year 1759, there happened one which caused the greatest ravages. It is said to have destroyed, in the valley of Balbec, upwards of twenty thousand persons; a loss which has never been repaired. For three months the shock of it terrified the inhabitants of Lebanon so much, as to make them abandon their houses, and dwell under tents." Comp. Jude 7.]

SOREK, (lat. 31°. 45'.-long. 34°. 45',) a brook which flowed through the country of the Philistines, and ran into the Mediterranean Sea, near Ascalon. In some part of the valley through which this river ran, lived Delilah, the treacherous mistress of Samson. Judg. xvi. 4.

SUCCOTH, (lat. 30°. 5'.-long. 31°. 43',) the first encampment of the Israelites, after they left Egypt. Exod. xii. 37.

SUCCOTH, (lat. 32°. 9.-long. 35°. 44',) a city beyond Jordan, between the brook Jabok and that river. Jacob, on his return from Mesopotamia, passing over the brook Jabok, set up his tents at Succoth, where afterwards a city was built. (Gen. xxxiii. 17.) Joshua assigned it to the tribe of Gad. (Josh. xiii. 27.) Solomon cast his large brazen vessels, for the temple, between Succoth and Zarthan. (1 Kings vii. 46.) Jerom says, (Quæst. Hebr. in Gen. xxxiii.) that Succoth was in the district of Scythopolis. The Jews tell us the name of Darala was some time afterwards given to Succoth-Succoth Darala. Gideon tore the flesh of the principal men of Succoth with thorns and briars, because they returned him a haughty answer when pursuing the Midianites. Judges viii. 5; ante, A. D. 1245.

SYRIA, without any other appellation, denotes the kingdom of Syria, of which Antioch became the capital, after the reign of the Seleucidæ.

Syria of Palestine, is read in some authors, (Herodot. lib. iii. cap. 5; ii. 104; Ammian. Marcel. Hist. lib. xiv.; Josephus, Antiq. lib. x. cap. 7; also De Bello. lib. v. cap. 14;)—sometimes comprehends Palestine under Syria, because this province was long subject to the kings of Syria.

Syria at first was governed by its own kings, each in his own city and territories. David subdued them, about ante A. D. 1044, (2 Sam. viii. 16,) on occasion of his war against the Ammonites, whom the Syrians had assisted. (2 Sam. x. 6-8.) After the reign of Solomon they shook off the yoke and were not reduced again, till Jeroboam II. king of Israel, A. M. 3179. Rezin, king of Syria, and Pekah, king of Israel, having declared war

against Ahab, king of Judah, this prince found himself under the necessity of craving aid from Tiglath-pileser, king of Assyria, who put Rezin to death, took Damascus, and transported the Syrians beyond the Euphrates. Syria now continued in subjection to the kings of Assyria. Afterwards, it came under the Chaldeans; then under the Persians: lastly, it was reduced by Alexander the Great, and followed the subsequent revolutions.

After the death of Alexander, (A. M. 3681; ante a. D. 323,) his empire was divided between his principal officers, who at first assumed only the title of governors, but at length that of kings.

A. M. 3682. Seleucus I. named Nicator, or Nicanor, head of the family of kings called Seleucidæ, took the diadem, and name of king of Syria. He reigned forty-two years.

3724. Antiochus I. surnamed Soter, nineteen years. 3743. Antiochus II. surnamed Theos, fifteen years.

3759. Seleucus II. surnamed Callinicus, or Pogon, (i. e. bearded,) reigned twenty years.

3778. Seleucus III. surnamed Keraunus, (or Thunder,) reigned three years.

3781. Antiochus III. surnamed Magnus, (the Great,) thirtysix years.

3816. Seleucus IV. surnamed Philopator, twelve years.

3828. Antiochus IV. surnamed Epiphanes, son of Antiochus the Great, and brother of Seleucus IV. reigned eleven years. 3840. Antiochus V. surnamed Eupator, two years.

3842. Demetrius I. surnamed Soter, son of Seleucus IV. reigned twelve years.

3854. Demetrius II. surnamed Nicator, reigned ten years, with much perplexity, Alexander Balas, or Belles, and Antiochus, son of Balas, were his competitors. He died A. M. 3864. Alexander Balas died A. M. 3859. Antiochus Theos, his son, began to reign under the regency of Tryphon, A. M. 3860; but was slain 3861, and the kingdom was usurped by Tryphon, who was put to death in 3866.

3864. Antiochus VI. surnamed Pius, or Soter, or Sidetes, (i. e. the fisher or hunter,) brother to Demetrius Nicanor, reigned about ten years, when he was put to death by the Parthians.

3873. Demetrius III. surnamed Nicanor, had a competitor in Alexander Zebina. Demetrius was overcome, and slain in 3878, as was Zebina in 3882.

3878. Seleucus V. son of Demetrius Nicanor, reigned one year in great uneasiness.

3882. Antiochus VII. surnamed Gryphus, or Philometer, dispossessed Zebina in 3882, and reigned eight years in peace. Antiochus, surnamed Cyzicenus, his brother, overcame him in 3892. They divided the kingdom. Antiochus Gryphus died in 3910, having reigned in all about twenty-nine years. Antiochus Cyzicenus, his brother, was overcome and put to death the same year by Seleucus, son of Gryphus.

