by Brad Ricca
God alone, without partner: Marcus Milwright, “Initial Description of the Mosaic Inscriptions,” The Dome of the Rock and Its Umayyad Mosaic Inscriptions (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2016), 49–82.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
He was quite sick: Charles Warren, Underground Jerusalem, 528.
work in this area: ibid., 523–24.
mourn for them: ibid., 530.
through into a passage: ibid., 582.
“standing on a roof”: ibid.
the time of the Temple’s destruction: ibid.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
new machinery: Vincent, Underground, 2.
reveled in it: ibid., 17.
to meet somewhere in between: ibid., 20.
like a black rectangular door: ibid.; Patti Smith, “Land: Horses/Land of a Thousand Dances/La Mer (De),” Horses, Arista, 1975.
“a detailed plan of it”: Underground, 18.
detailed photographs of the tunnel: ibid., 43–65.
easier to correct later: ibid., 22–24.
eleventh century BC: ibid., 51–52.
“washed, and came seeing”: John 9:1–12.
“A tomb”: Underground, 21.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
view from the roof: Our Jerusalem, 203.
Mr. Moses: ibid., 146–49.
Miss Poole: ibid., 132–33.
made manifest in him: 46. Chapters 1 and 2 of Our Jerusalem tell this very moving story. See also Jane Fletcher Geniesse, American Priestess (New York: Nan A. Talese, 2008).
“shall we be too”: Our Jerusalem, 47.
three years old: ibid., 57, 65.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
middle of the dirt road: Charles Warren, “The Moabite Stone,” Palestine Exploration Quarterly 2, no. 5 (1869): 169–83.
Moabite Stone: Charles Warren, Underground Jerusalem, 536–37. See also James King, Moab’s Patriarchal Stone (London: Palestine Exploration Fund, 1878); Robert Francis Harper, “The Moabite Stone,” Biblical World 7, no. 1 (1896): 60–64; Warren and Wilson, Recovery, 489–502.
Charles Clermont-Ganneau: “The Late M. Charles Clermont-Ganneau,” Palestine Exploration Quarterly 55, no. 3 (1923), 137–39.
“but they failed”: Warren, Underground Jerusalem, 540.
“will fall upon their crops”: Warren, “Moabite Stone,” 162.
make a squeeze of the stone: ibid.; Warren, Underground Jerusalem, 540–42; Warren and Wilson, Recovery,498–501.
with a spear in his leg: Warren and Wilson, Recovery, 390–93.
letter: Warren and Wilson, Recovery, 170–71.
None of it was true: Warren, Underground Jerusalem, 543–44.
“and I took it, for Chemosh”: Warren and Wilson, Recovery, 170–71, 503–04; Thomas Parker, “Recent Explorations in Palestine,” Christian Ambassador, vol. 10 (London: G. Lamb, 1872), 63–64.
“Chemosh upon the wall”: 2 Kings 3:27.
“and the publicity given”: Warren and Wilson, Recovery, 496.
“moral order is preserved”: ibid., 510.
Louvre: The Mesha Stele, Louvre Museum, Paris, louvre.fr/en/oeuvre-notices/mesha-stele.
“ten, or maybe twenty years”: Warren, Underground Jerusalem, 605.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
“most kind and hospitable”: Autumn, 28. In his preface, Foley says that his book “does not profess to record anything of historical interest, with the possible exception of the Jameson Raid.”
“we completely broke down”: ibid., 29–30.
Any minute now: ibid., 119.
“But can you beat it”: ibid., 46–47.
“wristwatch stopped”: ibid., 61.
“taken food from a child:”: ibid., 64–67; Ishay Govender-Ypma, “Mealie Pap Is a South African Breakfast for All,” MyRecipes, April 2, 2018, myrecipes.com/extracrispy/mealie-pap-south-africa.
“munching an apple”: Autumn, 67.
“and we looked the part”: ibid., 71–73.
“would need a lot of men”: ibid., 76.
“Does it matter?”: Valter, ch. 5. Parker was diagnosed with neurasthenia, largely understood as shell shock, or PTSD; Valter, ch. 4; M. A. Crocq and L. Crocq. “From Shell Shock and War Neurosis to Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: A History of Psychotraumatology,” Dialogues in Clinical Neuroscience 2, no. 1 (2000): 47–55; Caroline Alexander, “The Shock of War,” Smithsonian Magazine, September 1910.
silt of three thousand years: Autumn, 119.
“I fought Dracula”: bit.ly/3a0d2s5.
