'Transactions of the Bombay Geographical Society, from January 1847 to May 1849. Edited by the Secretary. Volume VIII.' [‎340] (449/496)

340
At no distant period after tlie rebuilding of tlie wall of Jerusalem in
tlie time of Nehemiah, or about b. c. 443, Ai seems to have again fallen
into decay, as no subsequent mention of it is met with, either in the Old
or New Testaments. Probably most of its inhabitants repaired to the
Sacred City soon after the rebuilding of the wall.
Josephus, the next authority after Holy Writ, makes no mention of it
as an existing city in his time, but, in his history of Joshua,* he relates
the siege and capture of the place by Joshua with little variation from
the Scriptural version, except in his orthography of the name of the city,
which the Septuagint gives as Ayyat, but which is spelt in Josephus
A LV a .— €ls Kivav tt6\lv vnep rrjs The orthography would
appear not to be the same in all the editions of Josephus, as Stephanas
Byzantinus, in quoting from the Jewish historian, spells it “ANNA ttoXis
rrjs lovftcuas vnep lepixovura” It is also called “ Aiap” by Stephanas
Byzantinus. Berkelius notices this discrepancy, but concludes the places
to be identical.
In the time of Eusebius and Jerome (about A. d. 330 and 400,)
nothing remained of the royal city but a few small ruins, and its site was
then barely pointed out. “ Aggai vero vix parvse ruinse resident: et
locus tantummodo monstratur.” Its site is not very accurately describ
ed, except in being laid down as in the vicinity of Bethel, which itself,
however, is very correctly fixed in the same passage.|
Masius tells us that Ai was three leagues from Jericho; and Bethel
one league from Ai. And Breydenbach (a. d. 1483-84) describes its
position very accurately with reference to the supposed site of Grilgal, the
fountain of Elisha, Mount Quarantana (Jwdie, Ain es Sultan ^
and Gebel Karanlal an d Bethel. He preserves the an
cient orthography of the word as it first occurs in Genesis, substituting
y for i in the final, and writes it, “Hay.” Bethel he states to have
been once called Lusa (Luz,) and describes as lying one league norther
ly, and somewhat westerly from “ Hay.”J
* Antiq. Jud. v. ]2.
t Aggai ad occidentalem plagam vergifc Bethelis, non multum ab ea distans.
Sita est autem Bethol euntibus GEiiara de Neapoli in Iseva parte via3 duo e< ^ 1 ^’
circiter milliario ab CElia ; et usque iiodie parvus licet vicus ostenditur : [se. e
clesia sedificata est ubi dormivit Jacob pergens Mesopotamian), unde et ^
Bethel id est domus Dei. nomen imposuit. FEuseb. et Hieron. Onomas •
Aggai.]
X “ De Galgale loco de quo dictus est supra tribus leucis de fonte Heiisei ta