rather inclined to Ptolemy. But when this Ptolemy was pursued by
his mother Cleopatra, and retired into Egypt, Alexander besieged
Gadara, and took it; as also he did Amathus, which was the
strongest of all the fortresses that were about Jordan, and
therein were the most precious of all the possessions of
Theodorus, the son of Zeno. Whereupon Theodopus marched against
him, and took what belonged to himself as well as the king's
baggage, and slew ten thousand of the Jews. However, Alexander
recovered this blow, and turned his force towards the maritime
parts, and took Raphia and Gaza, with Anthedon also, which was
afterwards called Agrippias by king Herod.

3. But when he had made slaves of the citizens of all these
cities, the nation of the Jews made an insurrection against him
at a festival; for at those feasts seditions are generally begun;
and it looked as if he should not be able to escape the plot they
had laid for him, had not his foreign auxiliaries, the Pisidians
and Cilicians, assisted him; for as to the Syrians, he never
admitted them among his mercenary troops, on account of their
innate enmity against the Jewish nation. And when he had slain
more than six thousand of the rebels, he made an incursion into
Arabia; and when he had taken that country, together with the
Gileadires and Moabites, he enjoined them to pay him tribute, and
returned to Areathus; and as Theodorus was surprised at his great
success, he took the fortress, and demolished it.

4. However, when he fought with Obodas, king of the Arabians, who
had laid an ambush for him near Golan, and a plot against him, he
lost his entire army, which was crowded together in a deep
valley, and broken to pieces by the multitude of camels. And when