a site amidst the vineyards which surround Hebron on every side. Towns are not wanting whose names lend themselves to the identification. El-Kermel answers to Carmel of Judah

S. Kharbet-Kerma, &, presents no trace of springs and has only cisterns.*On the other hand, we find on the west-south-west of Hebron an assortment of places which seem to answer the conditions that the double name of Aïna and Karman indicates. On leaving Ras Kanáan, the Kanana of Seti (as Conder has shewn), we pass through a series of valleys, Oued el-Djouzjl, Oued Abou

veryواد المنشار ed el-ensharاد ابو رمان Roumman

fertile and very well cultivated. "The vine chiefly abounds there and prospers wonderfully. It festoons itself round all the trees and forms capricious garlands. The bunches while still green are very long and laden with enormous grapes which still swell much in ripening.... At twenty-five minutes past nine our direction inclined towards north-west. At forty-five minutes past nine another beautiful valley called Oued el-Kerm,, on account of its superb vineyards, displayed to our sight its verdant show of gigantic vines and fruit-trees. The walls of many enclosures which it contains are carefully kept up throughout. . . . At ten we arrive at the spring called 'Aïn esh-Shems, which is covered by an arched vault of ancient look. One goes down by many steps. At a small distance from this spring I observe an ancient wine-press, three-quarters full, composed of two basins cut in the rock. Turning to the right towards the south I soon meet with two fine cisterns hewn in the rock.... Beside these we find a second winepress like that which I have mentioned. Further on, in the same direction and amidst rich vineyards, a third antique wine-press, much more remarkable than the other two, drew my attention. The place they occupy is called Kharbét Serásir; they call it also by the name of Kharbét Daouïrbân, and it includes no other ruins than those of small habitations or towers scattered amidst the vines. A high hill very abrupt towards the south-west, and at a little distance, bears also the name of Daouïrbân. If a town was built formerly in this place it has been almost entirely effaced from the ground except some tombs hewn in the rock and several masses of stones

* Guérin, Judée, t. iii, pp. 370–371.

which may belong to demolished structures."* Some have wished to place here the Debîr of Judah, 77, but this opinion has not been admitted. It seems to me that Kharbét Sérásir answers well enough to the special conditions of our list. 'Aïn esh-Shems is the Aïna, Kharbét-Sérásir the Karman whose name may remain at Oued el-Karm. The spring ('Aïna) and the vineyard (Karmana) are near enough for the locality to have been called indifferently 'Aïna or Karman or 'Aïn-Karman. The hypothesis is so tempting that I cannot withhold myself from giving it.

This granted, I will seek the site of the three preceding numbers in the same region, between Doura and Hebron. And first I must call attention to the whole series of names as significant of a land well cultivated, for we have one upon another 'the meadow,'

A

'the gardens,'

from) מֶגְרָפוֹת

a vineyard,

This is, I believe, a proof that we are in a

very rich territory, and the name of Adora-Doura indicates the district of Hebron, the most fertile of all this region. From the order in which these places are enumerated, we may conclude that the first three are between Doura and Kharbét Serasir: unfortunately they have left no trace on modern ground. The names which follow Karman are not easier to identify. The presence of a new

Aubilou (No. 99) makes me believe that we are not far from
the central region of Judah, and this conjecture is confirmed
by the presence of
Tipounou (No. 98). This
last word corresponds, in fact, letter by letter with Thephon,
which is mentioned among the towns fortified by Judas
Maccabæus, and although we cannot identify this town,t

* Guérin, Judée, t. iii, pp. 260-261, 264.

+ E. de Rougé, Sur divers monuments, p. 58. The identification that I have proposed with Dimôn of Judah falls by the fact that never to my knowledge a Op in Egyptian transcribes a in Hebrew: Dimôn-Dibôn cannot answer to Tipounou, Dipounou.

M.

‡ The ordinary identification of Thephon with Tappuakh has the fault of taking no account of the final . For the same reason the comparison of Mariette between Tipounou and Tappoúakh (Lisles géographiques, p. 40) appears to me inadmissible.

1

there is a general agreement to place it in the parts with which we are at present concerned. The other towns

JEND 100), P

اله

Bitia (No. 97), 44-
Har-karo (No. 101), |=||

Iâkob-ilou (No. 102), 4A

Ierdou (No.

44

Kapouto (No. 103), do

not suggest to me any serious comparison, and I can add nothing to what I have already said some years ago.

*

From No. 104 to No. 119 the list carries us over the confines of Judea and Samaria. Δ

(No. 104), Gaziro

is Gezert, Tell-Djézer; then come, at a little interval from one another,

ת

Bierôtou (No. 109), Beeroth

(No. 114),

The

♫ of Benjamin, now el-Biréh, 4 Gebâou, Gebâ ya or Gibéah 2 of Benjamin. direction is sufficiently indicated by these three landmarks set from place to place. Rabbitou

(No. 105), Makerotou, Makelotou

(No. 106),

Δ 'Amekou (No. 107), appear to me as if they should be sought in the environs of Gézer. All these namest

מְקֵרָה or מִקְרָא from מקרוֹת רַבַּת ,are very regular in form

if the Egyptian py;

to, and ; none of them has survived.

