(The first part of this chapter glances at the seacoast district between Tyre and Acre, dwelling especially on the “Ladder of Tyre” — the name of a famous promontory, near Acre, traversed by a road cut out of the cliff. Then an account is given of the road to Acre from another point, Rumeish, noticed in last chapter, a considerable distance to the northeast; lastly we are introduced to Acre itself. ED.)
March 12Th
Road From Tyre to Acre
While we are quietly passing over this broad and fertile plain of Acre toward Jiddin, I call for your adventures after we parted at Rumeîsh last Saturday. The account of that ride can soon be given; but let me remind you first, that by taking the interior route by Banias, we have missed the entire road from Tyre over the “Ladder” to Acre.
I can easily fill up that gap. The road follows the shore south of Tyre for two hours to the Nahr Uzzîyeh, where are the remains of an old Roman bridge. This stream rises near Kefr Buri'am, passes by the site of Hazor under the name of Wady el Aiyûn, and thence to the sea by a tortuous, wild, and wooded gorge, like those we have looked into in other parts of Naphtali. Fifteen minutes farther is a well called Medfeneh, south of which are ruins scattered along the shore, with no other name than that of the well; but just at the foot of the “Ladder” is el Hŭmra, a very ancient site, probably, of a castle built to command the pass.
Ladder of Tyre
The Ladder — the Promontorium Album of the geographers — is a path cut in the cliff overhanging the sea for about a mile, and rising two hundred feet above its surface. It makes even a bold man nervous to look down where the waves dash against the perpendicular rocks, and groan and bellow through the hollow caverns. The direction of the pass is east and west, and the mountain rises boldly overhead several hundred feet, in cliffs of white indurated marl, interlaced with seams of dark-colored flint. If you watch closely you will always see timid conies creeping about on these cliff's. At the end of the pass the road turns south for a mile to the ruins of Scanderûna, the Alexandroschene of the ancients; there is nothing about them, however, indicative of an age older than the times of the Crusaders. William of Tyre, in his History, lib. 11, sect. 29-30, gives an account of the repairing of this place in A.D. 1116 by Baldwin; but he derives its name from Alexander the Great, and native tradition ascribes the road over the Ladder to the same hand; but there was a road there long before Alexander's day, and many others besides him have repaired it.
There are many specimens of Roman road in this vicinity, and a fountain of delicious water flows out near the shore, most grateful to the weary traveler along this desolate coast: no doubt the ancient city owed its existence to this fountain. A mile farther south stands a solitary column on the hill side, marking the site of a ruined temple and forsaken city.
Em El Amed
The place is now called Em el 'Amed (mother of columns), and the remains are extensive, spreading up the valley — broken columns, prostrate houses, sarcophagi, and rock tombs. The Wady HamAl comes down from Alma to the sea at this point, but the road up it is nearly impracticable, from the dense jungle of bushes, briers, and ruins which choke this romantic valley. An aqueduct once led the water from Neba Hamûl to Em el 'Allied, but it has long since been broken. One may at least start the inquiry whether this may not be the Amad given to Asher by Joshua (Josh. 19:2626And Alammelech, and Amad, and Misheal; and reacheth to Carmel westward, and to Shihor-libnath; (Joshua 19:26)).
Khan En NakûRa
The coast from this place bends southwest for thirty minutes to Khan en Nakûra, east of which is a village of the same name; and on the shore stands one of St. Helen's towers, in good preservation, tenanted by flocks below, and hawks and owls above. From this khan the road lies along the shore westward for a mile, and then rising over Cape en Nakûra, descends deeply to the sea, where the mountain terminates in bold and picturesque precipices. After crossing a wady on an old Roman bridge half broken away, the path amends by a most villanous track for half an hour, to the ancient tower called Musheirifeh.
Scala Tyrionum
The entire cape is about seven miles across, and has three distinct promontories: the first, the real Ladder, or Scala Tyrionum, which does not project into the sea more than a mile beyond the general line of the coast; the second is Ras en Nakûra; and the last is Ras el Musheirifeh, which is the highest of all, and shows boldest toward the sea, and hence has been often confounded with the true “Scala.”
