Personal Narrative of a Pilgrimage to Al-Madinah & Meccah by Sir Richard Francis Burton (page 6)

ten feet [i]n diameter. Upon this the people stand who draw up the water in leathern buckets, an iron railing being so placed as to [p.310] prevent their falling in. In El Fasy’s time there were eight marble basins in this room, for the purpose of ablution.”

“On the north-east (south-east) side of Zem Zem stand two small buildings, one behind the other,[FN#42] called El Kobbateyn; they are covered by domes painted in the same manner as the Mosque, and in them are kept water-jars, lamps, carpets, mats, brooms, and other articles used in the very Mosque.[FN#43] These two ugly buildings are injurious to the interior appearance of the building, their heavy forms and structure being very disadvantageously contrasted with the light and airy shape of the Makams. I heard some Hadjys from Greece, men of better taste than the Arabs, express their regret that the Kobbateyn should be allowed to disfigure the Mosque. They were built by Khoshgeldy, governor of Djidda A.H. 947; one is called Kobbet el Abbas, from having been placed on the site of a small tank said to have been formed by Abbas, the uncle of Mohammed.”

[p.311] “A few paces west (north-west) of Zem Zem, and directly opposite to the door of the Kaabah, stands a ladder or staircase,[FN#44] which is moved up to the wall of the Kaabah on days when that building is opened, and by which the visitors ascend to the door. It is of wood, with some carved ornaments, moves on low wheels, and is sufficiently broad to admit of four persons ascending abreast. The first ladder was sent hither from Cairo in A.H. 818 by Moyaed Abou el Naser, King of Egypt.”

“In the same line with the ladder and close by it stands a lightly built insulated and circular arch, about fifteen feet wide, and eighteen feet high, called Bab es’ Salam, which must not be confounded with the great gate of the Mosque, bearing the same name. Those who enter the Bait Ullah for the first time are enjoined to do so by the outer and inner Bab-es-Salam; in passing under the latter they are to exclaim, ‘O God, may it be a happy entrance.’ I do not know by whom this arch was built, but it appears to be modern.[FN#45]”

“Nearly in front of the Bab-es-Salam and nearer the Kaabah than any of the other surrounding buildings, stand[s] the Makam Ibrahim.[FN#46] This is a small building supported by six pillars about eight feet high, four of which are surrounded from top to bottom by a fine iron railing, while they leave the space beyond the two hind pillars open; within the railing is a frame about five feet square, terminating in a pyramidal top, and said to contain the sacred stone upon which Ibrahim stood when he built the Kaabah, and which with the help of his son Ismayl he had removed from hence to the place

[p.312] called Maajen, already mentioned. The stone is said to have yielded under the weight of the Patriarch, and to preserve the impression of his foot still visible upon it; but no hadjy has ever seen it,[FN#47] as the frame is always entirely covered with a brocade of red silk richly embroidered. Persons are constantly seen before the railing invoking the good offices of Ibrahim; and a short prayer must be uttered by the side of the Makam after the walk round the Kaabah is completed. It is said that many of the Sahaba, or first adherents of Mohammed, were interred in the open space between this Makam and Zem Zem[FN#48]; from which circumstance it is one of the most

[p.313] favourite places of prayers in the Mosque. In this part of the area the Khalif Soleyman Ibn Abd el Melek, brother of Wolyd (Al-Walid), built a fine reservoir in A.H. 97, which was filled from a spring east of Arafat[FN#49]; but the Mekkawys destroyed it after his death, on the pretence that the water of Zem Zem was preferable.”

“On the side of Makam Ibrahim, facing the middle part of the front of the Kaabah, stands the Mambar, or pulpit of the Mosque; it is elegantly formed of fine white marble, with many sculptured ornaments; and was sent as a present to the Mosque in A.H. 969 by Sultan Soleyman Ibn Selym.[FN#50] A straight, narrow staircase leads up to the post of the Khatyb, or preacher, which is surmounted by a gilt polygonal pointed steeple, resembling an obelisk. Here a sermon is preached on Fridays and on certain festivals. These, like the Friday sermons of all Mosques in the Mohammedan countries, are usually of the same turn, with some slight alterations upon extraordinary occasions.[FN#51]”

“I have now described all the buildings within the inclosure of the temple.”

“The gates of the Mosque are nineteen in number, and are distributed about it without any order or symmetry.[FN#52]”

Burckhardt’s description of the gates is short and

[p.314] imperfect. On the eastern side of the Mosque there are

[p.315] four principal entrances, seven on the southern side, three in the western, and five in the northern wall.

The eastern gates are the Greater Bab al-Salam, through which the pilgrim enters the Mosque; it is close to the north-east angle. Next to it the Lesser Bab al-Salam, with two small arches; thirdly, the Bab al-Nabi, where the Prophet used to pass through from Khadijah’s house; and, lastly, near the south-east corner, the Bab Ali, or of the Benu Hashim, opening upon the street between Safa and Marwah.

Beyond the north-eastern corner, in the northern wall, is the Bab Duraybah, a small entrance with one arch. Next to it, almost fronting the Ka’abah, is the grand adit, “Bab al-Ziyadah,” also known as Bab al-Nadwah. Here the colonnade, projecting far beyond the normal line, forms a small square or hall supported by pillars, and a false colonnade of sixty-one columns leads to the true cloister of the Mosque. This portion of the building being cool and shady, is crowded by the poor, the diseased, and the dying, during Divine worship, and at other times by idlers, schoolboys, and merchants. Passing through three external arches, pilgrims descend by a flight of steps into the hall, where they deposit their slippers, it not being considered decorous to hold them when circumambulating the Ka’abah.[FN#53] A broad pavement, in the shape of an irregular triangle, whose base is the cloister, leads to the circuit of the house. Next to the Ziyadah Gate is a small, single-arched entrance, “Bab Kutubi,” and beyond it one similar, the Bab al-Ajlah ([Arabic]), also named Al-Basitiyah, from its proximity to the college of Abd al Basitah. Close to the north-west angle of the cloister is the Bab al-Nadwah, anciently called Bab al-Umrah, and now Bab

[p.316] al-Atik, the Old Gate. Near this place and opening into the Ka’abah, stood the “Town Hall” (Dar al-Nadwah), built by Kusay, for containing the oriflamme “Al-Liwa,” and as a council-chamber for the ancients of the city.[FN#54]

In the western wall are three entrances. The single-arched gate nearest to the north angle is called Bab Benu Saham or Bab al-Umrah, because pilgrims pass through it to the Tanim and to the ceremony Al-Umrah (Little Pilgrimage). In the centre of the wall is the Bab Ibrahim, or Bab al-Khayyatin (the Tailors’ Gate); a single arch leading into a large projecting square, like that of the Ziyadah entrance, but somewhat smaller. Near the south-west corner is a double arched adit, the Bab al-Wida’a (“of farewell”): hence departing pilgrims issue forth from the temple.

At the western end of the southern wall is the two-arched Bab Umm Hani, so called after the lady’s residence, when included in the Mosque. Next to it is a similar building, “Bab Ujlan” [Arabic] which derives its name from the large college “Madrasat Ujlan”; some call it Bab al-Sharif, because it is opposite one of the palaces. After which, and also pierced with two arches, is the Bab al-Jiyad (some erroneously spell it Al-Jihad, “of War”), the gate leading to Jabal Jiyad. The next is double arched, and called the Bab al-Mujahid or Al-Rahmah (“of Mercy”). Nearly opposite the Ka’abah, and connected with the pavement by a raised line of stone, is the Bab al-Safa, through which pilgrims now issue to perform the ceremony “Al-Sai”; it is a small and unconspicuous erection. Next to it is the Bab al-Baghlah with two arches, and close to the south-east angle of the Mosque the Bab Yunus, alias Bab Bazan, alias Bab al-Zayt, alias Bab al-Asharah (“of the ten”), because a favourite with the first ten Sahabah, or Companions
[p.317] of the Prophet. “Most of these gates,” says Burckhardt, “have high pointed arches; but a few round arches are seen among them, which, like all arches of this kind in the Heja[z], are nearly semi-circular. They are without ornament, except the inscription on the exterior, which commemorates the name of the builder, and they are all posterior in date to the fourteenth century. As each gate consists of two or three arches, or divisions, separated by narrow walls, these divisions are counted in the enumeration of the gates leading into the Kaabah, and they make up the number thirty-nine. There being no doors to the gates, the Mosque is consequently open at all times. I have crossed at every hour of the night, and always found people there, either at prayers or walking about.[FN#55]”

“The outside walls of the Mosques are those of the houses which surround it on all sides. These houses belonged originally to the Mosque; the greater part are now the property of individuals. They are let out to the richest Hadjys, at very high prices, as much as 500 piastres being given during the pilgrimage for a good apartment with windows opening into the Mosque.[FN#56] Windows have in consequence been opened in many parts of the walls on a level with the street, and above that of the floor of the colonnades. Hadjys living in these apartments are allowed to perform the Friday’s prayers at home; because, having the Kaabah in view from the windows, they are supposed to be in the Mosque itself, and to join in prayer those assembled within the

[p.318] temple. Upon a level with the ground floor of the colonnades and opening into them are small apartments formed in the walls, having the appearance of dungeons; these have remained the property of the Mosque while the houses above them belong to private individuals. They are let out to water-men, who deposit in them the Zem Zem jars, or to less opulent Hadjys who wish to live in the Mosque.[FN#57] Some of the surrounding houses still belong to the Mosque, and were originally intended for public schools, as their names of Medresa implies; they are now all let out to Hadjys.”

“The exterior of the Mosque is adorned with seven minarets irregularly distributed:—1. Minaret of Bab el Omra (Umrah); 2. Of Bab el Salam; 3. Of Bab Aly; 4. Of Bab el Wodaa (Wida’a); 5. Of Medesa Kail (Kait) Bey; 6. Of Bab el Zyadi; 7. Of Medreset Sultan Soleyman.[FN#58] They are quadrangular or round steeples, in no way differing from other minarets. The entrance to them is from the different buildings round the Mosque, which they adjoin.[FN#59] A beautiful view of the busy crowd below is attained by ascending the most northern one.[FN#60]”

Having described at length the establishment

[p.319] attached to the Mosque of Al-Madinah, I spare my readers a detailed account of the crowd of idlers that hang about the Meccan temple. The Naib al-Harim, or vice-intendant, is one Sayyid Ali, said to be of Indian extraction; he is superior to all the attendants. There are about eighty eunuchs, whose chief, Sarur Agha, was a slave of Mohammed Ali Pasha. Their pay varies from 100 to 1,000 piastres per mensem; it is, however, inferior to the Madinah salaries. The Imams, Mu’ezzins, Khatibs, Zemzemis, &c., &c., are under their respective Shaykhs who are of the Olema.[FN#61]

Briefly to relate the history of the Ka’abah.

The “House of Allah” is supposed to have been built and rebuilt ten times.

1. The first origin of the idea is manifestly a symbolical allusion to the angels standing before the Almighty and praising his name. When Allah, it is said, informed the celestial throng that he was about to send a vice-regent on earth, they deprecated the design. Being reproved with these words, “God knoweth what ye know not,” and dreading the eternal anger, they compassed the Arsh, or throne, in adoration. Upon this Allah created the Bayt al-Ma’amur, four jasper pillars with a ruby roof,

[p.320] and the angels circumambulated it, crying, “Praise to Allah, and exalted be Allah, and there is no ilah but Allah, and Allah is omnipotent!” The Creator then ordered them to build a similar house for man on earth. This, according to Ali, took place 40, according to Abu Hurayrah, 2,000 years before the creation; both authorities, however, are agreed that the firmaments were spread above and the seven earths beneath this Bayt al-Ma’amur.

2. There is considerable contradiction concerning the second house. Ka’ab related that Allah sent down with Adam[FN#62] a Khaymah, or tabernacle of hollow ruby, which the angels raised on stone pillars. This was also called Bayt al-Ma’amur. Adam received an order to compass it about; after which, he begged a reward for obedience, and was promised a pardon to himself and to all his progeny who repent.

Others declare that Adam, expelled from Paradise, and lamenting that he no longer heard the prayers of the angels, was ordered by Allah to take the stones of five hills, Lebanon, Sinai, Tur Zayt (Olivet), Ararat, and Hira, which afforded the first stone. Gabriel, smiting his wing upon earth, opened a foundation to the seventh layer, and the position of the building is exactly below the heavenly Bayt al-Ma’amur,—a Moslem corruption of the legends concerning the heavenly and the earthly Jerusalem. Our First Father circumambulated it as he had seen the angels do, and was by them taught the formula of prayer and the number of circuits.

According to others, again, this second house was not erected till after the “Angelic Foundation” was destroyed by time.

3. The history of the third house is also somewhat

[p.321] confused. When the Bayt al-Ma’amur, or, as others say, the tabernacle, was removed to heaven after Adam’s death, a stone-and-mud building was placed in its stead by his son Shays (Seth). For this reason it is respected by the Sabaeans, or Christians of St. John, as well as by the Moslems. This Ka’abah, according to some, was destroyed by the deluge, which materially altered its site. Others believe that it was raised to heaven. Others, again, declare that only the pillars supporting the heavenly tabernacle were allowed to remain. Most authorities agree in asserting that the Black Stone was stored up in Abu Kubays, whence that “first created of mountains” is called Al-Amin, “the Honest.”

4. Abraham and his son were ordered to build the fourth house upon the old foundations: its materials, according to some, were taken from the five hills which supplied the second; others give the names Ohod, Kuds, Warka, Sinai, Hira, and a sixth, Abu Kubays. It was of irregular shape; 32 cubits from the Eastern to the Northern corner; 32 from North to West; 31 from West to South; 20 from South to East; and only 9 cubits high. There was no roof; two doors, level with the ground, were pierced in the Eastern and Western walls; and inside, on the right hand, near the present entrance, a hole for treasure was dug. Gabriel restored the Black Stone, which Abraham, by his direction, placed in its present corner, as a sign where circumambulation is to begin; and the patriarch then learned all the complicated rites of pilgrimage. When this house was completed, Abraham, by Allah’s order, ascended Jabal Sabir, and called the world to visit the sanctified spot; and all earth’s sons heard him, even those “in their father’s loins or in their mother’s womb, from that day unto the day of resurrection.”

