DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.10357#0138
JERUSALEM.
text in having Gilion. Josephus, however, states that David ordered Zadok and Benaiah to
carry Solomon " out of the city to the fountain called Gihon and to anoint him there." The
spring stopped by Hezekiah appears to have been some distance up the Tyropceon Valley.
Its position has not yet been discovered, but the rock-hewn conduit which has been found
running along the bed of the Tyropceon Valley is believed to be the work of Hezekiah, and
the water which sometimes finds its way through it may come from the spring.
No well has yet been discovered at Jerusalem except Bir Eyub (Job's Well), but others
may possibly exist beneath the rubbish. Close to Bir Eyub there is a remarkable work which
must have involved a great expenditure of time and labour. It consists of a drift or tunnel
some six feet high and from two to three feet wide, cut in the solid rock. The tunnel is more
than eighteen hundred feet long, and runs beneath the western side of the bed of the valley
at a depth of from seventy to ninety feet from the surface. It is reached at certain intervals
by flights of rock-hewn steps. The object of this tunnel seems to have been the collection
of the water running in between the beds of limestone, and it is interesting to find that a
work of such magnitude was considered necessary at a level so much lower than that of the
city. It clearly shows that there must always have been some difficulty in providing
Jerusalem with water.
The most important system of supply was, however, that by which water was brought
into the city from the south by aqueducts. The supply was derived from three sources, and
the conduits were apparently constructed at different periods. They were of considerable
extent, and the remains exhibit a degree of engineering skill which could not well be
surpassed at the present day. The first works, and perhaps the most ancient, are those
connected with the Pools of Solomon. These pools, three in number, are cleverly and well
constructed in the bed of a valley not far from Bethlehem, and they are so situated that the
water from each of the upper pools can be run off into the one immediately below it as the
supply is drawn upon.
The water was first carried to Bethlehem, and, passing under that town through a tunnel,
was finally delivered in the Temple area at Jerusalem. From the pools to Bethlehem the
fall of the conduit is about one in eight hundred, but from Bethlehem to Jerusalem it is only
one in five thousand two hundred. The total length is seventy thousand feet, and the total
fall thirty-two feet, which gives a mean fall of less than two and a half feet per mile. This
conduit, to which the name " low-level aqueduct " has been given, crosses the Valley of
Hinnom a little above the Birket es Sultan (see page 106) on several pointed arches, which
just show their heads above ground, and, winding round the southern slope of the modern
Sion, enters the city near the Jewish almshouses. It then passes along the eastern side of
the same hill, partly supported by masonry and partly through a tunnel, until, taking a sudden
turn eastward, it runs over the causeway and Wilson's Arch, and enters the Haram esh Sherif
at the Gate of the Chain. The numerous Saracenic fountains in the lower part of the city
were supplied by pipes branching off from the main aqueduct. The channels and conduits in
1G
text in having Gilion. Josephus, however, states that David ordered Zadok and Benaiah to
carry Solomon " out of the city to the fountain called Gihon and to anoint him there." The
spring stopped by Hezekiah appears to have been some distance up the Tyropceon Valley.
Its position has not yet been discovered, but the rock-hewn conduit which has been found
running along the bed of the Tyropceon Valley is believed to be the work of Hezekiah, and
the water which sometimes finds its way through it may come from the spring.
No well has yet been discovered at Jerusalem except Bir Eyub (Job's Well), but others
may possibly exist beneath the rubbish. Close to Bir Eyub there is a remarkable work which
must have involved a great expenditure of time and labour. It consists of a drift or tunnel
some six feet high and from two to three feet wide, cut in the solid rock. The tunnel is more
than eighteen hundred feet long, and runs beneath the western side of the bed of the valley
at a depth of from seventy to ninety feet from the surface. It is reached at certain intervals
by flights of rock-hewn steps. The object of this tunnel seems to have been the collection
of the water running in between the beds of limestone, and it is interesting to find that a
work of such magnitude was considered necessary at a level so much lower than that of the
city. It clearly shows that there must always have been some difficulty in providing
Jerusalem with water.
The most important system of supply was, however, that by which water was brought
into the city from the south by aqueducts. The supply was derived from three sources, and
the conduits were apparently constructed at different periods. They were of considerable
extent, and the remains exhibit a degree of engineering skill which could not well be
surpassed at the present day. The first works, and perhaps the most ancient, are those
connected with the Pools of Solomon. These pools, three in number, are cleverly and well
constructed in the bed of a valley not far from Bethlehem, and they are so situated that the
water from each of the upper pools can be run off into the one immediately below it as the
supply is drawn upon.
The water was first carried to Bethlehem, and, passing under that town through a tunnel,
was finally delivered in the Temple area at Jerusalem. From the pools to Bethlehem the
fall of the conduit is about one in eight hundred, but from Bethlehem to Jerusalem it is only
one in five thousand two hundred. The total length is seventy thousand feet, and the total
fall thirty-two feet, which gives a mean fall of less than two and a half feet per mile. This
conduit, to which the name " low-level aqueduct " has been given, crosses the Valley of
Hinnom a little above the Birket es Sultan (see page 106) on several pointed arches, which
just show their heads above ground, and, winding round the southern slope of the modern
Sion, enters the city near the Jewish almshouses. It then passes along the eastern side of
the same hill, partly supported by masonry and partly through a tunnel, until, taking a sudden
turn eastward, it runs over the causeway and Wilson's Arch, and enters the Haram esh Sherif
at the Gate of the Chain. The numerous Saracenic fountains in the lower part of the city
were supplied by pipes branching off from the main aqueduct. The channels and conduits in
1G