vainly applied at Cairo, would doubtless discover the prime necessary in the Wadys, many of the latter being still damp and muddy. Moreover, the crible continue à grilles filtrantes, the invention of MM. Huet and Geyler, introduced, we are told, into the mechanical treatment of metals, a principle which greatly economizes fluid. Founded upon the fact that sands of nearly the same size, but of different densities, when mixed in liquid and subjected to rapid vertical oscillation, range themselves by order of weight, the heavier sinking and not allowing passage to lighter matter, the new sieve offers the advantages of a single and simple instrument, with increased facility for treating poor “dirt.” Finally, as I shall show, the country is prepared by nature to receive a tramway; and the distance to the sea does not exceed fourteen miles, liberally computed.[EN#27]
Either the rain-water affected the health of the party, or it suffered from the excessive dryness and variations of the atmosphere, eight to nine hundred feet above sea-level (aner. 29.10), ranging in the tents between 92 degrees by day and 45 degrees at night, a piercing, killing temperature in the Desert. Moreover, the cold weather is mostly the unwholesome season in hot lands, and vice versâ: hence the Arab proverb, Harárat el-Jebel, wa lá Bard-há (“The heat of the hills and not their cold”). Old Haji Wali lost his appetite, complained of indigestion, and clamoured to return home; Ahmed Kaptán suffered from Sulb (“lumbago”) and bad headache; whilst Lieutenant Yusuf was attacked by an ague and fever, which raised the mouth thermometer to 102 degrees–103 degrees, calling loudly for aconite. These ailments affected the party more or less the whole way, but it was not pleasant to see them begin so soon. When our work of collecting specimens–three tons from the Jebel el-Abyaz, and three from the Filon Husayn–was finished, I resolved upon returning to the coast and treating our loads at the Sharmá water. We reached the valley mouth on December 30th, and we greatly enjoyed the change from the harshness of the inland to the mildness of the seaboard air.
We stayed at Sharmá, much disliking its remarkably monotonous aspect, for another week, till January 7, 1878. Yule, “the wheel,” despite the glorious tree-logs and roaring fires, had been a failure at the White Mountain. The Dragoman had killed our last turkey, and had forgotten to bring the plum-pudding from El-Muwaylah: there was champagne, but that is not the stuff wherewithal to wash down tough mutton. New Year’s Day, on the other hand, had all the honours. Its birth was greeted with a flow of whisky-punch, wherein wine had taken the place of water; and we drank the health of his Highness, the Founder of the Expedition, in a bottle of dry Mumm. The evening ended with music and dancing, by way of “praying the Old Year out and the New Year in.” Mersál, the Boruji, performed a wild solo on his bugle; and another negro, Ahmed el-Shinnáwi, played with the Nái or reed-pipe one of those monotonous and charming minor-key airs–I call them so for want of a word to express them–which extend from Midian to Trafalgar, and which find their ultimate expression in the lovely Iberian Zarzuela.[EN#28] The boy Husayn Genínah, a small cyclops in a brown felt calotte and a huge military overcoat cut short, caused roars of laughter by his ultra-Gaditanian style of dancing. I have also reason to suspect that a jig and a breakdown tested the solidity of the plank table, while a Jew’s harp represented Europe. In fact, throughout the journey, reminiscences of Mabille and the Music Halls contrasted strongly with the memories of majestic and mysterious Midian. And, to make the shock more violent, some friend, malè salsus, sent me copies of the cosmopolitan Spectator and the courteous Mayfair, which at once became waste paper for Bedawi cartridges.
Our Rosh há Shanah (“New Year’s Day”) was further distinguished by the discovery of a vein and outcrop of metalliferous quartz, about half an hour’s walk, and bearing nearly east (80 degrees mag.) from camp. We followed the Wady Sharmá, and found above its “gate” the masonry-foundation of a square work; near it lay the graves of the Wild Men, one with the normal awning of palm-fronds honoris causâ. There were signs of stone-quarrying, and at one place a road had been cut in the rock. Leaving on the north the left side of the watercourse, with its rushes (Scirpus), and huge-headed reeds (Arundo donax), its dates and Daums–the two latter often scorched and killed by the careless Bedawi–we struck into a parallel formation, the Wady el Wuday, bone-dry and much trodden by camels. Arrived at the spot, we found that the confused masses of hill subtending the regular cliff-line of the old coast, are composed of grey granite, seamed with snowy quartz, and cut by the usual bands of bottle-coloured porphyritic trap, which here and there becomes red. Some of the heights are of greenish-yellow chloritic felspar, well adapted for brick-making. The surface of the land is scattered with fragments of white silex and fine red jasper, banded with black oligistic iron: this rock, close, hard, and fine enough to bear cutting, appears everywhere in scatters and amongst the conglomerates. Only one fossil was picked up, a mould so broken as to be quite useless.
We also followed out M. Marie’s find, to which he had been guided by a patch of red matter, conspicuous on the road from Tiryam to Sharmá. For forty minutes we skirted the seaward face of the old cliff, a line broken by many deep water-gashes and buttressed by Goz, or high heaps of loose white sand. We then turned eastwards or inland, ascended a Nakb (“gorge”), and saw, as before, the corallines and carbonates of lime altered, fused, scorified, and blackened by heated injections; the grey granite scored with quartz veins, running in all rhumbs; and the porphyritic trap forming crests that projected from the sands. The cupriferous stone struck east-west, with a dip to the south; the outcrops, visible without digging, measured fifteen to twenty metres long, by one to one and a half in breadth.
New Year’s Day also restored to us the pup “Páijí.” When quite a babe, it had walked up to me in the streets of Cairo, evidently claimed acquaintanceship, and straightway followed me into Shepheard’s, where; having a certain sneaking belief in metempsychosis, I provided it with bed and board. During our third march to the White Mountain, being given to violent yelps, which startled both mules and camels, the small thing had been left to walk, and had apparently made friends with an Arab goatherd. After nine days’ absence without leave, “Páijí” reappeared, with dirty rags tied round its bony back and wasted waist, showing an admirable skeleton, and making the most frantic demonstrations of joy. The loss of the poor little brute had affected all our spirits: we thought that the hyenas and the ravens had seen the last of it; and it received a warm welcome home.
M. Lacaze, unlike the rest, took a violent fancy for the Wady Sharmá: the water-scenery enchanted him. His sketches were almost confined to the palm-growth, and to the greenery so unexpected in arid Midian, where, according to the old and exploded opinion, Moses wrote the Book of Job. The idea of Arabia is certainly not associated with flowing rills, and waving trees, and rustling zephyrs. Every morning I used to awake surprised by the song of the Naiad, the little runnel whimpling down its bed of rushes, stone, and sand; and the response of the palms making music in the land-breeze.
Finally, on New Year’s Day, Lieutenant Amir, guided by Shaykh Furayj, and escorted by soldiers and miners, made a three days’ trip to the Wady ‘Urnub. There he surveyed a large isolated “Mará,” or quartz-hill, some twenty-two to twenty-five direct miles south-east of the main outcrop; thus giving a considerable extent to the northern mining-focus. This feature is described as being four or five times larger than the Jebel el-Abyaz (proper); and the specimens of quartz and grey granite proved it to be of the same formation. It showed a broken outline, with four great steps or dykes, which had apparently been worked. In the basal valleys, and spread over the land generally, was found a heavy yellow sand, calcareous and full of silex: the guide called it Awwal Hismá (the “Hismá frontier”).
Our travellers returned by a parallel line, southerly and more direct. In the Wady ‘Urnub, the Ma’ázah of the Salímát clan received them with apparent kindness, inwardly grumbling the while at their land being “spied out;” and they especially welcomed Furayj, who, being a brave soldier, is also noted as a peacemaker. All the men were armed, and wore the same dress as the Huwaytát; like these, they also breed camels and asses–that is, they are not cow-Arabs. Certain travellers on the Upper Nile have distributed the Bedawin into these two groups; add horse-Arabs and ass-Arabs, and you have all the divisions of the race as connected with the so-called “lower animals.” About three hours (= eleven miles) from Sharmá camp, some pyramids of sand were pointed out in the Wady Rátiyah: the Bedawin call one of them the Goz et-Hannán (“Moaning Sand-heap”). They declare that when the Hajj-caravan passes, or rather used to pass, by that way, before the early sixteenth century, when Sultán Selim laid out his maritime high-road, a Naubah (“orchestra”) was wont to sound within its bowels. This tale, which, by-the-by, is told of two other places in Midian, may have been suggested by the Jebel el-Nákús (“Bell Mountain”) in Sinai-land; but as the Arabs perform visitation and sacrifice to the “Moaning-heap,” the superstition probably dates from ancient days. Ruins are also reported to exist in the Jebel Fa’s, the southern boundary of the ‘Urnub valley; and, further south, in the Jebel el-Harb, I was told by some one whose name has escaped me, of a dolmen mounted upon three supports. Lieutenant Amir also brought copper ore from the Wady ‘Urnub, and from the Ras Wady el-Mukhbir specimens of a metal which the Arabs use as a kohl or collyrium. It proved, however, iron, not antimony; and the same mistake has been made in the Sinaitic Peninsula.
