Again, take the tombs of Absalom and St. James. There is nothing whatever to connect the first with Absalom. The singular style of its architecture shows that it cannot be the pillar “Absalom reared up for himself during his lifetime in the king's dale.” M. Clermont Ganneau has made excavations uncovering the bases and pedestals of the columns, all of which are purely Greek. Indeed, it is only since the twelfth century that it was called the tomb of Absalom at all. The author of the Jerusalem Itinerary calls it the tomb of Hezekiah, and Adamanus, in the seventh century, calls it the tomb of Jehoshaphat. It is possibly the monument of Alexander Jannæus spoken of by Josephus. So, too, the tomb of St. James has nothing to do with St. James; for there has lately been discovered on the façade an inscription in square Hebrew in so inaccessible a position as to have been only probably cut before the façade was completed, which mentions that the family of the Beni Hezir are buried there. This family of priests is mentioned in the Bible (1 Chron. xxiv. 15). The inscription seems to date from the first century before Christ. The so-called tomb of David is a vault over which has been built a room, called the chamber in which the Feast of the Passover prior to the crucifixion is supposed to have taken place. Close to it is the Palace of Caiaphas, and in it is shown the spot where Peter stood when he denied his Master. Near it is the rock upon which the cock roosted when he crew. The “rock,” the “spot,” the “palace,” the “Cænaculum,” and the “tomb” all rest upon equally invalid authority. As regards the tomb of David, we know that it was within the walls, together with those of eight other Jewish kings. That the place was apparently well known as late as the time of Christ we gather both from the Acts and Josephus. It is remarkable that one undisputed Jewish tomb still exists in such a position as to have been certainly within the city of David. This is the so-called tomb of Nicodemus, and it is yet more remarkable that in its original condition, before it was partly destroyed, this tomb must have been just made to contain nine bodies, placed in kokim, or graves cut according to the oldest arrangement employed by the Jews. Josephus mentions as a peculiarity of the tombs of the kings that some of the coffins were buried beneath the surface, so as to be unseen even to those standing within the monument. Just such an arrangement exists in the tomb under consideration, the floor of which is sunk so that the graves on one side are on a lower tier. It seems, therefore, quite possible that the Church of the Holy Sepulchre preserves the monument of the nine chief kings of Jerusalem. Of course, tradition, with its usual ignorance, places “the tombs of the kings” on the hill of the upper city, where your guide takes you to see them, and where there are no ancient tombs at all, the tombs there being of a date not earlier than the first century before Christ.