"Pliny on Essenes, Pliny on Jews"\*/


[Original print version in Dead Sea Discoveries 8 (2001) [in honor of Emanuel Tov] 255-261, with some later updates in green.]

by Robert A. Kraft, University of Pennsylvania [31 May 2001]

\*/ My associations with Emanuel Tov date back a third of a century, to a conference we both attended as promising young scholars in Uppsala, Sweden. Our common interests in the Old Greek translations of Jewish Scripture led to years of collaboration directing the "CATSS" project (Computer Assisted Tools for Septuagint Studies), where Emanuel taught me his special kind of English (we still laugh together over occasional "Tovisms") and we both learned some of the new language of the world of electronic scholarship. His immersion in DSS activities also drew me into closer contact with that field as well, and I offer this brief excursion into the vast world of Pliny -- who, I think, tells us as little about the DSS as he does about LXX/OG matters -- as a token of my respect and friendship on this celebratory occasion. I look forward to many more years of "good" (tovish?) association, separately and together probing the depths of our chosen fields of interest. For some pictures, see my web page http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/rs/rak/kraft.html !

A key passage in the discussion of ancient "Essenes" is Pliny the Elder's description in Natural History 5.73. Pliny does not claim to be original in this encyclopedic work, indeed, he gives long lists of sources (Roman/Latin and otherwise) in his detailed index of the work (now called "volume 1" of the 37 volumes [scrolls]).\1/

\1/ According to Pliny's Preface 17, he has collected in 36 volumes (not counting the index) some 20,000 items from about 2000 volumes by 100 authors, plus many other things from his own research and experience. The work is dedicated to Vespasian's son Titus. Pliny died trying to offer aid to the victims of the eruption of Vesuvius in August of 79 ce. Vespasian died two months earlier.

Pliny claims that his subject matter is "sterile" - the nature of things, real life - compared to more entertaining works that afford opportunity for digressions (excessus) or orations and discourses, or wondrous occurrences (casus mirabiles) or various events (eventus varios), agreeably spoken or pleasant to read (iucunda dictu aut legentibus blanda; Preface 12).

Nevertheless, he does include various entertaining and wondrous reports in his compilation, and his report about the "Essenes" in volume 5 is one such example. In the aforementioned index, Pliny describes this volume as dealing with "sites, groups (gentes), seas, towns, harbors, mountains, rivers, measurements, and people present and past" for the designated areas of the eastern Mediterranean.

The more immediate context of the "Essene" passage is a survey of southern Palestine-Judea (apart from Galilee and Perea, and "supra" Idumea and Samaria), divided into ten districts (5.70) from Jericho (with its palm trees) to Emmaus, Lydda, Joppa, Acraba, Gophna, Timna, Betholeptephe, Orine (where Jerusalem had been located), and Herodium. In 5.71, Pliny describes the source of the Jordan, and its flow through lake Galilee/Genesara southward to the Dead Sea ("Asphalites"), which is then described in 5.72, ending with a brief survey of sites to the east and south of it. At this point we find this passage, which contains the only description of local people in this section of Pliny's work:\2/
\2/ The literature on this passage is extensive, especially since the discovery in 1946-47 of the "Dead Sea Scrolls" near the site known as Qumran overlooking the northwest curve of the Dead Sea. A useful summary of scholarly opinions may be found in Martine Dulaey, "La notice de Pline sur les esse/niens (HN 5, 17, 73)," Helmantica 38 (1987) 283-93 (also pub. in Pline l'Ancien temoin de son temps, Salamanca and Nantes, 1987) -- I thank Stephen Goranson for this reference. The Latin text and English translation by H. Rackham (Loeb Classical Library, 1942) is conveniently annotated by M. Stern, Greek and Latin Authors on Jews and Judaism 1 (Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities 1974). The following English translations are my own attempts at reflecting the difficulties of the Latin as well as providing the general sense of the passages. For a similar early Latin version of this tradition about the Essenes, probably based directly or indirectly on Pliny's account (or its source?), see the 3rd c ce Collectanea Rerum Memorabilium by Solinus (Stern 2.#448), 35.9-12.

