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AKELDAMA (AV [Note: Authorized Version.] Aceldama).—The name of the ‘potter’s field’ (Act_1:19), purchased for the burial of strangers with the blood-money returned by Judas (Mat_27:3). The traditional site is at the E. side of the Wady er-Rababi (the so-called ‘Valley of Hinnom’) on the S. side of the valley. It is still known as Hakk ed-Dumm (‘field of blood’). which represents the old name in sound and meaning. The identification has not been traced earlier than the Crusaders, who erected here a charnel-house, the ruins of which still remain—a vault about 70 feet long and 20 feet wide (internal dimensions) erected over and covering the entrance to some of the ancient rock-cut tombs which abound in the valley. The skulls and bones which once thickly strewed the floor of this charnel-house have all been removed to a modern Greek monastery adjacent. There is no evidence recoverable connecting this site with the work of potters.
R. A. S. Macalister.