5. The Amalikah (descended from Imlik, great grandson of Sam, son of Noah), who first settled near Meccah, founded the fifth house. Al-Tabari and the Moslem

[p.322] historians generally made the erection of the Amalikah to precede that of the Jurham; these, according to others, repaired the house which Abraham built.

6. The sixth Ka’abah was built about the beginning of the Christian era by the Benu Jurham, the children of Kahtan, fifth descendant from Noah. Ismail married, according to the Moslems, a daughter of this tribe, Da’alah bint Muzaz ([Arabic]) bin Omar, and abandoning Hebrew, he began to speak Arabic (Ta arraba). Hence his descendants are called Arabicized Arabs. After Ismail’s death, which happened when he was 130 years old, Sabit, the eldest of his twelve sons, became “lord of the house.” He was succeeded by his maternal grandfather Muzaz, and afterwards by his children. The Jurham inhabited the higher parts of Meccah, especially Jabal Ka’aka’an, so called from their clashing arms; whereas the Amalikah dwelt in the lower grounds, which obtained the name of Jiyad, from their generous horses.

7. Kusay bin Kilab, governor of Meccah and fifth forefather of the Prophet, built the seventh house, according to Abraham’s plan. He roofed it over with palm leaves, stocked it with idols, and persuaded his tribe to settle near the Harim.

8. Kusay’s house was burnt down by a woman’s censer, which accidentally set fire to the Kiswah, or covering, and the walls were destroyed by a torrent. A merchant-ship belonging to a Greek trader, called “Bakum” ([Arabic]), being wrecked at Jeddah, afforded material for the roof, and the crew were employed as masons. The Kuraysh tribe, who rebuilt the house, failing in funds of pure money, curtailed its proportions by nearly seven cubits and called the omitted portion Al-Hatim. In digging the foundation they came to a green stone, like a camel’s hunch, which, struck with a pickaxe, sent forth blinding lightning, and prevented further excavation. The Kuraysh, amongst other alterations, raised the walls

[p.323] from nine to eighteen cubits, built a staircase in the northern breadth, closed the western door and placed the eastern entrance above the ground, to prevent men entering without their leave.

When the eighth house was being built Mohammed was in his twenty-fifth year. His surname of Al-Amin, the Honest, probably induced the tribes to make him their umpire for the decision of a dispute about the position of the Black Stone, and who should have the honour of raising it to its place.[FN#63] He decided for the corner chosen by Abraham, and distributed the privilege amongst the clans. The Benu Zahrah and Benu Abd Manaf took the front wall and the door; to the Benu Jama and the Benu Sahm was allotted the back wall; the Benu Makhzum and their Kuraysh relations stood at the southern wall; and at the “Stone” corner were posted the Benu Abd al-Dar, the Benu As’ad, and the Benu Ada.

9. Abdullah bin Zubayr, nephew of Ayishah, rebuilt the Ka’abah in A.H. 64. It had been weakened by fire, which burnt the covering, besides splitting the Black Stone into three pieces, and by the Manjanik (catapults) of Hosayn ([Arabic]) bin Numayr, general of Yazid, who obstinately besieged Meccah till he heard of his sovereign’s death. Abdullah, hoping to fulfil a prophecy,[FN#64] and seeing that the people of Meccah fled in alarm, pulled down the building by means of “thin-calved Abyssinian slaves.” When they came to Abraham’s foundation he saw that it included Al-Hijr, which part the Kuraysh had been unable to build. The building was made of cut stone and fine lime brought from Al-Yaman. Abdullah, taking in the Hatim, lengthened the building by seven cubits, and added to its former height nine cubits,

[p.324] thus making a total of twenty-seven. He roofed over the whole, or a part; re-opened the western door, to serve as an exit; and, following the advice of his aunt, who quoted the Prophet’s words, he supported the interior with a single row of three columns, instead of the double row of six placed there by the Kuraysh. Finally, he paved the Mataf, or circuit, ten cubits round with the remaining slabs, and increased the Harim by taking in the nearer houses. During the building, a curtain was stretched round the walls, and pilgrims compassed them externally. When finished, it was perfumed inside and outside, and invested with brocade. Then Abdullah and all the citizens went forth in a procession to the Tanim, a reverend place near Meccah, returned to perform Umrah, the Lesser Pilgrimage, slew 100 victims, and rejoiced with great festivities.

The Caliph Abd al-Malik bin Marwan besieged Abdullah bin Zubayr, who, after a brave defence, was slain. In A.H. 74, Hajjaj bin Yusuf, general of Abd al-Malik’s troops, wrote to the prince, informing him that Abdullah had made unauthorised additions to and changes in the Harim: the reply brought an order to rebuild the house. Hajjaj again excluded the Hatim and retired the northern wall six cubits and a span, making it twenty-five cubits long by twenty-four broad; the other three sides were allowed to remain as built by the son of Zubayr. He gave the house a double roof, closed the western door, and raised the eastern four cubits and a span above the Mataf, or circuit, which he paved over. The Harim was enlarged and beautified by the Abbasides, especially by Al-Mahdi, Al-Mutamid, and Al-Mutazid. Some authors reckon, as an eleventh house, the repairs made by Sultan Murad Khan. On the night of Tuesday, 20th Sha’aban, A.H. 1030, a violent torrent swept the Harim; it rose one cubit above the threshold of the Ka’abah, carried away the lamp-posts and the

[p.325] Makam Ibrahim, all the northern wall of the house, half of the eastern, and one-third of the western side. It subsided on Wednesday night. The repairs were not finished till A.H. 1040. The greater part, however, of the building dates from the time of Al Hajjaj; and Moslems, who never mention his name without a curse, knowingly circumambulate his work. The Olema indeed have insisted upon its remaining untouched, lest kings in wantonness should change its form: Harun al-Rashid desired to rebuild it, but was forbidden by the Imam Malik.

The present proofs of the Ka’abah’s sanctity, as adduced by the learned, are puerile enough, but curious. The Olema have made much of the verselet: “Verily the first house built for mankind (to worship in) is that in Bakkah[FN#65] (Meccah), blessed and a salvation to the three worlds. Therein (fihi) are manifest signs, the standing-place of Abraham, which whoso entereth shall be safe” (Kor. ch. 3). The word “therein” is interpreted to mean Meccah; and the “manifest signs” the Ka’abah, which contains such marvels as the foot-prints on Abraham’s platform and the spiritual safeguard of all who enter the Sanctuary.[FN#66] The other “signs,” historical, psychical, and physical, are briefly these: The preservation of the Hajar al-Aswad and the Makam Ibrahim from many foes, and the miracles put forth (as in the War of the Elephant), to defend the house; the violent and terrible deaths of the sacrilegious; and the fact that, in the Deluge, the large fish did not eat the little fish in the Harim. A wonderful desire and love impel men from distant regions to visit the holy spot, and the first sight of the Ka’abah causes awe and fear, horripilation and tears. Furthermore, ravenous beasts will not destroy their prey in the Sanctuary land, and the pigeons and other birds never perch upon the house, except to be [p.326] cured of sickness, for fear of defiling the roof. The Ka’abah, though small, can contain any number of devotees; no one is ever hurt in it,[FN#67] and invalids recover their health by rubbing themselves against the Kiswah and the Black Stone. Finally, it is observed that every day 100,000 mercies descend upon the house, and especially that if rain come up from the northern corner there is plenty in Irak; if from the south, there is plenty in Yaman; if from the east, plenty in India; if from the western, there is plenty in Syria; and if from all four angles, general plenty is presignified.

[FN#1] “Bayt Ullah” (House of Allah) and “Ka’abah,” i.e. cube (house), “la maison carree,” are synonymous.
[FN#2] Ali Bey gives 536 feet 9 inches by 356 feet: my measurement is 257 paces by 210. Most Moslem authors, reckoning by cubits, make the parallelogram 404 by 310.
[FN#3] On each short side I counted 24 domes; on the long, 35. This would give a total of 118 along the cloisters. The Arabs reckon in all 152; viz., 24 on the East side, on the North 36, on the South 36, one on the Mosque corner, near the Zarurah minaret; 16 at the porch of the Bab al-Ziyadah; and 15 at the Bab Ibrahim. The shape of these domes is the usual “Media-Naranja,” and the superstition of the Meccans informs the pilgrim that they cannot be counted. Books reckon 1352 pinnacles or battlements on the temple wall.
[FN#4] The “common stone of the Meccah mountains” is a fine grey granite, quarried principally from a hill near the Bab al-Shabayki, which furnished material for the Ka’abah. Eastern authors describe the pillars as consisting of three different substances, viz.: Rukham, white marble, not “alabaster,” its general sense; Suwan, or granite (syenite?); and Hajar Shumaysi,” a kind of yellow sandstone, so called from “Bir Shumays,” a place on the Jeddah road near Haddah, the half-way station. [FN#5] I counted in the temple 554 pillars. It is, however, difficult to be accurate, as the four colonnades and the porticos about the two great gates are irregular; topographical observations, moreover, must here be made under difficulties. Ali Bey numbers them roughly at “plus de 500 colonnes et pilastres.”
[FN#6] The author afterwards informs us, that “the temple has been so often ruined and repaired, that no traces of remote antiquity are to be found about it.” He mentions some modern and unimportant inscriptions upon the walls and over the gates. Knowing that many of the pillars were sent in ships from Syria and Egypt by the Caliph Al-Mahdi, a traveller would have expected better things. [FN#7] The reason being, that “those shafts formed of the Meccan stone are mostly in three pieces; but the marble shafts are in one piece.” [FN#8] To this may be added, that the façades of the cloisters are twenty-four along the short walls, and thirty-six along the others; they have stone ornaments, not inaptly compared to the French “fleur de lis.” The capital and bases of the outer pillars are grander and more regular than the inner; they support pointed arches, and the Arab secures his beloved variety by placing at every fourth arch a square pilaster. Of these there are on the long sides ten, on the short seven. [FN#9] I counted eight, not including the broad pavement which leads from the Bab al-Ziyadah to the Ka’abah, or the four cross branches which connect the main lines. These “Firash al-Hajar,” as they are called, also serve to partition off the area. One space for instance is called “Haswat al-Harim,” or the “Women’s sanded place,” because appropriated to female devotees.
[FN#10] The jars are little amphoræ, each inscribed with the name of the donor and a peculiar cypher.
[FN#11] My measurements give 22 paces or 55 feet in length by 18 (45) of breadth, and the height appeared greater than the length. Ali Bey makes the Eastern side 37 French feet, 2 inches and 6 lines, the Western 38° 4′ 6″, the Northern 29 feet, the Southern 31° 6′, and the height 34° 4′. He therefore calls it a “veritable trapezium.” In Al-Idrisi’s time it was 25 cubits by 24, and 27 cubits high. [FN#12] I would alter this sentence thus:—“It is built of fine grey granite in horizontal courses of masonry of irregular depth; the stones are tolerably fitted together, and are held by excellent mortar like Roman cement.” The lines are also straight.
[FN#13] This base is called Al-Shazarwan, from the Persian Shadarwan, a cornice, eaves, or canopy. It is in pent-house shape, projecting about a foot beyond the wall, and composed of fine white marble slabs, polished like glass; there are two breaks in it, one opposite and under the doorway, and another in front of Ishmael’s tomb. Pilgrims are directed, during circumambulation, to keep their bodies outside of the Shazarwan ; this would imply it to be part of the building, but its only use appears in the large brass rings welded into it, for the purpose of holding down the Ka’abah covering. [FN#14] Ali Bey also errs in describing the roof as “plat endessus.” Were such the case, rain would not pour off with violence through the spout. Most Oriental authors allow a cubit of depression from South-West to North-West. In Al-Idrisi’s day the Ka’abah had a double roof. Some say this is the case in the present building, which has not been materially altered in shape since its restoration by Al-Hajjaj, A.H. 83. The roof was then eighteen cubits long by fifteen broad. [FN#15] In Ibn Jubayr’s time the Ka’abah was opened every day in Rajah, and in other months on every Monday and Friday. The house may now be entered ten or twelve times a year gratis; and by pilgrims as often as they can collect, amongst parties, a sum sufficient to tempt the guardians’ cupidity.
[FN#16] This mistake, in which Burckhardt is followed by all our popular authors, is the more extraordinary, as all Arabic authors call the door-wall Janib al-Mashrik—the Eastern side—or Wajh al-Bayt, the front of the house, opposed to Zahr al-Bayt, the back. Niebuhr is equally in error when he asserts that the door fronts to the South. Arabs always hold the “Rukn al-Iraki,” or Irak angle, to face the polar star, and so it appears in Ali Bey’s plan. The Ka’abah, therefore, has no Northern side. And it must be observed that Moslem writers dispose the length of the Ka’abah from East to West, whereas our travellers make it from North to South. Ali Bey places the door only six feet from the pavement, but he calculates distances by the old French measure. It is about seven feet from the ground, and six from the corner of the Black Stone. Between the two the space of wall is called Al-Multazem (in Burckhardt, by a clerical error, “Al-Metzem,” vol. i. p. 173). It derives its name, the “attached-to,” because here the circumambulator should apply his bosom, and beg pardon for his sins. Al-Multazem, according to M. de Perceval, following d’Ohsson, was formerly “le lieu des engagements,” whence, according to him, its name[.] “Le Moltezem,” says M. Galland (Rits et Ceremonies du Pelerinage de la Mecque), “qui est entre la pierre noire et la porte, est l’endroit ou Mahomet se reconcilia avec ses dix compagnons, qui disaient qu’il n’etait pas veritablement Prophete.” [FN#17] From the Bab al-Ziyadah, or gate in the northern colonnade, you descend by two flights of steps, in all about twenty-five. This depression manifestly arises from the level of the town having been raised, like Rome, by successive layers of ruins; the most populous and substantial quarters (as the Shamiyah to the north) would, we might expect, be the highest, and this is actually the case. But I am unable to account satisfactorily for the second hollow within the temple, and immediately around the house of Allah, where the door, according to all historians, formerly on a level with the pavement, and now about seven feet above it, shows the exact amount of depression, which cannot be accounted for simply by calcation. Some chroniclers assert, that when the Kuraysh rebuilt the house they raised the door to prevent devotees entering without their permission. But seven feet would scarcely oppose an entrance, and how will this account for the floor of the building being also raised to that height above the pavement? It is curious to observe the similarity between this inner hollow of the Meccan fane and the artificial depression of the Hindu pagoda where it is intended to be flooded. The Hindus would also revere the form of the Meccan fane, exactly resembling their square temples, at whose corners are placed Brahma, Vishnu, Shiwa and Ganesha, who adore the great Universal Generator in the centre. The second door anciently stood on the side of the temple opposite the present entrance; inside, its place can still be traced. Ali Bey suspects its having existed in the modern building, and declares that the exterior surface of the wall shows the tracery of a blocked-up door, similar to that still open. Some historians declare that it was closed by the Kuraysh when they rebuilt the house in Mohammed’s day, and that subsequent erections have had only one. The general opinion is, that Al-Hajjaj finally closed up the western entrance. Doctors also differ as to its size; the popular measurement is three cubits broad and a little more than five in length. [FN#18] Pilgrims and ignorant devotees collect the drippings of wax, the ashes of the aloe-wood, and the dust from the “Atabah,” or threshold of the Ka’abah, either to rub upon their foreheads or to preserve as relics. These superstitious practices are sternly rebuked by the Olema. [FN#19] For North-East read South-East.
[FN#20] I will not enter into the fabulous origin of the Hajar al-Aswad. Some of the traditions connected with it are truly absurd. “When Allah,” says Ali, “made covenant with the Sons of Adam on the Day of Fealty, he placed the paper inside the stone”; it will, therefore, appear at the judgment, and bear witness to all who have touched it. Moslems agree that it was originally white, and became black by reason of men’s sins. It appeared to me a common aerolite covered with a thick slaggy coating, glossy and pitch-like, worn and polished. Dr. Wilson, of Bombay, showed me a specimen in his possession, which externally appeared to be a black slag, with the inside of a bright and sparkling greyish-white, the result of admixture of nickel [p.301] with the iron. This might possibly, as the learned Orientalist then suggested, account for the mythic change of colour, its appearance on earth after a thunderstorm, and its being originally a material part of the heavens. Kutb al-Din expressly declares that, when the Karamitah restored it after twenty-two years to the Meccans, men kissed it and rubbed it upon their brows; and remarked that the blackness was only superficial, the inside being white. Some Greek philosophers, it will be remembered, believed the heavens to be composed of stones (Cosmos, “Shooting Stars”): and Sanconiathon, ascribing the aerolite-worship to the god Cœlus, declares them to be living or animated stones. “The Arabians,” says Maximus of Tyre (Dissert. 38, p. 455), “pay homage to I know not what god, which they represent by a quadrangular stone.” The gross fetichism of the Hindus, it is well known, introduced them to litholatry. At Jagannath they worship a pyramidal black stone, fabled to have fallen from heaven, or miraculously to have presented itself on the place where the temple now stands. Moreover, they revere the Salagram, as the emblem of Vishnu, the second person in their triad. The rudest emblem of the “Bonus Deus” was a round stone. It was succeeded in India by the cone and triangle; in Egypt by the pyramid; in Greece it was represented by cones of terra-cotta about three inches and a half long. Without going deep into theory, it may be said that the Ka’abah and the Hajar are the only two idols which have survived the 360 composing the heavenly host of the Arab pantheon. Thus the Hindu poet exclaims:—

