The Yarmouk River (Arabic: نهر اليرموك, "Nahr Al-Yarmuk"; Hebrew: נהר הירמוך, "Nehar HaYarmukh"; Greek: Hieromax; Latin: Hieromyces) is the largest tributary of the Jordan River. It drains much of the Hauran Plateau. It is one of three main tributaries which enter the Jordan between the Sea of Galilee and the Dead Sea. To the south, are the Jabbok/Zarqa and the Arnon/Wadi Mujib) rivers. The Yarmouk forms the border between Israel and Jordan close to the Jordan Valley and between Syria and Jordan further upstream. It is the southern boundary of the Golan Heights. The important Battle of Yarmouk, where the Muslim Arabs defeated the Byzantine Empire, took place south of the river in 636.
Famous quotes containing the word river:
“Every incident connected with the breaking up of the rivers and ponds and the settling of the weather is particularly interesting to us who live in a climate of so great extremes. When the warmer days come, they who dwell near the river hear the ice crack at night with a startling whoop as loud as artillery, as if its icy fetters were rent from end to end, and within a few days see it rapidly going out. So the alligator comes out of the mud with quakings of the earth.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)