From [or towards] the west onward,\3/ Essenes flee the banks [or shores] that harm;\4/ a group set apart [or isolated] and in the entire world beyond all others extraordinary [or unique]\5/ -- without any women, stifling every urge, without money [or possessions], consort of palms.\6/


\3/ Ab occidente ... usque: for similar Latin constructions in NH see 6.45 and 6.209. Pliny has already described the Mediterranean coastal areas from Egypt to Syria, and has moved on inland to Idumea, Samaria, Galilee, Judea proper, and Perea -- pointing out along the way that Jericho has lots of water and palm groves (70); he then traces the Jordan from Panias in the north through the Genesara lake (Galilee) to the Dead Sea (71); then he locates the Dead Sea in relation to nomadic Arabia (to the east = ab oriente) and to Machaerus and the spring of Callirhoe (south = a meridie); so now there remains to be described the area west of the Dead Sea. Solinus, presumably using this same tradition, locates the Essenes in the "interior of Judea" which looks to the west, after discussing the Sodom and Gomorrah area. Note that neither Pliny nor Solinus place their Essenes in a specific settlement such as a town or city, but refer to them as inhabiting an area somewhere generally inland on the west of the lake/sea and above Engedi (apparently referring to elevation; see below n.9).


\4/ litora Esseni fugiunt (usque) qua nocent: literally something like "Essenes flee the banks/shores (usually of lakes and rivers) that harm" -- Pliny is not explicit about why they flee (elsewhere, Pliny sometimes talks of people fleeing odors, fumes, snakes, etc. -- but not here), nor is it clear to me what is meant by "qua nocent" -- are the banks/shores considered harmful, and if so why? Commerce? Socialization? Fumes? Water that does not support life? It is an awkward (to me) sequence of words, and does not necessarily imply what Rackham takes it to mean in the Loeb edition ("exhalations"). My suspicion is that it doesn't have anything to do with fumes, and that perhaps Pliny didn't have a clear idea of what it meant in his source. Staying away from the noxious water of the Dead Sea makes good sense (see Diodorus Siculus [1st c bce], Bibliotheca Historica 19.98-99 [Stern 1.62]). Solinus does not refer to this detail, other than locating the Essenes in the Judean "interior" (perhaps implying high ground, "looking westward").

\5/ gens sola et in toto orbe praeter ceteras mira: Pliny likes the phrase "in toto orbe," which occurs some 19 times in NH, including several passage that emphasize the wondrous nature of the situations reported (events, people). See the next note for Dulaey's analysis of the structure of these lines. Solinus speaks here of the Essenes "separating themselves from the rites of other gentes."

For further discussion of some of these issues, see the indexed arichives (http://orion.mscc.huji.ac.il/orion/discussion.shtml) of the discontinued Orion Online Discussion Group (active through 2002).
On, 6 June 2001 Stephen Goranson called attention to the following passage from the review by Adam Kamesar of Vermes and Goodman, The Essenes According to the Classical Sources(JAOS 111 [1991] 134-135):
"...Synesius, Dio 3.2, where the Essenes are described as a 'polis hole eudaimon'...This phrase is translated with the words 'an entire and prosperous city'....Yet it must be remembered that Dio is a Stoic of sorts, and he regards a polis not so much as a place of habitation, but as a 'group of people living under the rule of law in the same place' (Oratio 36.20; cf. 36.29 and H. von Arnim, Stoicum veterum fragmenta, III:80-81). Indeed, that in this passage polis should be translated and understood with reference to this definition (cf. the rendering "Gemeinwesen' in Adam and Burchard, 39) may be confirmed by the fact that it is employed [/p.135] in apposition to the word 'Essenes.' Accordingly, we should be wary of pressing the distinction between the description of the Essenes as a 'polis' in Dio/Synesius and as a 'gens sola' in Pliny...; for the latter phrase should probably be rendered 'a people living on its own,' and not as Goodman translates, 'a people unique of its kind'.... Likewise, 'eudaimon' should not be translated by an adjective with material connotations such as 'prosperous,' for the author is clearly thinking of that sort of eudaimonia which accrues to a city as a result of the virtue and concord of its inhabitants (see von Arnim, SVF, 1:61). In fact, in the immediately preceding sentence (omitted by Goodman), Synesius had mentioned Dio's description of the 'bios eudaimonikos' of an individual, a Euboaean hunter who lived a highly austere life in the wilderness but nevertheless achieved an outstanding degree of happiness (Oratio 7). Therefore, in all probability Synesius is referring to a description of the Essenes in which the latter are praised for a similar accomplishment in a group setting."