“Behold the marvels of my idol-temple, O Moslem! That when its idols are destroy’d, it becomes Allah’s House.”

Wilford (As. Soc. vols. iii. and iv.) makes the Hindus declare that the Black Stone at Mokshesha, or Moksha-sthana (Meccah) was an incarnation of Moksheshwara, an incarnation of Shiwa, who with his consort visited Al-Hijaz. When the Ka’abah was rebuilt, this emblem was placed in the outer wall for contempt, but the people still respected it. In the Dabistan the Black Stone is said to be an image of Kaywan or Saturn; and Al-Shahristani also declares the temple to have been dedicated to the same planet Zuhal, whose genius is represented in the Puranas as fierce, hideous, four-armed, and habited in a black cloak, with a dark turband. Moslem historians are unanimous in asserting that Sasan, son of Babegan, and other Persian monarchs, gave rich presents to the Ka’abah; they especially mention two golden crescent moons, a significant offering. The Guebers assert that, among the images and relics left by Mahabad and his successors in the Ka’abah, was the Black Stone, an emblem of Saturn. They also call the city Mahgah— moon’s place—from an exceedingly beautiful image of the moon; whence they say the Arabs derived “Meccah.” And the Sabaeans equally respect the Ka’abah and the pyramids, which they assert to be the tombs of Seth, Enoch (or Hermes), and Sabi the son of Enoch. Meccah, then, is claimed as a sacred place, and the Hajar al-Aswad, as well as the Ka’abah, are revered as holy emblems by four different faiths—the Hindu, Sabæan, Gueber, and Moslem. I have little doubt, and hope to prove at another time, that the Jews connected it with traditions about Abraham. This would be the fifth religion that looked towards the Ka’abah—a rare meeting-place of devotion. [FN#21] Presenting this appearance in profile. The Hajar has suffered from the iconoclastic principle of Islam, having once narrowly escaped destruction by order of Al-Hakim of Egypt. In these days the metal rim serves as a protection as well as an ornament. [FN#22] The height of the Hajar from the ground, according to my measurement, is four feet nine inches; Ali Bey places it forty-two inches above the pavement.
[FN#23] The colour was black and metallic, and the centre of the stone was sunk about two inches below the metal circle. Round the sides was a reddish-brown cement, almost level with the metal, and sloping down to the middle of the stone. Ibn Jubayr declares the depth of the stone unknown, but that most people believe it to extend two cubits into the wall. In his day it was three “Shibr” (the large span from the thumb to the little finger-tip) broad, and one span long, with knobs, and a joining of four pieces, which the Karamitah had broken. The stone was set in a silver band. “Its softness and moisture were such,” says Ibn Jubayr, “that the sinner would never remove his mouth from it, which phenomenon made the Prophet declare it to be the covenant of Allah on earth.” [FN#24] The band is now a massive circle of gold or silver gilt. I found the aperture in which the stone is, one span and three fingers broad.
[FN#25] The “Rukn al-Yamani” is the corner facing the South. The part alluded to in the text is the wall of the Ka’abah, between the Shami and Yamani angles, distant about three feet from the latter, and near the site of the old western door, long since closed. The stone is darker and redder than the rest of the wall. It is called Al-Mustajab (or Mustajab min al-Zunub or Mustajab al-Dua, “where prayer is granted”). Pilgrims here extend their arms, press their bodies against the building, and beg pardon for their sins. [FN#26] I have frequently seen it kissed by men and women. [FN#27] Al-Ma’ajan, the place of mixing or kneading, because the patriarchs here kneaded the mud used as cement in the holy building. Some call it Al-Hufrah (the digging), and it is generally known as Makam Jibrail (the place of Gabriel), because here descended the inspired order for the five daily prayers, and at this spot the Archangel and the Prophet performed their devotions, making it a most auspicious spot. It is on the north of the door, from which it is distant about two feet; its length is seven spans and seven fingers; breadth five spans three fingers; and depth one span four fingers. The following sentence from Herklet’s “Qanoon e Islam” (ch. xii. sec. 5) may serve to show the extent of error still popular. The author, after separating the Bayt Ullah from the Ka’abah, erroneously making the former the name of the whole temple, proceeds to say, “the rain-water which falls on its (the Ka’abah’s) terrace runs off through a golden spout on a stone near it, called Rookn-e-Yemeni, or alabaster-stone), and stands over the grave of Ismaeel.”—!
[FN#28] Generally called Mizab al-Rahmah (of Mercy). It carries rain from the roof, and discharges it upon Ishmael’s grave, where pilgrims stand fighting to catch it. In Al-Idrisi’s time it was of wood; now it is said to be gold, but it looks very dingy. [FN#29] Usually called the Hajar al-Akhzar, or green stone. Al-Idrisi speaks of a white stone covering Ishmael’s remains; Ibn Jubayr of “green marble, longish, in form of a Mihrab arch, and near it a white round slab, in both of which are spots that make them appear yellow.” Near them, we are told, and towards the Iraki corner, is the tomb of Hagar, under a green slab one span and a half broad, and pilgrims used to pray at both places. Ali Bey erroneously applies the words Al-Hajar Ismail to the parapet about the slab.
[FN#30] My measurements give five feet six inches. In Al-Idrisi’s day the wall was fifty cubits long.
[FN#31] Al-Hatim ([Arabic] lit. the “broken”). Burckhardt asserts that the Mekkawi no longer apply the word, as some historians do, to the space bounded by the Ka’abah, the Partition, the Zemzem, and the Makam of Ibrahim. I heard it, however, so used by learned Meccans, and they gave as the meaning of the name the break in this part of the oval pavement which surrounds the Ka’abah. Historians relate that all who rebuilt the “House of Allah” followed Abraham’s plan till the Kuraysh, and after them Al-Hajjaj curtailed it in the direction of Al-Hatim, which part was then first broken off, and ever since remained so. [FN#32] Al-Hijr ([Arabic]) is the space separated, as the name denotes, from the Ka’abah. Some suppose that Abraham here penned his sheep. Possibly Ali Bey means this part of the Temple when he speaks of Al-Hajar ([Arabic]) Ismail—les pierres d’Ismail. [FN#33] “Al-Hajjaj”; this, as will afterwards be seen, is a mistake. He excluded the Hatim.
[FN#34] As well as memory serves me, for I have preserved no note, the inscriptions are in the marble casing, and indeed no other stone meets the eye.
[FN#35] It is a fine, close, grey polished granite: the walk is called Al-Mataf, or the place of circumambulation. [FN#36] These are now iron posts, very numerous, supporting cross rods, and of tolerably elegant shape. In Ali Bey’s time there were “trente-une colonnes minces en piliers en bronze.” Some native works say thirty-three, including two marble columns. Between each two hang several white or green glass globe-lamps, with wicks and oil floating on water; their light is faint and dismal. The whole of the lamps in the Harim is said to be more than 1000, yet they serve but to “make darkness visible.”
[FN#37] There are only four “Makams,” the Hanafi, Maliki, Hanbali, and the Makam Ibrahim; and there is some error of diction below, for in these it is that the Imams stand before their congregations, and nearest the Ka’abah. In Ibn Jubayr’s time the Zaydi sect was allowed an Imam, though known to be schismatics and abusers of the caliphs. Now, not being permitted to have a separate station for prayer, they suppose theirs to be suspended from heaven above the Ka’abah roof. [FN#38] The Makam al-Maliki is on the west of, and thirty-seven cubits from, the Ka’abah; that of the Hanbali forty-seven paces distant. [FN#39] Only the Mu’ezzin takes his stand here, and the Shafe’is pray behind their Imam on the pavement round the Ka’abah, between the corner of the well Zemzem, and the Makam Ibrahim. This place is forty cubits from the Ka’abah, that is say, eight cubits nearer than the Northern and Southern “Makams.” Thus the pavement forms an irregular oval ring round the house[.]
[FN#40] In Burckhardt’s time the schools prayed according to the seniority of their founders, and they uttered the Azan of Al-Maghrib together, because that is a peculiarly delicate hour, which easily passes by unnoticed. In the twelfth century, at all times but the evening, the Shafe’i began, then came the Maliki and Hanbali simultaneously, and, lastly, the Hanafi. Now the Shaykh al-Mu’ezzin begins the call, which is taken up by the others. He is a Hanafi; as indeed are all the principal people at Meccah, only a few wild Sharifs of the hills being Shafe’i.
[FN#41] The door of the Zemzem building fronts to the south-east. [FN#42] This is not exactly correct. As the plan will show, the angle of one building touches the angle of its neighbour. [FN#43] Their names and offices are now changed. One is called the Kubbat al-Sa’at, and contains the clocks and chronometers (two of them English) sent as presents to the Mosque by the Sultan. The other, known as the Kubbat al-Kutub, is used as a store-room for manuscripts bequeathed to the Mosque. They still are open to Burckhardt’s just criticism, being nothing but the common dome springing from four walls, and vulgarly painted with bands of red, yellow, and green. In Ibn Jubayr’s time the two domes contained bequests of books and candles. The Kubbat Abbas, or that further from the Ka’abah than its neighbour, was also called Kubbat al-Sharab (the Dome of Drink), because Zemzem water was here kept cooling for the use of pilgrims in Daurak, or earthen jars. The nearer was termed Kubbat al-Yahudi; and the tradition they told me was, that a Jew having refused to sell his house upon the spot, it was allowed to remain in loco by the Prophet, as a lasting testimony to his regard for justice. A similar tale is told of an old woman’s hut, which was allowed to stand in the corner of the Great Nushirawan’s royal halls.
[FN#44] Called “Al-Daraj.” A correct drawing of it may be found in Ali Bey’s work.
[FN#45] The Bab al-Salam, or Bab al-Nabi, or Bab benu Shaybah, resembles in its isolation a triumphal arch, and is built of cut stone. [FN#46] “The (praying) place of Abraham.” Readers will remember that the Meccan Mosque is peculiarly connected with Ibrahim, whom Moslems prefer to all prophets except Mohammed.
[FN#47] This I believe to be incorrect. I was asked five dollars for permission to enter; but the sum was too high for my finances. Learned men told me that the stone shows the impress of two feet, especially the big toes, and devout pilgrims fill the cavities with water, which they rub over their eyes and faces. When the Caliph al-Mahdi visited Meccah, one Abdullah bin Osman presented himself at the unusual hour of noon, and informing the prince that he had brought him a relic which no man but himself had yet seen, produced this celebrated stone. Al-Mahdi, rejoicing greatly, kissed it, rubbed his face against it, and pouring water upon it, drank the draught. Kutb al-Din, one of the Meccan historians, says that it was visited in his day. In Ali Bey’s time it was covered with “un magnifique drap noir brode en or et en argent avec de gros glands en or;” he does not say, however, that he saw the stone. Its veils, called Sitr Ibrahim al-Khalil, are a green “Ibrisham,” or silk mixed with cotton and embroidered with gold. They are made at Cairo of three different colours, black, red, and green; and one is devoted to each year. The gold embroidery is in the Sulsi character, and expresses the Throne-verse, the Chapter of the Cave, and the name of the reigning Sultan; on the top is “Allah,” below it “Mohammed”; beneath this is “Ibrahim al-Khalil”; and at each corner is the name of one of the four caliphs. In a note to the “Dabistan” (vol. ii. p. 410), we find two learned Orientalists confounding the Black Stone with Abraham’s Station or Platform. “The Prophet honoured the Black Stone, upon which Abraham conversed with Hagar, to which he tied his camels, and upon which the traces of his feet are still seen.”
[FN#48] Not only here, I was told by learned Meccans, but under all the oval pavements surrounding the Ka’abah.
[FN#49] The spring gushes from the southern base of Mount Arafat, as will afterwards be noticed. It is exceedingly pure. [FN#50] The author informs us that “the first pulpit was sent from Cairo in A.H. 818, together with the staircase, both being the gifts of Moayed, caliph of Egypt.” Ali Bey accurately describes the present Mambar. [FN#51] The curious will find a specimen of a Moslem sermon in Lane’s Mod. Egypt. Vol. i. ch. iii.
[FN#52] Burckhardt “subjoins their names as they are usually written upon small cards by the Metowefs; in another column are the names by which they were known in more ancient times, principally taken from Azraky and Kotoby.” I have added a few remarks in brackets[.]

