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§ 45. FOUNTAINS AND CISTERNS.

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20. 33: 17. Lev. 23: 43. In the vicinity of the tents, was erected

from which the approach ,מִגְדָּל עֵדֶר טִירָה,a sort of watch tower

of enemies could be discerned afar off.

§ 45. FOUNTAINS and Cisterns.

Water, which was very scanty in the deserts, and yet was very necessary to large flocks, was very highly valued and very frugally imparted, Job. 22: 7. Num. 20: 17-19. Deut. 2: 6-28. Hence the Nomades, in those tracts, through which they yearly travel, dig wells and cisterns at certain distances, which they have the art of concealing in such a manner, that another, who travels the same way, will not discover them, nor steal away the waters. In this way perhaps they may be said to take possession of certain districts and to render them their own property, as was done by Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, in respect to Palestine. Hence the contentions respecting wells were of great moment, Gen. 21: 25. 26: 13-22. Different receptacles of water are mentioned.

I. Fountains, 2, 1. These are the source of running waters, and are common to all. If they flow all the year round,

נֶאֱמָנִים or ,אִיתָנִים מַיִם ,they are called by the orientals

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failing or faithful fountains; if they dry up in the summer they are denominated, or deceitful, Job 6:15-22. Isa. 33: 16. Jer. 15:18. Wells,, ning, are receptacles of water, from which there is no stream issuing. They belong to those persons, who found or dug them first. Sometimes they are owned by a number of shepherds in common, who come to them on appointed days with their flocks, in an order previously settled upon, descend a number of steps, which lead to the surface of the water, receive the water into small buckets,, and pour it into troughs, D, for the flock. The flocks are admitted to drink in a regular order, Gen. 29: 3–12. 24: 11-15. Exod. 2: 16. Jud. 5: 11. The waters of wells and fountains are called living waters, 7, and are very much esteemed, Lev. 14: 5, 50. Num. 19: 17. Hence they are made a symbol of prosperity, and God himself is compared to a fountain of living waters, Is. 43: 19, 20. 49: 10. Jer. 2: 13. 17: 13. Ps. 87: 7. Joel 3: 18. Ezek. 47: 1. et seq, Zech. 14: 18.

II. Cisterns, nimia, ninka, nia, NE. They were the property of those by whom they were made, Num. 21: 22. Under this name

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§ 46. THE FLOCKS OF THE NOMADES.

occur large subterranean vaults, often occupying an acre in extent, but which open by a small mouth. They are filled with rain water and snow during the winter, and are then closed at the mouth by large flat stones, over which sand is spread in such a way, as to prevent its being easily discovered. In cities the cisterns were works of much labour, for they were either hewn into rocks or surrounded with subterranean walls, and covered with a firm incrustation. We gather this from their ruins, and not a few of them remain. But if by chance the waters, which the shepherd has treasured up in cisterns, are lost by means of an earthquake or some other casualty, or are plundered by a thief, both he and his flocks are exposed to destruction; an event, which happens not unfrequently to travellers, who hasten to a fountain, but find its waters gone. For this reason a failure of water is used in Scripture, as an image of any great calamity, Isa. 41: 17-18. 44: 3. There is a large deposition of mud at the bottom of these cisterns, so that he who falls into them, when they are empty of water, perishes by a miserable death, Gen. 37: 22. ff. Jer. 38: 6. Lam. 3: 53. Ps. 40: 2, 69: 15. Cisterns, notwithstanding, were used, when empty, as prisons; prisons indeed, which were constructed under ground, received the same name, Gen. 39: 20. 40: 15.

§ 46. THE FLOCKS OF THE NOMADES.

These are goats and sheep, and they have great numbers of them. They are called by the Hebrews, collectively, Jr, but, separately, y, Jer. 49: 29. Ezek. 25: 5. The sheep are horned, and commonly white, Ps. 147: 16. Isa. 1: 18. Dan. 7: 9. Black ones are very rare, Dan; some are covered with small spots, DP, some with larger ones, D', others are streaked, ", and others again, called p, are distinguished by variegated hoofs, or, as some say, by circular streaks round the body, like rings, Gen. 30: 32–34. 31: 10—12. The sheep, mentioned in Ezek. 27: 18, whose wool is of a bright brown, inclining to a grey,, are found in Caramania.

Further; there are three different breeds of sheep in the East. I. The common, of which we have specimens every day among ourselves. II. The deformed breed, with short legs, macerated body, and rough wool, called in Arabick nakad, and in Hebrew pi

§ 46.

THE FLOCKS OF THE NOMADES.

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III. A breed larger than ours, and of very fine wool. Of this class of sheep, there are two kinds, the one, having immense tails, about four feet long, and five inches thick, N, the other, having short tails, and large clumps of fat on the haunches. Sheep are profitable to their owners for their milk,, their flesh and particularly for the wool,, which is shorn twice a year. A sheep hardly worth a florin will return a thousand to its owner, and many thousands of them are owned by a single shepherd in the vast deserts of the East, Job 1: 3. 1 Sam. 25: 3-4. 1 Chron. 5: 18-21. The annual increase of the flock is the greater on this account, that the sheep frequently bear twins, Cant. 6: 6. They bring forth twice a year, viz. in the spring and autumn, going with young only five months, but the spring lambs are esteemed preferable to those of the autumn. The lambs of a year old are called b, 7, by, a. We may infer from what has been stated, which indeed is the fact, that their sheep, which are the source of so much emolument to the Nomades, are very dear to them. They give them titles of endearment, and the ram, that is called out by its master, marches before the flock; hence the rulers of the people are every where called leaders of the flock, Jer, 25: 34, 35. 50: 8, Isa. 14: 9. Zech. 10: 3. The Arabians have certain terms, by which they can call the sheep, either to drink or to be milked. The sheep know the voice of the shepherd, and go at his bidding, John 10: 3, 14. Sometimes a lamb is taken into the tent, and tended and brought up like a dog. Such an one is called in Heb. 2, and in Arabick by a word which means an inmate, 2 Sam. 12: 3. Jer. 11: 19.