Subsequent threads in the Orion archives from June-July 2001 such as "Pliny's Esseni," "Are Essenes Jewish?" and "Essenes and Jews/Judeans" are also worth examining in this context, especially since some of them are direct responses to my suggestions. See also my followup of 25 June 2001 in those archives.

\6/ sine ulla femina, omni venere abdicata, sine pecunia, socia palmarum: Largely on formal grounds, Dulaey argues that "socia palmarum" refers to the reliance of this people who have no private possessions on trade in palm dates in the area (e.g. Ain Feshka), taking it as an elaboration of "without possessions" (for Dulaey [285] these lines contain three two-part statements -- on Essene uniqueness, sexual purity [neither heterosexually involved nor homosexual], and economics - apparently a rather standard device in classical rhetoric). This seems to me somewhat strained. I am not so sure that the "socia palmarum" requires literal palm trees in Pliny's understanding but may simply be an idiom describing the solitariness and social isolation of this exemplary people. Pliny is amazed at the non-procreative survival of this "gens" which he here calls "socia" (associate, companion, etc.). Socius/socia can also mean marriage partner, and it seemed possible, even probable, that Pliny (and/or his source) had this nuance in mind here -- this amazing "gens" has no human mates, but cohabits with the palms (why not with the rocks?). What I expected to find here was not a reference to trees, but to the uniqueness or exemplary nature of the group, and indeed, my Latin dictionary lists "palmaris, -e" in that sense ("excellent, admirable"), but I don't find any such uses elsewhere in Pliny. Perhaps his source said something of that sort (societas palmare?), and he misinterpreted -- I don't know if "palmaris" is sufficiently old in that meaning to serve such a hypothesis. (I would also reject, "out of hand" as it were, reading "palmarum"  as referring to the human hand rather than the tree, and thus finding an ironic, perhaps, homosexual twist to Pliny's language about these non-procreative people.) In the end, I convinced myself that "a companion people of palm trees" need not depend on the known presence of real trees to make Pliny's rhetorical point -- although in fact, palm trees were abundant in the general area (including Jericho to the north) that Pliny is describing. Perhaps a further search of early Latin literature would reveal whether "palm" gets used this way by other authors of the period. Solinus is very close to Pliny's wording here: nulla ibi femina, venere se penitus abdicaverunt, pecuniam nesciunt, palmis victitant.

In a day, from an equal number of associates a crowd is reconstituted, bloated by the multitude of those whom, exhausted in life, to their [i.e. Essene] customs fortune drives in waves;\7/ thus through thousands of years [or ages] -- incredible to report -- a group is eternal in which noone is born!\8/  

\7/ In diem ex aequo convenarum turba renascitur, large frequentantibus quos vita fessos ad mores eorum fortuna fluctibus agit: Again, the very positive assessment of the lifestyle of this amazing people is evidenced. It is not clear exactly due to what circumstances the exhausted newcomers are driven -- in general, the personal burdens of life seem to be in view, but perhaps also unfavorable "fortunes" of various sorts (old age, economic failure, warfare, disease, famine, etc.). The text is quite vague. Solinus makes a slightly different point, that although many people flock to them from every "gens," only those who display chastity and innocence are admitted.

\8/ Ita per saeculorum milia -- incredibile dictu -- gens aeterna est in qua nemo nascitur! For Pliny, this is one of those incredible stories -- yet true (like Ripley's "Believe it or Not" feature in newspapers since the middle 1900s) -- similar to the amazing tales of gymnosophists, etc. (Tales from the Frontiers?). Solinus echoes this wording closely (nemo ibi nascitur ... ita per inmensum spatium saeculorum, incredibile dictu, aeterna gens est cessantibus puerperiis).

