But his misfortune was more than made up by the triumphant
experience of a far more famous traveller, half a century
later--Rabhi Benjamin of Tudela.
Rabbi Benjamin finds new evidences of miracle in the Dead Sea, and
develops to a still higher point the legend of the salt statue of
Lot's wife, enriching the world with the statement that it was
steadily and miraculously rene wed; that, though the cattle of the
region licked its surface, it never grew smaller. Again a thrill of
joy went through the monasteries and pulpits of Christendom at this
increasing "evidence of the truth of Scripture."
Toward the end of the thirteenth century there appeared in
Palestine a traveller superior to most before or since--Count
Burchard, monk of Mount Sion. He had the advantage of knowing
something of Arabic, and his writings show him to have been
observant and thoughtful. No statue of Lot's wife appears to have
been washed clean of the salt rock at his visit, but he takes it
for granted that the Dead Sea is "the mouth of hell," and that the
vapour rising from it is the smoke from Satan's furnaces.
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