IN PALESTINE IN RELATION TO THE BIBLE. 



243 



is the fact that no other but these four names have been 

 found. 



Now, besides these specially stamped handles with " to the 

 king " on them, a great many other jar handles with Hebrew 

 names have been found, which names have from the first been 

 taken to be (as with the Greek jar handles) those of the potters 

 who made them. Why should not these others be the names, 

 of the Royal potters ? After an exhaustive study of the 

 genealogies in the early chapters of i Chronicles, Mr. Macalister 

 comes to the conclusion that this is the case ; he recovers all 

 the four names of the " royal " potters, and connects them with 

 I Chronicles iv, 23, when we read — 



" These are the potters and those that dwell among plants and 

 hedges (or in Netaim and Gederah) ; there they dwelt with the 

 king for his work." 



Not only do these names occur, but also most of the other 

 names on the jar handles can be found in close connection in 

 the Biblical genealogies. It is impossible to follow out here all 

 the arguments and deductions which Mr. Macalister makes, 

 from these discoveries, but it is most interesting to find the 

 same names in the contemporary pottery and in the Hebrew 

 text of the Bible ; thus it lends support to the older view, that 

 the names in the genealogies are personal rather than place- 

 names, and are taken from genuine contemporary records. It 

 is an encouragement to hope for more discoveries which may 

 illuminate difficult passages in the Bible. 



During the period of time covered by the just mentioned 

 excavations, a good deal of light has, from various sources, been 

 thrown upon the problem of the ancient topography of 

 Jerusalem, resulting in a very general reversal of the views 

 held a quarter of a century ago. Then it was practically 

 unanimously admitted among students of the subject that Zion 

 and the City of David occupied the summit of the western of 

 the two parallel hills into which the site of the Holy City is 

 naturally divided. Such a view seemed to have the support of 

 Josephus, and certainly has all the weight of ecclesiastical 

 tradition since the fourth century on its side. In recent years,, 

 and particularly in the last decade, almost all the leading 

 scholars* have come to the conclusion that the original Zion 



* Among the adherents of the new view may be mentioned, Birchv 

 Stade, Robertson-Smith, Sir Ch. Wilson, Prof. G. A. Smith, Socin and. 

 Beiizinger, Ryle, Bp. of Winchester, Canon Driver and Sir Ch. Warren. 