From the Online Orion Discussion Group (see above, n. 5), on 6 June 2001, Russell Gmirkin comments:
Kamesar's review is consistent with my own understanding of the political vocabulary underlying Dio (which is also present in Pliny's passage on the Essenes), and Dio Chrysostom's political interests.  However, I fail to see how this tends towards a "Stoic view of the Qumran Jewish Essenes". Rather, this is more in the Aristotlean / Peripatetic tradition, in which political institutions and ideas of various obscure groups around the world were collected for what insight they might provide. As such this tends to confirm some relation with Nicolas of Damascus, who was an Aristotelean (see his autobiography and comments by Wacholder), wrote a paradoxographical "collection of strange customs" for Herod (largely dealing with political institutions around the world), and of course wrote on the Essenes. I have already commented on Orion on the paradoxographical vocabulary prominent in Pliny's description of the Essenes. Thus for instance, Pliny's commentary on perpetuation of a community by adoption of others - "Thus through thousands of ages (incredible to relate) a race in which no one is born lives on forever" - is a typical Aristotelean / paradoxical theoretical formulation of no historical value, but expresses (in typical purple prose) interest in unique/bizarre political institutions of others.
[This was ollowed up in discussion with George Brooks, on 7 June 2001, with:]
Note the giveaway "incredible to relate" in the Pliny passage. "Thus through thousands of ages (incredible to relate) a race in which no one is born lives on forever." The reference to incredible matters is practically stock phraseology in paradoxography (and in others describing doubtful assertions by paradoxographers). Also, please observe that the reference to "thousands of ages" in Pliny does not mean the Essenes historically had a long past, though some have interpreted it this way. It could be equally interpreted to mean Pliny's source thought they would have a long future. With this adoption thing, they could go on forever!
[and later with:]
Whether Pliny's source had accurate information or not is another question; whether he was even concerned with accuracy is yet another; his presentation is more literary and paradoxical than factual.
[and further]
There may be a case that the Essenes practiced celibacy and/or adoption. If so, it would come out of Josephus and Philo. My main point above was that the passage in Pliny was of questionable accuracy due to its literary genre (paradoxography) and its tendency to model the Essenes as the mirror opposite of Biblical Sodom. By questioning its accuracy, I did not mean to definitely assert its inaccuracy on the point of adoption: I was raising questions, not asserting answers.

Below them, there had been a town Engada,\9/ second to Jerusalem [Jerico?] in fertility and the forests of palm-groves, but now another [or a second] killing-field [or graveyard].\10/

\9/ Infra hos Engada oppidum fuit: now Pliny takes his survey back towards the lake, from which his Essenes were said to have fled (see above, n.4), and moves southward towards Masada and also to the presumably lower elevation of the Engedi ruins. I take "infra hos" here to be primarily a reference to elevation, noting that Pliny also uses "super" ("above") to refer to geographical elevations in his descriptions -- see 5.70 (the immediate context of our passage!), 6.78, and 7.26. Solinus reads the material similarly: Engada oppidum infra Essenos fuit, sed excisum est.

For subsequent discussions of the location issue, with the claim that elevation and not direction was the point being made by Pliny (although not necessarily by his source[s]), see the Online Orion Discussion Group archives (above n. 5) under the "Pliny" related topics. The competing claims were especially voiced by Stephen Goranson (downstream, south) and Ian Hutchesson (lower in elevation, away from the smelly lake).

\10/ secundum ab Hierosolymis fertilitate palmetorumque nemoribus, nunc alterum bustum: it has been suggested that the text should read "Jerico" rather than "Jerusalem" -- note that the "palm groves" had already been mentioned in connection with Jerico (5.70). Solinus comments that despite the ravages of war, the famous palm groves of Engedi remain.

Then comes Masada, a cliff fortress, and itself not very far from the Asphalt Lake.\11/
\11/ Inde Masada castellum in rupe, et ipsum haut procul Asphaltite: Solinus combines the final two sentences into the simple statement that the "castellum" of Masada is the terminus of Judea.

Thusfar Judea.\12/

\12/ Et hactenus Iudaea est (see n.11 above).

Does Pliny recognize this "Essene" gens as Jewish? The fact that they are located in Judea is not necessarily decisive, and Stern perceptively asks (1.480) "Did Pliny or his source think of the Essenes as a special gens, separate from the Jewish nation though geographically included in Judaea...? This view is perhaps echoed by Josephus, who finds it necessary to emphasize that the Essenes are <gk>I)OUDAI=OI ME\N GE/NOS</> (BJ 2.119)."

Elsewhere in the Natural History Pliny mentions Jews or Judaism in several evaluative connections, but never with complimentary comments:

12.111-113 (Stern #213) The balsam shrub is native to Judea but was brought to Rome by "the Vespasian emperors" and "it now serves [Rome] and pays tribute along with its race (cum sua gente) [i.e. Judeans]. The Jews did violence to it as also to their own lives, but the Romans protected it in response, and there has been warfare over a bush!"\13/

\13/Saeviere in eam Iudaei sicut in vitam quoque suam; contra defendere Romani, et dimicatum pro frutice est: This suggests that during the first revolt, some Jews may have attempted to destroy the balsam groves rather than surrender such a valuable asset to the enemies, but the Romans were able to preserve this economic booty. Known locations in which balsam was grown include the areas near Jericho and Engedi (for references see Stern 1.490).

