In the Judaean period, I generally use the Greek not the Latin or Hebrew names for the Hasmonean kings – Aristobulos, for example. With minor characters such as Herod’s brother-in-law I use his Hebrew name Jonathan instead of his Greek one, Aristobulos, to avoid confusion with the many other Aristobuloses. With household names, I use the familiar – Herod (not Herodes), Pompey, Mark Antony, Tamurlane, Saladin. For Persian names, if well known such as Cyrus, I use that version. The Maccabean family reigned as the Hasmonean dynasty, but I call them Maccabean throughout for the sake of clarity.
In the Arab period, the challenges are greater. I do not pretend to be consistent. I generally use familiar English forms – such as Damascus rather than Dimashq. I have dropped the Arabic article ‘al-’ before persons, groups and towns but kept it on the whole within compound names and for the first mention of names in the text and the notes and not thereafter. I do not use diacritical marks. Most of the Abbasid and Fatamid caliphs and Ayyubid sultans adopted a regnant name, a laqab, such as al-Mansur. Purely to ease reading, I drop in all cases the definite article. I use ‘ibn’ instead of ‘bin’ except in well-known names. In names such as Abu Sufyan, I do not use the Arabic genitive (which would give, for example, Muawiya ibn Abi Sufyan), again for facility. I generally call the Ayyubids the ‘house of Saladin’.
There is no consistency in the Western historical use of Arab names – for example, the Abbasids are known by their ruling names apart from Harun al-Rashid because he is famous thanks to the Arabian Nights stories. All historians use the name Saladin for the twelfth-century sultan yet call his brother al-Adil. Saladin’s birth name was Yusuf ibn Ayyub; his brother was Abu Bakr ibn Ayyub. Both men adopted honorific names Salah al-Din and Saif al-Din; and both later used regnant names al-Nasir (the Victor) for Saladin and al-Adil (the Just) for his brother. For ease, I use Saladin and Safedin respectively, partly to avoid confusion of Ayyubid names such as al-Adil, al-Aziz, al-Afdal, and partly to highlight the connection with Saladin.
During the Mamluk period, historians usually use the name Baibars, rather than using his regnant name al-Zahir, but then employ regnant names for most of the others – except for al-Nasir Muhammad where they use both. I follow this inconsistent tradition.
During the Ottoman period, in less well-known names, I try to use Turkish, not Arabic, spellings. I have simply chosen the most recognizable version: Jemal Pasha is Çemal in Turkish and often transliterated as Djemal. I use Mehmet Ali instead of Muhammad Ali.
In modern times, I call Hussein ibn Ali the Sherif of Mecca or King Hussein of the Hejaz; I call his sons Prince or Amir (until they too become kings) Faisal and Abdullah instead of Faisal and Abdullah ibn Hussein. I call them Sherifians in the early period and Hashemites later. I call the first king of Saudi Arabia Abdul Aziz al-Saud but more often use the Westernized version, Ibn Saud. Bertha Spafford married Frederick Vester: for consistency I call her Spafford throughout.
Canaan, Judah, Judaea, Israel, Palaestina, Bilad al-Shams, Palestine, Greater Syria, Coele Syria, the Holy Land, are just some of the names used to describe the country, with varying borders. There are said to be seventy names for Jerusalem (some are listed in the Appendix). Within the city, the House of God, the Holy House, the Temple, all refer to the Jewish Temple. The Dome, the Qubbet al-Sakhra, Temple of the Lord, Templum Domini refer to the Dome of the Rock; the Aqsa is the Temple of Solomon. Har HaBayit is the Hebrew and Haram al-Sharif is the Arabic for the Temple Mount, which I also call the sacred esplanade. The Sanctuary refers either to the Holy of Holies or later to the Temple Mount, which Muslims call the Noble Sanctuary (Haram); for Muslims, the Two Sanctuaries refer to Jerusalem and Hebron, another Herodian building: the tomb of Abraham and the patriarchs. The Anastasis, the Church, the Sepulchre and Deir Sultan refer to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. The Rock is Sakhra in Arabic; the Foundation Stone is Even HaShtiyah in Hebrew; the Holy of Holies is Kodesh haKodeshim. The Wall, the Kotel, the Western and Wailing Wall and al-Buraq wall refer to the Jewish holy site. The Citadel and the Tower of David refer to the Herodian stronghold close to the Jaffa Gate. The Virgin’s Tomb and St Mary of Jehoshaphat are the same place. The Valley of Jehoshaphat is the Kidron Valley. David’s Tomb, Nabi Daoud, the Cenacle and Coenaculum describe the shrine on Mount Zion. Each of the gates has so many names which change so frequently that to list them would be worthless. Every street has at least three names: the Old City’s main street is El Wad in Arabic; Ha-Gai in Hebrew and the Valley in English.
