likely to be planted, nor to thrive out of the stations where it is indigenous. Salvadora Per- sica, proposed by Royle, is a desert shrub, with a trunk out of which it would be impossible to find a piece large enougli to carve into a graven image, and in every other way quite unsuitable. Luther's surmise, that the final i of the Heb. original is a i, and that the tree is a cedar, is forbidden by the preWous mention of the cedar in the same pas.sage. The interpretation ash of AV has no support from philology. It is wholly improbable that 'oren has any connexion with urnus. There are three species of a-sh in SjTia — Fraxinus Ornus, L., which grows in the mountains from Lebanon to Amanus ; F. excelsior, L. , Amanus and northward ; and F. oxycarpa, Willd., var. oligopht/lla, Boiss., Tel-el- ^adi (Dan) to Antilebanon, Lebanon, and Aleppo, 'ihe modern Arab, name for the last is dardAr (also the elm). It is a tine tree, with a hemispherical comus, 15 to 45 feet high, and has a trunk which would furnish wood suitable for the requirements of the text. But it grows XDild, usually near or by water, and therefore would not likely have been selected as a tree which the 'rain doth nourish.' Fir is an unfortunate guess, as there are other words which correspond to the different sorts of fir. Pine has the authority of the LXX. There are three species of pine growing in the Holy Land — Pinus Ilaleppensis, Mill, the Aleppo Pine ; P. Brutia, Ten. ; and P. Pinea, L., the maritime or stone pine. The latter tree fulfils best the condi- tions of the 'oren.
It is a tree well knoAvn by the Arabic name snowbar, with a resinous, hard wood, capable of being carved, and much used for fuel, especially in the public ovens. It produces large cones, and an edible seed, for which it is cultivated, and the taste of which when roasted resembles that of a roasted peanut. Moreover, it is a tree which ig very extensively planted, and always in sandy places or on dry hillsides, where it receives only the rain. It is one of the few cultivated (planted) trees in this land which are never watered except by the rain. It is never planted in irrigated ground. The seed is so>vn m low-lying districts along the coast after the first rains, when the ground is softened, and in the mountains in the latter days of February, when all danger of the tender sprout being nipped by frost has passed away, but when there is prospect of rain sufficient to ' nourish ' the seedling for its exposure to the blazing sunshine during the eight long rainless months that are to follow. The explanatory clause of our passage has very peculiar force witn refer- ence to this tree. The objection of Celsius, that the pine does not bear transplanting, is futile, as it is only said that they were planted. The same word is used for the lign-aloes (Nu 24"), and the cedars (Ps 1U4"), both of which it is said the ' Lord planted,' i.e. smced, for they were certainly not transplanted. Al.so God is rei)resented as planting the desolate places (Ezk Hli'"). Vast groves of fnnichar have been planted at points along the coast to arrest the movement of the sand dunes. Such a grove was planted by Ibrahim Pasha in 1840 near Beirftt, and is one of the most picturesque features of the beautiful plain between the city and Lebanon. Large numbers of these groves are planted on the red sand-stone oi Lebanon, and in parts of Palestine. As the tree grows, the lower brunches are lopped off, and only a mushroom-shaped top is left. The trees grow near together and very uniformly, so that the top of a large grove such as that near lieirt^t, when looked upon from the mountain, presents a flat green surface, which constitutes a very marked and attractive feature of the landscape. Wlicn planted on steep mountain sides, as in Lebanon and on
164
ASHAN
ASHER
the Apulian coast of Italy, the tall trunks, sur- mounted by their dense crown of evergreen leaves, fringe the tops and dot the sides of the rugged grey peaks with a beauty hardly rivalled by any ot her tree.
G. E. Post. ASHAN (m), Jos 15" 19', 1 Ch 4*' 6»».— Per- haps the same as Cor-aahan, which see. It was a to«-n of Judah, near Libnah and Rimmon, belon";ing to Simeon, and not far from Debir. It must have been on the slopes of the hills east of Gaza, but the site is doubtful. C. R. Conder.
ASHARELAH (nSK-iCK. AV Asarelah). — An Asiipliite (1 Ch 25-), called in v." Jesharelah (see Kittel's notes on 1 Ch 4" 25»- *).
ASHBEA (ySviK) occurs in an oliscure passage (1 Ch 4'" 'house of A.') where it is uncertain whether it is the name of a place or of a man. See Genealogy.
ASHBEL {'?35'N, perh. corrupted from Si';?n 'man of Baal '). — The second son of Benjamin (1 Ch 8' ; cf. Gn 46^', Nu 2e^). In Nu 26^ Ashbelite, in- habitant of Ashbel, occurs.
ASHDOD (■l^^v"^* ' fortress'?).— One of the five great Philistine cities. Jos 11*" 13» IS*"-", 1 S 5'-', 2 Ch 26«, Neh 4' 13", Jer 25»' 47», Am !», Zeph 2*, Zee 9«. Azotus, 1 Mac 5" 10»*, Ac S". It is now the mud village Esdud, on the edge of the plain, close to a large hillock of red sand, backed by dunes of drifted sand which extend to the shore cliffs. A few palms grow near, and water is supplied by a pond. The sand probably covers the site of the ancient city. The inhabitants, in type and dress, resemble the Egyp. rather than the Pal. peasantry. A small gem was found here in 1875, representing Dagon as a fish-man ; but this may be comparatively recent, resembling Gnostic gems of the 2nd cent. A.D. A. was not taken by the Hebrews, and was the refuge of the Anakim (Jos ll--*). The villages near it belonged to Judah (Jos 15*"-). The inhabitants were still independ- ent in the time of Samuel (1 S 5'), but A. was attacked by Uzziah (2 Ch 26'). Its inhabitants were enemies or the Jews after the Captivity (Neh 4'), and it is mentioned as a reproach that the children of the mixed marriages spoke ' half in the speech of A.' (Neh 13=*). The city is said in the 7th cent. B.C. to have sustained a 29 years' siege by Psammitichus (Herod, ii. 157). In B.C. 711 A. was besieged by Sargon after the capture of Samaria. Its king, Yavan or Yamanu, had been set up in place of the Assyrian nominee Akhimiti, whom Sargon placed on the throne instead of a certain Azuri who had refused tribute. The Philistines, Jews (Ja'udu), Edomites, and Moabit«s were allied, and had sent for aid to Pir'u (Pharaoh?) ; yet A. was obliged to submit to the Assj^ians. In B.C. 702 Sennacherib, according to his own record, freed Mitinti (who seems to have been also king of Ashkelon about thirty - four years later) from Hezekiah, and ha became tributary for a time to Assyria. In B.C. 668 the name of the kinjj of A., tributary to Assurbanipal, was Ahimilhi or Aliiinelech. The city was taken by Judas Mac- cab;eus (c. 165), and again (c. 148) by Jonathan (1 Mac 5" 10**). It became a bishopric in the 4th cent. A.D., but its importance gradually decreased, and the site was not generally known in the Middle Ages. See SWP vol. iii. sheet xvi.