At Wady Sharmá we rigged up, under the superintendence of M. Philipin, a trough and a cradle for washing the black sands, the pounded quartz of the Jebel el-Abyaz, and the red sands; these latter had shown a trace of silver (1/10000) to the first Expedition. We mixed it with mercury and amalgamed it in goatskins; the men moved them to and fro; but, of course, the water evaporated, and the mass speedily became dry. The upper or superficial white yielded only, as far as our engineer could judge, a little copper and bright knobs of pyrites. The Negros, or iridized formations, of the “Filon Husayn” on a lower horizon, gave the dubious result already alluded to. All the experiments were conducted in the rudest way. Of course, a quantity of metal may have escaped notice; and a fair proportion of the powdered stone was reserved for scientific treatment in Europe.
During our first trip we had found, upon the right jaw of the Wady Sharmá, a ruined village of workmen, probably slaves, whose bothans measured some twelve feet by eight. They differ from the Nawámis, or “mosquito-huts,” as the word is generally translated, only in shape–the latter are circular, with a diameter of ten feet–and they perfectly resemble the small stone hovels in the Wady Mukattab, which Professor Palmer (“Desert of the Exodus,” p. 202) supposes to have been occupied by the captive miners and their military guardians. This time we ascended the coralline ridge which forms the left jamb. At its foot a rounded and half degraded dorsum of stiff gravel, the nucleus of its former self, showed a segment of foundation-wall, and the state of the stone suggested the action of fire. Possibly here had been a furnace. The summit also bears signs of human occupation. The southern part of the buttress-crest still supports a double concentric circle with a maximum diameter of about fifteen feet; the outside is of earth, apparently thrown up for a rampart behind a moat, and the inside is of rough stones. Going south along the dorsum, we found remains of oval foundations; a trench apparently cut in the rock, pottery often an inch and more thick, and broken handmills made of the New Red Sandstone of the Hismá. Finally, at the northernmost point, where the cliff-edge falls abruptly, with a natural arch, towards the swamp, about one kilometre broad at the Báb, we came upon another circle of rough stones. We were doubtful whether these rude remains were habitations or old graves; nor was the difficulty solved by digging into four of them: the pick at once came upon the ground-rock. Hitherto these ruins have proved remarkably sterile; the only products were potsherds, fragments of hand-mills, and a fine lump of white marble (Rukhám), supposed to come from the Jebel el-Lauz.
Amongst our followers was a “Kázi of the Arabs,” one Jabr bin ‘Abd el-Nabi, who is a manner of judge in civil, but not in criminal matters. Before the suit begins the plaintiff, or his surety, deposits a certain sum in coin, corn, or other valuables, and lays his damages at so much. The defendant, if inclined to contest the claim, pays into court the disputed amount, and the question is settled after the traditional and immemorial customs of the tribe. This man, covetous as any other disciple of Justinian, was exceedingly anxious to obtain the honorarium of a Shaykh, and he worked hard to deserve it. Shortly before our departure from Sharmá, he brought in some scoriae and slag, broken and streaked with copper–in fact, ekvolades. They are thinly scattered over the seaward slope of the left jaw, where the stone nowhere shows a trace of the mineral in situ. As, however, the Expedition had found native copper in three places, more or less near the Jebel el-Abyaz, it was decided that the ore had been brought from the interior.
We were again much puzzled concerning the form of industry which gave rise to such a large establishment as Sharmá. Agriculture was suggested and rejected; and we finally resolved that it was a branch-town that supplied ore to the great smelting-place and workshop of the coast, ‘Aynúnah, and possibly carbonate of lime to serve for flux.
The distance along the winding Wady, between the settlement and the sea westward, where the watercourse ends in sand-heaps, is seven to eight miles, and the coast shows no sign of harbour or of houses. About three miles, however, to the northwest is the admirable Bay of ‘Aynu’nah, unknown to the charts. Defended on both sides by sandspits, and open only between the west and the north-west, where reefs and shoals allow but a narrow passage, its breadth across the mouth from east to west measures at least five thousand metres, and the length inland, useful for refuge, is at least three thousand. At the bottom of this noble Límán, the Kolpos so scandalously abused by the ancients, are three sandy buttresses metalled with water rolled stones, and showing traces of graves. Possibly here may have been the site of an ancient settlement. The Arabs call the southern anchorage, marked by a post and a pit of brackish water, El-Musaybah or Musaybat Sharmá. Its only present use seems to be embarking bundles of rushes for mat-making in Egypt. The north-eastern end of the little gulf is the Gád (Jád), or Mersá of El-Khuraybah, before described as the port of ‘Aynu’nah.
At the Musaybah I stationed our tender, the Sambúk El-Musahhil, which carried our heavy goods, specimens by the ton; rations and stores; forge, planks, and crowbars. The sailors lost no time in showing their rapacity. Every day they dunned us for tobacco; and when we made a counter-demand for the excellent fish which was caught in shoals, they simply asked, “What will you pay for it?” I imprudently left my keg of specimen-spirits on board this ignoble craft, and the consequence was that it speedily became bone-dry. The Musaybah bight is a direct continuation of the Wady el-Melláh, which, joining that of El-Maka’dah, runs straight up to the Jebel el-Abyaz and to the Filon Husayn. These metalliferous quartzes cannot be further from the coast than a maximum distance of fourteen miles, and the broad, smooth watercourse, with its easy gradients, points it out as the site of the future tramway. I should prefer a simpler form of the “Pioneer Steam Caravan or Saddleback-Railway System,” patented by Mr John L. Haddan, C.E., formerly of Damascus.[EN#29] He recommends iron as the best material for the construction; and the cost, delivered at Alexandria, would not exceed £1200, instead of £3000 to £20,000 per kilometre, including the rolling stock. As the distance from the port is nothing, £300 per kilometre would be amply sufficient for “fixing up;” but I should reduce the price to £500 for the transport of some 50 tons per diem. By proper management of the rails or the main rail, it would be easy for trained camels to draw the train up the Wady; and the natural slope towards the sea would give work only to the brake where derailments are not possible.
At Sharmá we saw the crescent, when the Englishmen turned their money in their pockets, and the Egyptian offficers muttered a blessing upon the coming moon. Every day we waxed more weary of the place; possibly the memories of the first visit were not pleasant. Many in camp still suffered; and an old Bedawi, uncle to Shaykh ‘Alayan, died and was buried at ‘Aynúnah. The number of servants also made us uncomfortable. The head Dragoman, whose memory was confined to his carnet, forgot everything; and, had we trusted to him, half the supplies would have returned to Suez, probably for the benefit of his own shop at Zagázig. I soon found his true use, and always left him behind as magazine-man, storekeeper, and guardian of reserve provisions. He was also a dangerous, mischief-making fellow; and such men always find willing ears that ought to know better. Petros, the Zante man, was the model of a tipotenios (an “anybody”), who seemed to have been born limp, without bones or brains. He was sent back as soon as possible to Cairo. The worst point of these worthies was, that they prevented, for their own reasons, the natives working for us; while they preferred eternal chatter and squabbles to working themselves. So the Greek element was reduced to George the cook, a short, squat, unwashed fellow, who looked like a fair-Hercules out of luck; who worked like three, and who loudly clamoured for a revolver and a bowie-knife. His main fault, professionally speaking, was that he literally drenched us with oil till the store happily ran out. His complexion was that of an animated ripe olive, evidently the result of his own cookery. His surprise when I imperatively ordered plain boiled rice, instead of a mess dripping with grease; and when told to boil the fish in sea water and to serve up the bouillon, was high comedy. Doubtless he has often, since his return, astounded his “Hellenion” by describing our Frankish freaks and mad eccentricities.
The stationary camp also retained Lieutenant Yusuf and MM. Duguid and Philipin, with thirteen soldiers and sixteen miners. The six camels were placed under Gabr, Kázi el-‘Orbán; and all the stay-behinds were charged with washing the several earths, with scouring the country for specimens, and with transporting sundry tons of the black sand before mentioned. Old Haji Wali, probably frightened by the Arabs, and maddened by the idea that, during his absence in the thick of the cotton season, the Fellahs of Zagázig would neglect to pay their various debts, began to “malinger” with such intensity of purpose, that I feared lest he would kill himself to spite us. The venerable Shylock, who ever pleaded poverty, had made some £300 by lending a napoleon, say, on January 1st, which became a sovereign on February 1st; not to speak of the presents and “benevolences” which the debtor would be compelled to offer his creditor. So he departed for El-Muwaylah, whence some correspondent had warned him that a pilgrim boat was about to start; declaring that he was dying, and trotting his mule as hard as it would go, the moment a safe corner was turned. He stayed two days on board the gunboat, and straightway returned to Egypt and the cotton season:–we had the supreme satisfaction, however, to hear that he had gone through the long quarantine at Tor. Yet after our return he reproached me, with inimitable coolness and effrontery, for not having behaved well to him.
