that he would put such men to death if any of them were discovered to be
so insolent as to do so again. Moreover, he gave it in charge to the
legions, that they should make a search after such as were suspected,
and should bring them to him. But it appeared that the love of money was
too great for all their dread of punishment, and a vehement desire of
gain is natural to men, and no passion is so venturesome as
covetousness. Otherwise such passions have certain bounds and are
subordinate to fear. But in reality it was God who condemned the whole
nation and turned every course that was taken for their preservation to
their destruction. This, therefore, which was forbidden by Cæsar under
such a threatening, was ventured upon privately against the deserters,
and these barbarians would go out still and meet those that ran away
before any saw them, and looking about them to see that no Roman spied
them, they dissected them and pulled this polluted money out of their
bowels, which money was still found in a few of them, while yet a great
many were destroyed by the bare hope there was of thus getting by them,
which miserable treatment made many that were deserting to return back
again into the city.
And, indeed, why do I relate these particular calamities? while Manneus,
the son of Lazarus, came running to Titus at this very time and told him
that there had been carried out through that one gate, which was
intrusted to his care, no fewer than a hundred and fifteen thousand
eight hundred and eighty dead bodies in the interval between the
fourteenth day of the month Xanthicus (Nisan), when the Romans pitched
their camp by the city, and the first day of the month Panemus (Tamuz).
This was itself a prodigious multitude; and though this man was not
himself set as a governor at that gate, yet was he appointed to pay the
public stipend for carrying these bodies out, and so was obliged of
necessity to number them, while the rest were buried by their
relations, though all their burial was but this, to bring them away and
cast them out of the city.
After this man there ran away to Titus many of the eminent citizens and
told him the entire number of the poor that were dead, and that no fewer
than six hundred thousand were thrown out at the gates, though still the
number of the rest could not be discovered; and they told him further
that when they were no longer able to carry out the dead bodies of the
poor they laid their corpses on heaps in very large houses and shut them
up therein; as also that a medimno of wheat was sold for a talent; and
that when, a while afterward, it was not possible to gather herbs, by
reason the city was all walled about, some persons were driven to that
terrible distress as to search the common sewers and old dunghills of
cattle, and to eat the dung which they got there, and what they of old
could not endure so much as to see they now used for food. When the
Romans barely heard all this they commiserated their case; while the
seditious, who saw it also, did not repent, but suffered the same
distress to come upon themselves, for they were blinded by that fate
which was already coming upon the city, and upon themselves also.
And now the Romans, although they were greatly distressed in getting
together their materials, raised their banks in one-and-twenty days,
after they had cut down all the trees that were in the country that
adjoined to the city, and that for ninety furlongs round about. And when
the banks were finished, they afforded a foundation for fear both to the
Romans and to the Jews, for the Jews expected that the city would be
taken unless they could burn those banks, as did the Romans expect that,
if these were once burned down they should never be able to take it, for
there was a mighty scarcity of materials, and the bodies of the soldiers
began to fail with such hard labors, as did their souls faint with so
many instances of ill-success.
The Romans had an advantage, in that their engines for sieges coöperated
with them in throwing darts and stones as far as the Jews, when they
were coming out of the city; whereby the man that fell became an
impediment to him that was next to him, as did the danger of going
farther make them less zealous in their attempts; and for those that had
run under the darts some of them were terrified by the good order and
closeness of the enemies' ranks before they came to a close fight, and
others were pricked with their spears and turned back again. At length
they reproached one another for their cowardice, and retired without
doing anything. This attack was made upon the first day of the month
Panemus (Tamuz).
So when the Jews were retreated the Romans brought their engines,
although they had all the while stones thrown at them from the tower of
Antonia, and were assaulted by fire and sword, and by all sorts of
darts, which necessity afforded the Jews to make use of, for although
these had great dependence on their own wall, and a contempt of the
Roman engines, yet did they endeavor to hinder the Romans from bringing
them. Now these Romans struggled hard, on the contrary, to bring them,
as deeming that this zeal of the Jews was in order to avoid any
impression to be made on the tower of Antonia, because its wall was but
weak and its foundations rotten. However, that tower did not yield to
the blows given it from the engines; yet did the Romans bear the
impressions made by the enemies' darts which were perpetually cast at
them, and did not give way to any of those dangers that came upon them
from above, and so they brought their engines to bear. But then, as they
were beneath the other, and were sadly wounded by the stones thrown down
upon them, some of them threw their shields over their bodies, and
partly with their hands and partly with their bodies and partly with
crows they undermined its foundations, and with great pains they removed
four of its stones. Then night came upon both sides, and put an end to
this struggle for the present. However, that night the wall was so
shaken by the battering rams in that place where John had used his
stratagem before, and had undermined their banks, that the ground then
gave way and the wall fell down suddenly.
