QuailsThere
can be no doubt that the Hebrew word in the Pentateuch (Exodus 16:13;
Numbers 11:31,32) and in the 105th Psalm, denotes the common quail,
Coturnix dactylisonans . (The enormous quantity of quails taken by the
Israelites has its parallel in modern times. Pliny states that they
sometimes alight on vessels in the Mediterranean and sink them. Colenel
Sykes states that 160,000 quails have been netted in one season on the
island of Capri.--ED.) The expression "as it were two cubits (high)
upon the face of the earth," (Numbers 11:31) refers probably to the
height at which the quails flew above the ground, in their exhausted
condition from their long flight. As to the enormous quantities which
the least-successful Israelite is said to have taken viz. "ten homers"
(i.e. eighty bushels) in the space of a night and two days, there is
every reason for believing that the "homers here spoken of do not
denote strictly the measure of that name but simply "a heap." The
Israelites would have had little difficulty in capturing large
quantities of these birds as they are known to arrive at places
sometimes so completely exhausted by their flight as to be readily
taken, not in nets only, but by the hand. They "spread the quails round
about the camp;" this was for the purpose of drying them. The Egyptians
similarly prepared these birds. The expression "quails from the sea,"
(Numbers 11:31) must not be restricted to denote that the birds came
from the sea, as their starting-point, but it must be taken to show the
direction from which they were coming. The quails were at the time of
the event narrated in the sacred writings, on their spring journey of
migration northward, It is interesting to note the time specified: "it
was at even" that they began to arrive; and they no doubt continued to
come all night. Many observers have recorded that the quail migrates by
night.
Quartus(fourth),
a Christian of Corinth, (Romans 16:23) said to have been one of the
seventy disciples, and afterward bishop of Berytus. (A.D. about 50.)
Quaterniona
military term signifying a guard of four soldiers, two of whom were
attached to the person of a prisoner, while the other two kept watch
outside the door of his cell. (Acts 12:4)
QueenThis
title is properly applied to the queen-mother, since in an Oriental
household it is not the wife but the mother of the master who exercises
the highest authority. Strange as such an arrangement at sight appears,
it is one of the inevitable results of polygamy. An illustration of the
queen-mother's influence is given in (1 Kings 2:19) ff. The term is
applied to Maachah, (1 Kings 15:13; 2 Chronicles 16:16) and to
Jezetiel, (2 Kings 10:13) and to the mother of Jehoiachin or Jeconiah,
(Jeremiah 13:18) compare 2Kin 24:12; Jere 29:2
Queen
Of Heaven(Jeremiah
7:18; 45:17,18,19,25) is the moon Ashtaroth or Astarte to whom
worshiped as Hebrew women offered cakes in the streets of Jerusalem.
Quicksands,
Themore
properly THE [1002]Syrtis, The, (Acts 27:17) the broad a deep bight on
the north African coast between Carthage and Cyrene. There were
properly two Syrtes--the eastern or larger, now called the Gulf of
Sidra, and the western or smaller, now the Gulf of Cabes . It is the
former to which our attention is directed in this passage of the Acts.
Quivera
box made for the purpose of holding arrows. (Genesis 27:3) There is
nothing in the Bible to indicate either its form or material, or in
what way it was carried.