palmer, “Jerusalem” (1st edit), 1871.
CONTROVERSIAL WORKS
J. Fergusson, “The Ancient Topography of Jerusalem,” 1847.
„ “The Holy Sepulchre and the Temple at Jerusalem,” 1865.
„ “The Temples of the Jews,” 1878.
Canon G. Williams, “The Holy City,” 2 vols. (2nd edit.), 1849.
Sir C. Warren, “The Temple or the Tomb,” 1880.
Dr. F. Buhl, “Geographie des Alten Palästina,” 1896.
Dr. G. A. Smith, “Jerusalem,” 2 vols., 1907.
H. Rix, “Tent and Testament,” 1907.
Rev. S. Merrill, “Ancient Jerusalem,” 1908.
MODERN SURVEYS OF JERUSALEM
F. W. Sieber, 1818.
Lieuts. Symonds and Aldrich, 1841.
Dr. E. Robinson (revised), 1856.
Lieut. Vandevelde, 1858.
Sir C. W. Wilson, “Ordnance Survey,” 1865.
Colonel C. R. Conder, “Plan of Environs,” 1881.
[Illustration: MODERN JERUSALEM
F. J. A. K. Johnson Limited Edinburgh & London.
London. John Murray]
INDEX
’Abd el Melek, 238–9
’Abd-ṣadaḳ, 31–6
’Abiri, 31
Absalom’s hand, 51
---- tomb, 51, 103, 325
Aceldama, 250, 307
Adam, Tomb of, 158
Adonizedek, 30, 32
Ælia Capitolina, 188–207
Agrippa I., 122, 131, 162
Agrippa, Wall of, 162–6
Agrippa II., 122, 170
Akra, 49, 92–6, 100–2, 113
Aḳṣa Mosque, 224–5, 239, 243, 245–7, 253, 299, 312, 323
Alexander the Great, 87–8
Altar, 21, 57, 98, 125
Amorites, 26–8
Amraphel, 26
Amygdalon Pool, 180–1
Ananus, Tomb of, 23, 184, 325
Antiochus III., 88, 91
Antiochus IV., 91–2
Antonia, 81, 94, 132–3, 183–4
Aqueducts, 18, 41–5, 63, 161, 206
Araunah, 28
Ark, 50, 56
Armenian Church (St. James), 303
Armoury, The, 84
Aryans in Palestine, 86–7
Ascension, Church of the, 11, 23, 231, 306
Asnerie, The, 155
Assassins, The, 268
Atonement, The Day of, 131
Baptisteries, 216, 220, 262
Barbican, The, 290, 323
Bar Cocheba, 194, 196–7
Baris Tower, 81, 132
Bathsheba’s Bath, 21
Beautiful Gate, The, 129, 141, 218, 287, 298
Bene Ḥezir, Tomb of the, 104
Benjamin, Gate of, 59, 72
Bernard the Wise, 247–8, 251
Bethany, 18, 23, 304
Bêther, 193–5
Bethesda, Pool of, 16, 142–4
Bethphage, 21
Bethso, 114
Bezetha, 99, 163, 170, 183
Bibars, Sulṭân, 321
Birket Isrâïl, 17, 143, 323
---- Mâmilla, 44, 53, 63, 178, 228, 303
---- es Sulṭân, 53, 303
Bishops, 189, 207, 249, 250
Bosheth, 72
Bridge, The Tyropœon, 107, 119, 137
Broad Wall, The, 50, 82
Calvary, 13, 80, 151–8, 161, 213, 215, 229, 262–3, 293
Camp of the Assyrians, 63, 179, 183
Caphenatha = Ophel, 100
Causeway, The, 129, 221, 226, 287
Cave of the Agony, 18
---- of Pelagia, 18, 206, 307
Caverns of the Kings, 163, 165
Chanson de Charlemagne, 251
Chapel of Helena, 230, 262
---- of the Mocking, 17, 150, 225, 325
Charlemagne, 250–1
Cherethites and Pelethites, 52
Cherubim, The, 57–8
Christian Street, 5
Cœnaculum, The, 14, 302
Coins, 101–3, 197–9, 203–4
Conduit of Upper Pool, 63, 67
Constantine, 209–12
Corner Gate, The, 62, 72, 82, 115
Council House, The, 113, 135, 145, 147, 185
Cradle of Christ, The, 19, 221, 299
Credo Chapel, The, 18
Crete, 86–7
Cross, The, 11
Crown of Thorns, The, 12
Crucifixions, 103, 151, 159
Crusades, 276–82, 314–6
Cyprus, 87
David, City of, 4, 41, 48, 93, 94, 102, 113
---- Tower of. See Pisans
Dolorous Gate, 21
Dome of the Chain, 241, 301
---- of Gabriel, 253
---- of the Prophet, 253
---- of the Rock, 233, 237–43, 252–3, 300, 312–13, 322
---- of the Roll, 21, 254, 301
---- of Spirits, 253
Dormition of the Virgin, 325
Double Gate, The, 120, 225
