Siloam, Pool of

Siloam, Pool Of A remarkable Hebrew inscription on an interior passage lately discovered behind the present. Fountain of the Virgin, by which the water was reached by the inhabitants of the city, commemorates the cutting of the tunnel- leading between these two reservoirs (see Dr. Guthe, in the Zeitschr. d. deutsch. morgenland. Geschellschaft, 36:3 sq.). The following translation is by professor Sayce (in the Quar. Statement of the "Pal. Explor. Fund," October 1883, page 210):

"1. (Behold) the excavation! Now this had been the history of the excavation. While the workmen were still lifting up "2. the axe, each towards his neighbor, and while three cubits still remained to (cut through), (each heard) the voice of the other who called "3. to his neighbor, since there was an excess of the rock on the right hand and on (the left). And on the day of the "4. excavation the workmen struck, each to meet his neighbor, axe against axe, and there flowed "5. the waters from the spring to the pool for thousand two hundred cubits; and, "6. of a cubit was the height of the rock over the heads of the workmen."