At the beginning of these Croisade wars, it seems indeed that hardly any but Askelon remained of the five great cities of the Philistines: Ashdod is spoken of, p. 810, as a place whose station was known, but the town gone; p. 886, mention is made of a hill on which, according to tradition, Gath stood, where they erected a castle which they called Hibelin; p. 917 speaks of the rebuilding Gaza, in the time of King Baldwin III, which town then lay in ruins, and quite uninhabited.

The traces of great previous changes, in the country of the Philistines: may be remarked in the Holy Scriptures, and should be observed with care by commentators.

OBSERVATION LVIII.

Of the Importance of Settlements near the Red Sea.

THE possessing some place on, or near the Red Sea, was not only thought an object of importance in elder times to Judea and Damascus, but has been so esteemed in later

ages. That it was so reckoned anciently appears from what the prophetic historian saith, 2 Kings xvi. 6. "At this time Rezin king of Syria recovered Elath to Syria, and drave the Jews from Elath and the Syrians came to Elath,

On the Eastern gulf of the Red Sea, which is distin guished from the Western by the name of the Elanitic, denominated, it is believed, from this town of Elath.

and dwelt there to this day." It was restored to Judah not long before by King Amaziah, great grandfather to Ahaz, from whom Rezin recovered it; and appears to have been in a ruinated state when Amaziah regained the possession of it; for he is said to have built Elath, as well as restored it to Judah, 2 Kings xiv. 22. When it was lost by Judah we are not, that I recollect, any where distinctly told; but we find it in the hands of Solomon, 2 Chron. viii. 17, 18, who appears to have made that a station for his shipping on the Red sea, as well as Ezion-geber, another place on that sea: Then went Solomon to Ezion-geber, and to Eloth (or Elath) at the sea-side in the land of Edom. And Huram sent him by the hands of his servants, ships, and servants that had knowledge of the sea; and they went with the servants of Solomon to Ophir.

The two kingdoms of Jerusalem and Damascus appear to be equally concerned, in later ages, to gain a footing in the country bordering on the Red sea.

So Baldwin, the first Christian king of Jerusalem of that name, was desirous, according to the Archbishop of Tyre, to enlarge the bounds of his kingdom, by making a settlement in that part of Arabia that was called by the name of Syria Sobal, and which lay on or near the Red

sea.

Petra, the capital of the second of the Arabias, according to the reckoning of the Croisaders, (known in those times by the name of

Crak,) according to St. Jerom, was but ten miles from Elath." This was an exceeding strong place, which having been ruinated, was rebuilt by one of the nobles of Fulk, the fourth Christian king of Jerusalem, those princes being desirous, we find, to establish themselves in the country beyond Jordan towards the South, which brought them near the Red sea. Noradine, the king of Damascus at that time, had similar views, and went and besieged Petra in the time of king Amalric, the sixth of those princes, but was obliged to raise the seige by the constable of the kingdom, in the absence of the king. Some years after Saladine, who united Damascus and Egypt together under his government, marched through Bashan and Gilead, then through the countries of Ammon and Moab to Crak, in order to besiege that city, which however he thought fit to abandon, upon the approach of the Christian army, after doing great damage to the town, and killing many of the inhabitants, but without being able to take the citadel."

f

Though the gaining the possession of a strong place on, or near the Red sea, might be of little consequence to his Egyptian subjects, who had some ports at that time on that sea, and carried on a great traffic for rich Eastern commodities in that age, by means of the port of Aideb in Upper Egypt, from whence they Vide Relandi Pal. illust. p. 932.

e Gesta Dei, per Francos, p. 1039.

were conveyed across the desert to the Nile, and from thence down that river to Alexandria; yet it must be of great consequence to the people of Damascus it is therefore no wonder that Noradine first, and Saladine afterwards, at the head of his Syrian troops, strove so hard to get possession of Crak; or that the Christian princes should take such pains to extend their dominions on that side, and after having gained that town, that they should be so solicitous to preserve it Damascus being a distinct and quite separate state from Egypt, when Saladine first set up for himself, and becoming again quite distinct from it upon his death, one of his family succeeding him in Damascus, and another branch of it in Egypt, and a desert of several days journey over intervening, and another state too, while that part of Arabia was held by the princes of the Croisades.

k

But these princes did not limit themselves to that part of this country which they called the second Arabia, and of which Crak, anciently called Petra, was the capital; they went on still more to the southward, passing through the second into the third Arabia, where they built a very strong fortress in a very healthful, pleasant, and fertile place, producing plenty of corn, wine, and oil, by means of which fortress they expected to hold the adjoining country in subjection. They erected also another castle

P. 972.

iD'Herbelot, art. Salahedden.

* Called also in those times Syria Sobal.

'Gesta Dei, p. 812.

in that country, to which castle they gave the name of the valley of Moses."

Unfortunately Bongarsius (the editor of William of Tyre, and the other historians of those times) has not given us a good map of those countries; nor are the accounts of the Archbishop of Tyre so clear as could be wished, but it seems that this third Arabia lay near, or perhaps about, the Eastern gulf of the Red sea, in which case it must have included Aila or Elath, for that town (called the Valley of Moses) the Archbishop tells us, was supposed to be near the Waters of Strife, which Moses brought forth out of the rock, and the congre gation drank, and their beasts also." This circumstance is mentioned Numb. xx. 1-13, and was when they were in Kadeh, in the border of Edom, and but a little before their entering into Canaan.

This third Arabia, or Syria Sobal, certainly lay considerably to the East of the Western gulf of the Red sea, and the country between them was a wild uninhabited desert, for we are told that after King Baldwin had built his chief fortress in this third Arabia, which was called Mount Royal, he being desirous to acquire a more perfect knowledge of those provinces, took proper guides, and a suitable train of attendants, and passing over Jordan and through Syria Sobal, he went through that vast desert to the Red sea, (the historian evidently means the Western gulf of that sea,) and entering

m Gesta Dei, p. 893.

a Ibid.