Dovecote, Rock of the, 183
Drafted masonry, 91, 117, 219–20
Draw-well, Chamber of the, 127–8
Druzes, The, 260–1
Dung Gate, The, 77, 83
East Gate, The, 72
Ecce Homo Arch, The, 21, 205, 288
Edward I., King, 321
El Boraḳ, 255
---- Mâmûn, 252–3
---- Muḳaddasi, 240, 258–9
En-rogel, 43, 51
Ephraim, Gate of, 62, 82
Essenes, Gate of the, 114
Eudocia’s Wall, 200, 218
Exchanges, The, 297
Exodus, Date of the, 31
Fâṭemites, The, 258–60, 267, 279
Field of Burial, The, 68, 84
First Wall, The, 113–5
Fish Gate, The, 68, 81–2
Flagellation, Chapel of the, 226, 298, 325
Footprints, 10, 11, 224, 231, 300
Forged coins, 198–9
Franciscans, The, 18, 22
Frank Kings, The, 282–4, 294
Frederick I., Barbarossa, 314
Frederick II., 317–8
Gabbatha, 146
Galilee on Sion, 14, 16
Gallicantus, Chapel of, 16
Garden Tomb, The, 155
Gareb, Hill of, 72, 153
Gate between two walls, The, 72, 85
---- of the Chain, 129, 226, 287
---- of the Prophet, 129, 235, 255
Gates of the city, 77–85, 115, 221, 288–9
---- of the Temple, 59, 127–30
Gennath Gate, The, 115
Geology, 39–40
Gethsemane, 18, 140, 147
Gihon, Spring of, 41–2, 52, 64, 68
Goath, 72
Godfrey of Bouillon, 278, 280
Golden Eagle, The, 132
---- Gate, The, 218, 223, 225
Golgotha = Calvary, 151–8
Goliath’s Castle, 289
Greeks, The, 86–92
Gymnasium, The, 89, 135
Hadrian, 192–4, 199, 202–7
---- Statue of, 202
Ḥâkim (El), 259
Ḥammâm esh Shefa (Healing Bath), 45
Ḥamzah’s buckler, 255
Hananeel, Tower of, 72, 81, 82
Hârûn er Rashîd, 250
Hasmonæans, The, 97–107
Healing Bath, The, 45
Hebrews, The, = ’Abiri, 33–4, 35–6
Helena’s monument, 163–4, 177
Hermits, 303
Herod Antipas, 149, 160
---- the Great, 108–11, 122
Herod’s monuments, 178, 184
Hezekiah’s Pool, 45, 63, 181, 303
---- tunnel, 65
Hildebrand, Pope, 271
Hinnom, Valley of, 27–8, 51–2, 62
---- Texts in, 248–9
Hippicus, The tower, 113–4, 134
Hippodrome, The, 136, 159
Hittites, The, 27–9, 72, 86
Holy Fire, The, 13, 295
---- Ghost, Chapel of, 2
---- Lance, The, 13
---- Sepulchre, The, 13, 154–8, 211–15, 229, 262–4, 290–4
Horse Gate, The, 60, 68, 72, 85
Hospital of Charlemagne, 251, 264
---- of Justinian, 226
---- of St. John, 6, 13, 269, 296–7
---- The Teutonic, 2, 301, 318
House of Annas, 16, 302, 325
---- of Caiaphas, 14, 15, 302, 323, 325
---- of David, 50, 60
---- of Dives, 23
---- of the Erebinthi, 184
---- of Herod, 22, 325
---- of Heroes, The, 84
---- of Millo, 84
---- of the Pharisee, 23
---- of Pilate, 16, 17
---- of Stoning, 152–4
---- of Uriah, 21
Huldah Gates, The, 119–20, 129
Hyrcanus, The Palace of, 89
Inner Pool, The (Piscina Interior), 17, 298, 303, 323
James the Great, 169
---- the Less, 168
Jannæus, Alexander, 102–3
Japhia, King, 32
Jebus, 27, 37, 41, 48
Jeremiah’s Grotto, 153
Jews at Jerusalem, 153, 196, 286, 326
Job, Monastery of, 249–50
---- Well of, 43–4, 250, 304
John Hyrcanus, Monument of, 177, 180
Josephus, 111–12, 181–2
Judas, The hanging of, 18
---- Maccabæus, 97–9
Julian, The Emperor, 217
Justinian, 222–6
Kalâ’ûn, Sulṭân, 321
Keft, The, 86
Kharezmians, The, 319–20
Khosrau II., 227–8
Kidron, Valley of, 52, 72
---- tombs, 103–5
King’s Dale, The, 25, 51
---- Entry, The, 64
---- Garden, The, 61, 72, 83–4
Kipunus, The Gate, 129, 141
Lower Pool, The, 63
Malquisinat Street, 287
Mariamne, The Tower, 134
Marino Sanudo, 323
Masjid el Aḳṣa. See Aḳṣa.
