Travels in Syria and the Holy Land Part 6

[Greek]

On the outer wall, on the north side of the rotunda;

[Greek]

On the south side of the village stands an edifice, dedicated to St.

Georgius, or El Khouder [Arabic], as the Mohammedans, and sometimes the Christians, call that Saint. It is a square building of about eighty- five feet the side, with a semicircular projection on the E. side; the roof is vaulted, and is supported by eight square columns, which stand in a circle in the centre of the square, and are united to one another by arches. They are about two feet thick, and sixteen high, with a single groove on each side. Between the columns and the nearest part of the wall is a s.p.a.ce of twelve feet. The niche on the east side contains the altar. The vaulted roof is of modern construction. The building had two entrances; of which the southern is entirely walled up; the western also is closed at the top, leaving a s.p.a.ce below for a stone door of six feet high, over which is a broad stone with the following inscription upon it:

[Greek]

[p.61] [Greek] [A.D. 410. This was the third year of the Emperor Theodosius the younger, in whose reign the final decrees were issued against the Pagan wors.h.i.+p. It appears from the inscription that the building upon which it is written was an ancient temple, converted into a church of St. George. Editor.]

Before the temple is a small paved yard, now used as the exclusive burial ground of the Greek priests of Ezra.

In the midst of the present inhabited part of the village stand the ruins of another large edifice; it was formerly applied to Christian wors.h.i.+p, and subsequently converted into a mosque: but it has long since been abandoned. It consists of a quadrangle, with two vaulted colonnades at the northern and southern ends, each consisting of a double row of five columns. In the middle of the area stood a parallel double range of columns of a larger size, forming a colonnade across the middle of the building; the columns are of the Doric order, and about sixteen feet high. The side arcades are still standing to half their height; those of the middle area are lying about in fragments; the E. and W. walls of the building are also in ruins. Over the entrance gate are three inscribed tablets, only one of which, built upside down in the wall, is legible; it is as follows:

[Greek]

Over an inner gate I saw an inscription, much defaced, which seemed to be in Syrian characters.

Adjoining this building stands a square tower, about fifty feet high; its base is somewhat broader than its top. I frequently saw

[p.62]similar structures in the Druse villages; and in Szannamein are two of the same form as the above: they all have windows near the summit; in some, there is one window on each side, in others there are two, as in this at Ezra. They have generally several stories of vaulted chambers, with a staircase to ascend into them.

To the E. of the village is the gateway of another public building, the interior of which has been converted into private dwellings; this building is in a better style than those above described, and has some trifling sculptured ornaments on its gate. On the wall on the right side of the gate is this inscription.

[Greek]

There are many private habitations, princ.i.p.ally at the S. end of the town, with inscriptions over the doors; most of which are illegible. The following I found in different parts of the village, on stones lying on the ground, or built into the walls of houses.

Over the entrance of a sepulchral apartment,

[Greek]

[p.63]I observed a great difference in the characters in which all the above inscriptions were engraved. That of S. Georgius is the best written.

In the evening I went to water my horse with the priest's cattle at the spring of Geratha, one hour distant from Ezra, N. by E. I met there a number of shepherds with theyr flocks; the rule is, that the first who arrives at the well, waters his cattle before the others; several were therefore obliged to wait till after sunset. There are always some stone basins round the wells, out of which the camels drink, the water being drawn up by leathern buckets, and poured into them: disputes frequent1y happen on these occasions. The well has a broad staircase leading down to it; just by it lies a stone with an inscription, of which I could make out only the following letters

[Greek]

This well is called Rauad.

November 12th.--I left Ezra with the Greek priest, to visit the villages towards the mountain of the Haouran. I had agreed to pay him by the day, but I soon had reason to repent of this arrangement. In order to protract my journey, and augment the number of days,

KERATHA.

[p.64]he loaded his horse with all his church furniture, and at almost every village where we alighted he fitted up a room, and said ma.s.s; I was, in consequence, seldom able to leave my night's quarters before mid-day, and as the days were now short our day's journey was not more than four or five hours. His description of me to the natives varied with circ.u.mstances; sometimes I was a Greek lay brother, sent to him by the Patriarch, a deception which could not be detected by my dress, as the priesthood is not distinguished by any particular dress, unless it be the blue turban, which they generally wear; sometimes he described me as a physician who was in search of herbs; and occasionally he owned that my real object was to examine the country. Our road lay S.E. upon the borders of the stony district called Ledja; and at the end of two hours we pa.s.sed the village of Bousser [Arabic] on our left, which is princ.i.p.ally inhabited by Druses; it lies in the War, and contains the Turkish place of pilgrimage, called Meziar Eliashaa. Near it, to the S.