Constantinople and Byzantium refer to Eastern Rome and its empire; after 1453, I refer to the city as Istanbul. Catholics and Latins are used interchangeably; Orthodox and Greeks also. Iran and Persia are used interchangeably. I use Iraq instead of Mesopotamia for accessibility.
On titles: the Roman emperors were the princeps in Latin and later imperator; Byzantine emperors later became basileos in Greek. In early Islam, Muhammad’s successors were variously Commanders of the Faithful and caliph. Sultan, padishah and caliph are all titles of the Ottoman rulers; in Germany, Kaiser and emperor and in Russia, tsar and emperor are used interchangeably.
PROLOGUE
On 8th of the Jewish month of Ab, in late July AD 70, Titus, the Roman Emperor Vespasian’s son who was in command of the four-month siege of Jerusalem, ordered his entire army to prepare to storm the Temple at dawn. The next day happened to be the very day on which Babylonians had destroyed Jerusalem over 500 years before. Now, Titus commanded an army of four legions – a total of 60,000 Roman legionaries and local auxiliaries who were eager to deliver the final blow to the defiant but broken city. Within the walls, perhaps half a million starving Jews survived in diabolical conditions: some were fanatical religious zealots, some were freebooting bandits, but most were innocent families with no escape from this magnificent death-trap. There were many Jews living outside Judaea – they were to be found throughout the Mediterranean and Near East – and this final desperate struggle would decide not only the fate of the city and her inhabitants, but also the future of Judaism and the small Jewish cult of Christianity – and even, looking forward across six centuries, the shape of Islam.
The Romans had built ramps up against the walls of the Temple. But their assaults had failed. Earlier that day, Titus told his generals that his efforts to preserve this ‘foreign temple’ were costing him too many soldiers and he ordered the Temple gates set alight. The silver of the gates melted and spread the fire to the wooden doorways and windows, thence to the wooden fittings in the passageways of the Temple itself. Titus ordered the fire to be quenched. The Romans, he declared, should ‘not avenge themselves on inanimate objects instead of men’. Then he retired for the night into his headquarters in the half-ruined Tower of Antonia overlooking the resplendent Temple complex.
Around the walls, there were gruesome scenes that must have resembled hell on earth. Thousands of bodies putrefied in the sun. The stench was unbearable. Packs of dogs and jackals feasted on human flesh. In the preceding months, Titus had ordered all prisoners or defectors to be crucified. Five hundred Jews were crucified each day. The Mount of Olives and the craggy hills around the city were so crowded with crucifixes that there was scarcely room for any more, nor trees to make them.1 Titus’ soldiers amused themselves by nailing their victims splayed and spread-eagled in absurd positions. So desperate were many Jerusalemites to escape the city that, as they left, they swallowed their coins, to conceal their treasure, which they hoped to retrieve when they were safely clear of the Romans. They emerged ‘puffed up with famine and swelled like men with dropsy’, but if they ate they ‘burst asunder’. As their bellies exploded, the soldiers discovered their reeking intestinal treasure troves, so they started to gut all prisoners, eviscerating them and searching their intestines while they were still alive. But Titus was appalled and tried to ban these anatomical plunderings. To no avaiclass="underline" Titus’ Syrian auxiliaries, who hated and were hated by the Jews with all the malice of neighbours, relished these macabre games.2 The cruelties inflicted by the Romans and the rebels within the walls compare with some of the worst atrocities of the twentieth century.