On the morning of January 7th, a walk of two hours and twenty minutes (= seven miles) northwards, and mostly along the shore of the noble “Musaybat Sharmá,” transferred us to well-remembered ‘Aynúnah. The sea in places washed over slabs of the fine old conglomerates which, in this country, line the banks and soles of all the greater Wadys: these are the Cascalho of the Brazil, a rock which is treated by rejecting the pebbles and by pounding the silicious paste. The air was softer and less exciting than that of Sharmá; and, although the vegetation was of the crapaud mort d’amour hue–here a sickly green, there a duller brown than April had showed–the scene was more picturesque, the “Gate” was taller and narrower, and the recollection of a happy first visit made me return to it with pleasure. Birds were more abundant: long-shanked water-fowl with hazel eyes; red-legged rail; the brown swallow of Egypt; green-blue fly-catchers; and a black muscivor, with a snowy-white rump, of which I failed to secure a specimen. We also saw the tern-coloured plover, known in Egypt as Domenicain and red kingfishers. The game species were fine large green mallard; dark pintail; quail, and red-beaked brown partridge with the soft black eye.
New formations began to develop themselves, and the sickly hues of the serpentines and the chlorites, so rich in the New World, appeared more charming than brow of milk or cheek of rose.[EN#30] There were few changes. A half-peasant Bedawi had planted a strip of barley near the camping place; the late floods had shifted the course of the waters; more date-trees had been wilfully burned; a big block of quartz, brother to that which we had broken, had been carried off; and where several of the old furnaces formerly stood, deep holes, dug by the “money-hunter,” now yawned. I again examined the two large fragments of the broken barrage, and found that they were of uncut stone, compacted with fine cement, which contained palm-charcoal.
At ‘Aynúnah we gave only one day to work. While M. Lacaze sketched the views, we blasted with gunpowder more than half charcoal the Ma’dan el-Fayrúz (“turquoise mine”), as the Arabs called it, on the right side of the Wady. The colour and texture were so unlike the true lapis Pharanitis that we began to suspect, and presently we ascertained from the few remaining fragments, it had been worked for copper,–the carbonates and the silicates which characterize Cyprus. Presently good specimens of the latter were brought to us from the Jebel el-Fará by a Bedawi pauper, ‘Ayd of the Tagaygát-Huwaytát tribe. These half-naked shepherds and goatherds, who know every stone in the land, are its best guides; not the Shaykhs, who, as a rule, see little or nothing outside their tents. From our camp the direction, as reported by Ahmed Kaptán, was 102 degrees (mag.), and the distance three miles. I afterwards sent Lieutenant Yusuf from El-Muwaylah to make a detailed plan.[EN#31]
We also dug in an old pit amongst the Christian graves to the south-east of the camp, and below the left jamb of the “Gate.” Here also the Bedawin had been at work; and, when unable to work deep enough, they told us wonderful tales of an alabaster slab, which doubtless concealed vast treasures. In Arabia, as in Africa, one must look out for what there is not, as well as for what there is. After spending a morning in sinking a twelve-feet shaft, we came upon a shapeless coralline-boulder, which in old times had slipped from the sea-face of the cliff to the left of the valley. I ascended this height, and saw some stones disposed by the hand of man; but there were no signs of a large slave-miner settlement like that on the other side of the Báb.
In the afternoon Mr. Clarke led a party of quarrymen across the graveyards to El-Khuraybah, the seaport of ‘Aynúnah, and applied them to excavating the floor of a cistern and the foundations of several houses; a little pottery was the only result. It was a slow walk of forty minutes; and thus the total length of the aqueducts would be three miles, not “between four and five kilometres.” I had much trouble and went to some expense in sending camels to fetch a “written stone” which, placed at the head of every newly buried corpse, is kept there till another requires it. It proved to be a broken marble pillar with a modern Arabic epitaph. In the Gád el-Khuraybah, the little inlet near the Gumruk (“custom-house”), as we called in waggery the shed of palm-fronds at the base of the eastern sandspit, lay five small Sambúks, which have not yet begun fishing for mother-of-pearl. Here we found sundry tents of the Tagaygát-Huwaytát, the half Fellahs that own and spoil the once goodly land; the dogs barked at us, but the men never thought of offering us hospitality. We had an admirable view of the Tihámah Mountains–Zahd, with its “nick;” the parrot-beak of Jebel el-Shátí; the three perpendicular Pinnacles and flying Buttresses of Jebel ‘Urnub; the isolated lump of Jebel Fás; the single cupola of Jebel Harb; the huge block of Dibbagh, with its tall truncated tower; the little Umm Jedayl, here looking like a pyramid; and the four mighty horns of Jebel Shárr.
I left ‘Aynúnah under the conviction that it has been the great Warshah (“workshop”) and embarking-place of the coast-section extending from El-Muwaylah to Makná; and that upon it depended both Wady Tiryam and Sharmá, with their respective establishments in the interior. Moreover, the condition of the slag convinced me that iron and the baser metals have been worked here in modern times, perhaps even in our own, but by whom I should not like to say.
Chapter III.
Breaking New Ground to Magháir Shu’ayb.
On January 9th we left ‘Aynúnah by the Hajj-road, and passed along the Quarry Hill visited during my first journey: the crest has old cuttings and new cuttings, the latter still worked for Bedawi headstones. The dwarf pillar with the mysterious cup is reflected by the Nubians, who hollow out the upper part of the stela to a depth of eight or ten inches without adding any ornament. Hence, perhaps, the Sawahíli custom of the inserted porcelain-plate.
After issuing from the stony and sandy gorge which forms the short cut, we regained the Hajj-road, and presently sighted a scene readily recognized. Fronting us, the northern horizon was formed by the azure wall of Tayyib Ism,[EN#32] the “Mountain of the Good Name,” backed by the far grander peaks of Jebel Mazhafah: the latter rises abruptly from the bluer Gulf of El-Akabah, and both trend to their culminating points inland or eastward. On our right followed the unpicturesque metalliferous heap of Jebel Zahd or ‘Aynúnah Mountain, whose Brèche de Roland seems to show from every angle; its chocolate-coloured heights contain, they say, furnaces and “Mashghal,” or ateliers, where the Marú (“quartz”) was worked for ore. In places it is backed by the pale azure peaks of Jebel el-Lauz. This “Mountain of Almonds” is said to take its name from the trees, probably bitter, which flourish there as within the convent-walls of St. Catherine, Sinai. They grow, I was told, high up in the clefts and valleys; and here, also, are furnaces both above and below. Of its white, sparkling, and crystallized marble, truly noble material, a tombstone was shown to me; and I afterwards secured a slab with a broken Arabic inscription, and a ball apparently used for rubbing down meal. The Lauz appears to be the highest mountain in Northern Midian-land; unfortunately, it is to be reached only viâ Sharaf, two long stations ahead, and I could not afford time for geographical research to the prejudice of mineralogical. Its nearer foot-hill is the Jebel Khulayf; and this feature contains, according to the Bedawin, seven wells or pits whose bottom cannot be seen. Between the “Almond Block” and its northern continuation, Jebel Munífah, we saw a gorge containing water, and sheltering at times a few tents of the ‘Amírát Arabs; in the same block we also heard of a Sarbút or rock said to be written over.
The regular cone of El-Maklá’ ends the prospect in the north-eastern direction. Looking westward, we see the ghastly bare and naked Secondary formation, the Rughám of the Bedawin, not to be confounded with Rukhám (“alabaster or saccharine marble”). We afterwards traced this main feature of the ‘Akabah Gulf as far south as the Wady Hamz. It is composed of the sulphates of lime–alabaster, gypsum, and the plaster with which the Tertiary basin of Paris supplies the world; and of the carbonates of lime–marble, chalk, kalkspar, shells, and eggs. The broken crests of the Jibál el-Hamrá, the red hills backing Makná,[EN#33] and the jagged black peaks of their eastern parallel, the Kalb el-Nakhlah, look like plutonic reefs or island-chains emerging from the Secondary sea. The latter, whose bleached and skeleton white is stained, here and there, by greenish-yellow sands, chlorite and serpentine, stands boldly out from the chaos of purpling mountains composing Sinai, and ending southwards in the azure knobs of three-headed Tirán Island. The country, in fact, altogether changed: quartz had disappeared, and chlorite had taken its place.
We passed the night at El-‘Usaylah, a Ghadir (or “hollow”) without drainage, which the sinking of water cakes with mud and covers with an irregular circle of salsolaceous trees, a patch of dark metallic green. This “‘Usaylah” is eaten by camels, but rejected by mules. Here our post reached us from Suez on the seventh day, having started on the 2nd inst. A dollar was offered to the Bedawi, who eyed the coin indignantly, declaring that it ought to be a ginni (guinea). I had also given him some tobacco, and repented, as usual, my generosity.
