These have again been renewed by Dr. Clarke, the latest, and, for a long time, the only Protestant traveller into the Holy Land, who had enough of the love of Scriptural illustration to think the topography of Jerusalem worth enquiring about. According to the opinion of some of the critics, he has succeeded in proving that the spot assumed for Calvary and the Holy Sepulchre, is not the one which they really occupied*; while others think the matter still doubtful, and incline rather to the hypothesis which he has attempted to overturn. †

The most satisfactory way of examining this question, will be, perhaps, to go over the original authorities for the topography of the city itself, and of such remarkable places as are mentioned in its immediate neighbourhood, as these will form the safest guides by which to infer the positions of others.

Josephus, in his chapter appropriated ex

urged by Gulielmus de Baldensel, which was, that the original sepulchre was an excavation, whereas the present appeared to be a building. "Monumentum Christi erat excisum in petra vivâ, &c. illud verò ex petris pluribus est compositum, de novo conglutinato cæmento." This is admitted to be true of the exterior of the sepulchre, but not of the interior, which, it is contended, is the original rock contained within a more costly casing.

* Quarterly Review.

+ Edinburgh Review.

1

pressly to the description of Jerusalem, says, "The city of Jerusalem was fortified with three walls on such parts as were not encompassed with impassable valleys; for in such places it hath but one wall. The city was built upon two hills, which are opposite to one another, and have a valley dividing them asunder; at which valley, the corresponding rows of houses on both hills end. Of these hills, that which contains the upper city is much higher, and in length more direct: accordingly, it was called the Citadel by king David; he was the father of that Solomon who built this temple at the first; but 'tis, by us, called the Upper Marketplace. But the other hill, which was called Acra, and sustains the lower city, is of the shape of a moon, when she is horned. Over against this, there was a third hill, but naturally lower than Acra, and parted formerly from the other by a broad valley. However, in those times, when the Asamoneans reigned, they filled up that valley with earth, and had a mind to join the city to the temple. They then took off part of the height of Acra, and reduced it to be of less elevation than it was before, that the temple might be superior to it. Now the valley of the Cheesemongers, as it was called, and was that which we told you before dis

tinguished the hill of the upper city from that of the lower, extended as far as Siloam; for that is the name of a fountain which hath sweet water in it, and this in great plenty also. But on the outsides, these hills are surrounded by deep valleys, and by reason of the precipices on both sides, are every where impassable.” *

We shall not follow the details regarding the walls and the towers, since this is a subject which D'Anville has already done at great length, and one upon which little curiosity would now be excited. Let us rather confine ourselves to the more remarkable features of the ground, and the positions of the hills, by which the great outline will be more easily determined.

The loftiest, the most extensive, and, in all respects, the most conspicuous eminence, included within the site of the ancient-city, was that of Sion, called the Holy Hill, and the Citadel of David. This we have positive authority for fixing on the south of the city. David himself saith, "Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth, is Mount Zion, on the sides of the north, the city of the great king."†

* Josephus, Jewish Wars, book v. c. iv. s. 1.
+ Psalm xlviii. ver. 2.

The second hill, both in size and importance, was Acra. "This," says D'Anville, "rose to the north of Sion, its east side facing Mount Moriah, on which the temple was situated, and from which this hill was separated only by a chasm which the Asamoneans partly filled up by lowering the summit of Acra, as we are informed by Josephus in the place quoted above; for this summit commanding the temple, and being very near it, according to the account of Josephus, Antiochus Epiphanes erected a fortress upon it to over-awe the city and the temple, which fortress having a Greek or Macedonian garrison, held out against the Jews till the time of Simon, who demolished it, and at the same time levelled the summit of the hill."

The third eminence was Mount Moriah, on which the temple stood, and this was to the east of Acra, but like it to the north of Sion, these two being divided from each other by the broad valley subsequently filled up by the Asamoneans, and both being separated from Sion by the valley of the Cheesemongers, or the Tyropæon, which extended as far as the fountain of Siloam.

* D'Anville's Dissertation on the Extent of Ancient Jerusalem, in the Appendix to Chateaubriand's Travels, vol. ii. p. 311.

“The east side of Mount Moriah," says D'Anville," bordered the valley of Kedron, commonly called the valley of Jehoshaphat, which was very deep. The south side, overlooking a very low spot (the Tyropæon) was faced from top to bottom with a strong wall, and had a bridge going across the valley for its communication with Sion. The west side looked towards Acra, the appearance of which from the temple is compared by Josephus to a theatre. And on the north side, an artificial ditch, says the same historian, separated the temple from a hill, named Bezetha, which was afterwards joined to the town by an extension of its area."**

We see thus that though there were only two great hills on which Jerusalem stood, namely Sion and Moriah, the one containing the ark and the citadel, and the other the temple, divided from each other by the deep valley of the Tyropæon, and connected by a bridge; yet that the northern division contained in itself the three separate eminences of Acra, Moriah, and Bezetha, as inferior parts of the same great hill, and separated from each other by less marked boundaries than the two great ones were.

The extent which the area of the ancient city

* D'Anville's Dissertation, in App. p. 312.