Alroy: The Prince of the Captivity

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page 94.—And conquered Julius Cæsar. This classic hero often figures in the erratic pages of the Talmud.

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page 94.—The Tombs of the Kings. The present pilgrim to Jerusalem will have less trouble than Alroy in discovering the Tombs of the Kings, though he probably would not as easily obtain the sceptre of Solomon. The tombs that bear this title are of the time of the Asmonean princes, and of a more ambitious character than any other of the remains. An open court, about fifty feet in breadth, and extremely deep, is excavated out of the rock. One side is formed by a portico, the frieze of which is sculptured in a good Syro-Greek style. There is no grand portal; you crawl into the tombs by a small opening on one of the sides. There are a few small chambers with niches, recesses, and sarcophagi, some sculptured in the same flowing style as the frieze. This is the most important monument at Jerusalem; and Dr. Clarke, who has lavished wonder and admiration on the tombs of Zachariah and Absalom, has declared the Tombs of the Kings to be one of the marvellous productions of antiquity.

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Page 95.—‘Rabbi Hillel was one of the most celebrated among the Jewish Doctors, both for birth, learning, rule, and children. He was of the seed of David by his mother’s side, being of the posterity of Shephatiah, the son of Abital, David’s wife. He was brought up in Babel, from whence he came up to Jerusalem at forty years old, and there studied the law forty years more under Shemaiah and Abtalion, and after them he was President of the Sanhedrim forty years more. The beginning of his Presidency is generally conceded upon to have been just one hundred ‘years before the Temple was destroyed; by which account he began eight-and-twenty years before our Saviour was born, and died when he was about twelve years old. He is renowned for his fourscore scholars.’—Lightfoot, vol. ii. p. 2008.

The great rival of Hillel was Shammai. Their controversies, and the fierceness of their partisans, are a principal feature of Rabbinical history. They were the same as the Scotists and Thomists. At last the Bath Kol interfered, and decided for Hillel, but in a spirit of conciliatory dexterity. The Bath Kol came forth and spake thus: ‘The words both of the one party and the other are the words of the living God, but the certain decision of the matter is according to the decrees of the school of Hillel. And henceforth, whoever shall transgress the decrees of the school of Hillel is punishable with death.‘

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page 97.—A number of small, square, low chambers. These excavated cemeteries, which abound in Palestine and Egypt, were often converted into places of worship by the Jews and early Christians. Sandys thus describes the Synagogue at Jerusalem in his time.

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[ page 08.—Their heads mystically covered. The Hebrews cover their heads during their prayers with a sacred shawl.

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page 98.—Expounded the law to the congregation of the people. The custom, I believe, even to the present day, among the Hebrews, a remnant of their old academies, once so famous.

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page 99.—The Valley of Jehoshaphat and the Tomb of Absalom. In the Vale of Jehoshaphat, among many other tombs, are two of considerable size, and which, although of a corrupt Grecian architecture, are dignified by the titles of the tombs of Zachariah and Absalom.

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page 101.—The scanty rill of Siloah. The sublime Siloah is now a muddy rill; you descend by steps to the fountain which is its source, and which is covered with an arch. Here the blind man received his sight; and, singular enough, to this very day the healing reputation of its waters prevails, and summons to its brink all those neighbouring Arabs who suffer from the ophthalmic affections not uncommon in this part of the world.

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page 102.—Several isolated tombs of considerable size. There are no remains of ancient Jerusalem, or the ancient Jews. Some tombs there are which may be ascribed to the Asmonean princes; but all the monuments of David, Solomon, and their long posterity, have utterly disappeared.

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page 103.—Are cut strange characters and unearthly forms. As at Benihassan, and many other of the sculptured catacombs of Egypt.

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page 104.—A crowd of bats rushed forward and extinguished his torch. In entering the Temple of Dendara, our torches were extinguished by a crowd of bats.

