It is pointed out by Sir George Grove that the name “Dead Sea” never occurs in the Bible, and appears not to have existed until the second century after Christ. It originated in an erroneous opinion, and there can be little doubt that to the name are due in a great measure the mistakes and misrepresentations which were for so long prevalent regarding this lake, and which have not indeed yet wholly ceased to exist. In the Old Testament it is called the Salt Sea, and the Sea of the Plain (Arabah). By the Arabs it is called El Bahr Lut (the Sea of Lot). The Salt Sea lies in the deepest part of the great Jordan-Arabah depression, and the ground rises to the south of it, as well as in all other directions. It was shown, in fact, by Colonel Kitchener’s survey of the Arabah that the bed of the valley, for the most part, is raised above the level of the Gulf of Akabah. From the border of the Dead Sea southward the ground rises but little for 10 miles, but then begins to rise rapidly, so that at a distance of about 40 miles it is as high as the sea level at Akabah; and 29 miles further south it is 660 feet above that level. The Jordan Valley, as already stated, coincides with a great fault in the strata. This had been recognised by Lartet, Tristram, Wilson, and others; and Professor Hull has traced the continuation of this fracture, at the base of the Edomite mountains along the Arabah Valley. He agrees with Lartet in thinking that the waters of the Jordan Valley have not flowed down into the Gulf of Akabah since the land emerged from the ocean. The disconnection of the inner waters from the outer is a very ancient event, dating back to Miocene times. The River Jordan, throughout its course, from the Sea of Tiberias to the Salt Sea, cuts its channel through alluvial terraces, consisting of sand, gravel, and calcareous marl, which sometimes contain shells, semi-fossilised, but of species still living in the lakes of Tiberias and Huleh. These terraces are continuous round the shores of the Salt Sea, and between the base of the cliffs of Jebel Karantul, near Jericho, and the fords of the Jordan, three of them may be observed, the first being at a level of 650 to 600 feet, the second " " 520 to 250 " , the third " " 200 to 130 " and below the last named is the alluvial flat, liable to be flooded on the rise of the waters. The upper surfaces and outer margins of these terraces indicate successive stages, at which the waters have rested in sinking down to their present level. Originally they reached a level somewhat over that of the Mediterranean, and at that time a great inland lake extended from Lake Huleh southwards into the Arabah Valley, its length being about 200 miles. In the Jordan Valley, the upper terrace, at the foot of the hills, is called the Ghor, and it is to be distinguished from the Zor, or bottom of the valley, in which the channel of the river, cut still deeper, meanders.