MusheîRifeh. Misrephoth
This Musheirifeh, with the noble fountains at its base of the same name, I am disposed to indentify with the Misrephothmaim (waters of Misrephoth), to which that part of the Canaanitish host which came from Dor, etc., fled from the battle of Merom (Josh. 11:88And the Lord delivered them into the hand of Israel, who smote them, and chased them unto great Zidon, and unto Misrephoth-maim, and unto the valley of Mizpeh eastward; and they smote them, until they left them none remaining. (Joshua 11:8)); and I do this, notwithstanding the contradictory renderings of these words in the margin of our Bibles, and all other philological criticisms whatsoever. The ancient and modern names are nearly identical in form, and I believe in signification, and both were suggested by the bright and glowing color of those magnificent cliffs which overhang the sea; and any one who will study the route which the division of Jabin's army that came from Dor must have taken to escape Joshua's troops and reach home, will see that this is the spot where they would most likely first find a safe and convenient halting-place on the shore. The difficult pass, commanded by a castle, where the present Burj stands, would be an effectual barrier against their enemies; and the plain below, in possession of Achzib, which the Jews did not subdue, would afford a delightful place for them to rest and refresh themselves after the fatigues of that disastrous day. Let Musheirifeh, therefore, stand for Misrephoth.
Strange Inscription
Below the old castle are picturesque caves, into which the waves tumble with tremendous uproar, and above one of them is a long inscription. I once descended the face of the cliff to the shore, and by creeping along a shelf of the rock several hundred feet long, and not more than six inches wide, I got within a few yards of this inscription. I had tried to reach it by boat several times, but the sea was always too rough. The result of this closer study left me in doubt whether, after all, it was not one of those unaccountable freaks of Nature, whose hand seems occasionally to sketch and scribble on the wild cliffs of the mountains, as if on purpose to puzzle antiquarian savants. If writing it be, there was a surface about fifteen feet square covered with some fifty lines, of the same length originally, but many of them now partially worn away. It is either Cufic of a very large pattern, and somewhat involved, or it is Egyptian hieroglyphics — possibly placed there when the kings of Egypt held Ptolemais, Ibrahim Pasha, the latest Egyptian potentate in possession of Acre, came to this place in a boat with a company of French savants, but neither could they get near enough to make anything out of it. If it is a freak of Nature, it is one of the strangest, and, at any rate, I hope some man of means and leisure will ere long solve the mystery. He should have two boats, with ladders, and means to suspend a scaffolding of some sort or other down the face of the cliff; and, above all, the day must be absolutely calm.
I found thousands of petrified star-fish mingled in the white rock of the cliffs, like colossal plums in a mountain of pudding. They seemed to be about equally diffused through the entire thickness of the cape. The rock is intensely hard, and white as snow.
Zip Achzib
From the fountains at the foot of Musheîrifeh it is an hour to Zib, the modern representative of ancient Achzib (Josh. 19:2727And turneth toward the sunrising to Beth-dagon, and reacheth to Zebulun, and to the valley of Jiphthah-el toward the north side of Beth-emek, and Neiel, and goeth out to Cabul on the left hand, (Joshua 19:27)), the Ecdippa of Roman geographers. The River Krum enters the sea near Zîb. The village stands on a mound, mainly of rubbish; and it has evident traces of antiquity about it, though it could never have been a large city. The shore opens into small creeks, which afford a partial shelter for boats; and this was probably the reason for building a city at this point. A grove of palm-trees, sheltering pyramids of bee-hives, will attract attention as the traveler hastens on to join the regular road to Acre at el Mŭzrah, where he will be sure to rest and regale himself with oranges, good water, and fine scenery. He will there have an excellent view of the great aqueduct which conveys water from Kabery to Acre. In half an hour more he will be at the Behajeh, the delightful but dilapidated palace of Abdallah Pasha, which our friend Jimmal has just purchased for sixty thousand piasters. This is two miles from Acre. The whole distance from Tyre is about twenty-eight miles. And now for your story.
Kutamone.
Well, after parting from you at Rumeish, we ascended a wady southward, called Kutamone, for half an hour, to a fountain, with an old castle on the hill east of it, all of the same name. The country thereabouts is densely wooded, and extremely beautiful, and, on that morning at least, alive with flocks and herds under the care of their shepherds. It also abounds, I was told, with leopards, wolves, wild boars, gazelles, doves, partridges, and almost every variety of birds found in this country. It was once densely peopled, too; for Mohammed, who seemed to be perfectly at home there, gave me a long list of ruins with outlandish names, which I did not venture to write.
