volume 2 - Robert Bedrosian's Armenian History Workshop

36 Jonah not Buried at Nineveh.
and the coffin itself is covered with rich stuffs. A railing
with large silver knobs runs round the coffin, and on it
hang embroidered towels and bathing cloths. The walls
of the room are decorated with mirrors, coloured tiles,
and texts from the Kur'in. In one comer of it are placed
a gilt ewer and basin, a ball of French soap, a comb, and a
pair of scissors, for the use of the Prophet Jonah, who
leaves his tomb at the times appointed for prayer daily,
and performs his ablutions according to the strict ceremonial
law of the Muslims.^ Very few of the faithful
ever approach the tomb, for it is considered to be most
holy, and many men are content to look at it through the
grated window in the mosque. The inhabitants of Nabi
Yunis, and the people around it for miles, would tolerate
no interference with the mosque, or the tomb, or the
cemetery ; and the ruins of the palaces of Sennacherib
and Esarhaddon, which lie beneath them, have never
been excavated.
There appears to be no evidence that Jonah was buried
at Nineveh. Many Jews in Mosul believe with Benjamin
of Tudela (ed. Asher, p. 92) that the " province of
Ashshur "* contains the synagogues of Obadiah, Jonah
and Nahum, the prophets, and at least respect the tradition
which makes Nabi Yunis the burial place of Jonah.
The Christians do not accept the tradition, and believe
that Jonah was buried in Palestine, but have no facts to
support them.' Yet it is clear that in some way or
^ Badger, Nestorians, vol. i, p. 85.
2 n-iss'K nnP (Heb. text, p. 53).
^ According to Solomon of Basrah (see my Book of the Bee, pp. 70,
71) Jonah came from Gath-hepher (2 Kings xiv, 25), or from Kuryath
Adam6s, which is near Ascalon and Gaza and the seacoast. He
prophesied in the reign of Sardana (Esarhaddon), and then because
the Jews hated him, he took his mother and went with her to Assyria
and lived there. He rebuked Ahab, and called down a famine on the
land. The widow of Elijah received him, and he returned to Judaea ;
his mother died on the way, and he buried her by Deborah's grave.
He lived in the land of Sarida, and died two years after the people
had returned from Babylon {sic), and was buried in the cave of Kainan.
Epiphanius has Kai KaroiKijcras £v yy' ^aap, exti airidavev, Acat eTa.