84 George Dakl, 



In answer to this tale, Josephus says that Apion has loaded the 

 ass (that is, himself) with a burden of ridiculous lies. The first of 

 these lies is his statement that there is in Idumea a city named Dor: 



Kol yap T07rov5 ovk 6vTa<s ypa<^u koX 7roA.et? ovk ciScjg fxeTaTiOrjaiv • ■^ 

 jLtev yap *l8ov/>tata r^s Ty/xerepas x^P"-'^ earlv o/u,o/oos, Kara Td^av Kcip^ivr], kol 

 Awpa ravrry? icrrlv ovSe/xta 7roA.t? • r^? fievTOi ^OLVLKr]<s irapa to l^apfxrjXtov opos 

 Awpa TToAis ovo/xo^erat, fXTjhev iinKOLvwvova-a tols 'Atti'covos f^XvaprjpxKn • t€(t- 

 ardpuyv yap rffiepSiv ohov t^s 'iSov/matas a<l>€aTrjK€v. 



"For he writes of places that do not exist, and being unac- 

 quainted with cities he changes them about. For Idumea borders 

 upon our country, and is near Gaza ; in it there is no such city as 

 Dor. There is, to be sure, a Phoenician city near Mount Carmel 

 named Dor, which, however, has nothing to do with Apion's 

 absurdities; for it is distant four days journey from Idumea." 



Although Josephus so stoutly maintains that there is no such city 

 as Dor in Idumea, it seems quite certain that Adora of Idumea is 

 meant in this story. We have seen in Ant. XIV. 5 : 3 (parallel, 

 B.J.^ I, 8 : 4) that the initial A was easily dropped. This may have 

 happened either through corruptions in texts or in popular speech. 

 It seems that this town Adora is called Dura at the present time'. 



It would appear from the reference to it above that, at the time 

 of the writing of the treatise Contra Apionem (i. e., c. 95 A. D.), 

 Dor was known as a city, doubtless of some importance, in Phoe- 

 nicia. What is here meant by " Phoenicia " is not an easy question 

 to decide, especially as the meaning of the name seems to have 

 varied at different periods. In some documents of the Greek 

 period the term KotA?; '%vpva kox ^olvlky] (*'Coele-Syria and Phoe- 

 nicia") is used to designate the whole Syrian district "beyond 

 (west of) the river (Euphrates) "\ The boundaries between Coele- 

 Syria and Phoenicia evidently varied greatly. In the last century 

 B. C. Coele-Syria seems to have been ordinarily applied only to the 

 district between Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon^ Holscher* argues 

 with considerable probability that the coast cities were organised 

 by the Romans soon after Pompey's invasion into a separate official 



1 G.A.S., Hist. Geog., map ; Schiir., G.J.V. II, 7. 



2 Torrey, Ezra Studies, p. 83. — This term is used as the equivalent of the 



Biblical in:n nn;;. 



3 Holscher, Palastina, p. 12 ; Torrey, I. c. 

 ^i. c.,p. 98. 