Wady El KŭRn
We climbed out of Wady Kutamone by a steep path through most charming oak groves, and immediately descended into another, called Bukra, which united below with Wady el Mon. From the top of the next ridge we saw a castle called Deir, but as it lay out of our line to the west, we did not visit it.
I did on one of my trips through that region, and found two villages, in both of which are remains of antiquity. The full name is Deir el Kasy, to distinguish it from another Deir farther south. The eastern part of the place is mainly built within an ancient fort, some four hundred feet square, in its present form apparently Saracenic. From thence I descended into Wady el Kŭrn, down a romantic path some fourteen hundred feet, and then toiled out of it again to Tarshîha — a feat which took me two hours to accomplish.
We looked into it, and wisely kept round to the east, where it is less profound, and, passing Harfush, came to a considerable place, whose name I spelled Sehemoita. We now had Tarshiha in a vale to the northwest of us; and in an hour more we stopped to rest and lunch at Yanoah, which I took to be very ancient. Descending from thence to the plain, we reached Acre just before sunset, having been nine hours in the saddle. Thus ends my brief story.
And in good time, for we now commence to climb the mountain to Jiddin, whose castle sits proudly above us, as if in defiance of all enemies, and the nature of the path forbids further conversation.
’Amkah or Emek
Castle of Jiddin
Here we are at last, before the castle of Jiddin; no great affair after all, and far from equaling the promise that beckoned us on from the plain. This is owing to its position on the bold swell of the mountain facing the sea, and with deep wadies on both sides. This modern castle was obviously built on the site of one more ancient, and was, no doubt, an important place. Dr. Robinson suggests that this wady may be the Jiphthah-el mentioned by Joshua as belonging to Asher; but I think this can scarcely be so. Jiphthah-el was farther south.
The castle need not detain us long. In its present form it was built by Dahr el 'Amer, who preceded Jezzar Pasha in Acre — about a hundred years ago. It is like that of Shem'a, except that here there are more traces of antiquity. It is not easy to see any motive for building a castle at this spot. The position is not strong, and there is neither great road nor village, nor even a fountain of water near it. The view over the plain, however, is most beautiful, and it might have been designed as a sort of health — retreat for the pashas in those days when castles were necessary to safety. Like all other castles in Syria, this has been suffered to fall into decay, and the only inhabitants are these crabbed and sinister Arabs, their flocks, and their dogs. These invite us to be gone, and so does the declining sun, for if we return to Acre by Kabery, we have no time to spare.
Waar Yaar, or Forest
The path leads down the mountains diagonally toward the northwest, over a wild rocky region for fifty minutes. Such tracts are called waar by the Arabs, and the same word occurs very often in the Bible, and doubtless it indicates the same sort of country. Thus David, at the instance of the prophet Gad, departed from the hold of Mizpeh of Moab, and came into the “forest” (yaar or waar) of Hareth (1 Sam. 22:55And the prophet Gad said unto David, Abide not in the hold; depart, and get thee into the land of Judah. Then David departed, and came into the forest of Hareth. (1 Samuel 22:5)). And again: the great battle against Absalom was in the “wood” (par) of Ephraim; and this yaar devoured more people that day than the sword devoured (2 Sam. 18:6-86So the people went out into the field against Israel: and the battle was in the wood of Ephraim; 7Where the people of Israel were slain before the servants of David, and there was there a great slaughter that day of twenty thousand men. 8For the battle was there scattered over the face of all the country: and the wood devoured more people that day than the sword devoured. (2 Samuel 18:6‑8)). These waars are not pleasant, open forests, for the ground is too rocky for that — rocks piled in horrid confusion, and covered with prickly oak and other thorny coppice, which confound the unhappy traveler who gets entangled among them. The natives, when they wish to deter you from attempting a given road, shout in your ear Waar, waar, with a harsh, guttural emphasis, which bitter experience has taught me always to respect. Nothing is more impracticable than these stony, thorny waars, and I can readily believe that such a “wood” would devour more of a routed army than the sword of the victors. And now, escaped from our own waar, we descend into this beautiful vale of Kŭzrone which conies rambling down from Tarshiha and M'alia. In the cliffs higher up the country a little animal abounds, called senanûr, a kind of marten, not found anywhere else in Syria, I am told. What rich fields of wheat! and they spread down the widening wady to Kabery yonder on the edge of the plain.
