The next ascent brought us in sight of a very remarkable village on the right, now called Sôba. It is separated from the ridge on which the road runs by the deep and impassable valley which, for the greater part of its length, forms the northern boundary of Judah. The place struck me much at the time--a high conical hill crowned by a village surrounded by steep rocky ledges with thick growth of wild shrubs mingled with olives. I had afterwards occasion to visit it, and found it to be undoubtedly an ancient site. Not only are there traces of a Crusading fortress, which was called Belmont, but also many ancient Jewish sepulchres cut in rock. The peasantry say it was the palace of the Sultan of the Fenish, and that his daughter lived at a certain ruined convent near the road, which we saw surrounded with ancient trees--the wilderness formed from its original garden.
Since the telegraph line has been laid to Jerusalem, this tradition has been supplemented with the detail that the Fenish had a telegraphic wire from the hill palace to that in the valley. Another favourite abode of the daughter was not far from Latrûn. Again at Beit Jibrîn and at Keratîya we found a cavern, a garden, and a castle of the Fenish; and the fact that this tradition is confined to the district south of the Jerusalem road and on the edge of the hills, leads one to suspect that the Fenish were no other than the Felish or Philistines, for the peasantry almost invariably change their L's into N's in this manner.
But to return to Sôba. This fine site, standing out black against the sky, with its grand ravine and wild copses, is evidently an important spot; yet the name Sôba does not recall any Scriptural place, though not far different from the Hebrew Zuph where Saul met Samuel. In modern Arabic it means "a heap,â such as the grain-heaps of the threshing-floors, a title which applies well to the shape of the hill, but probably this is a corruption of some older word.
Sôba also was at one time honoured, like Latrûn, as the ancient Modin, the true site of which was however known to Saint Jerome, east of Lydda, where El Medieh is now found. The distance of El Medieh from Jerusalem is close on that given in the Talmud for Modin, although the tomb supposed by M. Guérin to have been that of the Hasmoneans proves to be of Christian origin.