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page 104.—The gallery was of great extent, with a gradual declination. So in the great Egyptian tombs.

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page 105.—The Afrite, for it was one of those dread beings. Beings of a monstrous form, the most terrible of all the orders of the Dives.

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page 106.—An avenue of colossal lions of red granite. An avenue of Sphinxes more than a mile in length connected the quarters of Luxoor and Carnak in Egyptian Thebes. Its fragments remain. Many other avenues of Sphinxes and lion-headed Kings may be observed in various parts of Upper Egypt.

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page 107.—A stupendous portal, cut out of the solid rock, four hundred feet in height, and supported by clusters of colossal Caryatides. See the great rock temple of Ipsambul in Lower Nubia. The sitting colossi are nearly seventy feet in height. But there is a Torso of a statue of Rameses the Second at Thebes, vulgarly called the great Memnon, which measures upwards of sixty feet round the shoulders.

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page 109.—Fifty steps of ivory, and each step guarded by golden lions. See 1st Kings, chap. x. 18-20.

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page 120.—Crossed the desert on a swift dromedary. The difference between a camel and a dromedary is the difference between a hack and a thorough-bred horse. There is no other.

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page 121.—That celestial alphabet known to the true Cabalist. See Note 11.

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page 133.—The last of the Seljuks had expired. The Orientals are famous for their massacres: that of the Mamlouks by the present Pacha of Egypt, and of the Janissaries of the Sultan, are notorious. But one of the most terrible, and effected under the most difficult and dangerous circumstances, was the massacre of the Albanian Beys by the Grand Vizir, in the autumn of 1830. I was in Albania at the time.

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page 136.– The minarets were illumined. So, I remember, at Constantinople, at the commencement of 1831 at the departure of the Mecca caravan, and also at the annual fast of Ramadan.

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page 138.—One asking alms with a wire run through his cheek. Not uncommon. These Dervishes frequent the bazaars.

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page 142.—One hundred thousand warriors were now assembled. In countries where the whole population is armed, a vast military force is soon assembled. Barchochebas was speedily at the head of two hundred thousand fighting men, and held the Romans long in check under one of their most powerful emperors.

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page 143.—Some high-capped Tatar with despatches. I have availed myself of a familiar character in Oriental life, but the use of a Tatar as a courier in the time of Alroy is, I fear, an anachronism.

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page 144.—Each day some warlike Atabek, at the head of his armed train, poured into the capital of the caliphs. I was at Yanina, the capital of Albania, when the Grand Vizir summoned the chieftains of the country, and I was struck by their magnificent arrays each day pouring into the city.

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page 153.—It is the Sabbath etc. ‘They began their Sabbath from sunset, and the same time of day they ended it.’—Talm. Hierosolym. in Sheveith, fol. 33, col. I. The eve of the Sabbath, or the day before, was called the day of the preparation for the Sabbath.—Luke xxiii. 54.

‘And from the time of the evening sacrifice and forward, they began to fit themselves for the Sabbath, and to cease from their works, so as not to go to the barber, not to sit in judgment, &c.; nay, thenceforward they would not set things on working, which, being set a-work, would complete their business of themselves, unless it would be completed before the Sabbath came—as wool was not put to dye, unless it could take colour while it was yet day! &c.—Talm. in Sab., par. I; Lightfoot, vol. i. p. 218.

‘Towards sunsetting, when the Sabbath was now approaching, they lighted up the Sabbath lamp. Men and women were bound to have a lamp lighted up in their houses on the Sabbath, though they were never so poor—nay, though they were forced to go a-begging for oil for this purpose; and the lighting up of this lamp was a part of making the Sabbath a delight; and women were especially commanded to look to this business.’—Maimonides in Sab. par. 36.

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page 156.—The presence of the robes of honour. These are ever carried in procession, and their number denotes the rank and quality of the chief, or of the individual to whom they are offered.

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page 158.—Pressed it to his lips, and placed it in his vest. The elegant mode in which the Orientals receive presents.

