(3.) The involuntary shedder of blood was permit- ted to take flight to one of six Levitical cities, special- ly appointed out of the 48 as cities of refuge, 'three on each side of the Jordan (Num. xxxv, 22, 23; Deut. xix, 4-6). The cities were Kedesh, in Mount Naph- tali; Shechem, in Mount Ephraim ; Hebron, in the hill- country of Judah ; on the east side of Jordan, Bezcr in Reuben ; Ramoth, in Gad ; Golan, in Manasseh (Josh. xx, 7, 8). The elders of the city of refuge were to hear his case and protect him till he could be tried be- fore the authorities of his own city. If the act were then decided to have been involuntary, he was taken back to the city of refuge, round which an area with a radius of 2000 (3000, Patrick) cubits was assigned as the limit of protection, and was to remain there in safety till the death of the high-priest for the time being. Beyond the limit of the city of refuge the revenger might slay him, but after the high-priest's death he might return to his home with impunity (Num. xxxv, 25, 28; Josh, xx, 4, 6). The roads to the cities were to be kept open (Deut. xix, 3).
To these particulars the Talmudists add, among others of an absurd kind, the following; at the cross- roads posts were erected bearing the word ti^pO, ref- uge, to direct the fugitive. All facilities of water and situation were provided in the cities; no implements of war or chase were allowed there. The mothers of high-priests used to send presents to the detained per- sons to prevent their wishing for the high-priest's death. If the fugitive died before the high-priest, his bones were sent home after the high-priest's death (P. Fagius in Targ. Onk. Ap., Rittershus. de Jure Asyli, in the Crit. Sucr. viii, 159; Lightfoot, Cent, Chorogr. c. 50, Op. ii, 208).
(4.) If a person were found dead, the elders of the nearest city were to meet in a rough valley untouched by the plough, and, washing their hands over a be- headed heifer, protest their innocence of the deed, and deprecate the anger of the Almighty (Deut. xxi, 1-9) See Homicide.
2. Other Ancient Nations. — The high estimation in which blood-revenge stood among the ancient Arabs may be judged of from the fact that it formed the sub- ject of their most beautiful and elevated poetry (comp. the Scholiast TaurisA to the 16th poem in Schultens' Excerp. Hamas'). Mohammed did not abolish, but modified, that rigorous custom, by allowing tho accept-
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anec of a ransom in money for the forfeited life of the murderer {Koran, ii, 173-175), and at the worst forbid- ding the infliction of any cruel or painful death (ibid. xvii, 35). It was, and even still is, a common prac- tice among nations of patriarchal habits, that the near- est of kin should, as a matter of duty, avenge the death of a murdered relative. The early impressions and practice on this subject may be gathered from writings of a different though very earl}- age and of different countries (Gen. xxxiv, 30; Horn. II. xxiii, 84, 88; y.xiv, 480, 482; Od. xv, 270, 27G ; Muller on ^Eschyl. i'.um. c. ii, A and B). Compensation for murder is allowed by the Koran, and he who transgresses after this by killing the murderer shall suffer a grievous punishment (Sale, Koran, ii, 21, and xvii, 230). Among the Bedouins and other Arab tribes, should the offer of blood-money be refused, the " Thar," or law of blood, comes into operation, and any person within the fifth degree of blood from the homicide may be legally killed by any one within the same degree of consanguinity to the victim. Frequently the hom- icide will wander from tent to tent over the desert, or even rove through the towns and villages on its bor- ders with a chain found his neck and in rags, begging contributions from the charitable to pay the appor- tioned blood-money. Three days and four hours are allowed to the persons included within the " Thar" for escape. The right to blood-revenge is never lost, except as annulled by compensation : it descends to the latest generation. Similar customs, with local dis- tinctions, are found in Persia, Abyssinia, among the Druses and Circassians (Niebuhr, Descr. de V Arable p. 28, 30; Voyage, ii, 350; Burckhardt, Notes on the Btdndm, p. 66, 85; Travels in Arabia, i, 409, ii, 330; Syria, p. 540, 113, 643 ; Layard, Nin. and Bab. p. 305- 307; Chardin, Voyages, vi, 107-112). Money-com- pensations for homicide are appointed by the Hindoo law (Sir W. Jones, vol. iii, chap, vii) ; and Tacitus re- marks that among the German nations "a homicide is atoned by a certain number of sheep or cattle" {Germ. 21). By the Anglo-Saxon law also, money-compensa- tion for homicide, icer-gild, was sanctioned on a scale proportioned to the rank of the murdered person (Lap- penberg, ii, 336; Lingard, i, 411, 414).
Of all the other nations, the Greeks and Romans alone seem to have possessed cities of refuge (Serv. ad .■En. viii, 342 ; Liv. i, 8 ; Tac. Ann. iii, 60), of which Daphne, near Antioch, seems to have been one of the most prominent (2 Mace, iv, 34 ; comp. Potter's Greek Archceol. i, 480), and to have served as a refuge even for wilful murderers. The laws and customs of the ancient Greeks in cases of murder may be gathered from the principle laid down by Plato on that head il>' Legib. ix, in t. ix, p. 28 sq.): "Since, according to tradition, the murdered person is greatly irritated ag.iinst the murderer during the first few months after the perpetration of the deed, the murderer ought there- fore to inflict a punishment upon himself by exiling himself from his country for a whole year, and if the murdered be a foreigner, by keeping away from his country. If the homicide subjects himself to such a punishment, it is but fair that the nearest relative should be appeased and grant pardon ; but in case he does not submit to that punishment, or dares even to enter the temple while the guilt of blood is still upon his hands, the avenger shall arraign him before the bar of justice, where he is 1 1 be punished with the infliction of a double fine. But in case the avenger neglects to proceed against him, the guilt passes over to him (the avenger), and any one may take him before the judge, who passes on him the sentence of banishment for five years." — Kitto, s. v. ; Smith, s. v. See Asyu'm.