With regard to Antipatris, we have fortunately far greater certainty; but the place is of less interest, being mentioned in the Bible only as the limit of St. Paul’s night journey from Jerusalem (Acts xxiii. 31). It was well known in the fourth century, but its site was lost to the Crusaders, who identified it at Arsûf, the ancient Apollonia, where also the more ignorant supposed Ashdod to have stood. It is only within the last twenty years that attention has been directed to the true site.
Josephus describes Antipatris as a city in the plain, close to the hills, in a position well watered, with a river encompassing the city, and with groves of trees. Now, as there is but one river in the plain of Sharon, anywhere, near the required part, and as there is on that river but one important ancient site, surrounded by water and near the hills, we can have little doubt as to the locality of the town, first apparently identified by the late Consul Finn, in 1850; but, in addition to this, we have, in the old itineraries, various measurements to surrounding places which, though not quite exact, still serve to indicate the same site. They are as follows:
| R.M. | R.M. | ||
| Antipatris to Galgula (Kalkilia) | 6, | measures | 6½ |
| Antipatris to Lydda | 10, | measures | 11½ |
| Antipatris to Betthar (Tireh) | 10, | measures | 9¼ |
| Antipatris to Cæsarea | 28, | measures | 30½ |
These measurements on the Survey bring us to the Râs el ’Ain, a large mound covered with ruins, from the sides of which, on the north and west, the River ’Aujah (the Biblical Mejarkon, or “yellow water”) gushes forth, a full-sized stream.
A confusion has arisen between Antipatris and a town called Caphar Saba, in consequence of the loose description, given by Josephus, of a ditch dug by Alexander Balas, “from Cabarzaba, now called Antipatris,” to Joppa (Ant. xiii. 15, 1); but the same author afterwards explains that Caphar Saba was a district name, applied to the plain near Antipatris (Ant. xvi. 5, 2).
In the Talmud, the two towns, Antipatris and Caphar Saba, are both noticed in a manner which leaves little doubt that they were separate places. Of Antipatris, we learn that it was a town on the road from Judea to Galilee, the boundary of “the Land” on the side of Samaria; and, as I have noted above, the great boundary valley actually runs into the plain at this point. But while Antipatris was a Jewish city, Caphar Saba was in the district which was considered foreign ground, as within Samaritan territory; and an idolatrous tree existed there, perhaps now represented by the great sacred tree at Neby Serâkah, close to Kefr Sâba, five and a half miles north of Râs el ’Ain.
Antipatris, with two other places, Jishub and Patris, is mentioned as a station at the entrance to “the King’s Mountain,” as the Jews called the Judean hills. This agrees with its situation at the base of the hills, the other places being, perhaps, Sûfin and Budrus, in the same district.
The site thus fixed, by the Survey measurements, is one naturally better fitted for an important town than any in the district. The name has indeed vanished, being a Greek title derived from the name of Herod’s father, and always awkward to the mouths of the natives; but the stream, the mound of ruins, and the neighbouring hills, remain; the deep blue pools of fresh water well up close beneath the hillock, surrounded by tall canes and willows, rushes, and grass. A sort of ragged lawn extends some two hundred yards southwards, and westwards the stream flows rapidly away, burrowing between deep banks, and rolling to the sea, a yellow, turbid, sandy volume of water, unfordable in winter, and never dry, even in summer.
The ruins of Herod’s city are now covered with the shell of a great Crusading castle. The knights seem to have taken the name Mirr, or “Passage,” applied to a hamlet near the ford, and transformed it into Mirabel, by adding “bel,” a word which occurs in the names of several of their fortresses, such as Belfort, Belvoir, etc. The castle is flanked with round towers, and resembles that of Capernaum (near ’Athlît), on a larger scale. It was here that Manasseh, the cousin of Queen Melisinda, was besieged, in 1149, by Baldwin III., and obliged to capitulate. In 1191 Mirabel was dismantled by Saladin, on the approach of King Richard, in common with Plans, Capernaum, and many other castles; nor does it appear to have been subsequently restored.