3910. Seleucus VI. son of Gryphus, reigned one year. He was deprived of his kingdom, A. M. 3911, by Antiochus Eusebes, son of his uncle Antiochus Cyzicenus, and was put to death the same year, at Mopsuesta, in Cilicia.

3911. Antiochus VIII. surnamed Eusebes, reigned in trouble two years. His competitors were Antiochus and Philippus, brothers to his uncle Seleucus, also Demetrius Eucarus, son of Antiochus Gryphus, who forced him to take refuge in Parthia.

3912. Syria was now divided between Philip and Demetrius Eucarus: the latter reigned at Damascus. But the Syrians, finding their country almost ruined by the civil wars, a party of them determined to call in their neighbour, king

3921. Mithridates; others were for Ptolemy Lathurus, king of Egypt at last they agreed on Tigranes, king of Armenia, who governed Syria eighteen years.

3932 to 3939. Antiochus XI. surnamed Asiaticus, and his brother, sons of Antiochus Eusebes, who still held possession of that part of Syria, which Tigranes had not seized, went to Rome, A. M. 3932, to solicit the kingdom of Egypt from the senate, which they pretended to claim in right of their mother Cleopatra, surnamed Selene. But Tigranes having put Selene to death in 3934, Antiochus Asiaticus lost all hope of obtaining Egypt, and returned into Syria in 3935, where he reigned four years, till Pompey reduced Syria into a Roman province, A. M. 3939, when this monarchy became extinct, having subsisted two hundred and fifty-seven years.

COUNTRY OF SYRIA.

["The present inhabitants," says Volney, (Trav. vol. i. p. 288,) "who, according to the constant practice of the Arabs, have not adopted the Greek names, are ignorant of the name of Syria,

instead of which they call it Barr el Sham, which signifies 'country of the left; and is the name given to the whole space contained between two lines, drawn, the one from Alexandretta to the Euphrates, and the other from Gaza to the desert of Arabia, bounded on the east by that desert, and on the west by the Mediterranean. This name, 'country of the left,' from its contrast with that of the Yamin, or country of the right,' indicates some intermediate place as a common point, which must be Mecca.

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Geographers, however, sometimes write it Sauria, from the constant change of the Greek upsilon into the Arabic waw.

"El-sham is also the name of the city of Damascus, the reputed capital of Syria.

"The plains of Acre, Esdraelon, Sour, Havala, and the Lower Bekaa, are justly boasted of for their fertility. Corn, barley, maize, cotton, and sesamum, produce, notwithstanding the imperfection of their culture, twenty and twenty-five for one. The country of Kaisaria possesses a forest of oaks, the only one in Syria. Safad furnishes cottons, which, from their whiteness, are held in as high estimation as those of Cyprus. The neighbouring mountains of Sour produce as good tobacco as that of Latakia, and in a part of them is made a perfume of cloves, which is reserved exclusively for the use of the sultan and his The country of the Druses abounds in wine and silks: in short, from the situation of the coast, and the number of its creeks, this pachalic necessarily becomes the emporium of Damascus and all the interior parts of Syria."-Volney, vol. ii. p. 180.

women.

INHABITANTS OF SYRIA.

"I do not wish to appear an advocate for those rapid populations, which, from a single man, are made to pour forth, in a few generations, numerous and powerful nations: in these relations there are a multitude of mistakes in words, and errors of copyists; but admitting only what is conformable to experience and nature, there is nothing to contradict the great population of high antiquity: without appealing to the positive testimony of history, there are innumerable monuments which depose in favour of the fact: such are the prodigious quantities of ruins dispersed over the plains, and even in the mountains, at this day

deserted. On the most remote parts of Carmel are found wild vines and olive-trees, which must have been conveyed thither by the hand of man; and in the Lebanon of the Druses and Maronites, the rocks, now abandoned to fir-trees and brambles, present us in a thousand places with terraces, which prove they were anciently better cultivated, and consequently much more populous than in our days." (Volney, Trav. vol. ii. p. 368.) This has been much confirmed since Volney published his Travels, by the discovery of vast and magnificent ruins, &c. which demonstrate the former existence of great, populous, and wealthy cities.

SYRIAN CHURCHES.

It was but natural, that the gospel, which may be said to be of Syrian origin, should be first of all extensively propagated in Syria; and to this, no doubt, all the apostles contributed. If we consider this country as comprising, principally, the coast of the Mediterranean, then the chief seat of its Christianity was Antioch; and the introduction of this religion into that city is recorded in the Acts of the Apostles. Of the interior Syria, Damascus was the capital; and we know that it contained Christian converts very early. Eastward, what may be called Chaldean Syria, was evangelized chiefly by Thomas the Apostle, and his assistants; such is the account given by Syrian writers. Those writers reckon the patriarchates, or principal sees, in the following order :—1. Jerusalem, because here the gospel was first established, and this was the first seat of an apostle; 2. Antioch; 3. Rome; 4. Alexandria, in Egypt; 5. Babylon, in honour of the apostles, Thomas and Bartholomew, who also is Nathanael. It may also be taken as probable, that these apostles, with their attendants, penetrated much further eastward, into Persia; and possibly, in later ages, the doctrine spread from there into China, wherever there were colonies of Jews.

Antioch, with its neighbouring churches, has been so often visited with the calamities of war and the desolations of conquest, that it now can furnish little information on the history of its early Christianity. Subject to Mahometan oppression, the condition of the few adherents to the cross is lamentable: and indeed the place would be wholly deserted, did not a commerce