Before the shearing, the sheep are collected into an uncovered enclosure, surrounded by a wall, 3, 3, also,, auλn, John 10: 11, 16. The object of this is, that the wool may be rendered finer by the sweating and evaporation, which necessarily result from the flock's being thus crowded together. These are the sheepfolds mentioned in the following as well as in other places, Num. 32: 16. 24: 36, 2 Sam. 7: 8, Zeph. 2: 6. There is no other kind than this, used in the East. Sheepshearings were great festivals, 1 Sam. 25: 2, 4, 18, 36. 2 Sam. 13: 23.

Goats, as well as sheep, are comprehended under the collective noun, N, but are properly called y from 7, a she-goat. The

They are of a צְפִיר and שְׂעִיר הָעַדִים תַּיִשׁ he-goat is called

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847. ANIMALS OF THE OX-Kind.

black color, sometimes particoloured. They live under the open sky, with this exception only, that the kids are sometimes taken into the tent, to keep them from sucking the dam. They compensate their owners with their milk, more precious than any other, Prov. 27: 27; with their flesh, which in the East is highly esteemed, and with their hair, of which the Arabian women make cloth to cover their tents with. Of the skins bottles are made,

When they are used to hold water חֵמֶת כאד נֶבֶל נְבָלִים אֹבוֹת

or other liquids, the hairy side of the skin is external, with the exception, that in wine bottles, the hairy side is always turned in and the other out.

From the skins of kids small bottles are made, which answer the purpose of flasks. It is uncertain what that preparation by the means of smoke was, which is mentioned, Ps. 119: 83. Perhaps it was the same with what, the Ambassador from Vienna informs us, is practised at this day among the Calmucks, who, by means of smoke, prepare very durable and transparent skins, and make from them small, but elegant flasks and bottles. The goats of Ancyra with hair resembling silk, commonly called Camel's hair, appear, to have been known to the ancient Hebrews, and Schultz, in Paulus' Collection of Travels, VII. 108-110, says, that he saw flocks of these goats descending from the mountains in the vicinity of Acco and Ptolemais, which exemplified the descriptions in Cant. 4: 1, 2, 6: 5.

NOTE. It is not necessary to enumerate the different species of wild goats. It is worthy of remark, that geese, hens, and swine were not known among the domestick animals of the Nomades. At a somewhat recent period hens in some places were raised by the Hebrews; for 37, a hen,' that does not hatch its eggs,' is spoken of by Jeremiah, 17: 11, and in the time of Christ, when Peter denied his master, the cock crew in Jerusalem. No hearing is to be given to those Talmudists, who, though they lived nearly 200 years after Christ, took it upon themselves to deny the existence at any time of fowls of this kind in that city.

§ 47. ANIMALS OF THE OX-KIND.

These animals are called collectively, but separately,

עֶגְלִים עֶגְלוֹת those under three years ,שְׁיָרִים, אַלּוּפִים שׁוֹר

§ 47. ANIMALS OF THE OX-KIND.

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b. and those, over three years, e, me, ie, nie, also , which last however, is properly an epithet of strength. These animals are smaller in oriental countries, than among us, and have certain protuberances on the back directly over the forefeet. They are useful chiefly in agriculture, but they are not excluded from the possessions of the Nomades, Gen. 24: 25, Job 1: 3. Herdsmen were held in lower estimation, than the keepers of flocks, but they possessed the richest pastures in Bashan, Sharon, and Achior. Hence the oxen and bulls of Bashan, which were not only well fed, but strong and ferocious, are used as the symbols of ferocious enemies, Ps. 22: 12, 68: 31, Isa 34: 7. Deut. 33: 17. Prov. 14: 14. Heifers were symbolic of matrons, Amos 4: 1. Hosea 4: 15, 16, 10: 11, Jer. 46: 20. The horns of oxen and bulls, also of goats, are used tropically to express power, Ps. 75: 10, 89: 17, 24, 92: 10. Amos 6: 13, Jer. 48: 25, Lam. 2: 3, Ezek. 29: 21, Dan. 7: 7, 8, 24. 8: 3–5, Luke 1: 69. If the horns are represented as made of brass or iron, they indicate very great, as it were, insuperable power, 1 Kings 22: 11. 1 Chron. 18: 10. Mic. 4: 13-16. Hence the ancient coins represent kings with horns, and one of the titles which the Arabians attach to the great, especially to the warlike son of Philip, is, horned.

Oxen not only submitted to the yoke, and were employed in drawing carts and ploughs; but the Nomades frequently made use of them to transport goods on their backs, as they did on camels. The milk of the cows was found a nutritive drink, Gen. 18: 8. Of this the people made cheese,,, . 2 Sam. 17:29. What is called 1 Sam. 17: 18, were slices of coagulated milk, which had been strained through a leathern strainer, and, after it had grown hard, cut into pieces, as it was found necessary to use them. Anciently butter was not much used, but instead of it, oil of olives, which was applied not only to vegetables, but also to other kinds of food. In the Bible there is no mention made of butter., which in the Vulgate and other translations is rendered butter, was used as a drink, Jud. 5: 25, and, therefore, must have been milk in some shape or other. Honey and milk were accounted great dainties, but a great plenty of them was an indication, that a wide destruction of the people had preceded. On account of which diminution of the inhabitants, large and rich pastures were every where to be found; so that

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