Druidical Altar?.
form of a chest or house, were intended as memorials of the ark. The curious subject of Arkite worship is especially illustrated by the two famous medals of Apamea. There were six cities of this name, of which the most celebrated was that of Syria ; next to it in importance was the one in Phr}'gia, called also Ki/ioj- -6c, Kibotos, which, as we have seen, means an ark or hollow vessel. The medals in question belong, the one to the elder Philip, and the other to Pertinax. In the former it is extremely interesting to observe that on the front of the ark is the name of Noah, NQE, in Greek characters. In both we perceive the ark floating on the water, containing the patriarch and his wife, the dove on wing, the olive-branch, and the raven perched on the ark. These medals also repre- sent Noah and his wife on terra, firm a, in the attitude of rendering thanks for their safety. The genuine- ness of these medals has been established beyond all question by the researches of Bryant and the critical inspection of Abbe Barthelemy. There is another medal, struck in honor of the Emperor Hadrian, which bears the inscription AHAMEUN KIBQTOS MAP2- 2IA, "the ark and the Marsj-as of the Apameans." See ArAMEA. The coincidences which these medals offer are at least exceedingly curious; and they are scarcely less illustrative of the prevailing belief to which we are referring, if, as some suppose, the figures represented are those of Deucalion and Pyrrha (Meis- ner, De area Xoachi, Witt. 1622) — Kitto. See Flood.
ARK
402
ARK
Coins of Apamea Ciloiv.% with supposed Representations of the Ark.
2. The Ark of Bulrushes (SlSSl, tebah' ; Sept. S'i'/3(f). In Exod. ii, 3, we read that Moses was ex- posed among the flags of the Nile in an ark (or boat of bulrushes) daubed with slime and with pitch. The bulrushes of which the ark was made were the papy- rus reed (Cyperus papyrus), which grows in Egypt in marshy places. It was used for a variety of purposes, even for food. Pliny says, from the plant itself they veuve boats, and other ancient writers inform us that the Nile wherries were made of papyrus. Boats made of this material were noted for their swiftness, and are alluded to in Isa. xviii, 2. See Reed.
3. The Sacred Ark of the Jews (l'"l1N or pX aron; Sept. and New Test. k-(/3w-oc), different from the term applied to the ark of Noah. It is the com- mon name for a chest or coffer, whether applied to the ark in the tabernacle, to a coffin, to a mummy-chest (Gen. 1, 20), or to a chest for money (2 Kings xii, 9, 10). Our word ark has the same meaning; being de- rived from the Latin area, a chest. The sacred chest is distinguished from others as the "ark of God" (1 Sam. iii, 3), " ark of the covenant" (Josh, iii, G; Heb. ix, 4), and " ark of the law" (Exod. xxv, 22). This ark was a kind of box, of an oblong shape, made of shittim (acacia) wood, a cubit and a half broad and high, two culiits long, and covered on all sides with the purest gold. It was ornamented on its upper sur- face with a border or rim of gold ; and on each of the two sides, at equal distances from the top, were two gold rings, in which were placed (to remain there per- petually) the gold-covered poles by which the ark was carried, and which continued with it after it was de- posited in the tabernacle. The Levites of the house of Kohath, to whose office this especially appertained, bore il in its progress. Probably, however, when re- moved from within the vail in the most holy place, which was its proper position, or when taken out * thence, priests were its bearers (Num. vii, 9 ; x, 21 ; iv, 5, 19, 20; 1 Kings viii, 3, 6). The ends of the St iv. is were visible without the vail in the holy place of the temple of Solomon, the staves being drawn to the ends, apparently, but not out of the rings. The ark, when transported, was enveloped in the " vail" of the dismantled tabernacle, in the curtain of badgers' skins, and in a blue cloth over all. and was therefore not seen. The lid or cover of the ark was of the same
length and breadth as the ark itself, and made of the purest gold. Over it, at the two extremities, were two cherubim, with their faces turned toward each other, and inclined a little toward the lid (otherwise called the mercy-seaC). See Cherub. Their wings, which were spread out over the top of the ark, formed the throne of God, the King of Israel, while the ark itself was his footstool (Exod. xxv, 10-22 ; xxxvii, 1-9). (Comp. Josephus, Ant. iii, G, 5; Philo, Opera, ii, 150; Koran, ii, 249, ed. Marrac. ; for heathen parallels, see Apulej. Asm. xi, 262, Bip. ; Pausan. vii, 19, 3; Ovid, Ars Am. ii, 609 sq. ; Catull. lxiv, 260 sq. See gen- erally Behind, Antiq. Sacr. i, 5, 19 sq., 43 sq. ; Carp- zov, Appar. p. 260 sq. ; Schaacht, Animadvers. p. 334 sq. ; Buxtorf, Hist, areas fad. in Ugolini Thesaur. viii ; Hoffmann, in the Hall. Encycl. xiv, 27 sq. ; Otho, Lex. Rabb. p. GO sq. ; Rau, Nubes super area fad. Herbon. 1757, Utrecht, 1760 ; Thalemann, Nubes super area fad. Lips. 1752, Vindic. 1771; Lamy, Be tabernac. fad. p. 412 sq. ; Van Til, He tabernac. Mas. p. 117 sq.)