[Mention is made of Modern names; Arches; and Ancient names.]

1. Bab el Salam, composed of gates or arches; 3; Bab Beni Shaybah (this is properly applied to the inner, not the outer Salam Gate.)
2. Bab el Neby; 2; Bab el Jenaiz, Gate of Biers, the dead being carried through it to the Mosque.
3. Bab el Abbas, opposite to this the house of Abbas once stood; 3; Bab Sertakat (some Moslem authors confound this Bab al-Abbas with the Gate of Biers.)

4. Bab Aly; 3; Bab Beni Hashem

5. Bab el Zayt
Bab el Ashra; 2; Bab Bazan (so called from a neighbouring hill).

6. Bab el Baghlah; 2;

7. Bab el Szafa (Safa); 5; Bab Beni Makhzoum.

8. Bab Sherif; 2; Bab el Djiyad (so called because leading to the hill Jiyad)

9. Bab Medjahed; 2; Bab el Dokhmah.

10. Bab Zoleykha; 2; Bab Sherif Adjelan, who built it.

11. Bab Om Hany, so called from the daughter of Aby Taleb; 2; Bab el Hazoura (some write this Bab el Zarurah).

12. Bab el Wodaa (Al-Wida’a), through which the pilgrim passes when taking his final leave of the temple; 2; Bab el Kheyatyn, or Bab Djomah.

13. Bab Ibrahim, so called from a tailor who had a shop near it; 1;

14. Bab el Omra, through which pilgrims issue to visit the Omra. Also called Beni Saham; 1; Bab Amer Ibn el Aas, or Bab el Sedra.

15. Bab Atech (Al-Atik?); 1; Bab el Adjale.

16. Bab el Bastye; 1; Bab Zyade Dar el Nedoua.

17. Bab el Kotoby, so called from an historian of Mekka who lived in an adjoining lane and opened this small gate into the Mosque; 1;

18. Bab Zyade; 3; (It is called Bab Ziyadah—Gate of Excess—because it is a new structure thrown out into the Shamiyah, or Syrian quarter.)

19. Bab Dereybe; 1; Bab Medrese.

Total [number of arches] 39[FN#53] An old pair of slippers is here what the “shocking bad hat” is at a crowded house in Europe, a self-preserver. Burckhardt lost three pairs. I, more fortunately, only one.
[FN#54] Many authorities place this building upon the site of the modern Makam Hanafi.
[FN#55] The Meccans love to boast that at no hour of the day or night is the Ka’abah ever seen without a devotee to perform “Tawaf.” [FN#56] This would be about 50 dollars, whereas 25 is a fair sum for a single apartment. Like English lodging-house-keepers, the Meccans make the season pay for the year. In Burckhardt’s time the colonnato was worth from 9 to 12 piastres; the value of the latter coin is now greatly decreased, for 28 go to the Spanish dollar all over Al-Hijaz. [FN#57] I entered one of these caves, and never experienced such a sense of suffocation even in that favourite spot for Britons to asphixiate themselves—the Baths of Nero. [FN#58] The Magnificent (son of Salim I.), who built at Al-Madinah the minaret bearing his name. The minarets at Meccah are far inferior to those of her rival, and their bands of gaudy colours give them an appearance of tawdry vulgarity.
[FN#59] Two minarets, namely, those of the Bab al-Salam and the Bab al-Safa, are separated from the Mosque by private dwelling-houses, a plan neither common nor regular.
[FN#60] A stranger must be careful how he appears at a minaret window, unless he would have a bullet whizzing past his head. Arabs are especially jealous of being overlooked, and have no fellow-feeling for votaries of “beautiful views.” For this reason here, as in Egypt, a blind Mu’ezzin is preferred, and many ridiculous stories are told about men who for years have counterfeited cecity to live in idleness[.] [FN#61] I have illustrated this chapter, which otherwise might be unintelligible to many, by a plan of the Ka’abah (taken from Ali Bey al-Abbasi), which Burckhardt pronounced to be “perfectly correct.” This author has not been duly appreciated. In the first place, his disguise was against him; and, secondly, he was a spy of the French Government. According to Mr. Bankes, who had access to the original papers at Constantinople, Ali Bey was a Catalonian named Badia, and was suspected to have been of Jewish extraction. He claimed from Napoleon a reward for his services, returned to the East, and died, it is supposed, of poison in the Hauran, near Damascus. In the edition which I have consulted (Paris, 1814) the author labours to persuade the world by marking the days with their planetary signs, &c., &c., that he is a real Oriental, but he perpetually betrays himself. Some years ago, accurate plans of the two Harims were made by order of the present Sultan. They are doubtless to be found amongst the archives at Constantinople.
[FN#62] It must be remembered that the Moslems, like many of the Jews, hold that Paradise was not on earth, but in the lowest firmament, which is, as it were, a reflection of earth.
[FN#63] Others derive the surname from this decision. [FN#64] As will afterwards be mentioned, almost every Meccan knows the prophecy of Mohammed, that the birthplace of his faith will be destroyed by an army from Abyssinia. Such things bring their own fulfilment.
[FN#65] Abu Hanifah made it a temporal sanctuary, and would not allow even a murderer to be dragged from the walls. [FN#66] Makkah (our Meccah) is the common word; Bakkah is a synonym never used but in books. The former means “a concourse of people.” But why derive it from the Hebrew, and translate it “a slaughter”? Is this a likely name for a holy place? Dr. Colenso actually turns the Makaraba of Ptolemy into “Makkah-rabbah,” plentiful slaughter. But if Makaraba be Meccah, it is evidently a corruption of “Makkah” and “Arabah,” the Arab race. Again, supposing the Meccan temple to be originally dedicated to the sun, why should the pure Arab word “Ba’al” become the Hebræized Hobal, and the deity be only one in the three hundred and sixty that formed the Pantheon?
[FN#67] This is an audacious falsehood; the Ka’abah is scarcely ever opened without some accident happening.

[p.327] APPENDIX III.[FN#1]

SPECIMEN OF A MURSHID’S DIPLOMA, IN THE KADIRI ORDER OF THE MYSTIC CRAFT AL-TASAWWUF.

[ TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE: Footnote 1 gives a description of the original manuscript. In Burton’s book, the text is presented as follows: – Firstly, the section of text beginning “This is the tree…” and ending with the lines “Amen.”, “A.”, presented as a triangle, with each line centred on the page.
– Below this, the section of text “There is no god but Allah…a thing to Allah.”, centred, and enclosed in a circle. – Below that, the section of text “Sayyid A…of C.”, centred, and enclosed in a horizontal oval.
– The line “And of him…we beg aid.”, in smaller type. – All the following lines are enclosed in a box filling most of each page, with a horizontal rule separating the lines of text. Each line fills the width of the box neatly, except for the last four lines (beginning “It is finished.”), which are centred. – Footnotes are presented, in smaller type than usual, at the outside edge of the page in which the reference occurs, and (as much as possible) level with the reference.
– The placement of line breaks in the main body of this Appendix has been preserved from the original (book) text. ]

THIS is the tree whose root is firm, and whose branches are spreading, and whose shade is perpetual: and the bearer is a good man— we beg of Allah to grant him purity of
intention by the power of him upon
whom Revelation descended and In-
spiration! I have passed it on, and I, the poorest of men, and the ser-
vant of the poor, am Sayyid
A,[FN#2] son of Sayyid B the
Kadiri, the servant of the
prayer-rug of his grand-
sire, of the Shaykh
Abd al-Kadir
Jilani, Allah
sanctify his
honoured
tomb!
Amen.
A.

There
is no god but
Allah—Shaykh
Abd al-Kadir
—a thing to
Allah.[FN#3]

Sayyid A
Son of Sayyid B
of C.[FN#4]

And of him—In the name of Allah the Merciful, the Compassionate—we beg aid.

Praise be to Allah, opener of the locks of hearts with his name, and withdrawer of the veils of hidden

[p.328] things with his beneficence, and raiser of the flags of increase to those who persevere in thanking him. I praise him because that he hath made us of the people of Unity. And I thank him, being desirous of his benefits. And I bless and salute our Lord Mohammed, the best of his Prophets and of his Servants, and (I bless and salute) his (Mohammed’s) family and companions, the excelling indignity, for the increase of their dignity and its augmentation. But afterwards thus saith the needy slave, who confesseth his sins and his weakness and his faults, and hopeth for the pardon of his Lord the Almighty—Sayyid A the Kadiri,son of Sayyid B the Kadiri, son of Sayyid Abu Bakr the Kadiri, son of Sayyid Ismail the Kadiri, son of Sayyid Abd al-Wahhab the Kadiri, son of Sayyid Nur al-Din the Kadiri, son of Sayyid Darwaysh the Kadiri, son of Sayyid Husam al-Din the Kadiri, son of Sayyid Nur al-Din the Kadiri, son of Sayyid Waly al-Din the Kadiri, son of Sayyid Zayn al-Din the Kadiri, son of Sayyid Sharaf al-Din the Kadiri, son of Sayyid Shams al-Din the Kadiri, son of Sayyid Mohammeda I-Hattak, son of Sayyid Abd al-Aziz, son of the

[p.329] Sayyid of Sayyids, Polar-Star of Existence, the White Pearl, the Lord of the Reins of (worldy) possession, the Chief of (Allah’s) friends, the incomparable Imam, the Essence negativing accidents, the Polar Star of Polar Stars,[FN#5] the Greatest Assistance,[FN#6] the Uniter of the Lover and the Beloved,[FN#7]the Sayyid (Prince), the Shaykh (Teacher), Muhiyal-Din, Abd al-Kadir of Jilan,[FN#8] Allah sanctify his honoured Sepulchre, and Allah enlighten his place of rest!—Son of Abu Salih Muse Jangi-dost, son of Sayyid Abdullah al-Jayli, son of Sayyid Yahya al-Zahid, son of Sayyid Mohammed, son of Sayyid Da’ud,son of Sayyid Musa, son of Sayyid Abdullah, son of Sayyid Musa al-Juni, son of Sayyid Abdullah al-Mahz, son of Sayyid Hasan al-Musanna,[FN#9] son of theImam Hasan, Son of the Imam and the Amir ofTrue Believers, Ali the son of Abu Talib—may Allah be satisfied with him!—Son of Abd al-Mut-Talib,[FN#10] son of Hashim, son of Abd al-Manaf, son of Kusay, son of Kilab, son of Murrat, son of Ka’ab, Son of Luwiyy, son of Ghalib, son of Fihr (Kuraysh), Son of Malik, son of Nazr, son of Kananah, son of Khuzaymah, son of Mudrikah, son of Iliyas, son of

[p.330] Muzarr, son of Nizar, son of Adnan,[FN#11] son of Ada, son of Udad, son of Mahmisah, son of Hamal, son of Nayyit, son of Kuzar, son of Ismail, son of Ibrahim, son of Karikh, son of Kasir, son of Arghwa, son of Phaligh, son of Shalikh, son of Kaynan, son of Arfakhshad, son of Sam, son of Noah, son of Shays, son of Adam the Father of Mankind[FN#12]—with whom be Peace, and upon our Prophet the best of blessings and salutation!—and Adam was of dust, and dust is of the earth, and earth is of foam, and foam is of the wave, and the wave is of water,[FN#13] and water is of the rainy firmament, and the rainy firmament is of Power, and Power is of Will, and Will is of the Omniscience of the glorious God. But afterwards that good man, the approaching to his Lord, the averse to all besides him, the desirous of the abodes of futurity, the hoper for mercy, the Darwayah Abd-ullah[FN#14] son of the Pilgrim Joseph the Afghan,—henceforward let him be known by the name of “Darwaysh King-in-the-name-of-Allah!”—hath ccome to us and visited us and begged of us instruction in the Saying of Unity. I therefore taught him the saying which I learned by ordinance from my Shaykh and my instructor and

[p.331] my paternal uncle Sayyid the Shaykh Abd al-Kadir[FN#15] the Kadiri, son of the Sayyid the Shaykh Abu Bakr the Kadiri, son of the Sayyid the Shaykh Ismail the Kadiri, son of the Sayyid the Shaykh Abd al-Wahhab the Kadiri, son of the Sayyid the Shaykh Nur al-Din the Kadiri, son of the Sayyid the Shaykh Shahdarwaysh the Kadiri, son of the Sayyid the Shaykh Husam al-Din the Kadiri, son of the Sayyid the Shaykh Nur al-Din the Kadiri, from his sire and Shaykh Waly al-Din the Kadiri, from his sire and Shaykh Zayn al-Din the Kadiri, from his sire and Shaykh Sharafil al-Din the Kadiri, from his sire and Shaykh Mohammed al-Hattak the Kadiri, from his sire and Shaykh Abd al-Aziz—Allah sanctify his honoured Sepulchre and Allah enlighten his Place of rest!—from his sire and Shaykh Sayyid the Polar Star of Existence, the White Pearl, the Polar Star of Holy Men, the Director of those that tread the Path, the Sayyid the Shaykh Muhiyy al-Din Abd al-Kadir of Jilan—Allah sanctify his honoured Sepulchre and Allah enlighten his place of rest! Amen!—from his Shaykh the Shaykh Abu-Sa’id al-Mubarak al-Makhzumi, from his Shaykh the Shaykh Abu ‘I Hasan, al-Hankari,

[p.332] from his Shaykh the Shaykh Abu Faras al-Tarsusi, from his Shaykh the Shaykh Abd al-Wahidal-Tamimi, from his Shaykh the Shaykh Abu ‘l Kasim al-Junayd of Baghdad, from his Shaykh the Shaykh al-Sirri al-Sakati, from his Shaykh the Shaykh al-Ma’aruf al-Karkhi, from his Shaykh the Shaykh Da’ud al-Tai, from his Shaykh the Shaykh Habib al-‘Ajami, from his Shaykh the Shaykh al-Hasan of Bussorah, from his Shaykh the Prince of True Believers, Ali Son of Abu Talib—Allah be satisfied with him! and Allah honour his countenance!—from the Prophet of Allah, upon whom may Allah have mercy, from Jibrail, from the Omnipotent, the Glorious. And afterwards we taught him (i.e. that good man Abdullah) the Saying of Unity, and ordered its recital 165 times after each Farizah,[FN#16] and on all occasions according to his capability. And Allah have mercy upon our Lord Mohammed and upon His Family and upon His Companions one and all! And praise be to Allah, Lord of the (three) worlds!It is finished.There is no god but Allah! Number[FN#17] 165.