Next day we finished the last and larger part of the second pilgrim-stage from El-Muwaylah. Our Arabs had been “dodging;” and, much disappointed about converting a two days’ into a three days’ march, they punished us by feeding their camels on the road, and by not joining us till the evening. As before, there was no game till we approached the springs; yet tufts and scatters of tamarisks, Samur (Inga unguis) and Arák (Salvadora), looked capable of sheltering it. And now, beyond the level and monotonous Desert, we began to see our destination;–palms and tufty trees at the mouth of a masked Wady. This watercourse runs between a background of reddish-brown rock, the foot-hills and sub-ranges of the grand block, “El-Zánah,” to the north; and a foreground of pale-yellow, stark-naked gypsum, apparently tongue-shaped. Above the latter tower two sister-quoins of ruddy material, the Shigdawayn, to which a tale hangs.
Presently we fell into and ascended the great Wady ‘Afár, which begins in the Hismá, or Red Region, east of the double coast-range. After receiving a network of Secondary valleys that enable it to flow a torrent, as in France, every ten to twelve years, it falls into the Mínat el-‘Ayánát, a little port for native craft, which will presently be visited. We left this Wady at a bend, some two hundred metres wide, called the “Broad of the Jujube,” from one of the splendid secular trees that characterize North Midian. Near the camping-ground we shall find another veteran Zizyphus, whose three huge stems, springing from a single base, argue a green old age. Here both banks of the Fiumara are lined with courses of rough stone, mostly rounded and rolled boulders, evidently the ruins of the water-conduits which served to feed the rich growth of the lower ‘Afa’l. The vegetation of the gorge-mouth developed itself to dates and Daums, tamarisks and salsolaceæ, out of which scuttled a troop of startled gazelles. We turned the right-hand jamb of the “Gate,” and found ourselves at the water and camping-ground of Magháir Shu’ayb.
The general appearance of the station-basin is novel, characteristic, and not without its charms, especially when the sunset paints the plain with the red, red gold, and washes every barren peak with the tenderest, loveliest rosy pink. Under an intensely clear sapphire-coloured sky rises a distant rim of broken and chocolate-coloured trap-hills, set off by pale hillocks and white flats of gypsum, here and there crystallized by contact with the plutonics. The formation mostly stands up either in stiff cones or in long spines and ridges, whose perpendicular wall-like crests are impossible to climb. The snowy cliffs rest upon shoulders disposed at the “angle of rest,” and the prevailing dull drab-yellow of the base is mottled only where accidental fracture or fall exposes the glittering salt-like interior. The gashes in the flank made by wind and rain disclose the core–grey granite or sandstone coloured by manganese. The greater part of the old city was built of this alabaster-like[EN#34] material. When new, it must have been a scene in fairy-land; Time has now degraded it to the appearance and the consistence of crumbling salt. The quoin-shaped hills of the foreground, all uptilted and cliffing to the north, show the curious mauve and red tints of the many-coloured clays called in the Brazil Tauá. Even the palms are peculiar. Their tall, upright crests of lively green fronds, their dead-brown hangings, and their trunks charred black by the careless Bedawi, form a quaint contrast with the genteel, nattily dressed, and cockneyfied brooms of Egypt and the Hejaz. And that grandeur may not be wanting to the view, on the east rise the peak and pinnacles of the Almond Mountain (Jebel el-Lauz), whilst northwards the Jebel el-Za’nah, a huge dome, forms the horizon.
This place, evidently the capital of Madyan Proper, is the
The “Water of Bada'” springs from the base of the hill El-Safrá, oozing out in trickling veins bedded in soft dark mud. It can be greatly increased by opening the fountains, and economized by a roofing of mat: we tried this plan, which only surprised the unready Arab. After swinging to the left bank and running for a few yards, it sinks in the sand; yet on both sides there are signs of labour, showing that, even of late years, the valley has seen better days. Long leats and watercourses have been cut in the clay, and are still lined with the white-flowered “Rijlah,” whose nutritive green leaf is eaten, raw or boiled, by the Fellahs of Egypt: the wild growth, however, is mostly bitter. On both sides are little square plots fenced against sheep and goats by a rude abattis of stripped and dead boughs, Jujube and acacia. Young dates have been planted in pits; some are burnt and others are torn; for the Bedawi, mischievous and destructive as the Cynocephalus, will neither work nor allow others to work. The ‘Ushash or frond-and-reed huts, much like huge birds’-nests, are scattered about in small groups everywhere except near the water. Wherever a collection of bones shows a hyena’s lair, the hunters have built a screen of dry stone.
In fact, Magháir Shu’ayb was spoken of as an Arab “Happy Valley.” But its owners, the Masá’íd, a spiritless tribe numbering about seventy tents, are protégés of the Tagaygát. This Huwayti clan is on bad terms with Khizr and ‘Brahim bin Makbúl; and the brother Shaykhs of the ‘Imrán, recognized by the Egyptian Government, claim the land where they have only the right of transit. Bedawi clans and sub-tribes always combine against stranger families; but when there is no foreign “war,” they amuse themselves with pilling and plundering, sabring and shooting one another. I believe that the palms were roasted to death by the ‘Imrán, although the Shaykhs assured me that the damage was done this year, by a careless Mas’údi when cooking his food. The tribe appears to be Egypto-Arab, like the Huwayta’t and the Ma’ázah, having congeners at Ghazzah (Gaze) and at Ras el-Wady, near Egyptian Tell el-Kebir. Consequently Rüppell is in error when he suspects that die Musaiti are ein Judenstamm. The unfortunates fled towards the sea and left the valley desolate about seven months ago. Their Shaykh is dead, and a certain Agíl bin Muhaysin, a greedy, foolish kind of fellow, mentioned during my First Journey, aspires to the dignity and the profit of chieftainship. He worried me till I named a dog after him, and then he disappeared.
The ruins, of large extent for North Midian, and equal to those of all the towns we have seen put together, begin with the palm-orchard on the left bank. The Jebel el-Safrá shows the foundations of what may have been the arx. It is a double quoin, the taller to the south, the lower to the north, and both bluff in the latter direction. The dip is about 45 degrees; the upper parts of the dorsa are scatters of white on brown-yellow stone; and below it, where the surface has given way, appear mauve-coloured strata, as if stained by manganese. Viewed in profile from the west, the site of El-Muttali'[EN#37], as the Arabs call the hauteville, becomes a tall, uptilted wedge; continued northwards by the smaller feature, and backed by a long sky-line, a high ridge of plaster, pale coloured with glittering points.
This isolated “Yellow Hill,” a “horse” in Icelandic parlance, rising about two hundred feet above the valley-sole, is separated by a deep, narrow gorge from the adjacent eastern range. The slopes, now water-torn and jagged, may formerly have declined in regular lines, and evidently all were built over to the crest like those of Syrian Safet. The foundations of walls and rock-cut steps are still found even on the far side of the eastern feature. The knifeback is covered with the foundations of what appears to be a fortified Laura or Palace; a straight street running north-south, with 5 degrees west (mag.). It serves as base for walls one metre and a half thick, opening upon it like rooms: of these we counted twenty on either side. At the northern end of the “horse,” which, like the southern, has been weathered to a mere spur, is a work composed of two semicircles fronting to the north and east. A bastion of well-built wall in three straight lines overhangs the perpendicular face of the eastern gorge: in two places there are signs of a similar defence to the south, but time and weather have eaten most of it away. The ground sounds hollow, and the feet sink in the crumbling heaps: evidently the whole building was of Rughám (gypsum); and in the process of decay it has become white as blocks of ice, here and there powdered with snow.
On the narrow, flat ledge, between the western base of this Safrá and the eastern side of the Bada’ valley, lie masses of ruin now become mere rubbish; bits of wall built with cut stone, and water-conduits of fine mortar containing, like that of the Pyramids, powdered brick and sometimes pebbles. We carried off a lump of sandstone bearing unintelligible marks, possibly intended for a man and a beast. We called it “St. George and the Dragon,” but the former is afoot–possibly the Bedawin stole his steed. There was a frustum or column-drum of fine white marble, hollowed to act as a mortar; like the Moslem headstone of the same material, it is attributed to the Jebel el-Lauz, where ancient quarries are talked of. There were also Makrákah (“rub-stones”) of close-grained red syenite, and fragments of the basalt handmills used for quartz-grinding. Part of a mortar was found, made of exceedingly light and porous lava.
