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Janum (2)

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For this locality Conder suggests (Tent Work, 2:337) the present Beni Naim, which lies three miles east of Hebron (a position possible, perhaps, for the group of towns with which it is associated in the sacred text), with cisterns in the vicinity, and thus described (from Guerin) in the Memoirs accompanying the Ordnance Survey (3:325):

"Here I saw in many places ancient materials employed in Arabic buildings. Several fragments of wall still upright in good cut stones attracted my attention. I visited a mosque which covers, according to the tradition of the people, the tomb of Lot. The coffin shown to me consists of a great wooden coffer, covered with a carpet, and probably contains the body of some modern santon revered under the name of Abraham's nephew. Around this sanctuary extends a court surrounded by a square gallery, which is itself enclosed by a wall built of stones belonging to different periods. On one of them distinguished the trace of a mutilated cross, and one of the people told me that the mosque is supposed to have succeeded a Christian Church. It is at once a sacred edifice and a fortress, for the terraces which cover the gallery are provided with a parapet pierced with loopholes. . . . I was told by the sheik that the place used to be called Kefr Bereik, which confirms Robinson's identification of the place with Jerome's Caphar Barnebo."'