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[296]
Now these towers were very troublesome to the Jews, who otherwise
opposed the Romans very courageously; for they shot at them out of their
lighter engines from those towers, as they did also by those that threw
darts, and the archers, and those that flung stones. For neither could
the Jews reach those that were over them, by reason of their height; and
it was not practicable to take them, nor to overturn them, they were so
heavy, nor to set them on fire, because they were covered with plates of
iron. So they retired out of the reach of the darts, and did no longer
endeavor to hinder the impression of their rams, which, by continually
beating upon the wall, did gradually prevail against it; so that the wall
already gave way to the Nico, for by that name did the Jews themselves
call the greatest of their engines, because it conquered all things. And
now they were for a long while grown weary of fighting, and of keeping
guards, and were retired to lodge in the night time at a distance from
the wall. It was on other accounts also thought by them to be superfluous
to guard the wall, there being besides that two other fortifications still
remaining, and they being slothful, and their counsels having been ill
concerted on all occasions; so a great many grew lazy and retired. Then
the Romans mounted the breach, where Nico had made one, and all the Jews
left the guarding that wall, and retreated to the second wall; so those
that had gotten over that wall opened the gates, and received all the army
within it. And thus did the Romans get possession of this first wall, on
the fifteenth day of the siege, which was the seventh day of the month
Artemisius, [Jyar,] when they demolished a great part of it, as well as
they did of the northern parts of the city, which had been demolished also
by Cestius formerly.
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