Page:Buried cities and Bible countries (1891).djvu/118

 And then the northern boundary is known without description. If this rendering holds good, then Gomorrah was north-west of the Dead Sea, on a line joining Gaza with Sodom; and the boundary of the Canaanites, after reaching Gomorrah, touched Admah and Zeboim, and continued northward to the grotto at Banias.

Zeboim means "hyenas," and is identical with the Arabic Dub'a. For this reason Conder asks whether it may not have been situated at the cliff just above the plain, near the site of Roman Jericho, for that is now called Shakh ed Dub'a, "lair of the Hyena." If I am right in my reading of Gen. x. 19, Zeboim should be northward of Admah—unless two names so often coupled together may have their order transposed. Grove reminds us that the Valley of Zeboim (the name spelt a little differently) was a ravine or gorge apparently east of Michmas, described in 1 Sam. xiii. 18. It appears to be overlooked in the discussion that Zeboim is mentioned in Nehemiah xi. 34, in the same group with Hadid, Lod, and Ono, among the places occupied by the children of Benjamin, while in Neh. vii. 37, these three places are named between Jericho and Senaah. But if the Lod in this passage is to be regarded as Lydda in the Plain of Sharon, the grouping of the places affords us no guidance.

Sodom alone, as Conder goes on to say, remains without a suggestion, and he finds no trace of it west of the Jordan. He notes, however, that the word Siddim is apparently the same with the Arabic Sidd, which is used in a peculiar sense by the Arabs of the Jordan Valley as meaning "cliffs" or banks of marl, such as exist along the southern edge of the plains of Jericho, the ordinary meaning being "dam" or obstruction. Thus the Vale of Siddim might well, so far as its name is concerned, have been situated in the vicinity of the northern shores of the Dead Sea.

Dr Selah Merrill, in his "East of the Jordan," also discusses the site of the Cities of the Plain. He says:—"Since Zoar