is the small village Kherbet Hariri. In one hour we pa.s.sed Baara, a village under the control of the Sheikh of Ezra; and at half an hour farther to our right, the village Eddour [Arabic]. The Wady Kanouat, a torrent which takes its rise in the mountain, pa.s.ses Baara, where it turns several mills in the winter season; towards the end of May it is generally dried up. At one hour from Baara is the Ain Keratha, or Geratha, according to Bedouin and Haouran p.r.o.nunciation [Arabic]. At the foot of a hill in the War are several wells; this hill is covered with the ruins of the ancient city of Keratha, of which the foundations only remain: there had been such a scarcity of water this year, that the people of Bousser were obliged to fetch it from these wells. A quarter of an hour E. of them is the village Nedjran [Arabic], in the Ledja, in which are several ancient buildings inhabited by Druses. In the Ledja, in the neighbourhood of Keratha,

MEDJEL.

[p.65]are many spots of arable ground. Upon a low hill, in our route, at an hour and a quarter from the Ain or well, is Deir el Khouat [Arabic], i.e. the Brothers' Monastery, a heap of ruins. From thence we travelled to the south-eastward for three quarters of an hour, to the village Sedjen [Arabic], where we alighted, at the house of the only Christian family remaining among the Druses of the place. Sedjen is built, like all these ancient towns, entirely of the black stone peculiar to these mountains.

November 13th.--We left Sedjen about noon; and in half an hour came to the spring Mezra [Arabic], the water of which is conducted near to Sedjen by an ancient ca.n.a.l, which empties itself in the summer time into a large pond; in the winter the stream is joined by a number of small torrents, which descend from the Djebel Haouran between Kanouat and Soueida; it empties itself farther to the west into the Wady Kanouat.

Above the spring is a ruined castle, and near it several other large buildings, of which the walls only are standing; the castle was most probably built to protect the water. There is a tradition that Tamerlane filled up the well; and a similar story is repeated in many parts of the Haouran: it is said that he threw quick-silver into the springs, which prevented the water from rising to the surface; and that the water collecting under ground from several sources near Mezerib, at length burst forth, and formed the copious spring at that place, called Bushe.

From Mezra to Medjel we travelled E.N.E. one hour. It rained the whole day. On arriving at Medjel I alighted to copy some inscriptions, when the Druse Sheikh immediately sent for me, to know what I was about. It is a general opinion with these people that inscriptions indicate hidden treasure; and that by reading or copying them a knowledge is obtained where the treasure lies. I often combated this opinion with success, by simply asking them,

[p.66]whether, if they chose to hide their money under ground, they would be so imprudent as to inform strangers where it lay? The opinion, however, is too strongly rooted in the minds of many of the country people, to yield to argument; and this was the case with the Sheikh of Medjel. Having asked me very rudely what business I had, I presented to him the Pasha's Bouyourdi; but of twenty people present no one could read it; and when I had read it to them, they refused to believe that it was genuine. While coffee was roasting I left the room, finished copying some inscriptions, and rode off in a torrent of rain. On the left side of a vaulted gate-way leading into a room in which are three receptacles for the dead is this inscription:

[Greek].

And opposite to it, on the right side of the gate-way, in large characters,

[Greek]

Over the eastern church, or mosque gate,

[Greek]

KAFER EL LOEHHA.

[p.67]On the northern church gate,

[Greek].

On two stones built into the wall of a house on the side of the road, beyond the village,

[Greek]

There are two other buildings in the town, which I suppose to have been sepulchral. In one of them is a long inscription, but the rain had made it illegible. We rode on for three quarters of an hour farther to the village Kafer el Loehha [Arabic], situated in the Wady Kanouat, on the borders of the Ledja. I here pa.s.sed a comfortable evening, in the company of some Druses, who conversed freely with me, on their relations with their own Sheikhs, and with the surrounding Arabs.

November 14th.--The princ.i.p.al building of Kafer el Loehha is

RIMA EL LOEHF.

[p.68]a church, whose roof is supported by three arches, which, like those in the private dwellings, spring from the floor of the building.

Upon a stone lying near it I read [Greek]. Not far from the church, on its west side, is another large edifice, with a rotunda, and a paved terrace before it. Over the gateway, which is half buried, is the following inscription:

[Greek]

From Kafer el Loehha we rode N. forty minutes, to a village called Rima el Loehf, [Arabic] inhabited by only three or four Druse families. At the entrance of the village stands a building eight feet square and about twenty feet high, with a flat roof, and three receptacles for the dead; it has no windows; at its four corners are pilasters. Over the door is this inscription:

[Greek]

The walls of this apartment are hollow, as appears by several

DOUBBA.