the
populace obsequious to them, but the Pharisees have the multitude on
their side. But about these two sects, and that of the Essens, I have
treated accurately in the second book of Jewish affairs.

7. But when Hyrcanus had put an end to this sedition, he after that
lived happily, and administered the government in the best manner for
thirty-one years, and then died, [30] leaving behind him five sons. He
was esteemed by God worthy of three of the greatest privileges,--the
government of his nation, the dignity of the high priesthood, and
prophecy; for God was with him, and enabled him to know futurities;
and to foretell this in particular, that, as to his two eldest sons, he
foretold that they would not long continue in the government of public
affairs; whose unhappy catastrophe will be worth our description, that
we may thence learn how very much they were inferior to their father's
happiness.

CHAPTER 11. How Aristobulus, When He Had Taken The Government First
Of All Put A Diadem On His Head, And Was Most Barbarously Cruel To
His Mother And His Brethren; And How, After He Had Slain Antigonus, He
Himself Died.

1. Now when their father Hyrcanus was dead, the eldest son Aristobulus,
intending to change the government into a kingdom, for so he resolved to
do, first of all put a diadem on his head, four hundred eighty and one
years and three months after the people had been delivered from the
Babylonish slavery, and were returned to their own country again. This
Aristobulus loved his next brother Antigonus, and treated him as his
equal; but the others he held in bonds. He also cast his mother into
prison, because she disputed the government with him; for Hyrcanus had
left her to be mistress of all. He also proceeded to that degree of
barbarity, as to kill her in prison with hunger; nay, he was alienated
from his brother Antigonus by calumnies, and added him to the rest whom
he slew; yet he seemed to have an affection for him, and made him above
the rest a partner with him in the kingdom. Those calumnies he at first
did not give credit to, partly because he loved him, and so did not give
heed to what was said against him, and partly because he thought
the reproaches were derived from the envy of the relaters. But when
Antigonus was once returned from the army, and that feast was then at
hand when they make tabernacles to [the honor of God,] it happened that
Arlstobulus was fallen sick, and that Antigonus went u