Tent Work in Pale Stine
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TENT WORK IN PALE STINE. TO HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS THE PRINCE OF WALES CQ!hi,g ®ilork i,g ~lebicatc:b, WITH HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS' GRACIOl:S PERMISSION, EY THE AUTHOR. PREFACE. THE Survey of Western Palestine was commenced under Captain Stewart, R.E., in January, 1872. Ill-health obliged that officer to return almost immediately. Lieutenant Conder, R.E., was ap pointed to the command, and arrived in Palestine in the summer of the same year. The work meantime had been conducted under the charge of the late Mr. C. F. Tyrwhitt Drake. Lieutenant Conder returned to England in Sep tember, 1875, having surveyed 4700 square miles. He brought with him a mass of notes, special surveys, observations, and drawings, in the arrangement of which he has been principally occupied from that time to the present. I The remaining 1300 square miles of the Survey were finished by Lieutenant Kitchener last year. vili .P.kEFACE. The volumes which the Committee now Issue contain Lieutenant Conder's personal history of his work, without specially entering on the scientific results. These will be published with the great map, in the form of memoirs, twenty-six in number, one to every sheet. Lieutenant Conder's conclusions and proposed ,identifications are, it will be understood, his own. The Committee do not, collectively, adopt the conclusions of any of their officers. W. HEPWORTH DIXON, Chairman of the Executive Committee. PALESTINE EXPLORATIO~ Fu::-m 0l'FICES, 11 & 12, CHARING CROSS, lllay, 1878. CONTENTS OF VOL. I. CHAPTER PAG>!l PREFACE - Vll INTRODUCTION - Xlll L THE ROAD TO JERUSALEM 1 IL SHECHEM A:SD THE SAMARITANS - - 29 III. THE SURVEY OF SAMARIA - 80 IV. THE GREAT PLAIN OF ESDRAELON - - 110 V. THE NAZARETH HILLS - - 136 VI. CARMEL AND ACRE - 167 VII. SHARON - - 197 VIII. DAMASCUS, BAALBEK, AND HERl\ION - 234 IX. SAMSON'S COUNTRY - 267 X. BETHLEHEM AND MAn. SABA - - 282 XL JERUSALEl\1 - - 307 XII. THE TEMPLE AND CALVARY - - 346 LIST OF ILL USTR.ATIONS. PAGB THE DOME OF THE ROCK-F1·ontispiece. From a photograph by Lieut. Kitchener, R.E. ; showing part of the arcade, and the pillars and "grille " beneath the Drum. TITLE-PAGE. From a sketch by the Author. A theodolite-party at work. JACOB'S WELL 2!) F~om a sketch made by the Author in the vault over the well; looking south. TOMB OF PHINEHAS 77 From a sketch by the Author; looking south-west. llEROD'S COLONNADE AT SA:!IIARIA - 80 From a photograph ; looking east. GUEST HOUSE !)7 From a sketch by the Author made in the village of Kuriet Jit. VIEW FRmi JENIN - llO From a water-colour sketch by the Author ; looking north. TABOR • to face 120 Seen from the top of Jebel Duhy. From a water-colour sketch by the Authoi·. Xll LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. PAGID CHURCH OF ST. ANNE, AT SEFFURIEH - 136 From a. photograph by Lieut. Kitchener, R.E.; looking east. CARMEL- - 167 From a. water-colour sketch by the Author; looking west from near thtl village of Mujeidil. CONSTANTINE'S BASILICA AT BETHLEHEM - 282 From a. photograph by Lieut_ Kitchener, R.E.; looking east. :MAR SABA - 302 From a. photograph ; looking north-cast. THE DOME OF THE ROCK - 307 From a. photograph; looking north. CAPITALS Sl'PPORTING THE DRuM (DOllE OF THE ROCK) to face 323 Reduced photographically from sketches by the Author. THE TEMPLE WALL - 346 From a. sketch made by the Author in a. chamber outside the west wall, near the north corner_ SITE OF HEROD'S TEMPLE to face 359 Proposed restoration in dotted lines ; a.ctua.l vaults and build ings in firm lines, with actual rock levels above the Mediterranean. ANCIENT JERUSALEM to face 365 Showing places where the level of the rock ha.s been ascer tained, aml with fifty-foot contours. THE PLACE OF STONING - to face 37 4 Generally called J eremia.h's Grotto. From· a photograph ; lookii!g north. INTRODUCTION. THE Trigonometric-a! Survey of Western Pa!ostine is now an accomplished .fact. The whole of the mater4:'ll collected is safely stored in the Working Office of the Palestine Exploration Fund, and it is hoped that in the course of the year 1878 it will be ready for publieation. It is not an easy task which has thus been successfully accomplished ; the difficulties of the Survey party have been many, ar..d, more than once, events seemed to threaten the entire inter ruption of the work. But the time was unusually favourable in many respects, for the land was quiet and comparatively prosperous, the Bedawin were in subjection to the Turkish Government, and the price of provisions and of animals was, at first, remarkably