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page 164.—A cap of transparent pink porcelain, studded with pearls. Thus a great Turk, who afforded me hospitality, was accustomed to drink his coffee.

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page 168.—Slippers powdered with pearls. The slippers in the East form a very fanciful portion of the costume. It is not uncommon to see them thus adorned and beautifully embroidered. In precious embroidery and enamelling the Turkish artists are unrivalled.

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page 185.—The policy of the son of Kareah. Vide Jeremiah, chap. xlii.

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page 191.—The inviting gestures and the voluptuous grace of the dancing girls of Egypt. A sculptor might find fine studies in the Egyptian Almeh.

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page 194.—Six choice steeds sumptuously caparisoned. Led horses always precede a great man. I think there were usually twelve before the Sultan when he went to Mosque, which he did in public every Friday.

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page 194.—Six Damascus sabres of unrivalled temper. But sabres are not to be found at Damascus, any more than cheeses at Stilton, or oranges at Malta. The art of watering the blade is, however, practised, I believe, in Persia. A fine Damascus blade will fetch fifty or even one hundred guineas English.

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page 195.—Roses from Rocnabad. A river in Persia famous for its bowery banks of roses.

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page 195.—Screens made of the feather of a roc. The screens and fans in the East, made of the plumage of rare birds with jewelled handles, are very gorgeous.

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page 196.—A tremulous aigrette of brilliants. Worn only by persons of the highest rank. The Sultan presented Lord Nelson after the battle of the Nile with an aigrette of diamonds.

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page 211.– To send him the whole of the next course. These compliments from the tables of the great are not uncommon in the East. When at the head-quarters of the Grand Vizir at Yanina, his Highness sent to myself and my travelling companions a course from his table, singers and dancing girls.

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page 212.—The golden wine of Mount Lebanon. A most delicious wine, from its colour, brilliancy, and rare flavour, justly meriting this title, is made on Lebanon; but it will not, unfortunately, bear exportation, and even materially suffers in the voyage from the coast to Alexandria.

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page 221.—And the company of gardeners. These gardeners of the Serail form a very efficient body of police.

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page 226.—Alroy retired to the bath. The bath is a principal scene of Oriental life. Here the Asiatics pass a great portion of their day. The bath consists of a long suite of chambers of various temperatures, in which the different processes of the elaborate ceremony are performed.

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page 232.—We are the watchers of the moon. The feast of the New Moon is one of the most important festivals of the Hebrews. ‘Our year,’ says the learned author of the ‘Rites and Ceremonies,’ ‘is divided into twelve lunar months, some of which consist of twenty-nine, others of thirty days, which difference is occasioned by the various appearance of the new moon, in point of time: for if it appeared on the 30th day, the 29th was the last day of the precedent month; but if it did not appear till the 31st day, the 30th was the last day, and the 31st the first of the subsequent month; and that was an intercalary moon, of all which take the following account.

‘Our nation heretofore, not only observing the rules of some fixed calculation, also celebrated the feast of the New Moon, according to the phasis or first appearance of the moon, which was done in compliance with God’s command, as our received traditions inform us.

‘Hence it came to pass that the first appearance was not to be determined only by rules of art, but also by the testimony of such persons as deposed before the Sanhedrim, or Great Senate, that they had seen the New Moon. So a committee of three were appointed from among the said Sanhedrim to receive the deposition of the parties aforesaid, who, after having calculated what time the moon might possibly appear, despatched some persons into high and mountainous places, to observe and give their evidence accordingly, concerning the first appearance of the moon.

‘As soon as the new moon was either consecrated or appointed to be observed, notice was given by the Sanhedrim to the rest of the nation what day had been fixed for the New Moon, or first day of the month, because that was to be the rule and measure according to which they were obliged to keep their feasts and fasts in every month respectively.