“Not even by the Hittites!”: Autumn, 128.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
snow was falling over Jerusalem: “A White Christmas in Jerusalem,” Evening News, December 23, 1910, 1.
soup kitchen downstairs: Valter, ch. 7.
“mysterious”: “Pool of Siloam,” New York Times, December 12, 1909, C4; “Strange Treasure Hunt,” Irish News and Belfast Morning News, May 14, 1910, 3; “King Solomon’s Treasure,” Dundee Evening Telegraph, July 8, 1910, 4.
Le Queux: “Fiction,” Banbury Advertiser, August 4, 1910, 6.
“among his best work”: “Treasures of Israel,” Dublin Daily Express, February 24, 1910, 7.
Le Queux: Valter, ch. 5. This successful novel hinged on a professor from a university in “northern Europe” who cracked the cipher. Stewart’s treatment of his work is exhaustive. A later fictionalization of the expedition is Elizabeth Peters, A River in the Sky (New York: Harper, 2010). A New York Times bestseller, the book finds Peters’s beloved protagonist Amelia Peters following “would-be archaeologist Major George Morley” as he hunts for the Ark in 1910.
French archaeologist: Galor, Katharina, Finding Jerusalem: Archaeology between Science and Ideology (Oakland: University of California Press, 2017), 119–122.
“entrance, seek!: Parker Archive.
“also was found”: ibid.
Warren thought the blood canal: Charles Warren, Underground Jerusalem, 404–05.
“went or what I did”: Nehemiah 2:1–20
“drawing a blank”: “Cosy Corner Chat,” Gentlewoman, July 23, 1910, 17.
small map: Parker Archive.
“go to hell”: J. Lusthaus, “A History of Hell: The Jewish Origins of the Idea of Gehenna in the Synoptic Gospels,” Journal for the Academic Study of Religion 21, no. 2, (2009), 175–87; Alice K. Turner, The History of Hell (New York: Harvest Books, 1995); Elaine Pagels, The Origin of Satan: How Christians Demonized Jews, Pagans, and Heretics (New York: Vintage, 1996).
CHAPTER THIRTY
Gehenna: I do not know for certain if Monty went to Gehenna, but it was nearby, and he certainly interacted with it conceptually in trying to understand the cipher. My model for their tour, whether real or imagined, is from Mark Twain, The Innocents Abroad; or, The New Pilgrims’ Progress (Connecticut: American Publishing, 1869), 582–83. When Twain visited Palestine, he also visited the American Colony. See also Lloyd R. Bailey, “Enigmatic Bible Passages: Gehenna: The Topography of Hell,” Biblical Archaeologist 49, no. 3 (1986): 187–91.
“went to the underworld”: Underground, 17.
“Here is where Molok stood”: Twain, 583.
“St. Onuphrius, a desert hermit”: “Venerable Onuphrius the Great,” oca.org/saints/lives.
not afford burial elsewhere: Matthew 27:3–10; Leen Ritmeyer and Kathleen Ritmeyer, “Potter’s Field or High Priest’s Tomb?” Biblical Archaeology Review 20, no. 6 (1994): 22–78; Danny Herman, “Akeldama, the Field of Blood,” dannythedigger.com/jerusalem/akeldama.
was a charnel house: “Akeldama (Field of Blood),” seetheholyland.net/tag/charnelhouse/.
Knights Templar: Dan Jones, The Templars: The Rise and Spectacular Fall of God’s Holy Warriors (New York: Penguin, 2018); Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh, and Henry Lincoln, Holy Blood, Holy Grail (New York: Delacorte, 1982).
Freemasons: There is no physical or anecdotal evidence that Monty was a Mason, so I chose to present it instead from an outsider’s (his) view. In an email on January
12, 2021, Olivia Parker wrote, “As far as I know, no Parkers were Masons (I haven’t been taught the secret handshake yet anyway).” See also Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh, The Temple and the Lodge (New York: Arcade, 2020); Graham Addison, email to author, October 23, 2020. According to Graham, Cyril Ward was a Mason.
