2-982-648 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Bethlehem - from Laborde, 1858. 'There are two Bethlehems in Palestine, but the birthplace of our Saviour is, and was, distinguished as Bethlehem Ephrath or Ephratah. This word Beth-lehem (House of Bread or Flesh) refers, in all probability, to its situation in a fertile and corn-growing district...Bethlehem is pleasantly situated upon a hill about six miles south-east of Jerusalem, and three miles from the famous ''Pools of Solomon." On its left slopes a considerable valley, Beet Jal, or the Yellow House, through which there runs a rippling brook. Stretching away to the eastward, for nearly twenty miles, are ample plains, crowned with the olive and the vine, until a ruder, rougher soil bears witness to the evil influence of the waters of the Dead Sea...the houses, even the meanest, are all roofed; and those small cupolas abound which give to the towns and the houses of the Holy Land an air of comfort, and even of importance, in strong contrast with the dreariness of the uniform flat roofs, or oftener roofless mud walls, of Egypt. Bethlehem is inhabited mostly by Christians, Roman Catholic and Greek. There is but one small mosque; few Mohammedans; no Jews'. From the Christmas Supplement to the "Illustrated London News", 1858.