Fountains
There are two great fountains in the village, one of which is led directly into the aqueduct, and never pauses until it reaches the courts in Acre. The other is elevated in a birkeh, like those at Ras el 'Ain, and drives the mills that are built against it. The cluster of hamlets below bears the name of Nahr (river), and abounds in mills, orchards, and vegetable gardens.
Aqueduct
Near it is seen the line of an ancient aqueduct, covered with immense masses of tufa, which not only proclaim the antiquity of the work, but also inform us that this water, like that at Ras el 'Ain, is far from pure. The people say that this aqueduct was built by Jezzar Pasha, and destroyed by Bonaparte — both incorrect. It was a ruin ages before Jezzar, and Bonaparte never destroyed such works. It can be traced along under Sheikh Daûd and Ghabsîyeh, and thence in a direct line toward Acre. The present aqueduct was made, it is said, by
Suleiman Pasha, and is therefore not fifty years old. This is doubtful; he perhaps only repaired it. It runs much lower down the plain than the ancient canal. This entire region, both in the plain and on the mountains, is full of ruins, which I once examined, but they are not historically important, so far as is known, and we have no time to devote to them today.
The distance from this to Acre is not far from ten miles, and my aneroid gives one hundred and seventy feet as the elevation above the sea — quite sufficient to carry the water over the walls, and to the tops of the highest houses in the city.
Bussa
We shall return by Bussa, and thus take a look into the northwest corner of this great plain. It abounds in antiquities beyond most parts even of this land of ruins. We shall find the explanation of these old quarries on the hill above us. This daughter of Jabal says those nearest remains are called Shwoizerîyeh — a very hard word, and apparently foreign.
Why call this curly-headed Bedawy by that name?
The Bible says that Jabal was the father of such as dwell in tents, and of such as have cattle (Gen. 4:2020And Adah bare Jabal: he was the father of such as dwell in tents, and of such as have cattle. (Genesis 4:20)). Now she dwells in one of those goat-hair tents on the mountain side, and she is tending this drove of poverty-smitten cattle. This Biblical form of expression is very common. Any one who should now invent tents, or the custom of living in tents, would be called the father not only of tents, but also of tent-dwelling; indeed the Arabs call a person distinguished for any peculiarity the father of it. Thus, a man with an uncommon beard is named abu dŭkn — father of a beard; and I have often beard myself called abu tangera — father of a saucepan — because the boys in the street fancied that my hat resembled that black article of kitchen furniture. And now we are among the ruins of Shwoizerîyeh: look closely to your path if you would not plunge headlong into an old cistern. These ancient sites are perfectly honeycombed with them. This entire region above us is covered with ruined sites, among which I have spent days of agreeable excitement, first and last; but there are no names of historic notoriety, and therefore we shall pass them by without notice.
Tall Column
We will now cross this Wady el Kŭrn, and ride up to that column, which stands like a solitary sentinel of by-gone generations. It has maintained its lonely watch over the plain for at least two thousand years. The shaft is composed of ten pieces, each three feet thick, and hence it is thirty feet long, standing on a base ten feet high and nine feet square. The entire elevation of this singular column is therefore forty feet, and it is sixteen feet in circumference. Of course it must have had a statue or something else on the top, to give it symmetry, but what that was, and how high, no one can tell; nor when, by whom, or for what it was erected. Those who sought to immortalize their names or deeds by it have utterly failed. This column is now called Hŭmsîn, and also Minawat, from this collection of ruins in its neighborhood. Scattered over this hill side below the column are the remains of a large town, but without a name. From this to Bŭssa is a little more than half an hour, but we shall not go any farther than to this very ancient site, called 'Ammarîyeh, from which much of the stone used in building Bŭssa has been quarried.
Extreme Antiquity
They are at it even now, and you see in this spot a striking proof of extreme antiquity. These men are digging out old foundations many feet deep in the soil, beneath an aged olive-tree which they are undermining. Now these houses were ancient ruins, buried thus deep under rubbish before this olive could have been planted, and the tree itself is many hundred years old. There is another very large ruin in the valley east of Bŭssa, called Masûba, from which marble slabs and sarcophagi are also quarried, some of which have Greek inscriptions. And still farther up the country are other sites of ancient places, which I have examined on former occasions. The path to Alma leads over that rocky mountain to the northeast, and it takes about an hour and a quarter to reach it. But now for Acre; and we shall find ourselves shut out, unless we put our steeds to the gallop, for the gate closes at sun-set, and waits for no man.
