Page:Buried cities and Bible countries (1891).djvu/163

 safe, therefore" (says Conder) "to look on this gorge as the scene of the wonderful escape of David, due to a sudden Philistine invasion, which terminated the history of his hair-breadth escapes in the South Country."

To return to Adullam. The famous hold where David collected "every one that was in distress and every one that was in debt, and every one that was discontented," was, according to Josephus, at the city called Adullam (Ant. vi. 12, 3). This city was one of the group of fifteen situated in the Shephelah or Lowlands (Josh. xv. 35). The term Shephelah is applied to the low hills of soft limestone which form a distinct district between the maritime plain and the central line of mountains. M. Clermont Ganneau was the first explorer who found the name Adullam still in use; but Major Conder also, on finding it among the names which Corporal Brophy had collected, set out to examine the site.

The great Valley of Elah (Wâdy es Sunt) is the highway from Philistia to Hebron; and divides the low hills of the Shephelah from the rocky mountains of Judah. Eight miles from the valley-head stands Shochoh, and Wâdy es Sunt is here a quarter of a mile across: just north of this ruin it turns round westward, and so runs, growing deeper and deeper, between the rocky hills covered with brush-wood, becoming an open vale of rich corn land, flanked by ancient fortresses, and finally debouching at the cliff of Tell es Safi. About 2½ miles south of the great angle near Shochoh there is a very large and ancient terebinth—it is from elah the "terebinth" tree that the valley gets its name—and near it are two ancient wells, with stone water-troughs round them. South of the ravine is a high rounded hill, almost isolated by valleys, and covered with ruins, a natural fortress, not unlike the well-known tells which occur lower down the valley of Elah. "This site seems to be ancient" (says Conder), "not