Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume II.djvu/42

 26 JERUSALEM. on the sloping side of a hill, and the streets ^vere furnished with raised pavements, alone; which some of the passengers walked on high, while others kept the lower path,— a precaution adopted to secure those who were purified from the pollution which contact with anything unclean could have occa- sioned The place, too, was well adapted for mercantile pursuits, and abomided in artificers of various crafts. Its market was supplied with spicery, gold, and precious stones, by the Arabs, in whose neighbouring mountains there had formerly been mines of copper and iron, but the works had been abandoned during the Persian domination, in conse- quence of a representation to the government that they must prove ruinously expensive to the country. It was also richly furnished with all such articles as are imported by sea, since it had commodious harbours — as Ascalon, Joppa, Gaza, and Ptolemais, from none of which it was far distant." (Aristeas, ap. Gallandii Bihlioth. Vet. Pat. tom. ii. pp. 805, &c.) The truthfulness of this description is not affected by the authorship; there is abundance of evidence, internal and external, to prove that it was written by one who had actually visited the Jewish capital during the times of the Ptolemies (cir. B.C. 250). The Seleucidae of Asia were not behind the Pto- lemies in their favours to the Jews ; and the peace and prosperity of the city suffered no material dimi- nution, while it was handed about as a marriage dowry, or by the chances of war, between the rivals, until internal factions subjected it to the dominion of Antiochus Epiphanes, whose tyranny crushed for a time the civil and ecclesiastical polity of the nation (b. c. 175). The Temple was stripped of its costly sacred vessels, the palaces burned, the city walls demolished, and an idol-altar raised on the very altar of the Temple, on which daily sacrifices of swine were offered. This tyranny resulted in a vigorous national revolution, which secured to the Jews a greater amount of independence than they had enjoyed subsequently to the captivity. This continued, under the Asmonean princes, until the con- quest of the country by the Romans: from which time, though nominally subject to a native prince, it was virtually a mere dependency, and little more tlian a province, of the Roman empire. Once again before this the city was recaptured by Antiochus Sidetes, during the reign of John Hyrcanus (cir. 135), when the city walls, which had been restored by Judas, were again levelled with the ground. 4. The capture of the city by Pompey is recorded by Strabo, and was the first considerable event that fixed the attention of the classical writers on the city (b.c. 63). He ascribes the intervention of Pompey to the disputes of the brothers Hyrcanus and Aristobulus, the sons of Alexander Jannaeus, wlio first assumed regal power. He states that the conqueror levelled the fortifications when he had taken the city, which he did by filling up an enor- mous fosse which defended the Temple on the north side. The particulars of the siege are more fully given by Josepluis, who states that Pompey entered the Holy of Holies, but abstained from the sacred treasures of the Temple, which were plundered by Crassus on his way to Parthia (b. c. 54). The struggle for power between Antigonus, the son of Aristobulus, and Herod, the son of Antipater, led to the sacking of the city by the Parthians, whose aid had been sought by the former (b. c. 40). Herod, having been appointed king by the senate, only JERUSALEJI. secured possession of his capital after a long siege, in which he was assisted by Sosius, Antony's lieu- tenant, and the Roman legionaries. Jlention has been already made of the palace in the Tpper City and the fortress Antonia, erected, or enlarged and beautified, by Herod. He also undertook to restore the Temple to a state of magnificence that should rival the gloiy of Solomon's ; and a particular de- scription is given of this work by the Jewish his- torian {Ant. XV. 11.) The erection of a theatre and circus, and the institution of quinquennial games in honour of the emperor, went far to conform his city to a pagan capital. On the death of Herod and the banishment of his son Archelaus, Judaea was reduced to a Roman province, within the praefecture of Syria, and subject to a subordinate governor, to whom was intrusted the power of life and death. His ordinary residence at Jerusalem was the fortress Antonia; but Caesarea now shared with Jerusalem the dig- nity of a metropolis. Coponius was the first procu- rator (a. d. 7), under the praefect Cyrenius. The only pennanent monument left by the procurators is the aqueduct of Pontius Pilate (a. d. 26 — 36), constructed with the sacred Corban, which he seized for that purpose. This aqueduct still exists, and conveys the water from the Pools of Solomon to the Mosk at Jerusalem {Holy City, vol. ii. pp. 498 — 501 ). The particulars of the siege by Titus, so fully de- tailed by Josephus, can only be briefly alluded to. It occupied nearly 100,000 men little short of five months, h.aving been commenced on the 14th of Xanthicus (April), and terminated with the cap- ture and conflagration of the Upper City on the 8th of Gorpeius (September). This is to be ac- counted for by the fact that, not only did each of the three walls, but also the Fortress and Temple, require to be taken in detail, so that the operations involved five distinct sieges. The general's camp was established close to the Psephine Tower, with one lesion, the twelfth; the tenth was encamped near the summit of Mount Olivet : the fifth oppo- site to the Hippie Tower, two stadia distant from it. The first assault was made apparently between the towers Hippicits and Psephinus, and the outer wall was carried on the fifteenth day of the the siege. This new wall of Agrippa was im- mediately demoHshed, and Titus encamped within the New City, on the traditional camping-ground of the Assyrians. Five days later, the second wall was carried at its northern quarter, but the Romans were repulsed, and only recaptured it after a stout resistance of three days. Four banks were then raised, — two against Antonia, and two against the northern wall of the Upper City. After seventeen days of incessant toil the Romans discovered that their banks had been undermined, and their engines were destroyed by fire. It was then resolved to siuTound the city with a wall, so as to form a complete blockade. The line of circumvallation, 39 furlongs in circuit, with thirteen redoubts equal to an additional 1 furlongs, was completed in three days. Four fresh banks were raised in twenty-one days, and the Antonia was carried two months after the occupation of the Lower City. Another month elapsed before they could succeed in gaining the Inner Sanctuary, when the Temple was accidentally fired by the Roman soldiers. The Upper City still held out. Two banks were next raised against its eastern wall over against the Temple. This occu- pied eighteen days ; and the Upper City was at length carried, a month after the Inner Sanctuary.