How have you spent your time in Acre?
Acre – Few Biblical Notices
When not confined to the house by rain, I have been searching round the ruins of this famous fortress, and looking into its singular history. I find very few notices of it in the Bible. In Judges 1:3131Neither did Asher drive out the inhabitants of Accho, nor the inhabitants of Zidon, nor of Ahlab, nor of Achzib, nor of Helbah, nor of Aphik, nor of Rehob: (Judges 1:31) it is said that Asher did not “drive out the inhabitants of Accho”; which not only ascertains the fact of its existence at that early age, but also that it belonged to Asher, and was too strong to be subdued by that tribe. It is often mentioned in the apocryphal books under the name of Ptolemais, given to it by Ptolemy Soter; and in Acts 21:77And when we had finished our course from Tyre, we came to Ptolemais, and saluted the brethren, and abode with them one day. (Acts 21:7), we read that Paul visited it on his way from Tyre to Cæsarea. These are all the Biblical notices I could find.
History
And they include the whole; but a place so celebrated in general history is worthy of study for its own sake, as well as for the rank it so long held as the chief city on this coast. But it would take a volume to trace out its manifold vicissitudes and various fortunes, a work we must leave to historians and antiquarians. That extraordinary young man, Hadrian Reland, has culled out of ancient authors nearly everything that has come down to our time about Acre, and you will find it in his Palestina Illustrate. Perhaps the best modern compend of her history is that of Dr. Kitto, in his Biblical Cyclopædia.
Errors of Kitto
The article on Acre seems to have been written by himself, and, notwithstanding the care and research bestowed upon it, he has fallen into some singular blunders. He says that the mountains of Anti-Lebanon are seen at the distance of about four leagues to the north! North of Acre there is nothing but the sea, and no part of Anti-Lebanon can be seen from it, and if it could, it would be ten leagues instead of four. The bay of Acre is about three leagues wide, as he says; but “two leagues in depth” is a very equivocal expression. If he means to measure from the extreme northwestern point of the base of Carmel to the mouth of the Kishon, it may be four miles, but at Acre the distance inward is not two. Dr. Kitto is also mistaken in supposing that the vaults mentioned by Mr. Now were “designed to afford cool underground retreats to the inhabitants during the heat of the day in summer.” No such practice is known on this coast. The heat does not require it, and the climate is so moist that even upper rooms, if not constantly ventilated, become quickly covered with mold, and are unfit to live in. It is true that at Bagdat, Mosul, and other places along the valley of the Tigris, the houses are constructed with a sort of cellars called surdab, to which the inhabitants retreat during the day; but then the air is extremely dry there, and the thermometer ranges thirty degrees higher than on this coast. In this country, however, castles, and nearly all sorts of buildings, are erected on large vaults, and these lower apartments in dwelling-houses are used for winter, not for summer. As soon as the heat begins, the family reopen the upper story, which has been partially deserted during the cold months. Such speculations as the above mislead, and should be corrected; they are in flat contradiction to facts.
The Summer and Winter House
Jeremiah speaks of a winter house in which Jehoiakim sat in the ninth month, with a fire before him on the hearth (Jer. 36:2222Now the king sat in the winterhouse in the ninth month: and there was a fire on the hearth burning before him. (Jeremiah 36:22)); and Amos mentions both winter and summer houses (Amos 3:1515And I will smite the winter house with the summer house; and the houses of ivory shall perish, and the great houses shall have an end, saith the Lord. (Amos 3:15)). Such language is easily understood by an Oriental. In common parlance, the lower apartments are simply el beit — the house; the upper is the ulliyeh, which is the summer house. Every respectable dwelling has both, and they are familiarly called belt shetawy and belt seîfy — winter and summer house. If these are on the same story, then the external and airy apartment is the summer house, and that for winter is the interior and more sheltered room. It is rare to meet a family that has an entirely separate dwelling for summer. King Jehoiakim was therefore sitting in one of the inner apartments of his palace, I suppose, when he cut up Jeremiah's prophetic roll with his penknife, and cast it into the fire.
