Page:An Introduction to the Survey of Western Palestine.djvu/130

114 114 THE DEAD SEA WATERSHED.

cliffs at the outfall of the wady into the Dead Sea. As far as Beni N'aim this boundary divides the basin from Wady el Khulil, which includes the city of Hebron, and runs by Beer- sheba to Wady Ghuzzeh, entering the Mediterranean Sea near Gaza.

The Watercourses of el 'Areijeh Basin.

A large and elevated plateau is enclosed at the head of the basin, between the waterparting and a long ridge extend- ing from Kh. el 'Addeiseh to Bir ez Zaferan (alt. 3,000 feet), and Kanan ez Zaferan to the Wady el 'Arrub, which divides the northern end of the ridge from a spur coming to meet it from the northern waterparting at Khurbet Tekua (alt. 2,788 feet). It may be called the plateau of el 'Arrub.

This plateau approaches the form of an equilateral triangle with sides of six or seven miles long. Its main wady and outlet is Wady el 'Arrub, which rises in the north-western extremity of the basin, near Safa. It receives on its right bank all the wadys descending from the western edge of the basin, including (1) Wady Marrina between Kh. Marrina and Kh. Beit Sh'ar; (2) Wady el'Arab, and (4), Wady esh Sheikh, from Beit Ummar, Kh. Kuffin, and Beit Zata ; (5) Wady esh Shinnar, from Beit Sur and the northern side of Hullul ; (6) Wady Siair, and (7) Wady ez Zaferan, from the south side of Hullul, and the villages of Siair and esh Shuikh. On its left bank it receives the outlet of a group of wadys descending from an enclosure between the north waterparting and a spur from it following the left bank of Wady el 'Arrub, on which Beit Fejjar (alt. 3,170 feet) is situated. These include (1), Wady er Eai, (2) Wady Bir el Khanzir, (3) Wady Beit Fejjar (separated by Eai and Khanzir from the village of that name), and (4) Wady Marah el Ajd. These fall into (5) Wady Eekeban, which empties itself at el Meniyeh into Wady el 'Arrub, where that wady discharges itself from the plateau into the long and rocky gorge of Wady el Jihar and Wady el Ghar.

From the gorge of el Jihar and el Ghar, the main wady