‘This notice was given to them in time of peace, by firing of beacons, set up for that purpose, which was looked upon as the readiest way of communication, but, in time of war, when all places were full of enemies, who made use of beacons to amuse our nation with, it was thought fit to discontinue it.‘

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page 263.—The women chatted at the fountain. The bath and the fountain are the favourite scenes of feminine conversation.

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page 264.—Playing chess. On the walls of the palace of Amenoph the Second, called Medeenet Abuh, at Egyptian Thebes, the King is represented playing chess with the Queen. This monarch reigned long before the Trojan war.

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page 272.—Impaled. A friend of mine witnessed this horrible punishment in Upper Egypt. The victim was a man who had secretly murdered nine persons. He held an official post, and invited travellers and pilgrims to his house, whom he regularly disposed of and plundered. I regret that I have mislaid his MS. account of the ceremony.

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page 299.—In the Germen Davidis of Gants, translated into Latin by Vorstius, Lug. 1654, is an extract from a Hebrew MS. containing an account of Alroy. I subjoin a translation of a passage respecting his death.

R. Maimonides deposes: That the Sultan asked him whether he were the Messiah, and that he answered him, “I am”; and that then the monarch inquired of him what sign he had. To this he replied that they might cut off his head and that he would return to life. Then the King commanded that his head should be cut off, and he died, having said previously to the monarch that the latter should not lack in his life the most grievous torments.

Seven years before the incident quoted above, the Israelites had serious troubles on account of a son of Belial who called himself the Messiah, so that the tetrarch and the princes were justly incensed against the Jews, to such an extent, indeed, that they sent to the latter to inquire whether they desired the reign of the Messiah. The name of this accursed troubler was David El-David, alias Alroy, who hailed from the city of Omadia, where were gathered about a thousand rich, honest, happy and decently-living families, whose tabernacle was the principal resort of those that dwelt in the neighbourhood of the river Sabbathion; and around them were gathered more than a hundred minor tabernacles.

This city was on the border of the region of Media, and the dialect used there was the Targum. Thence to the region of Golan is a journey of fifty days. It is under the rule of Persia, to which it pays a heavy tribute every fifteen years, and one golden talent in addition. Moreover, this man David El-David was educated under the Prince of the Chaldean captivity, in the care of the eminent Scholiarch, in the city of Bagdad, who was preeminently wise in the Talmud and in all foreign sciences, as well as in all books of divination, magic, and Chaldean lore; This David El-David, out of the boldness and arrogance of his heart, lifted his hand against the ruling powers, and collected those Jews who dwelt in the neighbourhood of Mount Chophtan, seducing them to follow him into battle against all the neighbouring peoples. He showed them signs-of what value they knew not: there were men, indeed, who supported him on account of his magic art and of certain things to be done; others said that his great power came from the hand of God. Those who flocked to him called him the Messiah, lauding and extolling him.

In another epoch of Persian history a certain Jew arose, calling himself the Messiah, and prospered greatly. A large part of the Israelitish population believed in him. But when the King indeed heard of all this pretender’s power, and that he proposed to join battle with him, he sent to the Jews who lived thereabouts and notified them that unless they deserted this man, and came oui; from all association with him, they certainly should be slain, every one of them, with the sword, and afterward the children and the women should perish. Then the whole population of Israel assembled, and argued with this man, and threw themselves down before him on the ground, strongly supplicating him, with clamour and tears, to depart from them. Why, indeed, should he put them and others in danger? Had not the King already sworn that they should perish by the sword, and wherefore should he bring affliction upon all the Jewish inhabitants of Persia? Responding, he said: “I have come to serve you, and ye will not have me. Whom do ye fear? Who dares stand in front of me, and what doth this Persian King that he dare not oppose me and my sword?” The Jews asked him what sign he had that he was the Messiah. He answered: “My mission prospers: the Messiah needs no other sign.” They answered that many had acted likewise, and that none had reached success. Then he drove them forth from his face with superb indignation.