[FN#1] This document is written upon slips of paper pasted together, 4 feet 5 inches long, by about 6 1/2 inches broad, and contains altogether 71 lines below the triangle. The divisions are in red ink. It rolls up and fits into a cylinder of tin, to which are attached small silk cords, to sling it over the shoulder when travelling or on pilgrimage.
[FN#2] The names are here omitted for obvious reasons. [FN#3] Facsimile of the seal of the Great Abd al-Kadir. This upon the document is a sign that the owner has become a master in the craft. [FN#4] This is the living Shaykh’s seal, and is the only one applied to the apprentice’s diploma.
[FN#5] Or Prince of Princes, a particular degree in Tasawwuf. [FN#6] Ghaus (Assistance) also means a person who, in Tasawwuf, has arrived at the highest point to which fervour of devotion leads. [FN#7] The human soul, and its supreme source. [FN#8] For a short notice of this celebrated mystic, see d’Herbelot, “Abdalcader.
[FN#9] “Hasan the Second,” from whom sprung the Sharifs of Al-Hijaz. [FN#10] Father to Abdullah, Father of Mohammed. [FN#11] Dated by M.C. de Perceval about 130 years B.C. [FN#12] Thus, between Adnan and Adam we have eighteen generations! Al-Wakidi and Al-Tabiri give forty between Adnan and Ishmael, which Ibn Khaldun, confirmed by M.C. de Perceval, thinks is too small a number. The text, however, expresses the popular estimate. But it must be remembered that the Prophet used to say, “beyond Adnan none but Allah knoweth, and the genealogists lie.”
[FN#13] Moslems cleaving to the Neptunian theory of earthy origin. [FN#14] Your humble servant, gentle reader. [FN#15] The former genealogy proved my master to be what is technically called “Khalifah Jaddi,” or hereditary in his dignity. The following table shows that he is also “Khulfai” (adopted to succeed), and gives the name and the descendants of the holy man who adopted him. [FN#16] Each obligatory prayer is called a Farizah. The Shaykh therefore directs the Saying of Unity, i.e. La ilaha illa llah, to be repeated 825 times per diem.
[FN#17] i.e. number of repetitions after each obligatory prayer.

[p.333]APPENDIX IV.

THE NAVIGATION AND VOYAGES OF LUDOVICUS VERTOMANNUS, GENTLEMAN OF ROME.
A.D. 1503.

THE first of the pilgrims to Meccah and Al-Madinah who has left an authentic account of the Holy Cities is “Lewes Wertomannus (Lodovico Bartema), gentelman of the citie of Rome.[FN#1]” If any man,” says this aucthor, “shall demand of me the cause of this my voyage, certeynely I can shewe no better reason than is the ardent desire of knowledge, which hath moved many other to see the world and the miracles of God therein.” In the year of our Lord 1503 he departed from Venice “with prosperous wynds,” arrived at Alexandria and visited Babylon of Egypt, Berynto, Tripoli, Antioch, and Damascus. He started from the latter place on the 8th of April, 1503, “in familiaritie and friendshyppe with a certayne Captayne Mameluke” (which term he applies to “al such Christians as have forsaken theyr fayth, to serve the Mahumetans and Turks”), and in the garb of a

[p.334] “Mamaluchi renegado.” He estimates the Damascus Caravan to consist of 40,000 men and 35,000 camels, nearly six times its present number.[FN#2] On the way they were “enforced to conflict with a great multitude of the Arabians:” but the three score mamluks composing their escort were more than a match for 50,000 Badawin. On one occasion the Caravan, attacked by 24,000 Arabians, slew 1500 of the enemies, losing in the conflict only a man and a woman.[FN#3] This “marveyle”—which is probably not without some exaggeration—he explains by the “strength and valiantness of the Mamalukes,” by the practice (still popular) of using the “camells in the steede of a bulwarke, and placing the merchaunts in the myddest of the army (that is), in the myddest of the camelles, whyle the pilgrims fought manfully on every side;” and, finally, by the circumstance that the Arabs were unarmed, and “weare only a thynne loose vesture, and are besyde almost naked: theyr horses also beyng euyll furnished, and without saddles or other furniture.” The Hijazi Badawi of this day is a much more dangerous enemy; the matchlock and musket have made him so; and the only means of crippling him is to prevent the importation of firearms and lead, and by slow degrees to disarm the population. After performing the ceremonies of pilgrimage at Al-Madinah and Meccah, he escaped to Zida or Gida (Jeddah), “despite the trumpetter of the caravana giving warning to all the Mamalukes to make readie their horses, to direct their journey toward Syria, with proclamation of death to all that should refuse so to

[p.335] doe,” and embarked for Persia upon the Red Sea. He touched at certain ports of Al-Yaman, and got into trouble at Aden, “where the Mahumetans took him,” and “put shackles on his legges, which came by occasion of a certayne idolatour, who cryed after him, saying, O, Christian Dogge, borne of Dogges.[FN#4]” The lieutenant of the Sultan “assembled his council,” consulted them about putting the traveller to death as a “spye of Portugales,” and threw him ironed into a dungeon. On being carried shackled into the presence of the Sultan, Bartema said that he was a “Roman, professed a Mamaluke in Babylon of Alcayr;” but when told to utter the formula of the Moslem faith, he held his tongue, “eyther that it pleased not God, or that for feare and scruple of conscience he durst not.” For which offence he was again “deprived of ye fruition of heaven.”

But, happily for Bartema, in those days the women of Arabia were “greatly in love with whyte men.” Before escaping from Meccah, he lay hid in the house of a Mohammedan, and could not express his gratitude for the good wife’s care; “also,” he says, “this furthered my good enterteynement, that there was in the house a fayre young mayde, the niese of the Mahumetan, who was greatly in loue with me.” At Aden he was equally fortunate. One of the Sultan’s three wives, on the departure of her lord and master, bestowed her heart upon the traveller. She was “very faire and comely, after theyr maner, and of colour inclynyng to blacke:” she

[p.336] would spend the whole day in beholding Bartema, who wandered about simulating madness,[FN#5] and “in the meane season, divers tymes, sent him secretly muche good meate by her maydens.” He seems to have played his part to some purpose, under the colour of madness, converting a “great fatt shepe” to Mohammedanism, killing an ass because he refused to be a proselyte, and, finally, he “handeled a Jewe so euyll that he had almost killed hym.” After sundry adventures and a trip to Sanaa, he started for Persia with the Indian fleet, in which, by means of fair promises, he had made friendship with a certain captain. He visited Zayla and Berberah in the Somali country, and at last reached Hormuz. The 3rd book “entreateth of Persia,” the 4th of “India, and of the cities and other notable thynges seene there.” The 8th book contains the “voyage of India,” in which he includes Pegu, Sumatra, Borneo, and Java, where, “abhorryng the beastly maners” of a cannibal population, he made but a short stay. Returning to Calicut, he used “great subtiltie,” escaped to the “Portugales,” and was well received by the viceroy. After describing in his 7th book the “viage or navigation of Ethiopia, Melinda, Mombaza, Mozambrich (Mozambique), and Zaphala (Sofala),” he passed the Cape called “Caput Bonæ Spei, and repaired to the goodly citie of Luxburne (Lisbon),” where he had the honour of kissing hands. The king confirmed with his great seal the “letters patentes,” whereby his lieutenant the viceroy of India had given the pilgrim the order of knighthood. “And thus,” says Bartema by way of conclusion, “departing from thence with the kyngs pasporte and safe conducte, at the length after these my long and great trauayles and

[p.337] dangers, I came to my long desyred native countrey, the citie of Rome, by the grace of God, to whom be all honour and glory.”

This old traveller’s pages abound with the information to be collected in a fresh field by an unscrupulous and hard-headed observer. They are of course disfigured with a little romancing. His Jews at Khaybor, near Al-Madinah, were five or six spans long. At Meccah he saw two unicorns, the younger “at the age of one yeare, and lyke a young coolte; the horne of this is of the length of four handfuls.[FN#6]” And so credulous is he about anthropophagi, that he relates of Mahumet (son to the Sultan of Sanaa) how he “by a certayne naturall tyrannye and madnesse delyteth to eate man’s fleeshe, and therefore secretly kylleth many to eate them.[FN#7]” But all things well considered, Lodovico Bartema, for correctness of observation and readiness of wit, stands in the foremost rank of the old Oriental travellers.

I proceed to quote, and to illustrate with notes, the few chapters devoted in the 1st volume of this little-known work to Meccah and Al-Madinah.

CHAPTER XI.—Of a Mountayne inhabited with Jewes, and of the Citie of Medinathalnabi, where Mahumet was buried.

In the space of eyght dayes we came to a mountayne which conteyneth in circuite ten or twelve myles. This is inhabited with Jewes, to the number of fyue thousande

[p.338] or thereabout. They are very little stature, as of the heyght of fyue or sixe spannes, and some muche lesse. They have small voyces lyke women, and of blacke colour, yet some blacker then other. They feede of none other meate than goates fleshes.[FN#8] They are circumcised, and deny not themselues to be Jewes. If by chaunce, any Mahumetan come into their handes, they flay him alyue. At the foot of the mountayne we founde a certayne hole, out of whiche flowed aboundance of water. By fyndyng this opportunitie, we laded sixtiene thousand camels; which thyng greatly offended the Jewes. They wandred in that mountayne, scattered lyke wylde goates or prickettes, yet durst they not come downe, partly for feare, and partly for hatred agaynst the Mahumetans. Beneath the mountaine are seene seuen or eyght thorne trees, very fayre, and in them we found a payre of turtle doues, which seemed to vs in maner a miracle, hauying before made so long journeyes, and sawe neyther beast nor foule. Then proceedyng two dayes journey, we came to a certayne citie name Medinathalnabi: four myles from the said citie, we founde a well. Heere the carauana (that is, the whole hearde of camelles) rested. And remayning here one day, we washed ourselves, and changed our shertes, the more freshely to enter into the citie; it is well peopled, and conteyneth about three hundred houses; the walles are lyke bulwarkes of earth, and the houses both of stone and bricke. The soile about the citie is vtterly barren, except that about two myles from the citie are seene about fyftie palme trees that beare dates.[FN#9] There, by a certayne garden, runneth a course of water fallyng into a lower playne, where also passingers are accustomed to water theyr camelles.[FN#10] And here opportunitie now serueth to [p.339] confute the opinion of them whiche thynke that the arke or toombe of wicked Mahumet to hang in the ayre, not borne vp with any thing. As touching which thyng, I am vtterly of an other opinion, and affirme this neyther to be true, nor to haue any lykenesse of trueth, as I presently behelde these thynges, and sawe the place where Mahumet is buried, in the said citie of Medinathalnabi: for we taryed there three dayes, to come to the true knowledge of all these thynges. When wee were desirous to enter into theyr Temple (which they call Meschita,[FN#11] and all other churches by the same name), we coulde not be suffered to enter without a companion little or great. They taking vs by the hande, brought vs to the place where they saye Mahumet is buried.

CHAPTER XII.—Of the Temple or Chapell, and Sepulchre of Mahumet, and of his Felowes.

His temple is vaulted, and is a hundred pases in length, fourscore in breadth; the entry into it is by two gates; from the sydes it is couered with three vaultes; it is borne vp with four hundred columnes or pillers of white brick; there are seene, hanging lampes, about the number of three thousande. From the other part of the temple in the first place of the Meschita, is seene a tower of the circuite of fyue pases vaulted on euery syde, and couered with a cloth or silk, and is borne vp with a grate of copper, curiously wrought and distant from it two pases; and of them that goe thyther, is seene as it were through a lateese.[FN#12] Towarde the lefte hande, is the way to the tower, and when you come thyther, you must enter by a narower gate. On euery syde of those gates or doores, are seene many bookes in manner of a librarie, on the one syde 20, and on the other syde 25. These contayne the filthie traditions and lyfe of Mahumet and his fellowes:

[p.340] within the sayde gate is seene a sepulchre, (that is) a digged place, where they say Mahumet is buried and his felowes, which are these, Nabi, Bubacar, Othomar, Aumar, and Fatoma[FN#13]; but Mahumet was theyr chiefe captayne, and an Arabian borne. Hali was sonne in lawe to Mahumet, for he tooke to wyfe his daughter Fatoma. Bubacar is he who they say was exalted to the dignitie of a chiefe counseller and great gouernour, although he came not to the high degree of an apostle, or prophet, as dyd Mahumet. Othomar and Aumar were chief captaynes of the army of Mahumet. Euery of these haue their proper bookes of factes and traditions. And hereof proceedeth the great dissention and discorde of religion and maners among this kynde of filthie men, whyle some confirm one doctrine, and some another, by reason of theyr dyuers sectes of Patrons, Doctours, and Saintes, as they call them. By this meanes are they marueylously diuided among themselues, and lyke beastes kyll themselues for such quarelles of dyuers opinions, and all false. This also is the chiefe cause of warre between the sophie of Persia and the great Turke, being neuerthelesse both Mahumetans, and lyue in mortall hatred one agaynst the other for the mayntenaunce of theyr sectes, saintes and apostles, whyle euery of them thynketh theyr owne to bee best.

CHAPTER XIII.—Of the Secte of Mahumet.

