strongholds as gave him the most trouble at the time.  Ramah acquired an unenviable reputation in the course of these early conflicts:  its position gave it command of the roads terminating in Jerusalem, and when it fell into the hands of Israel, the Judaean capital was blockaded on this side.  The strife for its possession was always of a terrible character, and the party which succeeded in establishing itself firmly within it was deemed to have obtained a great success.*

* The campaign of Abijah at Mount Zemaraim (2 Chron. xiii. 3-19), in which the foundation of the narrative and the geographical details seem fully historical.  See also the campaign of Baasha against Ramah (1 Kings xv. 17-22; cf. 2 Chron. xvi. 1-6).

The encounter of the armies did not, however, seem to produce much more serious results than those which followed the continual guerilla warfare along the frontier:  the conqueror had no sooner defeated his enemy than he set to work to pillage the country in the vicinity, and, having accomplished this, returned promptly to his headquarters with the booty.  Rehoboam, who had seen something of the magnificence of Solomon, tried to perpetuate the tradition of it in his court, as far as his slender revenues would permit him.  He had eighteen women in his harem, among whom figured some of his aunts and cousins.  The titular queen was Maacah, who was represented as a daughter of Absalom.  She was devoted to the asheras, and the king was not behind his father in his tolerance of strange gods; the high places continued to be tolerated by him as sites of worship, and even Jerusalem was not free from manifestations of such idolatry as was associated with the old Canaanite religion.  He reigned seventeen years, and was interred in the city of David;* Abijam, the eldest son of Maacah, succeeded him, and followed in his evil ways.  Three years later Asa came to the throne,** no opposition being raised to his accession.  In Israel matters did not go so smoothly.  When Jeroboam, after a reign of twenty-two years, was succeeded by his son Nadab, about the year 905 B.C., it was soon evident that the instinct of loyalty to a particular dynasty had not yet laid any firm hold on the ten tribes.  The peace between the Philistines and Israel was quite as unstable as that between Israel and Judah:  an endless guerilla warfare was waged on the frontier, Gibbethon being made to play much the same part in this region as Ramah had done in regard to Jerusalem.  For the moment it was in the hands of the Philistines, and in the second year of his reign Nadab had gone to lay siege to it in force, when he was assassinated in his tent by one of his captains, a certain Baasha, son of Ahijah, of the tribe of Issachar:  the soldiers proclaimed the assassin king, and the people found themselves powerless to reject the nominee of the army.***

     * 1 Kings xiv. 22-24; cf. 2 Chron. xi. 18-23, where the
     details given in addition to those in the Booh of Kings seem
     to be of undoubted authenticity.