When this accident had unexpectedly happened, the minds of both parties
were variously affected, for though one would expect that the Jews would
be discouraged, because this fall of their wall was unexpected by them,
and they had made no provision in that case, yet did they pull up their
courage, because the tower of Antonia itself was still standing; as was
the unexpected joy of the Romans at this fall of the wall soon quenched
by the sight they had of another wall, which John and his party had
built within it.
Upon the fifth day of the month Panemus (Tamuz), twelve of those men
that were on the forefront and kept watch upon the banks got together
and called to them the standard-bearer of the Fifth legion, and two
others of a troop of horsemen, and one trumpeter; these went without
noise, about the ninth hour of the night, through the ruins, to the
tower of Antonia; and when they had cut the throats of the first guards
of the place, as they were asleep, they got possession of the wall and
ordered the trumpeter to sound his trumpet. Upon which the rest of the
guard got up on the sudden and ran away before anybody could see how
many they were that were gotten up, for partly from the fear they were
in and partly from the sound of the trumpet which they heard they
imagined a great number of the enemy were gotten up. But as soon as
Cæsar heard the signal he ordered the army to put on their armor
immediately, and came thither with his commanders, and first of all
ascended, as did the chosen men that were with him. And as the Jews were
flying away to the Temple they fell into that mine which John had dug
under the Roman banks. Then did the seditious of both the bodies of the
Jewish army, as well that belonging to John as that belonging to Simon,
drive them away; and indeed were no way wanting as to the highest degree
of force and alacrity; for they esteemed themselves entirely ruined if
once the Romans got into the Temple, as did the Romans look upon the
same thing as the beginning of their entire conquest.
So a terrible battle was fought at the entrance of the Temple, while the
Romans were forcing their way, in order to get possession of that
Temple, and the Jews were driving them back to the tower of Antonia; in
which battle the darts were on both sides useless, as well as the
spears, and both sides drew their swords and fought it out hand-to-hand.
Now during this struggle the positions of the men were undistinguished
on both sides, and they fought at random, the men being intermixed one
with another and confounded, by reason of the narrowness of the place;
while the noise that was made fell on the ear after an indistinct
manner, because it was so very loud. Great slaughter was now made on
both sides, and the combatants trod upon the bodies and the armor of
those that were dead, and dashed them to pieces. Accordingly, to which
side soever the battle inclined, those that had the advantage exhorted
one another to go on, as did those that were beaten make great
lamentation. But still there was no room for flight nor for pursuit, but
disorderly revolutions and retreats, while the armies were intermixed
one with another; but those that were in the first ranks were under the
necessity of killing or being killed, without any way for escaping, for
those on both sides that came behind forced those before them to go on,
without leaving any space between the armies.
At length the Jews' violent zeal was too hard for the Romans' skill, and
the battle already inclined entirely that way; for the fight had lasted
from the ninth hour of the night till the seventh hour of the day, while
the Jews came on in crowds, and had the danger the Temple was in for
their motive; the Romans having no more here than a part of their army,
for those legions, on which the soldiers on that side depended, were not
come up to them. So it was at present thought sufficient by the Romans
to take possession of the tower of Antonia.
In the mean time the rest of the Roman army had, in seven days' time,
overthrown [some] foundations of the tower of Antonia, and had made a
ready and broad way to the Temple. Then did the legions come near the
first court and began to raise their banks. The one bank was over
against the northwest corner of the inner temple; another was at that
northern edifice which was between the two gates; and of the other two,
one was at the western cloister of the outer court of the Temple; the
other against its northern cloister. However these works were thus far
advanced by the Romans, not without great pains and difficulty, and
particularly by being obliged to bring their materials from the distance
of a hundred furlongs.
They had further difficulties also upon them; sometimes by their
over-great security they were in that they should overcome the Jewish
snares laid for them, and by that boldness of the Jews which their
despair of escaping had inspired them withal.
In the mean time the Jews were so distressed by the fights they had been
in, as the war advanced higher and higher, and creeping up to the holy
house itself, that they, as it were, cut off those limbs of their body
which were infected, in order to prevent the distemper's spreading
further, for they set the northwest cloister, which was joined to the
tower of Antonia, on fire, and after that brake off about twenty cubits
of that cloister, and thereby made a beginning in burning the sanctuary;
two days after which, or on the twenty-fourth day of the forenamed month
[Panemus or Tamuz], the Romans set fire to the cloister that joined to
the other, when the fire went fifteen cubits farther. The Jews, in like
manner, cut off its roof; nor did they entirely leave off what they were
about till the tower of Antonia was parted from the Temple, even when it
was in their power to have stopped the fire--nay, they lay still while
the Temple was first set on fire, and deemed this spreading of the fire
to be for their own advantage. However, the armies were still fighting
one against another about the Temple, and the war was managed by
continual sallies of particular parties against one another.