Now will we speake of the maners and sect of Mahumet. Vnderstande, therefore, that in the highest part of the tower aforesayde, is an open round place. Now shall you vnderstande what crafte they vsed to deceyue our carauans. The first euening that we came thyther to see the sepulchre of Mahumet, our captayne

[p.341] sent for the chiefe priest of the temple to come to him, and when he came, declared vnto him that the only cause of his commyng thyther was to visite the sepulchre and bodie of Nabi, by which woord is signified the prophet Mahumet; and that he vnderstoode that the price to be admitted to the syght of these mysteries should be foure thousande seraphes of golde. Also that he had no parents, neyther brothers, sisters, kinsefolkes, chyldren, or wyues; neyther that he came thyther to buy merchaundies, as spices, or bacca, or nardus, or any maner of precious jewelles; but only for very zeale of religion and saluation of his soule, and was therefore greatly desirous to see the bodie of the prophet. To whom the priest of the temple (they call them Side), with countenance lyke one that were distraught[FN#14], made aunswere in this maner: “Darest thou with those eyes, with the which thou hast committed so many horrible sinnes, desyre to see him by whose sight God hath created heauen and earth?” To whom agayne our captayne aunswered thus: “My Lord, you have sayde truly; neuertheless I pray you that I may fynd so much fauour with you, that I may see the Prophet; whom when I haue seene, I will immediately thrust out myne eyes.” The Side aunswered, “O Prince, I will open all thynges unto thee. So it is that no man can denye but that our Prophet dyed heere, who, if he woulde, might haue died at Mecha. But to shewe in himself a token of humilitie, and thereby to giue vs example to folowe him, was wyllyng rather heere than elsewhere to departe out of this worlde, and was incontinent of angelles borne into heauen, and there receyued as equall with them.” Then our captayne sayde to him, “Where is Jesus Christus, the sonne of Marie?” To whom the Side answered, “At

[p.342] the feete of Mahumet.[FN#15]” Then sayde our captayne agayne: “It suffyceth, it suffyceth; I will knowe no more.” After this our captayne commyng out of the temple, and turnyng to vs, sayd, “See (I pray you) for what goodly stuffe I would haue paide three thousande seraphes of golde.” The same daye at euenyng, at almost three a clock of the nyght, ten or twelue of the elders of the secte of Mahumet entered into our carauana, which remayned not paste a stone caste from the gate of the citie.[FN#16] These ranne hyther and thyther, crying lyke madde men, with these wordes, “Mahumet, the messenger and Apostle of God, shall ryse agayne! O Prophet, O God, Mahumet shall ryse agayne! Have mercy on vs God!” Our captayne and we, all raysed with this crye, tooke weapon with all expedition, suspectyng that the Arabians were come to rob our carauana; we asked what was the cause of that exclamation, and what they cryed? For they cryed as doe the Christians, when sodeynly any marueylous thyng chaunceth. The Elders answered, “Sawe you not the lyghtning whiche shone out of the sepulchre of the Prophet Mahumet[FN#17]?” Our captayne answered that he sawe nothing; and we also beyng demaunded, answered in lyke maner. Then sayde one of the old men, “Are you slaues?” that is to say, bought men; meanyng thereby Mamalukes. Then sayde our captayne, “We are in deede Mamalukes.” Then agayne the old man sayde, “You, my Lordes, cannot see heauenly thinges, as being Neophiti, (that is) newly come to the fayth, and not yet confirmed in our religion.” To this our captayne answered [p.343] agayne, “O you madde and insensate beastes, I had thought to haue giuen you three thousande peeces of gold; but now, O you dogges and progenie of dogges, I will gyue you nothing.” It is therefore to bee vnderstoode, that none other shynyng came out of the sepulchre, then a certayne flame which the priests caused to come out of the open place of the towre[FN#18] spoken of here before, whereby they would have deceyved vs. And therefore our captayne commaunded that thereafter none of vs should enter into the temple. Of this also we haue most true experience, and most certaynely assure you that there is neyther iron or steele or the magnes stone that should so make the toombe of Mahumet to hange in the ayre, as some haue falsely imagined; neyther is there any mountayne nearer than foure myles: we remayned here three dayes to refreshe our company. To this citie victualles and all kynde of corne is brought from Arabia Fælix, and Babylon or Alcayr, and also from Ethiope, by the Redde Sea, which is from this citie but four dayes journey.[FN#19]

CHAPTER XIV.—The Journey to Mecha.[FN#20]

After we were satisfied, or rather wearyed, with the filthinesse and lothesomenesse of the trumperyes, deceites, trifles, and hypocrisis of the religion of Mahumet, we determined to goe forward on our journey; and that by guyding of a pylot who might directe our course with the mariners boxe or compasse, with also the carde of the sea, euen as is vsed in sayling on the sea. And thus bendyng our journey to the west we founde a very fayre

[p.344] well or fountayne, from the which flowed great aboundance of water. The inhabitantes affyrme that Sainct Marke the Euangelist was the aucthour of this fountayne, by a miracle of God, when that region was in maner burned with incredible drynesse.[FN#21] Here we and our beastes were satisfied with drynke. I may not here omit to speake of the sea of sande, and of the daungers thereof. This was founde of vs before we came to the mountayne of the Jewes. In this sea of sande we traueiled the journey of three days and nightes: this is a great brode plaine, all couered with white sande, in maner as small as floure. If by euil fortune it so chaunce that any trauaile that way southward, if in the mean time the wind come to the north, they are ouerwhelmed with sande, that they scatter out of the way, and can scarsely see the one the other ten pases of. And therefore the inhabitants trauayling this way, are inclosed in cages of woodde, borne with camels, and lyue in them,[FN#22] so passing the jorney, guided by pilots with maryner’s compasse and card, euen as on the sea, as we haue sayde. In this jorney, also many peryshe for thirst, and many for drynkyng to muche, when they finde suche good waters. In these sandes is founde Momia, which is the fleshe of such men as are drowned in these sandes, and there dryed by the heate of the sunne: so that those bodyes are preserued from putrifaction by the drynesse of the sand; and therefore that drye fleshe is esteemed medicinable.[FN#23] Albeit there is [p.345] another kynde of more pretious Momia, which is the dryed and embalmed bodies of kynges and princes, whiche of long tyme haue been preserued drye without corruption. When the wynde bloweth from the northeast, then the sand riseth and is driuen against a certayne mountayne, which is an arme of the mount Sinai.[FN#24] There we found certayne pyllers artificially wrought, whiche they call Ianuan. On the lefte hande of the sayde mountayne, in the toppe or rydge thereof, is a denne, and the entrie into it is by an iron gate. Some fayne that in that place Mahumet lyued in contemplation. Here we heard a certayne horrible noyse and crye; for passyng the sayde mountayne, we were in so great daunger, that we thought neuer to have escaped. Departyng, therefore, from the fountayne, we continued our journey for the space of ten dayes, and twyse in the way fought with fyftie thousande Arabians, and so at the length came to the citie of Mecha, where al things were troubled by reason of the warres betweene two brethren, contendyng whiche of them shoulde possesse the kyngedome of Mecha.

CHAPTER XV.—Of the Fourme and Situation of the Citie of Mecha; and why the Mohumetans resort thyther.

Nowe the tyme requireth to speake somewhat of the famous citie of Mecha, or Mecca, what it is, howe it is situate, and by whom it is gouerned. The citie is very fayre and well inhabited, and conteyneth in rounde fourme syxe thousande houses, as well buylded as ours, and some that cost three or foure thousande peeces of golde: it hath no walles. About two furlongs from the citie is a mount, where the way is cutte out,[FN#25] whiche leadeth to a playne

[p.346] beneath. It is on euery syde fortified with mountains, in the stead of walles or bulwarkes, and hath foure entries. The Gouernour is a Soltan, and one of the foure brethern of the progenie of Mahumet, and is subject to the Soltan of Babylon of whom we haue spoken before. His other three brethren be at continuall warre with hym. The eighteen daye of Maye we entered into the citie by the north syde; then, by a declynyng way, we came into a playne. On the south syde are two mountaynes, the one very neere the other, distant onely by a little valley, which is the way that leadeth to the gate of Mecha. On the east syde is an open place betweene two mountaynes, lyke vnto a valley,[FN#26] and is the waye to the mountayne where they sacrifice to the Patriarkes Abraham and Isaac.[FN#27] This mountayne is from the citie about ten or twelve myles, and of the heyght of three stones cast: it is of stone as harde as marble, yet no marble.[FN#28] In the toppe of the mountaine is a temple or Meschita, made after their fashion, and hath three wayes to enter into it.[FN#29] At the foote of the mountayne are two cesterns, which conserue waters without corruption: of these, the one is reserued to minister water to the camels of the carauana of Babylon or Alcayr; and the other, for them of Damasco. It is rayne water, and is deriued far of.[FN#30]

But to returne to speake of the citie; for as touchyng the maner of sacrifice which they vse at the foote of the mountayne wee wyll speake hereafter. Entryng, therefore, into the citie, wee founde there the carauana of Memphis, or Babylon, which prevented vs eyght dayes, and came not the waye that wee came. This carauana

[p.347] conteyned threescore and foure thousande camelles, and a hundred Mamalukes to guyde them. And here ought you to consyder that, by the opinion of all men, this citie is greatly cursed of God, as appereth by the great barrennesse thereof, for it is destitute of all maner of fruites and corne.[FN#31] It is scorched with drynesse for lacke of water, and therefore the water is there growen to suche pryce, that you cannot for twelve pence buye as much water as wyll satysfie your thyrst for one day. Nowe, therefore, I wyll declare what prouision they have for victuales. The most part is brought them from the citie of Babylon, otherwyse named Memphis, Cayrus, or Alcayr, a citie of the ryuer of Nilus in Egypt as we have sayde before, and is brought by the Red Sea (called Mare Erythreum) from a certayne port named Gida, distaunt from Mecha fourtie myles.[FN#32] The rest of theyr prouisions is brought from Arabia Faelix, (that is) the happye or blessed Arabia: so named for the fruitfulnesse thereof, in respect of the other two Arabiaes, called Petrea and Diserta, that is, stonye and desart. They haue also muche corne from Ethyopia. Here we found a marueylous number of straungers and peregrynes, or pylgryms; of the whiche some came from Syria, some from Persia, and other from both the East Indiaes, (that is to say) both India within the ryuer of Ganges, and also the other India without the same ryuer. I neuer sawe in anye place greater abundaunce and frequentation of people, forasmuche as I could perceyue by tarrying there the space of 20 dayes. These people resort thyther for diuers causes, as some for merchandies, some to obserue theyr vowe of pylgrymage, and other to haue pardon for theyr sinnes: as touchyng the whiche we wyll speake more hereafter.

[p.348]CHAPTER XVII.—Of the Pardons or Indulgences of Mecha.

Let vs now returne to speake of the pardons of pilgryms, for the which so many strange nations resort thither. In the myddest of the citie is a temple, in fashyon lyke vnto the colossus of Rome, the amphitheatrum, I meane, lyke vnto a stage, yet not of marbled or hewed stones, but of burnt bryckes; for this temple, like vnto an amphitheatre, hath fourscore and ten, or an hundred gates,[FN#33] and is vaulted. The entrance is by a discent of twelve stayers or degrees on euery part[FN#34]: in the church porche, are sold only jewels and precious stones. In the entry the gylted walles shyne on euery syde with incomparable splendour. In the lower part of the temple (that is vnder the vaulted places) is seene a maruelous multitude of men; for there are fyue or sixe thousande men that sell none other thyng then sweete oyntmentes, and especially a certayne odoriferous and most sweete pouder wherewith dead bodyes are embalmed.[FN#35] And hence, all maner of sweete sauours are carried in maner into the countreys of all the Mahumetans. It passeth all beleefe to thynke of the exceedyng sweetnesse of these sauours, farre surmounting the shoppes of the apothecaries. The 23 daye of Maye the pardones began to be graunted in the temple, and in what maner we wyll nowe declare. The temple in the myddest is open without any inclosyng, and in the myddest also thereof is a turrett of the largnesse of sixe passes in cercuitie,[FN#36] and inuolued or hanged with cloth or

[p.349] tapestry of sylke[,][FN#37]and passeth not the heyght of a man. They enter into the turret by a gate of syluer, and is on euery syde besette with vesselles full of balme. On the day of Pentecost licence is graunted to al men to se these thynges. The inhabitantes affyrm that balme or balsame to be part of the treasure of the Soltan that is Lorde of Mecha. At euery vaulte of the turret is fastened a rounde circle of iron, lyke to the ryng of a doore.[FN#38] The 22 day of Maye, a great multitude of people beganne, early in the mornyng before day, seuen tymes to walke about the turret, kyssing euery corner thereof, often tymes feelyng and handelyng them. From this turret about tenne or twelue pases is an other turret, like a chappell buylded after our maner. This hath three or foure entryes: in the myddest thereof is a well of threescore and tenne cubites deepe; the water of this well is infected with salt peter or saltniter.[FN#39] Egypt men are therevnto appoynted to drawe water for all the people: and when a multitude of people haue seuen tymes gone rounde about the first turret, they come to this well, and touchyng the mouth or brym thereof, they saye thus, “Be it in the honour of God; God pardon me, and forgeue me my synnes.” When these woordes are sayde, they that drawe the water powre three buckettes of water on the headdes of euery one of them, and stand neere about the well, and washe them all wette from the headde to the foote, although they be apparelled with sylk. Then the dotyng fooles dreame that they are cleane from all theyr synnes, and that theyr synnes are forgeuen them. They saye, furthermore, that

[p.350] the fyrst turret, whereof we haue spoken, was the fyrst house that euer Abraham buylded, and, therefore, whyle they are yet all wette of the sayd washyng, they go to the mountayne, where (as we have sayde before) they are accustomed to sacrifice to Abraham.[FN#40] And remayning there two daies, they make the said sacrifice to Abraham at the foote of the mountayne.

CHAPTER XVIII.—The Maner of sacrificing at Mecha.