Sieges
A host of travelers have spoken of Acre, and such works on the Crusades as Michaud's six volumes of rather confused annals enter largely into her fortunes during the Middle Ages. It was the last point surrendered by the Knights of St. John, from whom it took the name of St. Jean d'Acre. They gave it up to the Sultan of Egypt in A.D. 1291, and thus ended the anomalous and wonderful kingdom of the Franks in Palestine. During my time it was besieged for six months by Ibrahim Pasha, and when I visited it soon after he had taken it, the whole place was a mass of ruins. But he immediately set about repairing and fortifying it, and continued this work during the whole time he held possession of Syria. It was blown to pieces by the British fleet on November 3rd, 1840, and again have the walls and castles been repaired with great industry, and are now stronger, perhaps, than ever. But much of the interior is in ruins, and will probably remain so, at least until a change of dynasty brings in better times.
Fortifications
I have been round the fortifications, and estimate their circuit at about two and a half miles. They seem to me to be skillfully planned, and very substantial; but as any number of ships can bring their cannon to bear upon it, the guns on the walls can he silenced at once by overwhelming odds. This was done by Stopford and Napier in 1840. The number of pieces of all sorts is nearly 400, but most of them are of a very inferior character, and the carriages are old and rickety. They would he of very little service in actual combat. On a very large bronze cannon, commanding the harbor, is this somewhat satirical motto: “'Ultima ratio regum.” Alas! when they begin their “last argument,” angels weep, Death on his pale horse goes forth to slay, and hell follows after to devour.
Only a Military Place
The fortifications on the land side are almost concealed by admirably-constructed glacis without and beyond the deep ditch which runs round the wall. The piercings for cannon are so placed as to sweep every approach; and if Ibrahim Pasha had been permitted to complete the fosse, by which he intended to make Acre an island, by joining the sea from the northwest of the city to the bay at the southeast of it, the defenses would have been nearly impregnable. The distance across is small, as the sea comes round the northwest corner for a considerable part of the way. In fact, Acre has the bay on the southeast and south, and the sea on the west and northwest; a position well adapted for a strong fort, which has always been its distinguishing characteristic, and is so now. It has no source of life or prosperity but what is dependent on its military occupation, and its manners and municipal regulations are governed by the rigid laws of war. There is but one gate on the land side, skillfully placed at the water's edge on the southeast angle and strongly defended. A sea gate leads to the shipping in the harbor; and both are shut at sunset. To one coming toward Acre across the plain, its surface seems considerably elevated above the general level, and the appearance is rather imposing. This elevation is owing to the accumulation of rubbish during its long life of wars, desolations, and reconstructions. The modern city, with all its works, stands on the ruins of many generations.
Environs
At the summer palace of Abdallah Pasha, called el Behajeh, are some gardens and olive groves. A few palms and other trees are seen at Tell el Fakhar, a short distance southeast of the gate, and some fruit orchards and vegetable gardens are cultivated along the low banks of the Naamany. Otherwise the surroundings of Acre are very naked and uninteresting. It was not always so, even in modern times, if we are to believe the travelers who have spoken of it. Three things act together to keep down Acre: its military character, the unhealthiness of the climate, and the shallowness and insecurity of the harbor.
Khaifa a Rival
Khaifa is, to a great degree, free from these drawbacks, and will probably lead away nearly all the trade from Acre. Indeed, it has done this already, and the merchants who reside in Acre are obliged to have their houses for business in Khaifa.
In the distribution of the land made by Joshua, Acre was given to Asher. Can you draw the boundary of this tribe with any degree of certainty Not at all. It had Carmel, which seems to have belonged, in part at least, to Zebulun, on the south, Naphtali on the east, and the sea-board on the west.
But we must leave a large uncertain margin between what we know belonged to Naphtali, and what was certainly the territory of Asher. And so also Asher and Zebulun met in the valley of Jiphthah-el, which may have been this wady of the Kishon; but this is quite uncertain.
Boundaries of Tribes: How Irregular
The reason why the boundaries of the different tribes were so eccentric originally, and are now so difficult to follow, was, that the “lots” were not meted out according to geographical lines, but lands of certain cities lying more or less contiguous were assigned to each tribe as its inheritance. These cities were the capitals of small principalities or districts, just as Tibnin, and Hŭnin, and Bint Jebail, and so on, are now. The territory of one might extend far to the east of the city, that of the next to the west, and so on. Suppose two such cities on the eastern border of Asher, for example: the line might lie along the edge of the plain of Acre, and thus include all the land belonging to the first, and then it must be drawn eastward far up the mountains in a most eccentric compass to embrace all the territory appertaining to the next, and so on throughout.