South-east of the hauteville falls in the now rugged ravine, Khashm el-Muttalí, “Snout of the high” (town). It leads to the apex of the coralline formations, scattered over with fragments of gypsum, here amorphous, there crystalline or talc-like, and all dazzling white as powdered sugar. Signs of tent foundations and of buildings appear in impossible places; and the heights bear two Burj or “watchtowers,” one visible afar, and dominating from its mamelon the whole land. The return to the main valley descends by another narrow gorge further to the south-east, called Sha’b el-Darak, or “Strait of the Shield:” the tall, perpendicular, and overhanging walls, apparently threatening to fall, would act testudo to an Indian file of warriors. High up the right bank of this gut we saw a tree-trunk propped against a rock by way of a ladder for the treasure-seeker. The Sha’b-sole is flat, with occasional steps and overfalls of rock, polished like mirrors by the rain-torrents; the mouth shows remains of a masonry-dam some fourteen feet thick by twenty-one long; and immediately below it are the bases of buildings and watercourses.
Walking down the left bank of the great Wady, and between these secondary gorges that drain the “Yellow Hill,” we came upon a dwarf mound of dark earth and rubbish. This is the Siyághah (“mint and smiths’ quarter”), a place always to be sought, as Ba’lbak and Palmyra taught me. Remains of tall furnaces, now level with the ground, were scattered about; and Mr. Clarke, long trained to find antiques, brought back the first coins picked up in ancient Midian. The total gathered, here and in other parts of Magháir Shu’ayb, was 258, of which some two hundred were carried home untouched; the rest, treated with chloritic and other acids, came out well. One was a silver oval which may or may not have been a token. Eleven were thick discs, differing from the normal type; unfortunately the legends are illegible. The rest, inform bits of green stuff, copper and bronze, were glued together by decay, and apparently eaten out of all semblance of money until the verdigris of ages is removed.
All are cast like the Roman “as”, before B.C. 217, and some show the tail. The distinguishing feature is the human eye; not the outa of Horus,[EN#38] so well known to those who know the Pyramids, but the last trace of Athene’s profile. Two are Roman: a Nerva with S.C. on the reverse; and a Claudius Augustus, bearing by way of countermark a depressed oblong, of 20/100 by 14/100 (of inch), with a raised figure, erect, draped, and holding a sceptre or thyrsus. There is also a Constantius struck at Antioch. The gem of the little collection was a copper coin, thinly encrusted with silver, proving that even in those days the Midianites produced “smashers”: similarly, the Egyptian miners “did” the Pharaoh by inserting lead into hollowed gold. The obverse shows the owl in low relief, an animal rude as any counterfeit presentment of the
ever found in Troy. It has the normal olive-branch, but without the terminating crescent (which, however, is not invariably present) on the proper right, whilst the left shows a poor imitation of the legend
the reverse has been so corroded that no signs of the goddess’s galeated head are visible. My friend, Mr. W. E. Hayns, of the Numismatic Society, came to the conclusion that it is a barbaric Midianitish imitation of the Greek tetradrachm, which in those days had universal currency, like the shilling and the franc. The curious bits of metal, which also bear the owl, may add to our knowledge of the Nabathaean coins, first described, I believe, by the learned Duc de Luynes.[EN#39]
Another interesting “find” was a flat-bottomed, thick-walled clay crucible of small size (2 10/16 inches high by 2 4/16 inches across the mouth), exactly resembling the article picked up at Hamámát. The latter, however, contains a remnant of litharge, possibly showing that the old Egyptians worked the silver, which may have been supplied by the Colorado quartz.
I would here crave leave to make a short excursus to the ancient Ophirs of Egypt Proper, where, we are told by an inscription in the treasury of Ramses the Great (fourteen centuries before Christ), the gold and silver mines yielded per annum a total of 32,000,000 minæ = £90,000,000. Dr. H. Brugsch-Bey first drew attention to Hamámát, where, as he had learned from Diodorus (i. 49–iii 12) and from the papyri, the precious metals had been extensively worked. The “Wells of Hama’ma’t” lie between Keneh on the Nile and Kusayr (Cosseir) on the Red Sea; and the land is held by the Abábdah Arabs, who have taken charge, from time immemorial, of the rich commercial caravans. The formation of the country much resembles that of Midian; and the metalliferous veins run from northeast to south-west. In Arabia, however, the filons are of unusual size; in Africa they are small, the terminating fibrils, as it were, of the Asiatic focus; while the Dark Continent lacks that wealth of iron which characterizes the opposite coast.
By the courtesy of Generals Stone and Purdy I was enabled, after return to Cairo in May, 1878, to inspect the collection. Admirably arranged in order of place, and poor as well disposed, it is, nevertheless, useful to students; and it was most interesting to us. The only novelty is asbestos produced in the schist: the raw material is now imported by the United States, and used for a variety of purposes. It is said to exist in Mount Sinai; we found none in Midian, where the schist formations are of great extent, probably because we did not look for it. The collection was made by Colonel Colston; and Mr. L. H. Mitchell, a mining engineer attached to the Egyptian Staff, spent several weeks spalling sundry tons of quartz. After finding a speck of gold, the work was considered to be done. General Stone, however, sensibly deprecated any attempt to exploit the minerals: the country lacks wood and water, and the expense of camel-transport from Hamámát to Kusayr, and thence in ships to Suez, would swallow up all the profits.
That Egypt was immensely rich in old days we know from several sources. Appian tells us that the treasury of Ptolemy Philadelphus contained 740,000 talents; and assuming with Ebers[EN#40] the Egyptian at half the Æginetan, we have the marvellous sum of £83,250,000. According to Diodorus (i. 62), the treasury of Rhampsinit, concerning which Herodotus (ii. 121, 122) heard a funny story from his interpreter, contained 4,000,000 talents, equal to at least £450,000,000. This rich king’s treasure-house has been found portrayed in the far-famed Temple of Medinat Habú: the mass of wealth, gold, silver, copper, and spices, is enormous; and, while the baser metals are in bars, the precious are stored in heaps, sacks, and vases.
The gold-mines of the old Coptos-plain, the modern Kobt, south of Keneh, are preserved to all time by the earliest known map. It has survived; whilst those of the Milesian Anaximander (B.C. 610- 547), of Hekataeus (ob. B.C. 4 76), also from Miletus and called the “Father of Geography” (Ebers), and of Ptolemy the Pelusian are irretrievably lost. A papyrus in the Turin Museum contains a plan of the mineral region spoken of in two stel, those of Radesiyyah and Kuban, describing the supply of drinking-water introduced into the desert between Kuban and the Red Sea. Chabas[EN#41] has published a coloured facsimile of this map: the gold-containing mountains are tinted red, and the words “Tu en nub” (Mons aureus) are written over them in hieratics.
The only modern gold-workings of Egypt are in the Mudíriyyat (Nomos) of Famaka, the frontier town, better known as Fayzoghlú from its adjacent heights. The washings were visited lately (March, 1878) by my enterprising friend, Dr. P. Matteucci, and M. Gessi. In old days this local Cayenne had a very bad name; convicts were deported here with a frightful mortality. It is still a station for galley-slaves, and it has a considerable garrison, but we no longer hear of an abnormal fatality. The surface was much turned over by the compulsory miners, and European geologists and experts were sent to superintend them; at last the diggings did not pay and were abandoned. But the natives do by “rule of thumb,” despite their ignorance of mineralogy, without study of ground, and lacking co-ordination of labour, what the Government failed to do. They have not struck the chief vein’ if any exist; but, during the heavy rains of the Kharif (“autumn”) in the valley of the Túmát river, herds of slaves are sent yearly to wash gold, and they find sufficient to supply the only known coin–bars or ingots.
Beyond the Siyághah, the left bank is gashed by the ravines draining the south-eastern prolongation of the “Yellow Hill.” Water cuts through this rotten formation of rubbish like a knife into cheese; forming deep chasms, here narrow, there broad, with walls built up, as it were, of fragments, and ready to be levelled by the first rains. The lines of street and the outlines of tenements can be dimly traced, while revetments of rounded boulders show artificial watercourses and defences against the now dried-up stream. The breadth of this, the eastern settlement, varies with the extent of the ledge between the gypsum-hills and the sandy Wady; the length may be a kilometre. The best preserved traces of crowded building end with the south-eastern spur of the Jebel el-Safrá. Beyond them is a huge cemetery. The ancient graves are pits in the ground; a few still uncovered, the many yawning wide, and all of them ignoring orientation. Those of the moderns, on the contrary, front towards Meccah. The Bedawin of this country seem ever to prefer for their last homes the most ancient sites; they place the body in a pit, covered with a large slab or a heap of stones, but they never fill in the hollow, as is usual among Moslems, with earth. The arrangements suit equally well the hyena and the skull-collector; and thus I was able to make a fair collection of Bedawi crania.