13.46 (Stern #214) A type of date offered by the Romans to honor the gods is called "chydaeos" by the "Judaea gens," which is noted for contempt of divine authority.\14/

\14/ Nam quos ex his honori deorum damus, chydaeos appellavit Iudaea gens contumelia numinum insignis: Presumably this refers to Jewish failure to honor the emperors as divine.

30.11 (Stern #221) In Pliny's long discussion of "magic" and its unfortunate presence throughout the inhabited world, he speculates that the study of medicine gave rise to magic (associated especially with Zoroaster and the Persians), which led further to "religion" and to "astrology." He identifies a branch of the development popularized in Greek circles by Democritus, at the time of the Peloponnesian War, then mentions briefly "another faction" that developed from Moses and Jannes and Lotapes and also the Jews, many thousand years after Zoroaster.\15/ Magic also took hold among the Romans, although laws were created to control some aspects, and became especially despicable recently under Nero. Pliny quite clearly and unambiguously despises the practice of "magic," although he does not condemn out of hand everyone he assoicates in some way or another with magic (e.g. Homer, Democritus, Plato).

\15/ Est et alia magices factio a Mose et Ianne et Lotape ac Iudaeis pendens: Stern provides extensive notes with bibliography on these names. It is not clear that Pliny and/or his source(s) here would identify Moses with the Jews.

31.95 (Stern #223) In a long discussion about the uses of salt, Pliny inserts information on "garum," a sort of sauce made from fermeted fish remains. He describes variations of this product, and adds that another sort is used in Jewish superstitions regarding purity and even sacred rites, which is made from fish devoid of scales.\16/
\16/ Aliud vero est castimoniarum superstitioni etiam sacrisque Iudaeis dicatum, quod fit e piscibus squama carentibus: The reference to fish lacking scales contrasts with the Mosaic prohibition against eating or even coming into contact with such fish (Lev 11.9-12), unless Pliny's source referred to de-scaled fish, or unless the otherwise unattested rite intentionally involved the use of prohibited food. Whether this has any relation to the use of fish products for protection against evil spirits and for healing in Tobit 6, 8, and 11.7-13, is a matter of conjecture.

Given such passages, I am surprised by Stern's note on #214 to the effect that "This is Pliny's one reference to Jews or Judaea that has an undisputably anti-Semitic ring" (1.495). More to the point, I would think, is that Pliny never refers explicitly in a complimentary manner to Jews or their activities, and when he does add "value laden" comments, they have a definitely negative cast (Jews are involved with purity superstitions, magic, violence against Roman interests, contempt of divine "numen").

As he himself readily acknowledges, Pliny used a variety of sources for his information. Thus it is not a simple matter to determine precisely what his own attitudes may have been, or exactly what the sources may have reported or intended. My aim here is not to explore all of those side issues, important in their own right, but simply to point out that based on the available information in Pliny, there is little reason to believe that he thought of the "Essenes" as Jewish, and some reason to think that he did not make such a connection. If this sort of ambiguity was more widely present in the Greco-Roman world and was known to authors such as Philo and Josephus, it would help explain why they both make the clear claim that the "Essenes" they describe are indeed "Jewish" (Philo, Every Good Man is Free 75; Josephus, War 2.119).\17/ Ethnically unidentified "Essenes" may have been otherwise lauded by ancient reporters such as Pliny.

\17/ Philo's failure to identify the "Therapeutae" as explicitly Jewish is interesting. His description of them in On the Contemplative Life certainly seems to put them into a generally "Jewish" category -- seventh day assemblies (30, 36), guided by the sacred instructions of the prophet Moses (65, 87), reenactment of the Exodus (85-87), etc. -- but his claim that this sort of "genos" exists in many places (21), loyal to the "fatherlands" in which the adherents were born (18) or where they reside (22) suggests that a more general extra-Jewish phenomenon is envisioned as the context of this report. See also Philo's brief and less developed (thus earlier?) treatment of the Essenes in the fragment from Hypothetica in Eusebius, Praeparatio Evangelica (8.11.1-2), where associations with Moses and Judea are mentioned, but birth status (ethnicity?) is explicitly denied at the outset to be a criterion for membership -- of course, in a non-reproductive group, this may be more of a comment about reproduction (members are not born into the group) than ethnicity. Note also Philo's closing words in this excerpt, regarding the high repute in which the Essenes are held, even among great kings (8.11.18)!

