Town and Lake of Tiberias, from the North-west.
summit in Galilee. In addition to the language of the ' particular country, as Poland, Germany, Spain, from which they or their families emigrated, most of the ] Jews here speak also the Kabbinic Hebrew and modern Arabic. They occupy a quarter in the middle of the town, adjacent to the lake; just north of which, near the shore, is a Latin convent and church, occupied by a solitary Italian monk. There is a place of interment near Tiberias, in which a distinguished rabbi is said to be buried with 14,000 of his disciples around him. The grave of the Arabian philosopher Lokman, as Burckhardt states, was pointed out here in the 14th century.
4. Position and Present Condition. — As above inti- mated, the ancient name has survived in that of the modern Tubarieh, which occupies unquestionably the
and were employed for medicinal purposes. See Ham-
MATII.
It Stood anciently, as now, on the western shore, about two thirds of the way bet\vcen the northern and south- ern end of the Sea of Galilee. There is a margin or strip of land there between the water and the steep hills (which elsewhere in that quarter come down so boldly to the edge of the lake), aliout two miles long and a quarter of a mile broad. The tract in question is somewhat undulating, but approximates to the char- acter of a plain. Tubarieh, the modern town, occupies the northern end of this parallelogram, and the Warm Baths the southern extremity; so that the more ex- tended city of the Roman age must liave covered all, or nearly all, of tlie peculiar ground whose limits are thus clearly defined.
TIBERIAS, SEA OF
400
TIBNI
The present Tubarich has a rectangular form, is guarded by a stroni; wall on the land side, but is left entirely open towards the sea. A few palm-trees still remain as witnesses of the luxuriant vegetation which once adorned this garden of the Promised Land, but they are greatly inferior in size and beauty to those seen in Egypt. The oleander grows profusely here, almost rivalling that flower so much admired as found on the neighboring I'lain of Gennesaret. The people, as of old, draw their subsistence in part from the adja- cent lake. The spectator from his position here com- mands a view of almost the entire expanse of the sea, except the southern part, which is cut off by a slight projection of the coast. The precipices on the opposite side appear almost to overhang the water, but, on being approached, are found to stand back at some distance, so as to allow travellers to pass between them and the wa- ter. The lofty Hermon, the modern Jebel esh-Sheikh, with its glistening snow-heaps, forms a consjiicuous ob- ject of the landscape in the north-east. Many rock- tombs exist in the sides of the hills, behind the town, some of them, no doubt, of great antiquity, and con- structed in the best style of such monuments. The climate here in the warm season is very hot and un- healthy; but most of the tropical fruits, as in other parts of the valle}' of the Jordan, become ripe very early, and, with industry, might be cultivated iu great abundance and perfection.
This place, in common with many others in Galilee, suffered greatly by an earthquake on New-year's-day, 1837. Almost every building, with the exception of the walls and some parts of the castle, was levelled to the ground. The inhabitants were obliged to live for some time in wooden booths. It is supposed that at least seven hundred of the inhabitants were destroyed at that time. The place has even yet not fully recov- ered from the disaster.
Tiberias is fully described in Raumer's Palmlina, p. 125 ; Robinson's Biblical Researches, ii, 380 sq. ; Porter's Handbook, p. 421 sq. ; Thomson's Land and Book, ii, 71 sq. ; and most books of travel in Palestine.
TIBE'RIAS, The Sea. of (»'/ Sia\d(j(yi] tviq Tijiipia- coq ; Vidg. mare Tiheriadis). This term is found only in John xxi, 1, the other passage in which it occurs in the A. y. (vi, 1) being, if the original is accurately rendered. " the sea of (ialilee, of Tiberias." John probably uses the name as more familiar to non-residents in Palestine than the indigenous name of the "sea of Galilee," or " sea of Gennesaret," actuated, no doubt, by the same motive which has induced him so constantly to trans- late the Hebrew names and terms which he uses (such as Rabbi, Rabboni, Messias, Cephas, Siloam, etc.) into the language of the Gentiles. — Smith. See Galti.ee, Sea of.
Tibe'riiis (Ti/Ssoioc), in full, Tibeiuus Claudius Neiw) C.KSAii, the Roman emperor, successor of Augus- tus, wlio began to reign A.D. 14, and reigned until 37. He was the son of Tiberius Claudius Nero and Livia, and hence a stepson of Augustus. He was born at Rome Nov, 16, B.C. 45. He became emperor in his fifty-tifth year, after having distinguished himself as a conmiander in various wars, nnd having evinced talents of a high order as an orator and an administrator of civil affairs. His military exploits and those of Drusus, his brother, were sung by Horace (Carm. iv, 4, 14). He even gained the reputation of possessing the sterner virtues of the Ro- man character, and was regarded as entirely worthy of the imperial honors to which his birth and supposed personal merits at length opened the way. Yet on be- ing raised to the su])reme power, he suddenly became, or showed himself to be, a very different man. His subsequent life was one of inactivity, sloth, and self-in- dulgence. He was despotic in his government, cruel and vindictive in his disposition. He gave up the af- fairs of the State to the vilest favorites, while he himself wallowed in the verv kennel of all that was low and de-