knights: Graham Naylor, “St. Mary’s Church, Plympton,” A Church Crawler’s Journal, September 11, 2016, someolddevonchurches.wordpress.com. There were knights who held the Morley and Parker name, but not related to Monty. In January 1908, when the new session of Parliament opened, a strange man walked into the chamber wearing rich robes trimmed in ermine. He sat down in the House of Lords just before the Royal Procession entered. The Yeoman Usher of the Black Rod confronted him and called over the Garter King of Arms, who asked for his credentials. “I am the Lord de Morley,” the man said with a sneer. His name was James Thorne Rowe. He then produced a writ of summons issued by Edward I in 1299. They ordered him to leave. When he would not, they conducted him out in full view of the other astonished lords. Soon after, Rowe filed an official claim that he was descended from Sir John Parker, the eldest of Henry Parker, who died as the Tenth Baron de Morley in 1556. The royal officials checked their thick books and agreed that he indeed had a claim. But when it was found that Sir John had been born out of wedlock, his claim was permanently denied. Rowe was right that the Barony of Morley title had fallen into abeyance when Henry Parker died in 1556. It was resuscitated in 1815 in a different form when John Parker, the Second Baron of Boringdon (and no relation to that first Henry Parker!) was conferred the title of Lord Morley, even though he was not of the same Parkers or Morleys. This practice was fairly common, according to peerage enthusiasts. Even the original Morleys had complications with their lineage. At the siege of Calais in 1346, two knights—Nicholas, Lord Brunel, and Robert, Lord de Morley—walked on the field bearing arms of the exact same color—an unthinkable transgression. One of Brunel’s knights immediately challenged Morley to a duel, but the king intervened and had the matter handed over to the Court of Chivalry. During the proceedings, it was revealed that Morley had previously served as an esquire to a Brunel, and when his knight died he assumed the arms with his dying blessing. Robert de Morley did not like his chances in court, so he whispered to the king that if his arms were taken, he could no longer in good faith fight for His Majesty. It was a very risky move, but it was successful, as Robert kept his arms instead of losing his head. They agreed that Robert could keep them until his death. When he died while on crusade in Prussia, Robert’s heart was sent home to England. Somehow, his arms stayed in use for several generations, until they changed and no one cared anymore. The current crest of the House of Morley, in use since 1815, is a stag’s head on black, with two great antlers. Their motto is simple but hopeful: Fideli certa merces, or, “Reward is sure to the faithful.” See David Stone, “The Very Early Members of the Morley Family,” Dereham and District Team Ministry, 2011, derehamanddistrictteam.org.uk; John O. Morley, “The Origins of the Morleys in England and their Early Appearance in Wales,” Annals of Geneaological Research 9, no. 1 (2013), 1–61.
“steps(!) from Hakeldama”: Parker Archive.
three hundred yards: ibid.
utterly fallen in: ibid. Juvelius says in the cipher that the way is blocked, though he is unclear which cave he is referring to. There is other contemporary evidence of tunnels being inaccessible there. See James Hastings, ed., A Dictionary of Christ and the Gospels, vol. 1, part 2 (Honolulu: University Press of the Pacific, 1906, 2004 reprint), 852; W. E. Manley, “Letters to my Friends in Connecticut,” Manford’s Magazine 29, no. 12 (1885), 675.
his mother: Olivia Parker, email to author, November 15, 2020; Ceri Johnson, Saltram (Great Britain: National Trust, 1998), 54–55.
“children of Ammon”: 1 Kings 11:7.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
“King Solomon’s”: Underground, 29. Father Vincent’s story of the grand and ancient toilet is corroborated by Juvelius in Valkoinen, though the timelines disagree by over a year.
A necessary necropolis: Etan Nechin, “Dying in Jerusalem,” Boston Review, April 6, 2020.
The first cave: Underground, 24–25.
the second tomb: ibid., 25.
the third cave: ibid.
colorful pottery: ibid., 27–29.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
The primary sources for this chapter are Warren’s own letter, contemporaneous newspaper articles, and some of the official evidence. Whenever possible, I cite the online database casebook.org because of its ease of navigation and its policy of avoiding displaying the photos of the victims without warning or pause, as so many of the others commonly do. The secondary resources on this topic are too numerous to list or mention, though I found some helpful things in Nigel Graddon, Jack the Ripper’s New Testament (Kempton, IL: Adventures Unlimited, 2019); Alan Moore and Eddie Campbell, From Hell (Marietta, GA: Top Shelf, 2004); Richard Whittington-Egan, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive Casebook (Amberley Publishing, 2015). The most helpful model for trying to write about this subject at all was Hallie Rubenhold, The Five (Boston: Mariner Books, 2019), which I wish I had read first.
Goulston Street: For images, see casebook.org/victorian_london/sitepics.w-goul.