Asher
Thus it is possible that Cahill, and 'Umka, and Cosa, and Kanah, all lay along the eastern border of Asher. And thus it would happen that a village on the border of the plain would belong to Naphtali, and the next one, far east and on the mountains, to Asher. The coast was in the hands of Acre, Achzib, Tyre, and Sidon, which the Asherites could never conquer. There remains, therefore, generally the hills sloping toward the sea, with so much of the plains as they could subdue. Josephus is even more indefinite than Joshua. He says, “The tribe of Aser had that part which was called the valley, for such it was, and all that part which lay over against Sidon. The city Aser belonged to their share, which is also named Actipus.” Now there is no valley to correspond to this description.
Boundaries
The plain of Acre is full twenty miles long, and the upper part of this, with the eastern hills, we know formed a large part of Asher's “lot.” But a plain is not a valley. Farther north they doubtless possessed the great promontory called the Ladder of Tyre, which is about a thousand feet high and eight miles across, and was crowded with towns and cities as it is now with ruins. Still farther on, in the same direction, they had what is called Sahil Kanah — the plain of Kanah — including the hills and the eastern margin of the plain of Tyre to the River Kasimieh, in length about sixteen miles, and in breadth probably not more than eight. If they crossed the Kasimieh so as to possess the parts over against Sidon, as Josephus says, then they had the hill country now called Shumar, and parts of the districts of Shukîf and Tiffah, above Sidon. This would give a length of not less than sixty miles, with a mean breadth of ten or twelve, but it is in no proper sense a valley.
Josephus was probably acquainted personally with only that part of Asher which extended along the east side of the plain of Acre, terminating at the sea near Burj el Musheirifeh. This tract, seen from the neighboring heights of Galilee, would look like a valley, for a line of low sand hills begins in front of Acre at Tell el Fakhar, and runs parallel to the coast northward to Nahr el Kŭrn, in the vicinity of Zib. The plain between this and the hills of Galilee formed a valuable part of Asher's “lot,” and might have been called a valley. These remarks about boundaries may suffice once for all. It is now absolutely impossible to draw lines around the separate lots with any degree of certainty. Their general positions with relation to each other, however, can be ascertained with sufficient exactness for all important purposes in the study of Biblical geography.
Zebulun
I have one more inquiry before you drop the subject. The seaboard from Acre to Sidon belonged to Asher, and the lot of Zebulun extended eastward toward Tabor. Now, how do you reconcile this with the prophecy of Jacob in Genesis 49:1313Zebulun shall dwell at the haven of the sea; and he shall be for an haven of ships; and his border shall be unto Zidon. (Genesis 49:13): “Zebulun shall dwell at the haven of the sea; and he shall be for an haven of ships; and his border shall be unto Zidon?”
A Scripture Difficulty
There is, in fact, an apparent contradiction here between prophecy and history which I have not seen explained, or even noticed by ordinary commentators. That the territory of Zebulun did not reach to the city of Sidon is certain. Perhaps the following considerations may reconcile the prophecy of the dying patriarch with the subsequent history and home of Zebulun: In the time of Jacob, and at the distance of Egypt, Zidon was the representative of all Phenicia. She was, in fact, the mother of that people, and was so spoken of by Homer several hundred years after the death of Jacob. Homer does not speak of Achzib, or Acre, or Dor, but only of Zidon, when he has occasion to mention this country. But Phenicia, or Sidonia if you please, extended south of Acre, and Zebulun bordered on the sea for a considerable distance along that part of the coast; Jacob, therefore, spoke according to the received geography of his time, but with prophetic brevity mentioned only the parent city. When, however, Joshua, several hundred years later, came to divide the country between the tribes, it became necessary to specify the subordinate places, and no doubt some of the cities south of Sidon had by that time risen to importance, and might well give name to the coast in their vicinity; at all events, Joshua was obliged to mention them in defining the limits of the tribes. Hence, though Zebulun touched the sea far south of the city of Sidon, yet “his haven of ships” was actually a part of the general coast of Sidonia when Jacob gave forth his prophecy. Nor is it at all improbable that the territory of Sidon did originally extend southward to where Zebulun had his border at the sea, thus meeting the very letter of the promise.