Masons’ marks, 287
Meah, The Tower, 81
Medeba map, The, 200, 221
Melchizedek, 25, 26, 31
Millo = Akra, 49
Miphkad, The Gate, 59, 85
Modestus, 228–9
Modin, 97
Moḳed, The House, 125–7, 130, 185
Monument of the Fuller, 163
Moriah, 27
Moslem conquests, 234
Mosque of Omar, 236–7
Mount of Corruption, The, 61
Nebuchadnezzar, 71
Nehemiah’s wall, 81–5
New Gate, The, 72
Nicanor, The Gate of, 128, 139
Nob, 64
Norman architecture, 286
Normans, The, 277
Oak of Rogel, 21
Old Gate, The, 82
---- Pool, The, 63
Olivet, Mount, 10, 23, 61, 141, 217
Omar, The Khalîfah, 235–6
Omawîyah Khalifs, The, 237, 240
Ophel, 39–41, 52, 62, 68, 84–5, 100, 114–5
Ossuaries, 128, 164, 190–1
Palace of Annas, 140, 147
---- of David, 50
---- of Frank Kings, 293
---- of the Hasmonæans, 135, 145, 147
---- of Helena, 176
---- of Herod, 4, 134–5
---- of Monobasus, 176
---- of Solomon, 60, 61, 84
Paradise, The, 230, 291
Parthians, The, 109–10
Pastophoria, The, 176
Pater Noster Chapel, The, 18
Patriarch’s Bath, The, 45, 63, 303
Pavement, The, 146
Persians, The, 74–7
Peter the Hermit, 275–6
Peter’s Prison, 16, 302
Phasaelus, The Tower, 134, 159, 181
Philistines, The, 29, 86
Pierced Stone, The, 57, 202
Pilate, 148–50, 160
Pilate’s Aqueduct, 161
Pilgrims, 9–24, 264, 273–4
Pillar, Gate of the, 201, 288
---- of Scourging, 15
Pinnacle of the Temple, 19, 142
Pisans, Castle of the, 134, 284
Piscina interior. See Inner Pool
Pompey, 105–8
Prætorium, The, 17, 146, 149
Prison of Christ, The, 16, 231, 262
---- Gate, The, 59, 85
Procurators, The, 160
Prophet’s Gate, The. See Gates
Psephinus, The Tower, 163, 165
Ptolemy I., 88
Ptolemy II., 88
Ptolemy V., 88
Pûrstau not Philistines, 86
Quarters of the City, 205, 286
Rabbi ’Aḳîbah, 196
Red heifer, The, 131
Relics, 11, 12
Repose of Mary, The, 21, 288
Retreat of the Apostles, 23, 184, 325
Richard Lion-heart, 314–6
Ṣahrah “plateau,” The, 153
Saint Agnes, 20
---- Anne, 21, 221, 287, 298, 313
Saint Chariton, 21, 298, 313
---- George, 20, 249, 302
---- Giles, 20, 298
---- James the Less, 20, 302
---- John Baptist, 270, 296–7
---- ---- on Olivet, 19
---- ---- on Sion, 325
---- Lazarus, 18, 289, 304
---- Mark, 20, 302
---- Martin, 302
---- Mary of the Germans, 301
---- ---- (Aḳṣa Mosque), 17, 223–5, 245
---- ---- Latin, 21, 269, 296
---- ---- Magdalene, 21, 298
---- ---- Magna, 21, 296
Saint Saba, 303
---- Saviour, 302
---- Sion, 14, 204, 217, 231, 302
---- Sophia, 17, 225, 325
---- Stephen, 16, 19, 20, 218, 305
---- Thomas, 20, 302
---- ---- of the Germans, 301
---- Veronica, 22
Ṣakhrah “rock,” The, 53–7, 126–7, 225, 239
Saladin, 308–16
Salem, 25
Sanballat, 75
Saramel, 101
School of the Virgin, 21, 301
Seat of the Governor, 77, 82
Second Wall, The, 114
Seljuks, The, 264–8
Sennacherib, 67–8
Serapis, 192, 203–4
Serpent’s Pool, The, 44, 178
Shallecheth, The Gate, 59
Sheep Gate, The, 81
Shiloah (Siloam), 63
Shishak, 62
Shushan, The Gate, 129, 131
Si’a, The temple at, 121
Silla “steps,” 84
Siloah (Siloam), 83–4
Siloam, The Pool of, 41–2, 63–4, 65–7, 72, 77, 114, 182, 217, 220
---- Chapel at, 220, 326
Siloam Inscription, The, 66–7
Simon the Hasmonæan, 101
Sion. See Zion