In sum, Pliny does not refer to the Essenes as being at a specific settlement (town), but depicts them as a "gens" identified with an area to the (north-?) west of the Dead Sea, distinct from Jericho and Engedi, for some reason avoiding the nearby banks (of the Jordan and/or the Dead Sea?). He does not claim that they were Jewish, or that they were obliterated, or even disrupted, in the recent catastrophe that demolished Jerusalem/Jericho and Engedi (and brought the balsam bush to Rome), but suggests that they live on as a "gens aeterna"! He does not necessarily claim that they had palm trees of their own, or for that matter, anything of their own. That Pliny had any first hand knowledge of this rather "romantic" Essene presence is doubtful to me, but that he attests the existence in his world of reports about such a marvelous and mysterious group seems clear. It also seems reasonable to me that the blurry/muddled tradition he reports is not completely irrelevant for discussions about ancient Qumran, its occupants and its environs. But I wouldn't want to try to build much on this part of Pliny's reporting! \18/
\18/ Embedded in the Orion Discussion Group listings (see above, n.5) are my own added comments on some of the issues, including my attempt on 16 June 2001  to summarize the discussions to that point (see also the followup comments in my posting on 20 June 2001):

"I will ... simply list some of the observations that seem to me to be pertinent (for those who did not wade through the relevant postings [on the Orion discussion list]):

1. Pliny locates his "Esseni gens" in a general area "from the west" of the Dead Sea, having already noted places or areas from the east and to the south.

2. This Esseni area (real or imagined) avoids the undesirable aspects of the coastline (Solinus describes the area as inland/interior; note also possible connections with traditions on the location of Sodom [see Gmirkin's posting of 7 June 2001).

3. The area is part of Pliny's Judaea, itself thought of in general as "elevated" (super) in relation to Samaria and Idumea (both of which are placed along the Mediterranean coast by Pliny).

4. Thus "from the west" (Esseni land) one goes "infra" (down in elevation) to the ruins of Engedi, and thence to the rock-fortress Masada, also near the Dead Sea.

5. Pliny's information seems to be at second hand or worse in this entire section, with the Essene vignette probably coming from a "Believe it or Not" (paradoxigraphical?) sort of composition relating to that part of the world (especially the general "Judaea" area).

Thus I would say that Pliny's account is basically irrelevant for arguments about Qumran's possible Essene connections."


==[notes (as endnotes, lacking updates)]==

\1/According to Pliny's Preface 17, he has collected in 36 volumes (not counting the index) some 20,000 items from about 2000 volumes by 100 authors, plus many other things from his own research and experience. The work is dedicated to Vespasian's son Titus. Pliny died trying to offer aid to the victims of the eruption of Vesuvius in August of 79 ce. Vespasian died two months earlier.

\2/The literature on this passage is extensive, especially since the discovery in 1946-47 of the "Dead Sea Scrolls" near the site known as Qumran overlooking the northwest curve of the Dead Sea. A useful summary of scholarly opinions may be found in Martine Dulaey, "La notice de Pline sur les esse/niens (HN 5, 17, 73)," Helmantica 38 (1987) 283-93 (also pub. in Pline l'Ancien temoin de son temps, Salamanca and Nantes, 1987) -- I thank Stephen Goranson for this reference. The Latin text and English translation by H. Rackham (Loeb Classical Library, 1942) is conveniently annotated by M. Stern, Greek and Latin Authors on Jews and Judaism 1 (Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities 1974). The following English translations are my own attempts at reflecting the difficulties of the Latin as well as providing the general sense of the passages. For a similar early Latin version of this tradition about the Essenes, probably based directly or indirectly on Pliny's account (or its source?), see the 3rd c ce Collectanea Rerum Memorabilium by Solinus (Stern 2.#448), 35.9-12.