“the writing”: “Murders in the East-End,” London Evening Standard, October 2, 1888, 3; “The Whitechapel Tragedy. Chalk-Writing the Wall,” Eastern Daily Press, September 12, 1889, 8; “The Writing on the Wall,“October 12, 1888, 3; “Letter from Sir Charles Warren,” London Evening Standard, October 4, 1888, 3; “The Whitechapel Murder,“London Daily News, September 14, 1888, 6; “The East-End Murders,” Lloyd’s Weekly Newspaper, October 14, 1888, 3.
“would probably have been lost”: Charles Warren, “Warren’s Report to the Home Secretary,” November 6, 1888, casebook.org/official_documents/warrenlt.
“for nothing”: “Copy of attachment to a Police report from Chief Commissioner Sir Charles Warren of the Metropolitan Police, to the Home Office,” November 6, 1888. Home Office archive, HO 144.221.A49301C.8c, commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Juives.jpg.
might be Yiddish: Bruce Robinson, They All Love Jack (New York: Harper, 2015). For any readers interested in a detailed Masonic reading through Warren and his experiences in Palestine, this is the book to read.
“Dear Boss”: “Letter received on September 27th, 1888,” casebook.org/ripper _letters.
Kate Eddowes’s: “The Whitechapel Mystery,” Illustrated Police News, October 13, 1888.
that perhaps might fit: “Jack,” Oxford English Dictionary Online, 2nd ed., 1989, oed.com/oed2/00122699. Etymologically “Jack” comes from the word for a “generic,” “common” man. The definition I am considering is “To things of smaller than the normal size … a very small amount; the least bit; a whit … [as in] jack-bowl, jack-brick, jack-fish.” This later becomes Americanized in the idiom “you don’t know jack,” meaning you don’t know anything / you know nothing. And “jackass.”
Russian spies and secret men: William Le Queux, Things I Know about Kings, Celebrities, and Crooks (London: Eveleigh Nash and Grayson, 1923), 258–72; “Jack the Ripper,” Nottingham Evening Post, October 25, 1923, 1.
turned away as a madman: “Tracing Jack the Ripper,” Northampton Chronicle and Echo, January 13, 1931, 3; Jennifer D. Pegg, “Robert James Lees & Visions from Hell,” casebook.org/dissertations/ripperoo-lees. I tried, for far too long, to determine whether Robert James Lees could have been the mysterious James Lees identified with the expedition. Since I could not make an even transitory connection (I could not locate his 1888 diary), the story ends here, though the question is open.
the bloodhound experiment: “Charles Warren and the Bloodhounds,” Yorkshire Post, November 13, 1888, 6; Angela Buckley, “Dog Detectives,” Victorian Supersleuth Investigates, January 25, 2019, victorian-supersleuth.com/dog-detectives.
“for lost cities in Palestine”: “Our London,” Dundee Courier, October 11, 1888, 3.
on several fronts: “Resignation of Sir Charles Warren,” Morning Post, November 13, 1888, 5; “Sir Charles Warren’s Resignation,” Globe, November 13, 1888, 4.
in her rented room: There are rumors that the crime scene contained something on the walls that looked like writing. I finally looked at the photograph, just to make sure. Trust me, there is nothing there. Don’t look at it.
“of crime is love”: “The Moral of the Murders,” The Star, October 5, 1888, 1; Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Worship,” 1860, emersoncentral.com/texts/the-conduct-of-life/worship/.
“to be utterly and irretrievably bad”: “Points about Policemen,” Brooklyn Daily Eagle, December 9, 1888, 15.
Polly Nichols, Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Kate Eddowes, and Mary Jane Kelly: Hallie Rubenhold, The Five (Boston: Mariner Books, 2019).
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
at least ten men: William E. Curtis, “Moslems in a Rage,” Evening Star, May 22, 1911; the records analyzed in Fishman, “1911.”
Dome of the Rock: description from Jerry M. Landay, Dome of the Rock (New York: Newsweek, 1972).
A blackened star: William Simpson, Cave Under the Dome of the Rock, Jerusalem, pencil and watercolor, 1870; Daniel Estrina, “Replacing Carpet at Jerusalem Shrine Reveals Religious Rift,” AP News, April 21, 2015; Kylen Chase Campbell, “(When) History Is Rocky,” Roots to Now, roots2now.wordpress.com/tag/dome-of-the-rock; Rabbi Leibel Reznick, “Secret Chambers of the Temple Mount,” Jewish Action, spring 1997, jewishaction.com/jewish-world/israel/secret-chambers-temple-mount; “Well of Souls,” Madain Project, madainproject.com; Rivka Gonen, Contested Holiness: Jewish, Muslim, and Christian Perspectives on the Temple (Jersey City, KTAV Publishing, 2003), 23.
