PHILISTINES sometimesiVoMb.8 ; LXX. in Pent. and Joshua 1,ua,crr,ehtz, after wards 'AXA601,Xot • Vulg. Philistim • Joseph. ITO% aurrivoe) :—the inhabitants, during Ate greater part of the Biblical times, of the south-eastern shore of Palestine, from the river of Egypt' (Wadih Al Arish), near Gaza in the south, to the river Rubin (Ekron) in the north—a plain known as the She phelah, the Land of the Philistines, Philistia, or IIaaaurrIvs. The name of this plain has been variously derived from a root t15, cognate with Ezn, his, h9n (Hebr. and iEthiop.), to grate, wander about : whence, according to some, the Abyssinian Jews have retained the designation Phalasi'an or Falashas ; or from 9tC1, r15p0 (= )3,2);, Zeph. ii. 5), Lowland ; or from Sanscr. va laksha, which would designate the inhabitants as white ones.' The Philistines have further been identified with the Pelasgi, with the Poloste' (Pulusatu, Pulost)—the name of a conquered tribe inscribed on Egyptian monuments ; and with the Palaztu on the Western Sea,' read in a cuneiform record of Iva-Lush, king of Assyria. It was the Greeks who, following in the track of the Egyptian Pharaohs and Ptolemies, by degrees transferred the special name of this narrow strip of Philistia to the whole country of which heading the physical features also of this part are more fully dwelt upon in this work.
Suffice it here to mention that two parallel tracts divide the plain : the sandy tract (Ramleh) with the maritime cities, and the cultivated tract, which contains the inland cities, and which is one of the most fertile in the whole region. An immense plain of corn-fields stretches from the edge of the sandy region right up to the hills of Judah, inter sected by orchards and gardens, olive-groves and vineyards, wherever the eye rests. Five royal cities, the seats of the princes of the Philistine Con federacy, stand out prominently in the history of the people, besides a few no less conspicuous Daughter-cities.' At present, however, nothing remains in most instances but a small array of huts, or at most an insignificant village ; one and all, however, gloriously embedded in luxuriant verdure, flowers, and blossoms. The cities so closely inter twined with Philistine history that we must at least rapidly mention them, are, proceeding from north to south, Jabne (Jabneel, Jamnia), now Yebna, on the western bank of Wadi Surat-, about two miles from the sea, and three from Ekron. It was taken by Uzziah together with Gath and Eshdod, and was a place of vast importance during the Macca bxan wars ; in Philo's time it had risen to be one of the most populous cities of Judxa ; and became after the destruction of Jerusalem the seat of the great Sanhedrin, and one of the most celebrated academies under Gamaliel. The Crusaders identi fied it with Gath, and erected a fortress upon it which they called Ibelin. Few traces of antiquity are left to it in these days. Next in order stands Ekron (Akir), situated on the southern slope of a ridge which separates the plain of Philistia from Sharon. It was thither that the ark was sent from Gath, and whence it was instantly sped on to Beth shemesh. Alexander Balas, king of Syria, gave this city to Jonathan Maccabwus. In Jerome's time it was a well-peopled town ; now it is a village of about fifty rotten mud-huts. Gath, which has now entirely disappeared, and the situation of which can only now be conjectured (Tell-as-Safieh), is known in Biblical history as the native-place of Goliath, and the place of refuge of David from Saul, where, having first had to feign madness in order to escape death at the hands of the Philis tines (Ps. lvi.), he was afterwards received with
kindness by Achish. When he had ascended the throne he conquered the city. It was in later times taken by the Syrians. Uzziah dis mantled it together with the other principal for tresses, and from that time forth it ceased to play a part in history. Ashdod (Azotos), now Esdild, midway between Gaza and Joppa, and situated on the usual military route between Syria and Egypt, was a place of vast importance once, hotly contested for for a long time between Israelites and Philistines. Here it was that the ark was brought after the battle of Aphek, into the temple of Dagon. Uzziah dismantled the city, which sub sequently was taken by the Assyrians, and again by Psammetichus, after a siege of 29 years—the longest on record. Destroyed by the Maccabees, it was rebuilt by Gabinius, the Roman governor of Syria, and Herod the Great presented it to his sister Salome. From here it was that many returning from the captivity, married wives, whose children spoke the mongrel dialect called Ashdo dite. A small array of hovels now occupies its site. Next is Askalon (Askulan), between Ashdod and Gaza, the magnificent ruins of which still speak of its pristine glory. Notwithstanding its allotment to Judah, it did not fall under Jewish dominion for any length of time before the Maccabees. The birth-place of Semiramis and Herod the Great, it is also well known by the important part it played in the Crusades. Gaza (Ghuzzeh), about three miles from the sea, an important town still, and one of the oldest cities in the world, since it existed already before Abraham left his native country, the seat of giants' at Joshua's time, taken and re taken by Israel and the Philistines at different periods. It was to Gaza that Samson was brought blind and in fetters. Alexander the Great besieged and captured it, and after him Jonathan Macca bivus and Alexander Jannmus. Fortified again by Gabinius, it was taken by the Mohammedans in 634, fortified by the Christians in it52, and retaken by Saladin. Some few traces are still left of the ancient port (Majuma). Last in the list stand Gerar, on the borders of Idumtea, remembered in the his tory of Abimelech, and Abraham, and Isaac ; and Raphia (Refah), near which Antiochus Philopator vanquished Antiochus the Great, which was taken and destroyed by Alexander Jannmus, and rebuilt by Gabinius. Of these, Gaza, Ashdod, Ekron, Askalon, and Gath were the capitals of the five small principalities, and their hegemony varied with the peculiar circumstances of the commonwealth. After this rapid sketch of the chief cities and the country itself, whose position—between Phmnicia and Syria on the north, and Egypt and Arabia on the south—whose physical conditions, its seabord favourable to naval enterprise, its plain adapted for war-chariots, its elevations suggestive of fortresses and strongholds, and whose rare fertility of soil and variety of products, go far to explain the marvellous rapidity with which the people possessed themselves of an amount of wealth and power incredible almost at first sight, and by turns terrorised and subsidised that whole country of which they held but an ex treme narrow strip : we turn to one of the most puzzling, and, we cannot forbear from adding, most barren problems, viz., the origin of the Philistines ; premising, however, that we shall content ourselves in this place with merely indicating the principal opinions held on the subject, without entering into the very unsatisfactory controversy itself.