\3/Ab occidente ... usque: for similar Latin constructions in NH see 6.45 and 6.209. Pliny has already described the Mediterranean coastal areas from Egypt to Syria, and has moved on inland to Idumea, Samaria, Galilee, Judea proper, and Perea -- pointing out along the way that Jericho has lots of water and palm groves (70); he then traces the Jordan from Panias in the north through the Genesara lake (Galilee) to the Dead Sea (71); then he locates the Dead Sea in relation to nomadic Arabia (to the east = ab oriente) and to Machaerus and the spring of Callirhoe (south = a meridie); so now there remains to be described the area west of the Dead Sea. Solinus, presumably using this same tradition, locates the Essenes in the "interior of Judea" which looks to the west, after discussing the Sodom and Gomorrah area. Note that neither Pliny nor Solinus place their Essenes in a specific settlement such as a town or city, but refer to them as inhabiting an area somewhere generally inland on the west of the lake/sea and above Engedi (apparently referring to elevation; see below n.9).

\4/litora Esseni fugiunt (usque) qua nocent: literally something like "Essenes flee the banks/shores (usually of lakes and rivers) that harm" -- Pliny is not explicit about why they flee (elsewhere, Pliny sometimes talks of people fleeing odors, fumes, snakes, etc. -- but not here), nor is it clear to me what is meant by "qua nocent" -- are the banks/shores considered harmful, and if so why? Commerce? Socialization? Fumes? Water that does not support life? It is an awkward (to me) sequence of words, and does not necessarily imply what Rackham takes it to mean in the Loeb edition ("exhalations"). My suspicion is that it doesn't have anything to do with fumes, and that perhaps Pliny didn't have a clear idea of what it meant in his source. Staying away from the noxious water of the Dead Sea makes good sense (see Diodorus Siculus [1st c bce], Bibliotheca Historica 19.98-99 [Stern 1.62]). Solinus does not refer to this detail, other than locating the Essenes in the Judean "interior" (perhaps implying high ground, "looking westward").

\5/gens sola et in toto orbe praeter ceteras mira: Pliny likes the phrase "in toto orbe," which occurs some 19 times in NH, including several passage that emphasize the wondrous nature of the situations reported (events, people). See the next note for Dulaey's analysis of the structure of these lines. Solinus speaks here of the Essenes "separating themselves from the rites of other gentes."

\6/sine ulla femina, omni venere abdicata, sine pecunia, socia palmarum: Largely on formal grounds, Dulaey argues that "socia palmarum" refers to the reliance of this people who have no private possessions on trade in palm dates in the area (e.g. Ain Feshka), taking it as an elaboration of "without possessions" (for Dulaey [285] these lines contain three two-part statements -- on Essene uniqueness, sexual purity [neither heterosexually involved nor homosexual], and economics - apparently a rather standard device in classical rhetoric). This seems to me somewhat strained. I am not so sure that the "socia palmarum" requires literal palm trees in Pliny's understanding but may simply be an idiom describing the solitariness and social isolation of this exemplary people. Pliny is amazed at the non-procreative survival of this "gens" which he here calls "socia" (associate, companion, etc.). Socius/socia can also mean marriage partner, and it seemed possible, even probable, that Pliny (and/or his source) had this nuance in mind here -- this amazing "gens" has no human mates, but cohabits with the palms (why not with the rocks?). What I expected to find here was not a reference to trees, but to the uniqueness or exemplary nature of the group, and indeed, my Latin dictionary lists "palmaris, -e" in that sense ("excellent, admirable"), but I don't find any such uses elsewhere in Pliny. Perhaps his source said something of that sort (societas palmare?), and he misinterpreted -- I don't know if "palmaris" is sufficiently old in that meaning to serve such a hypothesis. (I would also reject, "out of hand" as it were, reading "palmarum"  as referring to the human hand rather than the tree, and thus finding an ironic, perhaps, homosexual twist to Pliny's language about these non-procreative people.) In the end, I convinced myself that "a companion people of palm trees" need not depend on the known presence of real trees to make Pliny's rhetorical point -- although in fact, palm trees were abundant in the general area (including Jericho to the north) that Pliny is describing. Perhaps a further search of early Latin literature would reveal whether "palm" gets used this way by other authors of the period. Solinus is very close to Pliny's wording here: nulla ibi femina, venere se penitus abdicaverunt, pecuniam nesciunt, palmis victitant.

