ARPAD. This probably is a famous City of Syria. Arpad in Scripture is always placed with Hamath. Sennacherib boasts of having reduced Arpad and Hamath, or of having destroyed the Gods of these two places. Hamath we know is Emesa, and as far as we are able to conjecture, Arpad must be the City of Arad or Arvad, as it is sometimes called in Hebrew. Others are of opinion, that it is the Town of Arphas, taken notice of in Josephus1, as limiting the Provinces or Cantons of Gamalitis, Gaulanitis, Batanæa, and Trachonitis on the North-East Side, as Julias was the Boundary to them on the South-West. This position would agree well enough with Arpad, near Hamath; and Josephus had obliged us if he had shewn us more exactly the position of Arpad. It is my conjecture, that this City of Arphas mentioned by Josephus, is no other than Raphanæa, or Raphan, lying between Mount Casius and Anticasius. Josephus says1, the river Sabbaticus runs between Arce and Raphanæa; and Stephens the Geographer sets Raphanæa near Epiphania, in the neighbourhood of Arad2.
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