(No. 108), Sarouti, Saroudi, Salouti, Saloudi, may be the original of the name Σıλadá, which the LXX. substitute for Iethlah, in the enumeration of the towns of Dan, and which Mr. Tyrwhitt Drake places at Shilta, a little northwest of Bethoron the Lower.t Between Bierôtou (No. 109) and Gebâou (No. 114) the list places four fresh names. The Bît-Shaîro, Bitshailou,

first (No. 110), II ) J }

* Notes, &c., Zeitschrift, 1881, p. 129; cfr. E. de Rougé, Sur divers Monu

ments, pp. 58-59.

+ The transcription of by Egyptian is proved, among others, by the spelling A

עזתי

I Quart. Stal., 1873, p. 101.

of the name of Gaza, ethn.

is that of a very important town:* we find it again with the

spelling in the Papyrus Anastasi No. 1, pl. xxii, 1. 8, and with the spelling at Gournah, under Seti I. The identifi

cation with, Beth-Shean, Scythopolis, which has been defended, especially by Chabas,‡ supposes a change of 1 into, which is not very admissible in the Egyptian transcription.§ Brugsch, on the other hand, has brought forward a reading Beth-Sheol, which M. de Rougé has not hesitated to adopt. The variants of the name prove that it is really a and not a final that the Egyptians meant: they wrote, in fact, in the Anastasi Papyrus III

with the same termination

Δ

that serves always

elsewhere to write the name of, ilou. It is then BîtShaîlou that we ought to read, and not Bîth-Shaîrou. The documents unfortunately furnish us no very precise information about this town. The Papyrus Anastasi No. 1 names it with a town of Diroka-îlou, or Diloka-ilou ¶ and seems to establish a connection between these two localities and the fords of Jordan; but the paragraph of the papyrus where we read this mention contains names of north and south, and the place which Bît-Shailou and Diroka-îlou occupy in the enumeration indicate nothing, if it be not that they are situated between Judæa and Galilee.

* The passages relating to this town were first brought together by Brugsch, Geogr. Inschriften, t. ii, pp. 40–41, 49–50.

+ Lepsius, Denkm. III., pl. 131a.

+ Voyage d'un Egyptien, pp. 203–205.

§ E. de Rougé, Sur divers monuments, p. 60.

p. 60.

Brugsch, G. Inc., II., pp. 40-41, 49–50; E. de Rougé, Sur divers monuments,

¶ Chabas (Voyage d'un Egyptien, p. 205) proposes to reverse the order of the signs, and read Kiriath-El, Civitas Dei. This inversion is so much the less needful as Δ is the transcription possible for two much used 1, arsit, flagravit, and 77, pedibus calcavit, 77, itio, iter. The two roots form names which have a very fit sense

roots,

Derek-el, or Dalak-el. The orthography Diroka

л

[Diloka]-flou is then perfectly legitimate and need not be changed.

The only fact which remains to us is that Bît-Shaîlou was an important town. I am then induced to admit as very probable the opinion of Mariette, according to which it will be Shiloh, the town of Ephraim.* Bêth-Shilo

בֵּית the house of rest, will have lost its initial בֵּית־שִׁילה -Ba'al בַּעַל מְעוֹן,Beth-Arbel בֵּית־אַרְבְּאֵל like "Apgaa from ,Gilgal בִּלְגָּל ,Beth-Ba'al-Meon בֵּית בַּעַל מְעוֹן Meon from

beside, and all the other towns of the same class

whose initial has lapsed.

No. 111 comes before us with two different spellings it is written Bit-Anati in two of the lists, Bit-Baniti in the third.† Bît - Anati

mm signifies the town of the goddess Anati, Anata, and the Egyptian transcription of the name of the goddess Anati by an initial is conformed to the Phoenician orthography where they wrote it as well as 740. On * the other hand, I am not convinced absolutely that the variant Bît-Baniti is an accidental fault of the copy. The goddess Anati-Anaïtis had her retinue of consecrated prostitutes, like all the Canaanite goddesses, and the name of Bit-Baniti in, the House of the daughters, applies well to her temple, or a town consecrated to her worship. The Egyptian scribes knew the languages that they spoke in Syria, and the variant of the third list is probably due to one of them who had personal knowledge of the Semitic religions. The Bît-Anatis could not have been rare in the land of Canaan: the Bible only mentions

בֵּית עֲנָת ,Beth-anoth in Judah בֵּית עֲנוֹת,two of them

Beth-anat in Nephtali; still they are both too remote for us to recognize our Bît-anati. The Levitical town of niny Anathoth, now 'Anata (is, may be an ancient Bît-Anati. The Jews had in fact modified, through horror of idolatry, the names into which the divinity Anati

* Mariette, Les listes géographiques, p. 42.

+ Recueil, t. viii, p. 96.

‡ Cfr. in a Carthaginian inscription of the Bibliothèque Nationale Bet-Anat, the temple of Anat. (Berger, L'exposition de la cour Caulaincourt au Louvre, p. 11).