\7/In diem ex aequo convenarum turba renascitur, large frequentantibus quos vita fessos ad mores eorum fortuna fluctibus agit: Again, the very positive assessment of the lifestyle of this amazing people is evidenced. It is not clear exactly due to what circumstances the exhausted newcomers are driven -- in general, the personal burdens of life seem to be in view, but perhaps also unfavorable "fortunes" of various sorts (old age, economic failure, warfare, disease, famine, etc.). The text is quite vague. Solinus makes a slightly different point, that although many people flock to them from every "gens," only those who display chastity and innocence are admitted.

\8/ Ita per saeculorum milia -- incredibile dictu -- gens aeterna est in qua nemo nascitur! For Pliny, this is one of those incredible stories -- yet true (like Ripley's "Believe it or Not" feature in newspapers since the middle 1900s) -- similar to the amazing tales of gymnosophists, etc. (Tales from the Frontiers?). Solinus echoes this wording closely (nemo ibi nascitur ... ita per inmensum spatium saeculorum, incredibile dictu, aeterna gens est cessantibus puerperiis).

\9/Infra hos Engada oppidum fuit: now Pliny takes his survey back towards the lake, from which his Essenes were said to have fled (see above, n.4), and moves southward towards Masada and also to the presumably lower elevation of the Engedi ruins. I take "infra hos" here to be primarily a reference to elevation, noting that Pliny also uses "super" ("above") to refer to geographical elevations in his descriptions -- see 5.70 (the immediate context of our passage!), 6.78, and 7.26. Solinus reads the material similarly: Engada oppidum infra Essenos fuit, sed excisum est.

\10/secundum ab Hierosolymis fertilitate palmetorumque nemoribus, nunc alterum bustum: it has been suggested that the text should read "Jerico" rather than "Jerusalem" -- note that the "palm groves" had already been mentioned in connection with Jerico (5.70). Solinus comments that despite the ravages of war, the famous palm groves of Engedi remain.

\11/Inde Masada castellum in rupe, et ipsum haut procul Asphaltite: Solinus combines the final two sentences into the simple statement that the "castellum" of Masada is the terminus of Judea.

\12/Et hactenus Iudaea est (see n.11 above).

\13/Saeviere in eam Iudaei sicut in vitam quoque suam; contra defendere Romani, et dimicatum pro frutice est: This suggests that during the first revolt, some Jews may have attempted to destroy the balsam groves rather than surrender such a valuable asset to the enemies, but the Romans were able to preserve this economic booty. Known locations in which balsam was grown include the areas near Jericho and Engedi (for references see Stern 1.490).

\14/Nam quos ex his honori deorum damus, chydaeos appellavit Iudaea gens contumelia numinum insignis: Presumably this refers to Jewish failure to honor the emperors as divine.

\15/Est et alia magices factio a Mose et Ianne et Lotape ac Iudaeis pendens: Stern provides extensive notes with bibliography on these names. It is not clear that Pliny and/or his source(s) here would identify Moses with the Jews.

\16/Aliud vero est castimoniarum superstitioni etiam sacrisque Iudaeis dicatum, quod fit e piscibus squama carentibus: The reference to fish lacking scales contrasts with the Mosaic prohibition against eating or even coming into contact with such fish (Lev 11.9-12), unless Pliny's source referred to de-scaled fish, or unless the otherwise unattested rite intentionally involved the use of prohibited food. Whether this has any relation to the use of fish products for protection against evil spirits and for healing in Tobit 6, 8, and 11.7-13, is a matter of conjecture.

\17/Philo's failure to identify the "Therapeutae" as explicitly Jewish is interesting. His description of them in On the Contemplative Life certainly seems to put them into a generally "Jewish" category -- seventh day assemblies (30, 36), guided by the sacred instructions of the prophet Moses (65, 87), reenactment of the Exodus (85-87), etc. -- but his claim that this sort of "genos" exists in many places (21), loyal to the "fatherlands" in which the adherents were born (18) or where they reside (22) suggests that a more general extra-Jewish phenomenon is envisioned as the context of this report. See also Philo's brief and less developed (thus earlier?) treatment of the Essenes in the fragment from Hypothetica in Eusebius, Praeparatio Evangelica (8.11.1-2), where associations with Moses and Judea are mentioned, but birth status (ethnicity?) is explicitly denied at the outset to be a criterion for membership -- of course, in a non-reproductive group, this may be more of a comment about reproduction (members are not born into the group) than ethnicity. Note also Philo's closing words in this excerpt, regarding the high repute in which the Essenes are held, even among great kings (8.11.18)!

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