Page:Folk-lore of the Holy Land.djvu/104

80 wall was built in the early part of the sixteenth century. Others have informed the writer that the monuments mark the graves of “ Mûjahedin,” or warriors of Islam, in the days either of Butkhtimnussur (Nebuchadnezzar) or of Salah-ed-din (Saladin), while still another story relates that the “wely” buried here was a namesake and contemporary of Salah-ed-din who was in charge of the gate when the Christians besieged the city, and when he fell in the battle, his severed head seized hold of his scimitar with its teeth, and kept the Christians off seven days and nights.

Concerning Nebuchadnezzar, it is related that long before the destruction of pre-exilic Jerusalem, Jeremiah or ’Ozair (Esdras), the prophet, knew him as a starving lad, afflicted with a scabby head, and covered with vermin. Having. foretold his future greatness, the prophet obtained from the youth a letter of “‘ Aman” or safety for himself and particular friends to be available at the time when the disasters predicted by the prophet should come upon the unhappy Beyt-el-Makdas. When, many years later, Jeremiah heard that the Babylonian hosts were actually on their way, he went down to Ramleh, presented the document to Bikhtinnussur, and claimed the protection promised. This was granted ;