Page:A Biographical Dictionary of the Celebrated Women of Every Age and Country (1804).djvu/461

Rh smitten with her charms, and received her with joy. The same day he invited her to supper with him, and during the repast became drunk with wine, in which situation his attendants placed him on the bed, and left him. Judith no sooner saw the coast clear, than she took his sword, cut off his head, and carried it off in a bag to Bethulia, where she was received with applause and gratitude. In the morning the Assyrians found the dead body of Holofernes, and took to flight. F.C.

, the son of Solomon and the queen of Sheba, or Saba, having brought over from Jerusalem the books of the law of Moses, and many learned doctors, to instruct his people in the faith, established the succession of his family to the throne; and his people embracing the Jewish religion, remained in it till about the year 330 after Christ, or a few years later, when they received the Gospel; but the crown continued in the same family, as it has done till the present day, with only two interruptions, one of which is the subject of this article, in the tenth or eleventh century.

In one family of the Jews, an independent sovereignty had always been preserved on the mountain of Samen, and the royal residence was upon a high-pointed rock, called the Jew's Rock. Several other inaccessible mountains served as natural fortresses for these people, now grown very considerable, in consequence of accessions of strength from Palestine and Arabia, whence the Jews had been expelled. Gideon and Judith were then king and queen, and their daughter Judith (whom in Amhara they call Esther and sometimes Saat, i.e, fire),