Forasmuche as for the most parte noble spirites are delyted with nouelties of great and straunge thyngs, therefore, to satisfie their expectation, I wyll describe theyr maner of sacrifycyng. Therefore, when they intend to sacrifice, some of them kyll three sheepe, some foure, and tenne; so that the butcherie sometyme so floweth with blood that in one sacrifice are slayne above three thousande sheepe. They are slayne at the rysyng of the sunne, and shortly after are distributed to the poore for God’s sake: for I sawe there a great and confounded multitude of poor people as to the number of 20 thousande. These make many and long dyches in the feeldes, where they keepe fyre with camels doong, and rost or seeth the fleshe that is geuen them, and eate it euen there. I beleue that these poore people came thither rather for hunger than for deuotion, which I thinke by this coniectur,—that great abundance of cucumbers are brought thyther from Arabia Fælix, whiche they eate, castyng away the parynges without their houses or tabernacles, where a multitude of the sayde poore people geather them euen out of the myre and sande, and eate them, and are so greedie of these parynges that they fyght who may geather most.[FN#41] The

[p.351] daye folowing,[FN#42] their Cadi (which are in place with them as with vs the preachers of God’s worde) ascended into a hygh mountayne, to preach to the people that remaineth beneath; and preached to them in theyr language the space of an houre. The summe of the sermon was, that with teares they should bewayle theyr sinnes, and beate their brestes with sighes and lamentation. And the preacher hymselfe with loude voyce spake these wordes, “O Abraham beloued of God, O Isaac chosen of God, and his friend, praye to God for the people of Nabi.” When these woordes were sayde, sodenly were heard lamenting voyces. When the sermon was done, a rumor was spredde that a great armye of Arabians, to the number of twentie thousande, were commyng. With which newes, they that kept the caraunas beyng greatly feared, with all speede, lyke madde men, fledde into the citie of Mecha, and we agayne bearyng newes of the Arabians approche, fledde also into the citie. But whyle wee were in the mydwaye between the mountayne and Mecha, we came by a despicable wall, of the breadthe of foure cubites: the people passyng this wall, had couered the waye with stones, the cause whereof, they saye to be this: when Abraham was commaunded to sacrifice his sonne, he wylled his sonne Isaac to folowe hym to the place where he should execute the commaundement of God. As Isaac went to follow his father, there appeared to him in the way a Deuyl, in lykenesse of a fayre and freendly person, not farre from the sayde wall, and asked hym freendlye whyther he went. Isaac answered that he went to his

[p.352] father who tarryed for him. To this the enemie of mankynde answered, that it was best for hym to tarrye, and yf that he went anye further, his father would sacrifice him. But Isaac nothyng feareyng this aduertisement of the Deuyl, went forward, that his father on hym myght execute the commaundement of God: and with this answere (as they saye) they Deuyell departed. Yet as Isaac went forwarde, the Diuell appeared to hym agayne in the lykenesse of an other frendlye person, and forbade hym as before. Then Isaac taking vp a stone in that place, hurlde it at the Deuyl and wounded him in the forehead: In witnesse and remembraunce whereof, the people passyng that waye when they come neare the wall, are accustomed to cast stones agaynst it, and from thence go into the citie.[FN#43] As we went this way, the ayre was in maner darkened with a multitude of stock doues. They saye that these doues, are of the progenie of the doue that spake in the eare of Mahumet, in lykenesse of the Holye Ghost.[FN#44] These are seene euery where, as in the villages, houses, tauernes and graniers of corne and ryse, and are so tame that one can scharsely dryue them away. To take them or kyll them is esteemed a thyng worthy death,[FN#45]

[p.353] and therefore a certayne pensyon is geuen to nourysshe them in the temple.

CHAPTER XX.—Of diuers thynges which chaunced to me in Mecha; and of Zida, a port of Mecha.

It may seeme good here to make mention of certayne thynges, in the which is seene sharpenesse of witte in case of vrgent necessitie, which hath no lawe as sayeth the prouerbe, for I was dryuen to the point howe I myght prieuly escape from Mecha. Therefore whereas my Captayne gaue me charge to buy certayne thynges, as I was in the market place, a certayne Mamaluke knewe me to be a christian, and therefore in his owne language spake vnto me these woordes, “Inte mename,” that is, whence art thou?[FN#46] To whom I answered that I was a Mahumetan. But he sayde, Thou sayest not truely. I sayde agayne, by the head of Mahumet I am a Mahumetan. Then he sayde agayne, Come home to my house, I folowed hym willingly. When we were there, he began to speake to me in the Italian tongue, and asked me agayne from whence I was, affyrming that he knewe me, and that I was no Mahumetan: also that he had been sometyme in Genua and Venice. And that his woordes myght be better beleeued, he rehearsed many thinges which testified that he sayed trueth. When I vnderstoode this, I confessed freely, that I was a Romane, but professed to the fayth of Mahumet in the citie of Babylon, and there made one of the Mamalukes; whereof he seemed greatly to reioyce and therefore vsed me honourably. But because my desyre was yet to goe further, I asked the Mahumetan whether that citie of Mecha was so famous as all the world spake of it: and inquired of him where was the great aboundaunce of pearles, precious stones, spices, and other rich merchandies that the bruite went of to be in that citie. And all my talke was to the ende

[p.354] to grope the mynde of the Mahumetan, that I might know the cause why such thinges were not brought thyther as in tyme paste. But to auoyde all suspition, I durst here make no mention of the dominion which the Kyng of Portugale had in the most parte of that ocean, and of the gulfes of the Redde Sea and Persia. Then he began with more attentyue mynde, in order to declare vnto me the cause why that marte was not so greatly frequented as it had been before, and layde the only faulte thereof in the Kyng of Portugale. But when he had made mention of the kyng, I began of purpose to detracte his fame, lest the Mahumetan might thinke that I reioyced that the Christians came thyther for merchandies. When he perceyued that I was of profession an enemy to the Christians, he had me yet in greater estimation, and proceeded to tell me many thynges more. When I was well instructed in all thynges, I spake vnto him friendly these woordes in the Mahumet’s language Menaba Menalhabi, that is to say, “I pray you assist mee.[FN#47]” He asked mee wherein. “To help me (sayed I) howe I may secretly departe hence.” Confyrmyng by great othes, that I would goe to those kinges that were most enemies to the Christians: affyrmyng furthermore, that I knewe certain secretes greatly to be esteemed, which if they were knowen to the sayde kynges, I doubted not but that in shorte tyme I should bee sent for from Mecha. Astonyshed at these woordes, he sayde vnto mee, I pray you what arte or secrete doe you know? I answered, that I would giue place to no man in makyng of all manner of gunnes and artillerie. Then sayde hee, “praysed be Mahumet who sent thee hyther, to do hym and his saintes good seruice:” and willed me to remayne secretly in his [p.355] house with his wyfe, and requyred me earnestly to obtayne leaue of our Captayne that under his name he myght leade from Mecha fifteine camelles laden with spices, without paying any custome: for they ordinarily paye to the Soltan thirtie seraphes[FN#48] of golde, for transportyng of such merchandies for the charge of so many camelles. I put him in good hope of his request, he greatly reioyced, although he would ask for a hundred, affyrmyng that might easily be obteyned by the priuileges of the Mamalukes, and therefore desyred hym that I might safely remayne in his house. Then nothyng doubtyng to obtayn his request, he greatly reioyced, and talkyng with me yet more freely, gaue me further instructions and counsayled me to repayre to a certayne kyng of the greater India, in the kyngdome and realme of Decham[FN#49] whereof we will speake hereafter. Therefore the day before the carauana departed from Mecha, he willed me to lye hydde in the most secrete parte of his house. The day folowyng, early in the mornyng the trumpetter of the carauana gaue warning to all the Mamalukes to make ready their horses, to directe their journey toward Syria, with proclamation of death to all that should refuse so to doe. When I hearde the sounde of the trumpet, and was aduertised of the streight commaundement, I was marueylously troubled in minde, and with heauy countenaunce desired the Mahumetan’s wife not to bewraye me, and with earnest prayer committed myselfe to the mercie of God. On the Tuesday folowyng, our carauana departed from Mecha, and I remayned in the Mahumetans house with his wyfe, but he folowed the carauana. Yet before he departed, he gaue commaundement to his wyfe to bryng me to the carauana, which shoulde departe from Zida[FN#50] the porte of Mecha to goe into India. This porte is distant from Mecha 40 miles. Whilest I laye

[p.356] thus hyd in the Mahumetans house, I can not expresse how friendly his wyfe vsed me. This also furthered my good enterteynement, that there was in the house a fayre young mayde, the niese of the Mahumetan, who was greatly in loue with me. But at that tyme, in the myddest of those troubles and feare, the fyre of Venus was almost extincte in mee: and therefore with daliaunce of fayre woordes and promises, I styll kepte my selfe in her fauour. Therefore the Friday folowyng, about noone tyde, I departed, folowyng the carauana of India. And about myd nyght we came to a certayne village of the Arabians, and there remayned the rest of that nyght, and the next day tyll noone. From hence we went forwarde on our journey toward Zida, and came thyther in the silence of the nyght. This citie hath no walles, yet fayre houses, somewhat after the buyldyng of Italie. Here is great aboundaunce of all kynd of merchandies, by reason of resorte in manner of all nations thyther, except jewes and christians, to whom it is not lawfull to come thyther. As soone as I entered into the citie, I went to their temple or Meschita, where I sawe a great multitude of poore people, as about the number of 25 thousande, attendyng a certayne pilot who should bryng them into their countrey. Heere I suffered muche trouble and affliction, beyng enforced to hyde myselfe among these poore folkes, fayning myselfe very sicke, to the ende that none should be inquisityue what I was, whence I came, or whyther I would. The lord of this citie is the Soltan of Babylon, brother to the Soltan of Mecha, who is his subiecte. The inhabitauntes are Mahumetans. The soyle is vnfruitfull, and lacketh freshe water. The sea beateth agaynst the towne. There is neuerthelesse aboundance of all thinges: but brought thyther from other places, as from Babylon of Nilus, Arabia F[æ]lix, and dyuers other places. The heate is here so great, that men are in maner dryed up therewith.

[p.357] And therefore there is euer a great number of sicke folkes. The citie conteyneth about fyue hundred houses.

After fyftiene dayes were past, I couenaunted with a pilot, who was ready to departe from thence into Persia, and agreed of the price, to goe with him. There lay at anker in the hauen almost a hundred brigantines and foistes,[FN#51] with diuers boates and barkes of sundry sortes, both with ores and without ores. Therefore after three days, gyuyng wynde to our sayles, we entered into the Redde Sea, otherwise named Mare Erythræum.