low. The Survey was actually commenced at the end xiv INTRODUCT.ION. of the year 18 71. Preliminary reconnaissances of parts of Palestine had been previously made by Captain Anderson, R.E., and Captain Warren, R.E., and the Ordnance Survey of the neigh bourhood of Jerusalem, with the line of leYels from the Mediterranean to the Dead Sea, and from Jerusalem to Solomon's Pools, had been executed by Major Wilson, R.E. It was by the advice of these experienced explorers that the Committee of the Palestine Exploration Fund undertook the Survey of Western Palestine, to the scale of one inch to the mile, the object being the complete examina tion of the whole country, with an amount of accuracy equal to that of Ordnance work. The officer to whom this great work was entrusted was Captain Stewart, R.E., and his staff consisted of Sergeant Black and Corporal Armstrong, R.E.; Mr. C. F. Tyrwhitt Drake was also appointed as linguist and archroologist to the expedition. The work met with a most serious check at its commencement. Captain Stewart, arriving in the most unhealthy time of the year, and engaged in the most unhealthy part of the country, while measuring the base line, was struck down with INTRODUCTION. XV fever and invalided home. The Committee then honoured me with the offer of the command, as his successor, and I was instructed to proceed as soon as possible to Palestine. In the meantime the little party, under the care of Mr. Tyrwhitt Drake, pursued its labours, and carried the Survey up the country to Jerusalem, and thence to N ablus, accomplishing in the first half of 1872 about 500 square miles. This work has since, under my direction, been re-examined, and the excellent character of this part of the map reflects the highest credit on the zeal and care of the two surveyors, who, though ignorant of the language and unaccustomed to the style of work required, yet succeeded in recovering every thing of value in the district ; nor does it less reflect credit on the tact and judgment of my lamented friend Mr. Tyrwhitt Drake, on whom devolved the arduous task of organising and managing the infant expedition. I reached Palestine on the 8th of July, 1872, and from that date, until the 1st October, 1875, the work was pushed on with scarcely any in terruption, except during my absence for four months in 187 4, when I returned to England to recruit my health, which was seriously impaired xvi INTRODUCTION. by the hardships encountered in the Jordan Valley. After the attack on the party at Safed in 1875, an account of which will be found in the second volume, the work was suspended for a year. When I left Palestine four-fifths of the Survey was completed; the remaining fifth has been happily carried out during the year 1877 under the command of Lieutenant Kitchener, and the great map now extends over 6000 square miles, from Dan to Beersheba, and from Jordan to the Mediterranean Sea. The Survey is being prepared in twenty-six sheets. The plan will show towns, villages, ruins, roads, water-courses, and buildings, tombs, caves, cisterns, wells, springs, and rock-cut wine-presses. The hills will also be delineated, and the cultiva tion shown, olives, figs, vines, and palms being distinguished; and the wild growth, oak-trees, scrub, and principal separate trees will appear. The Roman milestones on the roads are marked, and every similar relic of antiquity; the heights of the various principal features are given, and the levels of the Sea of Galilee and Dead Sea have been fixed to within a foot. Palestine is thus brought home to England, INTRODUCTION. xvii and the student may travel, in his study, over its weary roads and rugged hills without an ache, and may ford its dangerous streams, and pass through its malarious plains without dis comfort. The map, however, is but a part of the material collected, and the map without a memoir would be a sealed book. On that memoir, under the direction of two editors, Major Wilson, R.E., and Mr. G. Grove, I have now been employed for nearly two years, and may hope in another six months to have completed the work. There are in all some 9000 Arabic names on the map which, without translation, must prove a stumbling-block to the student; the first and most important want was therefore a series of indexes giving the Arabic words, their meanings when descriptive (and this applies to about nine-tenths of the whole number), their relation, when ancient, to the Hebrew, and their origin when modern. Thus, out of the mass of names collected, those of real value may easily be selected; and the danger of fixing on some modern title of little importance, as representing some old Scriptural site, is avoided.