ZOAR (zo'ar), (Heb. and iso'ar, small ness).
(1) Original Name. A town originally called Bala, and one of the five cities of the plain of Siddim. It was doomed with the rest to destruc tion ; but spared at the intercession of Lot as a place to which he might escape. He alleged the smallness of the city as a ground for asking this favor ; and hence the place acquired the name of Zoar, or 'smallness' (Gen. xiii :to ; xiv :2, 8; xix :20, 22, 30). It is again mentioned only in Dolt. xxxiv :3 ; Is. xv :5 ; Jcr. xlviii :34 ; which passages indicate that it belonged to the Moab ites, and was a place of some consequence.
(2) Historical Notices. Euscbius and Jerome describe it as having in their day many in habitants, and a Roman garrison (Ononiast., s.
v. 'Bala'). Stephen of Byzantium calls it a large village and fortress (Roland, Nicest. p. 1065). In the Ecclesiastical Notitia it is mentioned as the seat of a bishop of the Third Palestine. down to the centuries preceding the Crusades (Roland, pp. 217, 223, 226, 23o). The Crusaders seem to have found it under the name of Segor, as in the Sept., and they describe the place as pleasantly situated with many palm trees (Will. Tyr. x. 8). Abulfeda repeatedly speaks of Zoghar as a place adjacent to the Dead Sea and the Ghor (Tab. Syr. pp. 8, 9, t 1, 148), and indeed calls the Dead Sea itself the Lake of Zoghar (xii. pp. 148, i56).
(3) Site. Dr. Robinson (Bib. Researches, ii. 480, 481; 648-651) has much argument to show that Zoar must have lain on the cast of the Dead Sea ; which seems clear enough from its having been in the territory of Moab: and he thinks that Irby and Mangles have rightly fixed its position at the mouth of the Wady Kerak, at the point where the latter opens upon the isthmus of the long peninsula which stands out from the eastern shore of the lake towards its southern end. At this point Irby and Mangles discovered the re mains of an ancient town. Here 'stones that have been used in building, though for the most part unknown, are strewed over a great surface of uneven ground, and mixed with bricks and pottery. This appearance continues without in terruption, during the space of at least half a mile, quite down to the plain, so that it would seem to have been a place of considerable extent. We noticed one column, and we found a pretty specimen of antique variegated glass. It may pos sibly be the site of the ancient Zoar' (Travels, p. 448). Conder, who would place the lost cities at the north "end" of the Dead Sea, suggests Tell esh-Shaghur as the site of Zoar. It is at the foot of the eastern mountains, immediately north of the Dead Sea, and about six miles south of Nimrin.