Now of those that perished by famine in the city the number was
prodigious, and the miseries they underwent were unspeakable, for if so
much as the shadow of any kind of food did anywhere appear a war was
commenced presently, and the dearest friends fell a-fighting one with
another about it, snatching from each other the most miserable supports
of life. Nor would men believe that those who were dying had no food,
but the robbers would search them when they were expiring, lest anyone
should have concealed food in his bosom and counterfeited dying; nay,
these robbers gaped for want, and ran about stumbling and staggering
along like mad dogs, and reeling against the doors of the houses like
drunken men; they would also, in the great distress they were in, rush
into the very same houses two or three times in one and the same day.
Moreover, their hunger was so intolerable that it obliged them to chew
everything, while they gathered such things as the most sordid animals
would not touch, and endured to eat them; nor did they at length
abstain from girdles and shoes; and the very leather which belonged to
their shields they pulled off and gnawed; the very wisps of old hay
became food to some; and some gathered up fibres and sold a very small
weight of them for four Attic [drachmas].
But why do I describe the shameless impudence that the famine brought on
men in their eating inanimate things, while I am going to relate a
matter of fact, the like to which no history relates, either among the
Greeks or barbarians? It is horrible to speak of it and incredible when
heard. I had indeed willingly omitted this calamity of ours, that I
might not seem to deliver what is so portentous to posterity, but that I
have innumerable witnesses to it in my own age; and besides, my country
would have had little reason to thank me for suppressing the miseries
that she underwent at this time.
There was a certain woman that dwelt beyond Jordan, her name was Mary;
her father was Eleazar, of the village Bethezob, which signifies "the
House of Hyssop." She was eminent for her family and her wealth, and had
fled away to Jerusalem with the rest of the multitude, and was with them
besieged therein at this time. The other effects of this woman had been
already seized upon, such I mean as she had brought with her out of
Perea, and removed to the city. What she had treasured up besides, as
also what food she had contrived to save, had been also carried off by
the rapacious guards, who came every day running into her house for that
purpose. This put the poor woman into a very great passion, and by the
frequent reproaches and imprecations she cast at these rapacious
villains she had provoked them to anger against her; but none of them,
either out of the indignation she had raised against herself, or out of
commiseration of her case, would take away her life; and if she found
any food, she perceived her labors were for others, and not for herself;
and it was now become impossible for her any way to find any more food,
while the famine pierced through her very bowels and marrow, when also
her passion was fired to a degree beyond the famine itself; nor did she
consult with anything but with her passion and the necessity she was in.
She then attempted a most unnatural thing; and snatching up her son, who
was a child sucking at her breast, she said: "O thou miserable infant!
for whom shall I preserve thee in this war, this famine, and this
sedition? As to the war with the Romans, if they preserve our lives we
must be slaves. This famine also will destroy us even before that
slavery comes upon us. Yet are these seditious rogues more terrible than
both the other. Come on: be thou my food, and be thou a fury to these
seditious varlets, and a by-word to the world, which is all that is now
wanting to complete the calamities of us Jews."
As soon as she had said this she slew her son, and then roasted him, and
eat the one half of him, and kept the other half by her concealed. Upon
this the seditious came in presently, and smelling the horrid scent of
this food, they threatened her that they would cut her throat
immediately if she did not show them what food she had gotten ready. She
replied that she had saved a very fine portion of it for them, and
withal uncovered what was left of her son. Hereupon they were seized
with a horror and amazement of mind, and stood astonished at the sight,
when she said to them: "This is mine own son, and what hath been done
was mine own doing! Come, eat of this food, for I have eaten of it
myself! Do not you pretend to be either more tender than a woman or more
compassionate than a mother; but if you be so scrupulous and do
abominate this my sacrifice, as I have eaten the one half, let the rest
be reserved for me also." After which those men went out trembling,
being never so much affrighted at anything as they were at this, and
with some difficulty they left the rest of that meat to the mother. Upon
which the whole city was full of this horrid action immediately; and
while everybody laid this miserable case before their own eyes, they
trembled, as if this unheard-of action had been done by themselves. So
those that were thus distressed by the famine were very desirous to die,
and those already dead were esteemed happy, because they had not lived
long enough either to hear or to see such miseries.