At the south-eastern end of the outliers projected by the Jebel el-Safrá, where a gentle slope of red earth falls towards the valley-bank, is the only group of building of which any part is still standing. The site may be old, but the present ruins are distinctly mediæval, dating probably from the days of the Egyptian “Mameluke” Sultans. Beginning from below and to the south-west is a Hauz, or “cistern,” measuring twenty-six by nineteen and a half metres, with a depth of nine to ten feet. The material is cut sandstone, cemented outside with mortar containing the normal brick-crumbs and pebbles, and inside mixed with mud. At the north-eastern and south-western corners are retaining buttresses in two steps, exactly like those in the inland fort of El-Wijh; at the two other angles are flights of stairs, and the sole is a sheet of dried silt. To the south-east lies the remnant of a small circular furnace, and on the north-north-east a broken wall shows where stood the Bayt el-Saghir, or smaller reservoir. A narrow conduit of cut stone leads, with elaborate zigzags, towards two Sakiyah (“draw-wells”) hollowed in the gypsum. The Southern, an oval of five metres ten centimetres, is much dilapidated; and its crumbling throat is spanned by a worn-out arch of the surrounding Secondary rock. Close to the north-west is the other, revetted with cut stone, and measuring six metres in diameter. It is an elaborate affair; with a pointed arch and a regular keystone, circular Sadúd, or “walls for supporting the hauling-apparatus,” and minor reservoirs numbering three. On a detached hillock, a few paces to the north, stands the Fort which defended the establishment. The short walls of the parallelogram measure fifteen metres forty centimetres; and the long, eighteen metres sixty centimetres: the gate, choked by ruins, leads to a small hall, with a masked entrance opening to the right. There is a narrow room under the stone steps to the west, and two others occupy the eastern side. This Fort is to be restored for the better protection of pilgrims; and shortly after our departure an Egyptian engineer, Sulayman Effendi, came from Suez to inspect and report upon it.
According to local modern tradition this scatter of masonry was the original site of the settlement, called after the builder Bir el-Sa’idáni–“the Well of Sa’ídán.” For watering each caravan the proprietor demanded a camel by way of fee; at last a Maghribí, that is, a magician, refused to “part;” betook himself to the present camping ground, sank pits, and let loose the copious springs. The old wells then dried up, and the new sources gave to this section of the great Wady ‘Afál its actual name, Wady el-Badá–“of the innovation,” so hateful to the conservative savage. Hence Rüppell’s “Beden,” which would mean an ibex.
On the opposite or right bank of the broad and sandy bed, the traces of ancient buildings extend to a far greater distance, at least to two kilometres. They have been a continuous line of forts, cisterns, and tenements, still marked out by the bases of long thick walls; the material is mostly gypsum, leprous-white as the skin of Gehazi. But here, and indeed generally throughout Midian, the furious torrents, uncontrolled during long ages by the hand of man, have swept large gaps in the masses of homestead and public buildings. Again the ruins of this section are distributable into two kinds–the City of the Living, and the City of the Dead.
The former, of considerable extent, hugs the watercourse, and crowns all the natural spurs that buttress the bed. Beginning from the north lie two blocks of building considerable in extent: the southern, called by the Arabs El-Malká, is a broken parallelogram. Further down stream the bank is a vast strew of broken pottery; and one place, covered with glass fragments, was named by our soldiers El-Khammárah–“the tavern” or “the hotel.” As in ancient Etruria, so here, the people assemble after heavy rains to pick up what luck throws in the way. It is said that they often gather gold pieces, square as well as round, bearing by way of inscription “prayers” to the Apostle of Allah. Some of us, however, had a shrewd suspicion that the Tibr, or “pure gold-dust,” is still washed from the sands, and cast probably in rude moulds.
Behind, inland or westward of this southern town, lies the City of the Dead. Unlike the pitted graveyard to the north-east, the cemetery is wholly composed of catacombs, which the Bedawin call Magháir (“caves”) or Bíbán (“doors”). The sites are the sides and mouths of four little branch-valleys which cut through the hillocks representing the Wady-bank. The northernmost is known as Wady el-Khurayk, because it drains a height of that name: the others bear the generic term Wady el-Safrá, so called, like the hauteville hill, from the tawny-yellow colour of the rocks. The catacombs, fronting in all directions, because the makers were guided by convenience, not by ceremonial rule, are hollowed in the soft new sandstone underlying the snowy gypsum; and most of the façades show one or more horizontal lines of natural bead-work, rolled pebbles disposed parallelly by the natural action of water. In the most ruinous, the upper layer is a cornice of hard sandstone, stained yellow with iron and much creviced; the base, a soft conglomerate of the same material, is easily corroded; and the supernal part caves in upon the principle which is destroying Niagara. At each side of the doorways is a Mastabah (“stone bench”), also rock-hewn, and with triple steps. The door-jambs, which have hollowings for hinges and holes for bars, are much worn and often broken; they are rarely inclined inwards after the fashion of Egypt. A few have windows, or rather port-holes, flanking the single entrance. The peculiarities and the rare ornaments will be noticed when describing each receptacle; taken as a whole, they are evidently rude and barbarous forms of the artistic catacombs and tower-tombs that characterize Petra and Palmyra.
The “Magháir” may roughly be divided into four topical groups. These are–the northern outliers; the “Tombs of the Kings,” so called by ourselves because they distinguish themselves from all the others; the “buttressed caves” (two sets); and the southern outliers. The first mentioned begin with a ruin on the right jaw of the Khurayk gorge: it is dug in strata dipping, as usual, from north-west to south-east; it faces eastward, and the entrance declines to the south. All external appearance of a catacomb has disappeared; a rude porch, a frame of sticks and boughs, like the thatched eaves of a Bulgarian hut, stands outside, while inside signs of occupation appear in hearths and goat-dung, in smoky roof, and in rubbish-strewn floor. Over another ruin to the west are graffiti, of which copies from squeezes and photographs are here given: there are two loculi in the southern wall; and in the south-eastern corner is a pit, also sunk for a sarcophagus. A hill-side to the south of this cave shows another, dug in the Tauá or coloured sandstone, and apparently unfinished: part of it is sanded up, and its only yield, an Egyptian oil-jar of modern make, probably belonged to some pilgrim. Crossing the second dwarf gorge we find, on the right bank, a third large ruin of at least fourteen loculi; the hard upper reef, dipping at an angle of 30 degrees, and striking from north-west to southeast, fell in when the soft base was washed away by weather, and the anatomy of the graves is completely laid bare. Higher up the same Wady is a fourth Maghárah, also broken down: the stucco-coating still shows remnants of red paint; and the characters **–possibly Arab “Wasm,” or tribe-marks–are cut into an upright entrance-stone.
The precipitous left bank of the third gorge contains the three finest specimens, which deserve to be entitled the “Tombs of the Kings.” Of these, the two facing eastward are figured by Rüppell (p. 220) in the antiquated style of his day, with fanciful foreground and background.[EN#42] His sketch also places solid rock where the third and very dilapidated catacomb of this group, disposed at right angles, fronts southwards. Possibly the façades may once have been stuccoed and coloured; now they show the bare and pebble-banded sandstone.
The southernmost, which may be assumed as the type, has an upright door, flanked by a stone bench of three steps. Over the entrance is a defaced ornament which may have been the bust of a man: in Rüppell it is a kind of geometrical design. The frontage has two parallel horizontal lines, raised to represent cornices. Each bears a decoration resembling crenelles or Oriental ramparts broken into three steps; the lower set numbers eight, including the half ornaments at the corners, and the higher seven. The interior is a mixture of upright recesses, probably intended for the gods or demons; and of horizontal loculi, whose grooves show that they had lids. There is no symmetry in the niches, in the sarcophagi, or in the paths and passages threading the graves. The disposition will best be understood from the ground-plans drawn by the young Egyptian officers: their sketches of the façades are too careless and incorrect for use; but the want is supplied by the photographs of M. Lacaze.
Above these three “Tombs of the Kings” are many rock-cavities which may or may not have been sepulchral. Time has done his worst with them. We mounted the background of a quoin-shaped hill by a well-trodden path, leading to the remnants of a rude Burj (“watch-tower”), and to a semicircle of dry wall, garnished with a few sticks for hanging rags and tatters. The latter denotes the Musallat Shu’ayb, or praying-place of (prophet) Jethro; and here our Sayyid and our Shaykh took the opportunity of applying for temporal and eternal blessings. The height at the edge of the precipice which, cliffing to the north, showed a view of our camp and of Yubú and Shu’shú’ Islands, was in round numbers 450 feet (aner. 29.40–28.94). From this vantage-ground we could distinctly trace the line of the Wady Makná, beginning in a round basin at the western foot of the northern Shigd Mountain and its sub-range; while low rolling hills, along which we were to travel, separated it from the Wady Bada’-Afál to the south.
Two other important sets of catacombs, which I will call the “buttressed caves,” are pierced in the right flank of the same gorge, at the base of a little conical hill, quaintly capped with a finial of weathered rock. The material is the normal silicious gravel-grit, traversed and cloisonné by dykes of harder stone. Beginning at the south, we find a range of three, facing eastward and separated from one another by flying buttresses of natural rock. No. 1 has a window as well as a door. Next to it is a square with six open loculi ranged from north to south. No. 3 shows a peculiarity–two small pilasters of the rudest (Egyptian?) Doric, the only sign of ornamentation found inside the tombs; a small break in the south-western wall connects it with the northernmost loculus of No. 2. Furthest north are three bevel-holes, noting the beginning of a catacomb; and round the northern flank of the detached cone are six separate caves, all laid waste by the furious northern gales.
