Furtlier do^^*n the valley, at its junction with the Valley of Hinnom, there is a well, 125 feet deep, known as Bir Eyyiib, or Job's Well. This, though rediscovered by tlie Crusaders, is almost certainly ancient and may have been the En-rogel of the OT. From here great quantities of water are drawn all the year round, much of whicli is carried in skins and sold in Jerusalem, but it is in no way of better qualitj^ than that from the Virgin's Fountain. After a spell of heavy rain the water rises up like a frcnuinc spring, and over- flowing underground a littli- 1" low tlie actual well mouth, it bursts forth in a liiil.' stream and runs down the Wndi/ ni-.\'ir. Smli an outflow may last several days, and is a great source of attraction to the people of Jerusalem, who, on the cessation of the rain, hasten out to sit by the ' flo'ft'ing Kidron ' and refresh themselves beside its running waters. During the unusually lieavy rains of the winter 1904-5 tlie 'Kidron' ran thus four times. A little farther down the valley there occurs, at the same time and under the same cir- cumstances, another apparent 'sjiring' — the 'Ain el-L6z — due to the water of Bir E;/>/iib finding its way along an ancient rock-cut aqueduct and burst- ing up through the ground where the conduit is blocked.
The Hamm&m esh-Shefa (bath of healing) under the W. 'wall of the llarnni area has by many been considered an ancient spring. To-day the water col- lects in an extensive underground rocky chamber at the bottom of a well 86 feet deep. Quite pos- sibly before the area to the north was so thickly inhabited, when, for example, this well was outside the walls, a certain amount of good water may have been obtainable here, but now what collects is a foul and smelling liquid which percolates to the valley bottom from the neighbouring inhabited area, and it is unfit for even its present use — in a Turkish bath.
More imi.ortant tlian springs or wells are the in- nuim I 1 (• . 1 : ! - with which, from the earliest tini. , 1 . 1 iisalem has been honej-combed.
It hi y I 11 pointed out that the rainfall of
this 1' jj on I- I 1 11 1-11 Irrable, and rain-water collected on a clean roof and stored in a well-kept cistern is good for all domestic purposes. There are private cisterns under practically every house, but there are in addition a number of larger reservoirs for
public use. In the Hnrnm — the ancient Temple area — there are 37 known excavations, of which one, the ' great sea,' it is calculated, can hold about 2,000,000 gallons.
In other parts the more important cisterns are — the Birkct Mamilla, Hanimam el-Batrak, Birkct Israel, Birkct cs-Sultdn, ' The Twin' Pools,' the so-called ' Pool of Bethesda,' and the two Siloam pools — Birkct Silwan and Birkct el-Hamra. The last three are dealt with in the special articles Bethesda and Siloam respectivelv. The Birkct cs-SultAn, the misnamed ' Lower Pool of Gihon ' in the Valley of Hinnom, was probably first con- structed by German knights in the 12th cent., and was repaired by the Sultan Suleiman ibn Selim in the 16th cent., while the Twin Pools near the ' Sisters of Zion ' were made in the moat of the Antonia fortress after the destruction of the city in A.D. 70 ; so neither of these needs description here. The other three require longer notice. The Birkct Mamilla, incorrectly called the ' Upper Pool of Gihon,' lies at the head of the Valley of Hinnom, about 700 yards W. X. W. of the Jafta Gate, and used to collect all the surface water from the higher ground around ; in recent years the Moslem cemetery in which it lies has been surrounded by a wall, which has largely cut off the supplies. After a spell of heavy rain it often used to till to overflowing. It is 97 yards long, 64 yards wide, and 19 feet deep. It appears to be ' the Serpents' Pool' of Josephus {BJv. iii. 2). The outlet on the E. side leads to a conduit which enters the city near the Jatta Gate and empties itself into the great rock-cut pool — Birkct JfamviAm el-Batrak (the pool or bath of the Patriarch), commonly known as the Pool of Hezekiah. The pool, 80 yards long by 48 yards wide, is largely rock-cut, and lies across the W. arm of the Tyropoeon Valley ; there are indications that it extended at one time further north than it does at present. Josephus apparently refers to this as the Pool Amygdalon {KoKvfi^riepa 'A/ii'-zSaXoi-), a name perhaps derived from Bcrclcat ha-migdalim (Pool of the Towers) on account of the near proximity of some of the great fortresses on the neighbouring walls. As the pool is not mentioned in Josephus until after the second wall had been captured, it may be presumed that it was within that wall(/;./ V. xi. 4).
Thr r.u-lrf Isr.nl i, hiuU arross the width of a natural \aney whirh run- Ironi X.W. to S.E., and passes uniler the X.K. <ourse of tlie yaram at this point. It is supposed by some authorities that the pool itself did not exist at the period of Christ's ministry, but as a defence to the Temple enclosure and to the neighbouring Castle of Antonia (wh. see) it may well have been the Pool Struthius men- tioned by Josephus (ib.). He says the fifth legion raised a bank at the tower of Antonia ' over against the middle of the pool that is called Struthius.' It must, however, be stated that M. Ganneau and others propose to identify the ' Twin Pools ' with Struthius.