106 ACRE. 
CHAP, instances alike, mav either have served as allu- 
III. " 
» - , - ' sians to the decapitation of St. John, or were 
intended for a representation of the heads of 
Saracens, suspended as trophies upon the walls'. 
But there are other ruins in Acre, an account of 
which was published in the middle of the 
seventeenth century, by a French traveller ^ 
From his work it appears, that many edifices 
escaped the ravages of the Saracens, far surpass- 
ing all that Sandys has described, or Fuller 
believed to have existed : a reference to it will 
be here necessary, as many of the remains 
therein mentioned escaped the observation of 
our party, notwithstanding a very diligent in- 
quiry after the antiquities of the place ; and 
nothing can be more lamentably deficient than 
the accounts given of Acre by the different 
travellers who have visited this part of the 
(l) Every person who has visited Roynan- Catholic countries knows 
that the representations of St. John's decollation are among the common 
ornaments of the Latin, as well as of the Greek and Armeniari churches. 
But it is said, on the authority of William of Tyre, (lib. xviii. c. 5.) 
that St. John the /4lmsgiver, and not «S/. John the Baptist, was the 
patron of the Knights Hospitallers. Colonel Squire, who afterwards 
visited Jcre in company with Mr, IV. Hamilton and Major Leake tyi the. 
artillery, describes this building, in his Journal, as "the beautiful 
remnant of a Gothic church, consisting of a high wall with three Gothic 
arched windows, ornamented above with a rich frieze, and a line of 
human heads well sculptured and in good preservation." 
(2) Voyage de la Terre Sainte, fait Tan 1652, par M. I, Douhdan. 
Paris, 1657. 