The second set is carved in the bluff eastern end of an adjoining reef that runs away from the Wady; it consists of four sepulchres with the normal buttresses. They somewhat resemble those of the Kings, but there are various differences. No. 2 from the south is flanked by pilasters with ram’s-horn capitals, barbarous forms of Ionic connected by three sets of triglyphs: the pavement is of slabs; there is an inner niche, and one of the corners has apparently been used as an oven. On a higher plane lies a sunken tomb, with a deep drop and foot-holes by way of ladder; outside it the rocky platform is hollowed, apparently for graves. The other three facades bear the crenelle ornaments; the two to the north show double lines of seven holes drilled deep into the plain surface above the door, as if a casing had been nailed on; while the northernmost yielded a fragmentary inscription on the southern wall. These are doubtless the “inscribed tablets on which the names of kings are engraved,” alluded to in the Jihan-numá of Haji Khahífah.[EN#43] Rounding the reef to the north, we found three catacombs in the worst condition: one of them showed holes drilled in the façade.
The southern outliers lie far down the Wady ‘Afál, facing east, and hewn in the left flank of a dwarf gulley which falls into the right bank not far from the site called by our men “the tavern.” The group numbers three, all cut in the normal sandstone, with the harder dykes which here stand up like ears. The principal item is the upper cave, small, square, and apparently still used by the Arabs: in the middle of the lintel is a lump looking like the mutilated capital of a column. The two lower caves show only traces.
There is a tradition that some years ago a Frank (Rüppell?), after removing his Arab guides, dug into the tombs, and found nothing but human hair. Several of the horizontal loculi contained the bones of men and beasts: I did not disturb them, as all appeared to be modern. The floors sounding hollow, gave my companions hopes of “finds;” but I had learned, after many a disappointment, how carefully the Bedawi ransack such places. We dug into four sepulchres, including the sunken catacomb and the (southern) inscribed tomb. Usually six inches of flooring led to the ground-rock; in the sarcophagi about eight inches of tamped earth was based upon nine feet of sand that ended at the bottom. The only results were mouldering bones, bits of marble and pottery, and dry seeds of the Kaff Maryam, the Rose of Jericho (Anastatica), which here feeds the partridges, and which in Egypt supplies children with medicine, and expectant mothers with a charm. As the plant is bibulous, opening to water and even to the breath, it is placed by the couch, and its movement shows what is to happen. The cave also yielded specimens of bats (Rhinopoma macrophyllum), with fat at the root of their spiky tails.
I have described at considerable length this ruined Madiáma, which is evidently the capital of Madyan Proper, ranking after Petra. In one point it is still what it was, a chief station upon the highway, then Nabatí, now Moslem, which led to the Ghor or Wady el-‘Arabah. But in all others how changed! “The traveller shall come; he that saw me in my beauty shall come: his eyes shall search the field; they shall not find me.”
Chapter IV.
Notices of Precious Metals in Midian–the Papyri and the Mediæval Arab Geographers.
In my volume on “The Gold-Mines of Midian,” the popular Hebrew sources of information–the Old Testament and the Talmud–were ransacked for the benefit of the reader. It now remains to consult the Egyptian papyri and the pages of the mediæval Arab geographers: extracts from the latter were made for me, in my absence from England, by the well-known Arabist, the Rev. G. Percy Badger.[EN#44] I will begin with the beginning.
Dr. Heinrich Brugsch-Bey, whose “History of Egypt”[EN#45] is the latest and best gift to Egyptologists, kindly drew my attention to an interesting passage in his work, and was good enough to copy for me the source of his information, tile Harris Papyrus (No. 1) in the British Museum.
The first king of the twentieth Dynasty, born about B.C. 1200, and residing at Thebes, was Rameses III., whose title, Ramessu pa-Nuter (or Nuti), “Ramses the god,” became in the hands of the Greeks Rhampsinitos. This great prince, ascending the throne in evil days, applied himself at once to the internal and external economy of his realm; he restored the caste-divisions, and carried fire and sword into the lands of his enemies. He transported many captives to Egypt; fortified his eastern frontier; and built, in the Gulf of Suez, a fleet of large and small ships, in order to traffic with Pun and the “Holy Land,”[EN#46] and to open communication with the “Incense-country” and with the wealthy shores of the Indian Ocean.
“Not less important,” says our author (p. 594), “for Egypt, which required before all things the copper applied to every branch of her industry, was the sending of commissioners, by land (on donkey back!) and by sea, to explore and exploit the rich cupriferous deposits of ‘Atháka (in the neighbourhood of the ‘Akabah Gulf?). This metal, with the glance of gold, was there cast in brick-shape, and was transported by sea to the capital.
“The king also restored his attention to the treasures of the Sinaitic Peninsula, which had excited the concupiscence of the Egyptians since the days of King Senoferu[EN#47] (B.C. 3700). Loaded with rich presents for the sanctuary of the goddess Hathor, the protectress of Mafka-land, chosen employés were despatched on a royal commission to the peninsula, for the purpose of supplying the Pharaoh’s treasury with the highly prized blue-green copper-stones (Mafka, Turkisen?[EN#48]).”
These lines were published by Dr. Brugsch-Bey before he had heard of my discoveries of metals and of a modern turquoise-digging in the Land of Midian. He had decided that “‘Atháka” lay to the east of Suez, chiefly from the insistence laid upon the shipping; sea-going craft would certainly not be required for a sail of three or four hours. Moreover, as I have elsewhere shown, Jebel ‘Atakáh, the “Mountain of Deliverance,” at the mouth of the Wady Musá, was referred to the Jews at some time after the Christian era, and probably during the fourth and fifth centuries, when pilgrimages to the apocryphal Mounts Sinai became the fashion.
During the summer of 1877, Dr. Brugsch-Bey was kind enough to copy and to translate the original document, upon which he founded his short account of the “‘Atháka” copper-mines. I offer it to the reader in full.
The order of the alphabet is that adopted by Dr. Brugsch-Bey. It relies for the first letter upon the authority of Plutarch, who asserts that the Egyptian abecedarium numbered the square of five (twenty-five); and that it opened with —
expresses the god Thoth;–this is the case with —
the leaf of some water-plant. The sequence of the letters has been suggested by a number of minor considerations: we begin with the vowels, and proceed to the labial, the liquids, and so forth.[EN#49]
The sense of the highly interesting inscription, in its English order, would be:–
“I have sent my commissioners to the land ‘Atháka; to the (those)[EN#50] great mines of copper (or coppers)[EN#51] which are in this place (‘Atháka); and their (i.e. the commissioners’) ships[EN#52] were loaded, carrying them (the metals); while other (commissioners were sent and) marched on their asses. No! one never (ter-tot) had heard, since the (days of the olden) kings, that these (copper) mines had been found.[EN#53] The loads (i.e. of the ships and the asses) carried copper; the loads were by myriads for their ships, which went thence (i.e. from the mines) to Egypt. (After) happily arriving, the loads were landed, according to royal order, under the Pavilion,[EN#54] in form of copper- bricks;[EN#55] they were numerous as frogs (in the marsh),[EN#56] and in quality they were gold (Nub) of the third degree.[EN#57] I made them admired (by) all the world as marvellous things.”
The following lines upon the subject of Midian are from the notes (p. 143) of Jacob Golius in “Alferganum” (small 4to. Amsterdam, 1669), a valuable translation with geographical explanations. Ahmad ibn Mohammed ibn Kathír el-Fargháni derived his “lakab” or cognomen from the province of Farghán (Khokand), to the north-east of the Oxus; he wrote a work upon astronomy, and he flourished about A.H. 184 (= A.D. 800).
