waste and burning all the neighboring villages. And when he had laid
waste all the places about the toparchy of Thamnas, he passed on to
Lydda and Jamnia; and when both these cities had come over to him,
he placed a great many of those that had come over to him [from other
places] as inhabitants therein, and then came to Emmaus, where he seized
upon the passage which led thence to their metropolis, and fortified his
camp, and leaving the fifth legion therein, he came to the toparchy of
Bethletephon. He then destroyed that place, and the neighboring places,
by fire, and fortified, at proper places, the strong holds all about
Idumea; and when he had seized upon two villages, which were in the very
midst of Idumea, Betaris and Caphartobas, he slew above ten thousand of
the people, and carried into captivity above a thousand, and drove away
the rest of the multitude, and placed no small part of his own forces
in them, who overran and laid waste the whole mountainous country; while
he, with the rest of his forces, returned to Emmaus, whence he came down
through the country of Samaria, and hard by the city, by others called
Neapoils, [or Sichem,] but by the people of that country Mabortha, to
Corea, where he pitched his camp, on the second day of the month Desius
[Sivan]; and on the day following he came to Jericho; on which day
Trajan, one of his commanders, joined him with the forces he brought
out of Perea, all the places beyond Jordan being subdued already.

2.
Hereupon a great multitude prevented their approach, and came out of
Jericho, and fled to those mountainous parts that lay over against
Jerusalem, while that part which was left behind was in a great measure
destroyed; they also found the city desolate. It is situated in a plain;
but a naked and barren mountain, of a very great length, hangs over it,
which extends itself to the land about Scythopolis northward, but as far
as the country of Sodom, and the utmost limits of the lake Asphaltiris,
southward. This mountain is all of it very uneven and uninhabited, by
reason of its barrenness: there is an opposite mountain that is situated
over against it, on the other side of Jordan; this last begins at
Julias, and the northern quarters, and extends itself southward as far
as Somorrhon, [13] which is the bounds of Petra, in Arabia. In this
ridge of mountains there is one called the Iron Mountain, that runs in
length as far as Moab. Now the region that lies in the middle