Skopos, 172, 175, 177
Solomon’s Pool, 53, 114, 144
---- Porch, 141
---- Temple. See Temple
Spasm of the Virgin, Chapel of the, 22, 298, 323
Spring, The Gate of the, 77, 83
---- of the Monster, 44
Stables of Solomon, The, 21, 299
Stairs of the City of David, 83–4, 221
Stone of Foundation, The, 56
---- of Unction, The, 22
Strouthios, The Pool, 136, 143
Sundial in the Haram, 21
Sur, The Gate, 59
Tabernacles, The Feast of, 131–2
Ṭadi, The Gate, 127, 130
Tancred’s Tower, 165, 289
Tell Amarna tablets, 29–36
Templars, The, 298–300, 319–20
Temple of Herod, 53, 119, 123–31
---- of the Lord, 57, 300
---- of Solomon, 53–9
---- Zerubbabel, 53, 75–6
Teutonic Order, The, 301, 318
Texts, Aramaic, 118–9
Theatre, Herod’s, 136
Third Wall, The, 162–6
Three Maries, Chapel of the, 21, 302
Tomb of Christ, 154–7
---- of David, 60, 68–70
---- of Joseph, 70
---- of Nicodemus, 70
---- of the Virgin, 17, 18, 226, 231, 306
Tombs in Palestine, 157, 214
Topheth, 27–8, 72, 73
Tower of David. See Pisans
---- of the Furnaces, 82
Traditions, 3, 8–24
Transference of sites, 14
Triple Gate, The, 120
Turks, The, 256–8, 264–8, 323–4
Twin Pools, The, 16, 136, 143–4
Tyropœon Valley, The, 38, 49, 72, 80, 113
Tyrus, The Palace at, 89–90
Upper Pool, The, 44, 63, 180
Uriah the Hittite, 28, 51
Valley Gate, The, 62, 77, 82
Venus, The Temple of, 204
Via Dolorosa, The, 22, 288
Virgin’s Well, The, 17, 144
Wall of Titus, 183–4
Walls of the City, 50, 62, 68, 79, 85, 113–16, 162–7, 201, 219,
289–90, 324
Water Gate, The, 68, 84
---- supply, 40–6, 179, 303
Women’s Towers, 163–4, 177–8
Xystos, The, 113, 135, 159
Zechariah, Tomb of, 105
Zion = Sion, 27–8, 38, 46–8, 97–9, 101, 204
Zoheleth, The stone, 43, 51–2
Zuallardo, 324–5
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Transcriber’s Notes
Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made consistent when a
predominant preference was found in the original book; otherwise they
were not changed.
Text contains many diacritical marks, some of which were hard to read.
It is likely that some transcription errors remain in this ebook text.
Simple typographical errors were corrected; unbalanced quotation
marks were remedied when the change was obvious, and otherwise left
unbalanced.
Illustrations in this eBook have been positioned between paragraphs
and outside quotations. In versions of this eBook that support
hyperlinks, the page references in the List of Illustrations lead to
the corresponding illustrations.
Sidenotes originally were the running titles at the tops of
odd-numbered pages. Here, they have been positioned between or next to
paragraphs, close to the pages on which they originally appeared.
Footnotes, originally at the bottoms of pages, have been sequentially
renumbered and placed at the ends of the chapters that reference them.
The index was not checked for proper alphabetization or correct page
references.
Text uses both “Siloah” and “Siloam”.
Footnote 417, originally footnote 1 on page 214: text is missing the
volume number.
Page 296: “500 feet side” was printed that way.
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