Jerusalem Explored, Volume 1—Text: Being a Description of the Ancient and Modern City, with Numerous Illustrations Consisting of Views, Ground Plans and SectionsPierotti, Ermete
History
Jerusalem Explored, Volume 1—Text: Being a Description of the Ancient and Modern City, with Numerous Illustrations Consisting of Views, Ground Plans and Sections
Pierotti, Ermete
Jerusalem -- Antiquities; Jerusalem -- Description and travel
call it _Birket el-Hamra_. Coins are frequently found by the peasants
among the earth in the interior; which have been brought down and
deposited there by the conduits flowing from the city.
At the south-east corner of Solomon's Pool are some ruins, consisting of
shafts and broken capitals of columns, walls and dressed stones of
Jewish workmanship. In the middle stands a very old forked
mulberry-tree, said to mark the spot where the prophet Isaiah was sawn
asunder. According to a tradition received by both the Jews and the
Christians, Isaiah was put to death in the early part of Manasseh's
reign, and his body was buried under an oak near to the Well
Rogel[640]. I do not admit the identity of Siloam and Rogel, which Abbé
Mariti[641] tries to establish; but consider it improbable that the
mulberry should mark the place of the martyrdom, and the oak indicate
the tomb. The position of the latter I do not attempt to fix, as there
are many burial-places near Rogel, but none with the proper tree. The
Mohammedans hold the site of the martyrdom in great veneration, and go
there to pray. It also serves as a place of assembly for the villagers
of Siloam, when they want to discuss any matter of interest.
From this point we see at one glance the gardens of Siloam, which I have
already identified[642] with the King's gardens of former times[643].
The inhabitants are indebted to the little stream flowing from the upper
pool for the rich crops of vegetables produced by the plots of land,
once the favourite haunts of Solomon's wives. Then they must have been
more abundantly irrigated than they now are; and very probably the King
constructed the lower pool for this purpose. His humble successors still
reap large profits from the ground, though with a diminished supply of
water; all of which they bestow on the plants, reserving none for their
own persons.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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