[FN#1] I have consulted the “Navigation and Voyages of Lewes Wertomannus to the Regions of Arabia, Egypt, Persia, Syria, Ethiopia, and East India, both within and without the River of Ganges, &c., conteyning many notable and straunge things both Historicall and Natural. Translated out of Latine into Englyshe by Richarde Eden. In the year of our Lord, 1576.”—(Hakluyt’s Voyages, vol. iv.) The curious reader will also find the work in Purchas (Pilgrimmes and Pilgrimage, vol. ii.) and Ramusio (Raccolta delle Navigasioni e Viaggi, tom. i.). The Travels of Bartema were first published at Milan, A.D. 1511, and the first English translation appeared in Willes and Eden’s Decades, 4to. A.D. 1555. [FN#2] The number of pilgrims in this Caravan is still grossly exaggerated. I cannot believe that it contains more than 7000 of both sexes, and all ages.
[FN#3] This may confirm Strabo’s account of [Æ]lius Gallus’ loss, after a conflict with a host of Arabs—two Roman soldiers. Mons. Jomard, noticing the case, pleasantly remarks, that the two individuals in question are to be pitied for their extreme ill-luck. [FN#4] This venerable form of abuse still survives the lapse of time. One of the first salutations reaching the ears of the “Overlands” at Alexandria is some little boys—
Ya Nasrani
Kalb awani, &c., &c.—
O Nazarene,
O dog obscene, &c., &c.
In Percy’s Reliques we read of the Knight calling his Moslem opponent “unchristen hounde,”—a retort courteous to the “Christen hounde,” previously applied to him by the “Pagan.”
[FN#5] For a full account of the mania fit I must refer the curious reader to the original (Book ii. chap. v.) The only mistake the traveller seems to have committed, was that, by his ignorance of the rules of ablution, he made men agree that he was “no sainct, but a madman.” [FN#6] He proceeds, however, to say that “the head is lyke a hart’s,” the “legges thynne and slender, lyke a fawne or hyde, the hoofs divided much like the feet of a goat”; that they were sent from Ethiopia (the Somali country), and were “shewed to the people for a myracle.” They might, therefore, possibly have been African antelopes, which a lusus naturæ had deprived of their second horn. But the suspicion of fable remains. [FN#7] This is a tale not unfamiliar to the Western World. Louis XI. of France was supposed to drink the blood of babes,—“pour rajeunir sa veine epuisee.” The reasons in favour of such unnatural diet have been fully explained by the infamous M. de Sade.
[FN#8] This is, to the present day, a food confined to the Badawin. [FN#9] This alludes to the gardens of Kuba. The number of date-trees is now greatly increased. (See chap. xix.)
[FN#10] The Ayn al-Zarka, flowing from the direction of Kuba. (Chap. xviii).
[FN#11] Masjid, a Mosque.
[FN#12] Nothing can to more correct than this part of Bartema’s description.
[FN#13] Nabi (the Prophet), Abu Bakr, Osman, Omar, and Fatimah. It was never believed that Osman was buried in the Prophet’s Mosque. This part of the description is utterly incorrect. The tombs are within the “tower” above-mentioned; and Bartema, in his 13th chapter, quoted below, seems to be aware of the fact.
[FN#14] The request was an unconscionable one; and the “chief priest” knew that the body, being enclosed within four walls, could not be seen. [FN#15] This is incorrect. “Hazrat Isa,” after his second coming, will be buried in the Prophet’s “Hujrah.” But no Moslem ever believed that the founder of Christianity left his corpse in this world. (See chap. xvi.) [FN#16] Most probably, in the Barr al-Manakhah, where the Damascus caravan still pitches tents.
[FN#17] This passage shows the antiquity of the still popular superstition which makes a light to proceed from the Prophet’s tomb. [FN#18] It is unnecessary to suppose any deception of the kind. If only the “illuminati” could see this light, the sight would necessarily be confined to a very small number.
[FN#19] This account is correct. Kusayr (Cosseir), Suez, and Jeddah still supply Al-Madinah.
[FN#20] It is impossible to distinguish from this description the route taken by the Damascus Caravan in A.D. 1503. Of one thing only we may be certain, namely, that between Al-Madinah and Meccah there are no “Seas of Sand.”
[FN#21] The name of St. Mark is utterly unknown in Al-Hijaz. Probably the origin of the fountain described in the text was a theory that sprang from the brains of the Christian Mamluks. [FN#22] A fair description of the still favourite vehicles, the Shugduf, Takht-rawan, and the Shibriyah. It is almost needless to say that the use of the mariner’s compass is unknown to the guides in Al-Hijaz.
[FN#23] Wonderful tales are still told about this same Momiya (mummy). I was assured by an Arab physician, that he had broken a fowl’s leg, and bound it tightly with a cloth containing man’s dried flesh, which caused the bird to walk about, with a sound shank, on the second day. [FN#24] This is probably Jabal Warkan, on the Darb al-Sultani, or Sea road to Meccah. For the Moslem tradition about its Sinaitic origin, see Chapter xx.
[FN#25] The Saniyah Kuda, a pass opening upon the Meccah plain. Here two towers are now erected.
[FN#26] This is the open ground leading to the Muna Pass. [FN#27] An error. The sacrifice is performed at Muna, not on Arafat, the mountain here alluded to.
[FN#28] The material is a close grey granite. [FN#29] The form of the building has now been changed. [FN#30] The Meccans have a tradition concerning it, that it is derived from Baghdad.
[FN#31] Moslems who are disposed to be facetious on serious subjects, often remark that it is a mystery why Allah should have built his house in a spot so barren and desolate.
[FN#32] This is still correct. Suez supplies Jeddah with corn and other provisions.
[FN#33] A prodigious exaggeration. Burckhardt enumerates twenty. The principal gates are seventeen in number. In the old building they were more numerous. Jos. Pitt says, “it hath about forty-two doors to enter into it;—not so much, I think, for necessity, as figure; for in some places they are close by one another.”
[FN#34] Bartema alludes, probably, to the Bab al-Ziyadah, in the northern enceinte.
[FN#35] I saw nothing of the kind, though constantly in the Harim at Meccah.
[FN#36] “The Ka’abah is an oblong massive structure, 18 paces in length, 14 in breadth, and from 35 to 40 feet in height.” (Burckhardt, vol. i. p. 248.) My measurements, concerning which more hereafter, gave 18 paces in breadth, and 22 in length.
[FN#37] In ancient times possibly it was silk: now, it is of silk and cotton mixed.
[FN#38] These are the brazen rings which serve to fasten the lower edge of the Kiswah, or covering.
[FN#39] A true description of the water of the well Zemzem. [FN#40] There is great confusion in this part of Bartema’s narrative. On the 9th of Zu’l Hijjah, the pilgrims leave Mount Arafat. On the 10th, many hasten into Meccah, and enter the Ka’abah. They then return to the valley of Muna, where their tents are pitched and they sacrifice the victims. On the 12th, the tents are struck, and the pilgrims re-enter Meccah.
[FN#41] This well describes the wretched state of the poor “Takruri,” and other Africans, but it attributes to them an unworthy motive. I once asked a learned Arab what induced the wretches to rush upon destruction, as they do, when the Faith renders pilgrimage obligatory only upon those who can afford necessaries for the way. “By Allah,” he replied, “there is fire within their hearts, which can be quenched only at God’s House, and at His Prophet’s Tomb.” [FN#42] Bartema alludes to the “Day of Arafat,” 9th of Zu’l Hijjah, which precedes, not follows, the “Day of Sacrifice.” [FN#43] Bartema alludes to the “Shaytan al-Kabir,” the “great devil,” as the buttress at Al-Muna is called. His account of Satan’s appearance is not strictly correct. Most Moslems believe that Abraham threw the stone at the “Rajim,”—the lapidated one; but there are various traditions upon the subject.
[FN#44] A Christian version of an obscure Moslem legend about a white dove alighting on the Prophet’s shoulder, and appearing to whisper in his ear whilst he was addressing a congregation. Butler alludes to it :— “Th’ apostles of this fierce religion,
Like Mahomet’s, were ass and widgeon;” the latter word being probably a clerical error for pigeon. When describing the Ka’abah, I shall have occasion to allude to the “blue-rocks” of Meccah.
[FN#45] No one would eat the pigeons of the Ka’abah; but in other places, Al-Madinah, for instance, they are sometimes used as articles of food. [FN#46] In the vulgar dialect, “Ant min ayn?” [FN#47] I confess inability to explain these words: the printer has probably done more than the author to make them unintelligible. “Atamannik minalnabi,” in vulgar and rather corrupt Arabic, would mean “I beg you (to aid me) for the sake of the Prophet.” [FN#48] Ashrafi, ducats.
[FN#49] The Deccan.
[FN#50] Jeddah
[FN#51] A foist, foyst or buss, was a kind of felucca, partially decked.

[p.358]APPENDIX V.

THE PILGRIMAGE OF JOSEPH PITTS TO MECCAH AND AL-MADINAH.—A.D. 1680

OUR second pilgrim was Jos. Pitts, of Exon,[FN#1] a youth fifteen or sixteen years old, when in A.D. 1678, his genius “leading him to be a sailor and to see foreign countries,” caused him to be captured by an Algerine pirate. After living in slavery for some years, he was taken by his “patroon” to Meccah and Al-Madinah via Alexandria, Rosetta, Cairo, and Suez. His description of these places is accurate in the main points, and though tainted with prejudice and bigotry, he is free from superstition and credulity. Conversant with Turkish and Arabic, he has acquired more knowledge of the tenets and practice of Al-Islam than his predecessor, and the term of his residence at Algier, fifteen years, sufficed, despite the defects of his education, to give fulness and finish to his observations. His chief patroon, captain of a troop of

[p.359] horse, was a profligate and debauched man in his time, and a murderer, “who determined to proselyte a Christian slave as an atonement for past impieties.” He began by large offers and failed; he succeeded by dint of a great cudgel repeatedly applied to Joseph Pitts’ bare feet. “I roared out,” says the relator, “to feel the pain of his cruel strokes, but the more I cried, the more furiously he laid on, and to stop the noise of my crying, would stamp with his feet on my mouth.” “At last,” through terror, he “turned and spake the words (la ilaha, &c.), as usual holding up the forefinger of the right hand”; he was then circumcised in due form. Of course, such conversion was not a sincere one—“there was yet swines-flesh in his teeth.” He boasts of saying his prayers in a state of impurity, hates his fellow religionists, was truly pleased to hear Mahomet called sabbatero, i.e., shoemaker, reads his bible, talks of the horrid evil of apostacy, calls the Prophet a “bloody imposter,” eats heartily in private of hog, and is very much concerned for one of his countrymen who went home to his own country, but came again to Algier, and voluntarily, without the least force used towards him, became a Mahometan. His first letter from his father reached him some days after he had been compelled by his patroon’s barbarity to abjure his faith. One sentence appears particularly to have afflicted him: it was this, “to have a care and keep close to God, and to be sure never, by any methods of cruelty that could be used towards me, be prevailed to deny my blessed Saviour, and that he (the father) would rather hear of my death than of my being a Mahometan.” Indeed, throughout the work, it appears that his repentance was sincere.

“God be merciful to me a
Sinner!”

is the deprecation that precedes the account of his “turning Turk,” and the book concludes with,

“To him, therefore, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, Three

[p.360] Persons and one God, be all Honour, Glory, and Praise, world without end. Amen.”

Having received from his patroon, whom he acknowledges to have been a second parent to him, a letter of freedom at Meccah and having entered into pay, still living with his master, Pitts began to think of escape. The Grand Turk had sent to Algier for ships, and the renegade was allowed to embark on board one of them provided with a diplomatic letter[FN#2] from Mr. Baker, Consul of Algier, to Mr. Raye, Consul at Smyrna. The devil, we are told, was very busy with him in the Levant, tempting him to lay aside all thoughts of escaping, to return to Algier, and to continue a Mussulman, and the loss of eight months’ pay and certain other monies seems to have weighed heavily upon his soul. Still he prepared for the desperate enterprise, in which failure would have exposed him to be dragged about the streets on the stones till half dead, and then be burned to ashes in the Jews’ burial-place. A generous friend, Mr. Eliot, a Cornish merchant who had served some part of his apprenticeship in Exon and had settled at Smyrna, paid £4 for his passage in a French ship to Leghorn. Therefrom, in the evening before sailing, he went on board “apparel’d as an Englishman with his beard shaven, a campaign periwig, and a cane in his hand, accompanied with three or four of his friends. At Leghorn he prostrated himself, and kissed the earth, blessing Almighty God, for his mercy and goodness to him, that he once more set footing on the

[p.361] European Christian[FN#3] part of the world.” He travelled through Italy, Germany, and Holland, where he received many and great kindnesses. But his patriotism was damped as he entered “England, his own native country, and the civilised land must have made him for a time regret having left Algier. The very first night he lay ashore, he was “imprest into the kings service” (we having at that time war with France); despite arguments and tears he spent some days in Colchester jail, and finally he was put on board a smack to be carried to the Dreadnought man-of-war. But happily for himself he had written to Sir William Falkener, one of the Smyrna or Turkey company in London; that gentleman used his interest to procure a protection from the Admiralty office, upon the receipt of which good news, Joseph Pitts did “rejoice exceedingly and could not forbear leaping upon the deck.” He went to London, thanked Sir William, and hurried down to Exeter, where he ends his fifteen years’ tale with a homely, heartful and affecting description of his first meeting with his father. His mother died about a year before his return.

The following passages are parts of the 7th and 8th chapters of Pitts’ little-known work.

“Next we came to Gidda, the nearest sea-port town to Mecca, not quite one day’s journey from it,[FN#4] where the ships are unloaded. Here we are met by Dilleels,[FN#5] i.e. certain persons who came from Mecca on purpose to instruct the Hagges, or pilgrims, in the ceremonies (most [p.362] of them being ignorant of them) which are to be used in their worship at the temple there; in the middle of which is a place which they call Beat Allah, i.e. the House of God. They say that Abraham built it; to which I give no credit.

“As soon as we come to the town of Mecca, the Dilleel, or guide, carries us into the great street, which is in the midst of the town, and to which the temple joins.[FN#6] After the camels are laid down, he first directs us to the Fountains, there to take Abdes[FN#7]; which being done, he brings us to the temple, into which (having left our shoes with one who constantly attends to receive them) we enter at the door called Bab-al-salem, i.e. the Welcome Gate, or Gate of Peace. After a few paces entrance, the Dilleel makes a stand, and holds up his hands towards the Beat-Allah (it being in the middle of the Mosque), the Hagges imitating him, and saying after him the same words which he speaks. At the very first sight of the Beat-Allah, the Hagges melt into tears, then we are led up to it, still speaking after the Dilleel; then we are led round it seven times, and then make two Erkaets.[FN#8] This being done, we are led into the street again, where we are sometimes to run and sometimes to walk very quick with the Dilleel from one place of the street to the other, about a bowshot.[FN#9] And I profess I could not chuse but admire to see those poor creatures so extraordinary devout, and affectionate, when they were about these superstitions, and with what awe and trembling they

[p.363] were possessed; in so much that I could scarce forbear shedding of tears, to see their zeal, though blind and idolatrous. After all this is done, we returned to the place in the street where we left our camels, with our provisions, and necessaries, and then look out for lodgings; where when we come, we disrobe and take of our Hirrawems,[FN#10] and put on our ordinary clothes again.

“All the pilgrims hold it to be their great duty well to improve their time whilst they are at Mecca, not to do their accustomed duty and devotion in the temple, but to spend all their leisure time there, and as far as strength will permit to continue at Towoaf, i.e. to walk round the Beat-Allah, which is about four and twenty paces square. At one corner of the Beat, there is a black stone fastened and framed in with silver plate,[FN#11] and every time they come to that corner, they kiss the stone; and having gone round seven times they perform two Erkaets-nomas, or prayers. This stone, they say, was formerly white, and then it was called Haggar Essaed, i.e. the White Stone.[FN#12] But by reason of the sins of the multitudes of people who kiss it, it is become black, and is now called Haggar Esswaed, or the Black Stone.

“This place is so much frequented by people going round it, that the place of the Towoaf, i.e. the circuit which they take in going round it, is seldom void of people at any time of the day or night.[FN#13] Many have waited several weeks, nay months, for the opportunity of finding it so. For they say, that if any person is blessed with such an opportunity, that for his or her zeal in keeping up the honour of Towoaf, let they petition what they will at the Beat-Allah, they shall be answered. Many will walk round

[p.364] till they are quite weary, then rest, and at it again; carefully remembering at the end of every seventh time to perform two Erkaets. This Beat is in effect the object of their devotion, the idol which they adore: for, let them be never so far distant from it, East, West, North, or South of it, they will be sure to bow down towards it; but when they are at the Beat, they may go on which side they please and pay their Sallah towards it.[FN#14] Sometimes there are several hundreds at Towoaf at once, especially after Acshamnomas, or fourth time of service, which is after candle-lighting (as you heard before), and these both men and women, but the women walk on the outside the men, and the men nearest to the Beat. In so great a resort as this, it is not to be supposed that every individual person can come to kiss the stone afore-mentioned; therefore, in such a case, the lifting up the hands towards it, smoothing down their faces, and using a short expression of devotion, as Allah-waick barick, i.e. Blessed God, or Allah cabor, i.e. Great God, some such like; and so passing by it till opportunity of kissing it offers, is thought sufficient.[FN#15] But when there are but few men at Towoaf, then the women get opportunity to kiss the said stone, and when they have gotten it, they close in with it as they come round, and walk round as quick as they can to come to it again, and keep possession of it for a considerable time. The men, when they see that the women have got the place, will be so civil as to pass by and give them leave to take their fill, as I may say in their Towoaf or walking round, during which they are using some formal expressions. When the women are at the stone, then it is esteemed a very rude and abominable thing to go near them, respecting the time and place.

[p.365]“I shall now give you a more particular description of Mecca and the temple there.

“First, as to Mecca. It is a town situated in a barren place (about one day’s journey from the Red Sea) in a valley, or rather in the midst of many little hills. It is a place of no force, wanting both walls and gates. Its buildings are (as I said before) very ordinary, insomuch that it would be a place of no tolerable entertainment, were it not for the anniversary resort of so many thousand Hagges, or pilgrims, on whose coming the whole dependance of the town (in a manner) is; for many shops are scarcely open all the year besides.

The people here, I observed, are a poor sort of people, very thin,