Tent Work in Palestine: A Record of Discovery and AdventureConder, C. R. (Claude Reignier)
History
Tent Work in Palestine: A Record of Discovery and Adventure
Conder, C. R. (Claude Reignier)
Palestine -- Description and travel
The one-inch sheets are each accompanied by a memoir containing all the
information collected by the Survey Party. Section A gives a
geographical and topographical account of the country included in the
sheet. Section B is an archæological description of the ruined sites.
Section C includes the ethnographical notes and the local traditions of
the district. The text of this memoir, with exception of Sections A and
B, for sheets 1, 2, 3, 4 and 6, has been my work, under the editorship
of Mr. G. Grove and Colonel C. W. Wilson, R.E. The nomenclature of the
Survey, including about 9000 Arabic names, has been arranged in indexes
for each sheet, and edited by Professor E. H. Palmer. The memoir will
contain information which I have at various times carefully abstracted
from more than fifty standard works, including Egyptian, Samaritan, and
Talmudic writings, the early Christian Itineraries, and the mediæval
chronicles, besides the Bible narrative, and the works of Josephus and
other classical authorities.
It is evident that so great a work requires some general _résumé_, to
bring it within the reach of the general public, who might not read the
memoir, or would fail to obtain from it any very vivid idea of
Palestine, or of the discoveries made there during the execution of the
Survey.
The present volume is intended to supply this want, and to form a
popular introduction to the work of the Survey Party.
The main object of the Survey of Palestine may be said to have been to
collect materials in illustration of the Bible. Few stronger
confirmations of the historic and authentic character of the Sacred
Volume can be imagined than that furnished by a comparison of the Land
and the Book, which shows clearly that they tally in every respect.
Mistaken ideas and preconceived notions may be corrected; but the truth
of the Bible is certainly established, on a firm basis, by the
criticisms of those who, familiar with the people and the country, are
able to read it, not as a dead record of a former world or of an extinct
race, but as a living picture of manners and of a land, which can still
be studied by any who will devote themselves to the task.
The study is threefold. It includes the minute investigation of the
detailed topography of the Bible. Former explorers have done much in
this respect; but it may be claimed for the Survey that the new
discoveries are almost as numerous as all those of former travellers put
together.
The second branch is that of archæology. The Survey includes a complete
examination of the ancient condition of the country. The old cultivation
is traced by the wine-presses, olive-presses, ruined terraces, and rude
garden watch-towers. The ancient sites are recognised by their tombs,
cisterns, and rocky scarps. Thus we are entitled to draw conclusions as
to the ancient cultivation, climate, and water-supply of Palestine, in
Bible times.
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