374 THE HOLY LAND. 
CHAP, might have taken place. It has never yet 
' — V been determined when these sepulchres were 
hewn, nor by what people \ They are a con- 
tinuation of one vast coemetery, extending 
along the base of all the mountainous eleva- 
tions which surround Jerusalem upon its southern 
and eastern sides ; and their appearance alone, 
independently of every other consideration, 
denotes the former existence of a numerous, 
flourishing, and powerful people. To relate 
the legends of the monks with regard to these 
places would be worse than silence concerning 
them, even if they had not often been told 
before. The " Sepulchre of Jehosaphat" and the 
'' Cave of St. James,'' are smaller works, of the 
same nature with the monuments ascribed to 
Absalom and Zechariah. All of them contain 
apartments and receptacles for the dead, hewn 
in the same marvellous manner. Josephus men- 
tions a monument erected by Absalom; but he 
describes it as a marble Sttl^, distant two stadia 
from Jerusalem'^. The same, however, is said in 
(1) Mons.Dc Chdteauhriand places them amon^ the Greek and 
Roman monuments of Pagan times (See Trav. vol. II. p. 95.) erected 
by the, Jeivs. *' If I were required," says he, {Ibid. p. 101.) " to fix 
precisely the aje in which these Mausoleums were erected, I should 
place it about the time of the alliance between the Jews and the 
Lacedamonians, under the first Maccabees." 
(2) Antiq. lib. vii. cap. 9. Colon. 1691. 
