Beit Jibrin.—In the District of Hebron, west of Hebron town, lies Beit Jibrin, alluded to in §§ 1 and 2 above.
On the adjacent Tel Sandahannah stood the Israelitish town of Mareshah (the Greek Marissa), excavated by the Palestine Exploration Fund. Of great interest are the extensive rock caverns and tombs, many dating back to the ancient Hebrew period. The finest tomb, of more recent date, is that of Apollophanes (second century B.C.), with gabled roofs—the only one of the kind hitherto found in Palestine—and interesting wall paintings.[1] For the Roman mosaic recently unearthed at Beit Jibrin, cf. § 2 above.
Beit Jibrin was the Roman Eleutheropolis and the Crusading Gibelin.
Tel al-Hesi.—South-west of Beit Jibrin lies Tel al-Hesi, the ancient Lachish, excavated by Flinders Petrie and others under the auspices of the Palestine Exploration Fund.[2] These excavations laid the foundations of our knowledge of Palestinian ceramics.
§ 6. Jerusalem and Jaffa Province.
Jaffa.—Jaffa, the port of Jerusalem and now a town of about 45,000 inhabitants, is the ancient Japho, the Greek Joppa and the Crusaders' Japhe.
In mythology Jaffa is the scene of the rescue by Perseus of Andromeda from the sea-monster, whose fossilized bones were long exhibited in proof of the story, together with the chains with which Andromeda was fastened to the rocks by the shore. It was also the place where Jonah was swallowed by the whale (Jonah, i., 3).
The name of the city occurs on the pylon of Thothmes III. at Karnak in a list of Syrian towns overthrown by Pharaoh in the sixteenth century B.C. In the fifteenth century Jaffa was a Phoenician city under Egyptian suzerainty, and then became, and remained for about a thousand years, Philistine.
