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[451]
Hereupon a great multitude prevented their approach, and came out
of Jericho, and fled to those mountainous parts that lay over against Jerusalem,
while that part which was left behind was in a great measure destroyed;
they also found the city desolate. It is situated in a plain; but a naked
and barren mountain, of a very great length, hangs over it, which extends
itself to the land about Scythopolis northward, but as far as the country
of Sodom, and the utmost limits of the lake Asphaltiris, southward. This
mountain is all of it very uneven and uninhabited, by reason of its barrenness:
there is an opposite mountain that is situated over against it, on the
other side of Jordan; this last begins at Julias, and the northern quarters,
and extends itself southward as far as Somorrhon, 1
which is the bounds of Petra, in Arabia. In this ridge of mountains there
is one called the Iron Mountain, that runs in length as far as Moab. Now
the region that lies in the middle between these ridges of mountains is
called the Great Plain; it reaches from the village Ginnabris, as far as
the lake Asphaltitis; its length is two hundred and thirty furlongs, and
its breadth a hundred and twenty, and it is divided in the midst by Jordan.
It hath two lakes in it, that of Asphaltitis, and that of Tiberias, whose
natures are opposite to each other; for the former is salt and unfruitful,
but that of Tiberias is sweet and fruitful. This plain is much burnt up
in summer time, and, by reason of the extraordinary heat, contains a very
unwholesome air; it is all destitute of water excepting the river Jordan,
which water of Jordan is the occasion why those plantations of palm trees
that are near its banks are more flourishing, and much more fruitful, as
are those that are remote from it not so flourishing, or fruitful.
1 Whether this Somorrhon, or Somorrha, ought not to be here written Gomorrha, as some MSS. in a manner have it, (for the place meant by Josephus seems to be near Segor, or Zoar, at the very south of the Dead Sea, hard by which stood Sodom and Gomorrha,) cannot now be certainly determined, but seems by no means improbable.
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