This sad instance was quickly told to the Romans, some of whom could not
believe it, and others pitied the distress which the Jews were under;
but there were many of them who were hereby induced to a more bitter
hatred than ordinary against our nation. But for Cæsar, he excused
himself before God as to this matter, and said that he had proposed
peace and liberty to the Jews, as well as an oblivion of all their
former insolent practices; but that they, instead of concord, had chosen
sedition; instead of peace, war; and before satiety and abundance, a
famine. That they had begun with their own hands to burn down that
Temple which we have preserved hitherto, and that therefore they
deserved to eat such food as this was. That, however, this horrid action
of eating an own child ought to be covered with the overthrow of their
very country itself, and men ought not to leave such a city upon the
habitable earth to be seen by the sun wherein mothers are thus fed,
although such food be fitter for the fathers than for the mothers to eat
of, since it is they that continue still in a state of war against us,
after they have undergone such miseries as these. And at the same time
that he said this, he reflected on the desperate condition these men
must be in; nor could he expect that such men could be recovered to
sobriety of mind after they had endured those very sufferings, for the
avoiding whereof it only was probable they might have repented.
And now two of the legions had completed their banks on the eighth day
of the month Lous [Ab]. Whereupon Titus gave orders that the battering
rams should be brought and set over against the western edifice of the
inner temple; for before these were brought, the firmest of all the
other engines had battered the wall for six days together without
ceasing, without making any impression upon it; but the vast largeness
and strong connection of the stones were superior to that engine and to
the other battering rams also. Other Romans did indeed undermine the
foundations of the northern gate, and after a world of pains removed the
outermost stones, yet was the gate still upheld by the inner stones, and
stood still unhurt; till the workmen, despairing of all such attempts by
engines and crows, brought their ladders to the cloisters.
Now the Jews did not interrupt them in so doing; but when they were
gotten up, they fell upon them and fought with them; some of them they
thrust down and threw them backward headlong; others of them they met
and slew; they also beat many of those that went down the ladders again,
and slew them with their swords before they could bring their shields
to protect them; nay, some of the ladders they threw down from above
when they were full of armed men. A great slaughter was made of the Jews
also at the same time, while those that bare the ensigns fought hard for
them, as deeming it a terrible thing, and what would tend to their great
shame, if they permitted them to be stolen away. Yet did the Jews at
length get possession of these engines, and destroyed those that had
gone up the ladders, while the rest were so intimidated by what those
suffered who were slain that they retired; although none of the Romans
died without having done good service before his death. Of the
seditious, those that had fought bravely in the former battles did the
like now, as besides them did Eleazar, the brother's son of Simon the
tyrant. But when Titus perceived that his endeavors to spare a foreign
temple turned to the damage of his soldiers and made them be killed, he
gave order to set the gates on fire.
But then, on the next day, Titus commanded part of his army to quench
the fire and to make a road for the more easy marching up of the
legions, while he himself gathered the commanders together. Titus
proposed to these that they should give him their advice what should be
done about the holy house. Now some of these thought it would be the
best way to act according to the rules of war [and demolish it], because
the Jews would never leave off rebelling while that house was standing;
at which house it was that they used to get all together. Others of them
were of opinion that in case the Jews would leave it, and none of them
would lay their arms up in it, he might save it; but that in case they
got upon it and fought any more, he might burn it; because it must then
be looked upon not as a holy house, but as a citadel; and that the
impiety of burning it would then belong to those that forced this to be
done, and not to them.
But Titus said that "although the Jews should get upon that holy house
and fight us thence, yet ought we not to revenge ourselves on things
that are inanimate, instead of the men themselves"? and that he was not
in any case for burning down so vast a work as that was, because this
would be a mischief to the Romans themselves, as it would be an
ornament to their government while it continued. So Fronto and
Alexander and Cerealis grew bold upon that declaration, and agreed to
the opinion of Titus. Then was this assembly dissolved, when Titus had
given orders to the commanders that the rest of their forces should lie
still; but that they should make use of such as were most courageous in
this attack. So he commanded that the chosen men that were taken out of
the cohorts should make their way through the ruins and quench the fire.
Now it is true that on this day the Jews were so weary and under such
consternation that they refrained from any attacks. But on the next day
they gathered their whole force together, and ran upon those that
guarded the outward court of the Temple very boldly, through the east
gate, and this about the second hour of the day. These guards received
their attack with great bravery, and by covering themselves with their
shields before, as if it were with a wall, drew their squadron close
together; yet was it evident that they could not abide there very long,
but would be overborne by the multitude of those that sallied out upon
them, and by the heat of their passion. However, Cæsar seeing, from the
tower of Antonia, that this squadron was likely to give way, sent some
chosen horsemen to support them. Hereupon the Jews found themselves not
able to sustain their onset, and, upon the slaughter of those in the
forefront, many of the rest were put to flight. But as the Romans were
going off, the Jews turned upon them and fought them; and as those
Romans came back upon them, they retreated again, until about the fifth
hour of the day they were overborne, and shut themselves up in the inner
[court of the] Temple.