were closed, emptied of their contents, or altogether ruined.[1] As the Samaritans were very numerous in Palestine, they soon congregated together, and broke into open revolt. A brigand chief named Julian was chosen as their King, and under his leadership more than twenty thousand of the rebels assembled. Doubtless they were very inefficiently armed and equipped, but they proceeded at once to retaliate on the Christians by pillaging their property, massacring those who came in their way, and setting fire to the churches. Scythopolis and Neapolis were the chief scenes of their depredations. At the first news of the riots the Emperor became very irate and ordered the immediate execution of the local governor, but when subsequent accounts indicated that the movement had attained to the magnitude of a rebellion, he commanded the military Duke of the province to attack Julian with all the forces he could muster. After some preliminary skirmishes a considerable battle was fought, in which the Samaritan King was slain, and his army routed. The head of Julian, encircled with the diadem, was sent as a trophy to Constantinople; and the wretched sectaries were exterminated wherever they could be found among the mountains in which they had taken refuge. Altogether, twenty thousand are said to have perished by the sword; the young of both sexes to an equal number were captured by Arethas, and sold into slavery among the Persians and Indians; but the majority escaped by abandoning their homes and offering themselves as subjects to the Shah-*inshah.[2]
The devastation and depopulation of Palestine, which resulted from this civil war, had reduced a great part of the