“Ibidem (
Madínat Kúsh): Xaib[EN#58] enim illis idem est, qui Jethro dicitur Exod. iii. cujus filiam Sipporam Moses uxor duxit, cum ex Ægpto profugisset in terram Midjan; ubi Jethro princeps erat et Sacerdos. Autonomosia illa Arabibus familiaris. Ita Hanoch (
Khalíl), Rex Saul (
El-Fargháni is followed by the Imám Abú ‘Abbás Ahmed bin Yáhyá bin Jábir, surnamed and popularly known as El-Balázurí, who flourished between A.H. 232 and 247 (= A.D. 846 to 861), and wrote the Futú’h el-Buldán, or the “Conquests of Countries.” His words are (pp. 13-14, M. J. de Goeje’s edition; Lugduni Batavorum, 1866)–“It was related to me by Abú Abíd el-Kásim bin Sallám; who said he was told by Ishák bin Isa, from Malík ibn Anas and from Rabíat, who heard from a number of the learned, that the Apostle of Allah (upon whom be peace!) gave in feoff (Iktá’at) to Bilál bin el-Háris el-Muzni, mines (Ma’ádin, i.e. of gold) in the district of Furú’ (variant, Kurú’). Moreover, it was related to me by Amrú el-Nákid, and by Ibn Saham el-Antáki (of Antioch), who both declared to have heard from El-Haytham bin Jamíl el-Antáki, through Hammád bin Salmah, that Abú Makín, through Abú Ikrimah Maulá Bilál bin el-Háris el-Muzni, had averred ‘The Apostle of Allah (upon whom be peace!) enfeoffed the said Bilál with (a bit of) ground containing a mountain and a (gold) mine; that the sons of Bilál sold part of the grant to one ‘Umar bin ‘Abd el-‘Azíz, when a (gold) mine or, according, to others, two (gold) mines were found in it; that they said to the buyer, Verily we sold to thee land for cultivation, and we did not sell thee (gold) mining-ground; that they brought the letter of the Apostle (upon whom be peace!) in a (bound) volume: that ‘Umar kissed it and rubbed it upon his eyes, and said, Of a truth let me see what hath come out of it (the mine) and what I have laid out upon it.’ Then he deducted from them the expenses of working and returned to them the surplus. . . . And I was told by Musa’b el-Zubayri, from Malik ibn Anas, that the Apostle of Allah (upon whom be peace!) gave in feoff to Bilál bin Háris mines in the district of Fara’ (sic). There is no difference of opinion among our learned men on this subject, nor do I know any of our companions who contradicts (the statement) that the (gold) mine paid one-fourth per ten (= 2 1/2 per cent.) royalty (to the Bayt el-Mál, or Public Treasury). Musa’b further relates, from El-Zahri, that the (gold) mine defrayed the Zakát or poor-rate: he also said that the proportion was one-fifth (= 2 per cent.); like that which the people of El-Irák (Mesopotamia) take to this day from the (gold) mines of El-Fara’ (sic), and of Nejrán, and of Zúl-Marwah, and of Wady El-Kura[EN#60] and others. Moreover, the fifth is also mentioned by Safáin el-Thauri, and by Abú Hanífah and Abú Yúsuf, as well as by the people of El-‘Irák.”
Follows on my list the celebrated Murúj el-Dahab, or “Meads of Gold,” by El-Mas’údi, who died in A.H. 346 (= A.D. 957), and whose book extends to A.H. 332 (= A.D. 943). Unable to find the translation of my friend Sprenger, I am compelled to quote from “Maçoudi. Les Prairies d’Or,” texte et traduction par C. Barbier de Meynard et Pavet de Courteille. Société Asiatique, Paris, 1864, vol. iii. pp. 301-305.
“Les théologians ne sont pas d’accord sur la question de savoir à quel peuple appartenait Choâïb (Shu’ayb), fils de Nawil, fils de Rawaïl, fils de Mour, fils d’Anka, fils de Madian, fils d’Abraham, l’ami de Dieu, quoiqu’il soit certain que sa langue était l’arabe. Les uns pensent qu’il appartenait aux races arabes éteintes, aux nations qui ont disparu, à quelque une de ces générations passées dont nous avons parlé. Suivant d’autres, il s’agirait ici des descendants d’el-Mahd, fils de Djandal, fils de Yâssob, fils de Madian, fils d’Abraham, dont Choâïb etait frére par la naissance. De cette race sortit un grand nombre de rods qui s’étaient dispersés dans des royaumes contigus les uns aux autres ou sépare’s. Parmi ces rods il faut distinguer ceux qui étaient nommés Aboudjed, Hawaz, Houti, Kalamoun, Çafas et Kourichat,[EN#61] tous, comme nous venons de le dire, fils d’el-Mahd, fils de Djandal. Les lettres de l’alphabet sont représentées précisément par les noms de ces rois, oú l’on retrouve les vingt-quatre lettres sur lesquelles roule l’Aboudjed.[EN#62] Il a e’te’ dit beaucoup d’autres choses à propos de ces lettres, comme nous l’avons fait remarquer dans cet ouvrage; mais il n’entre pas dans notre sujet de rapporter ici tous les systèmes contradictoires imaginés pour l’expliquer la signification des lettres.[EN#63] Aboudjed fut roi de la Mecque et de la partie du Hédjaz qui y confine. Hawaz et Houti régnérent conjointement dans le pays de Weddj (El-Wijh), qui est le territoire de Tayif, et la portion du Nedjd qui lui est contigue. Kalamoun exerçait la suzeraineté sur le royaume de Madian; il y a même des auteurs qui pensent que son autorité s’étendait conjointement sur tous les princes et les pays que nous venons de nommer. Le châtiment du jour de la nuée (Koran, xxvi. 189) eut lieu sous le re’gne de Kalamoun. Choâïb appelant ces impies à la pénitence, ils le traitèrent de menteur. Alors il les mena,ca du châtiment du jour de la nuée, à la suite de quoi une porte du feu du ciel fut ouverte sur eux. Choâïb se retire, avec ceux qui avaient cru, dans l’endroit connu sous le nom d’el Aïkah, qui est un fourré dans la direction de Madian. Cependant, lorsque lcs incrédules sentirent les effets de la vengeance céleste, et que, consumés par une chaleur terrible, ils comprirent enfin la vérité, ils se mirent à la recherche de Choâïb et de ceux qui avaient cru en lui. Ils les trouvérent abrités sous un nuage blanc, doucement rafraichi par le zéphire, et ne ressentant en rien les atteintes de la douleur. Ils les chassèrent de cet asile, s’imaginant qu’ils y trouveraient eux-mêmes un refuge contre le fléau qui les poursuivait. Mais Dieu changea cette nuée en un feu qui se précipita sur leurs têtes. Mountassir, fils d’el-Moundir el-Médéni, a parlé de ce peuple et a déploré son triste sort dans des vers où il dit:
“Les rois des enfants de Houti et de Çafas, qui vivaient dans l’opulence, et ceux de Hawaz, qui possédaient des palais et des appartements somptueux,
“Régnaient sur la contrée du Hédjaz, et leur beauté était semblable à celle des rayons du soleil ou à l’éclat de la rune;
“Ils habitaient l’emplacement de la maison sainte, ils adoucissaient les moeurs de leurs compatriotes et gouvernaient avec illustration et honneur….
“Rien de plus curieux que l’histoire de ces rois, le ré’cit de leurs guerres, de leurs actes, de la manière dont ils s’emparèrent de ces contrées et établirent leur domination, apres en avoir exterminé les premières possesseurs. Ceux-ci étaient des peuples dont nous avons parlé dans nos précédents ouvrages, en traitant ce sujet; nous appelons l’attention dans ce livre sur nous premiers écrits, et nous engageons le lecteur à les consulter.”
The next in order of seniority is the well-known Idrísí (A.H. 531 = A.D. 1136). Dr. Badger’s Arabic copy not being paged, he has forwarded to me extracts from the French translation by M. P. Amadée Jaubert (Paris, 1836), having first compared them with the original:–
Tome 1 p. 5: “De cette mer de la Chine dérive encore le golfe de Colzoum (Kulzum), qui commence à Bab el-Mandeb,[EN#64] au point ou se termine la mer des Indes. Il s’étend au nord, en inclinant un peu vers l’occident, en longeant les rivages occidentales de l’Iemen, le Téháma, l’Hédjaz, jusqu’au pays de Madian, d’Aila (El-‘Akabah), et de Faran; et se termine à la ville de Colzoum, dont il tire son nom.”
P. 142: “Les districts fortifiés, dependents de la Mecque, sont . . . Ceux qui sont sous la dépendance de Médine sont . . . Madyan.”
P. 328: “Pour aller de Misr (Cairo) à’ Yetrib (sic pro Yathrib), on passe par les lieux suivants, Aïlah (Aylah) Madian,” etc.
P. 333: “Sur les bords de la mer Colzoum est la ville de Madian (in orig. Madiyan) plus grande qui Tabouk (Tabúk), et le puits ou Moïse (sur qui soit le salut!) abreuva le troupeau de Jethro (E1Shu’ayb). On dit que ce puits est (maintenant) à sec [Note at foot: Je lis Mu’attilah comme porte le MS. B., et non Mu’azzamah,[EN#65] leçon donnee par le MS. A.]; et qu’on a élevé audessus une construction. L’eau nécéssaire aux habitants provient de sources. Le nom de Madiyan (sic) de’rive de celui de la tribu à laquelle Jethro appartenait. Cette ville offre trés peu de ressources et le commerce y est misérable.”
The following notice of Madyan is taken from the Kitáb el-Buldán (“Book of Countries”),[EN#66] by Ahmed ibn Abí Ya’kúb bin Wádhih, surnamed El-Ya’kúbí and El-Kátib (the writer); according to the Arabic colophon it was completed on the morning of Saturday, Shawwál 21, A.H. 607 (= A.D. 1210). The author gives (p. 129, T. G. J. Juynboll, Lugduni Batavorum, 1861) a description of the route from Misr (Egypt, here Cairo) to Meccah. The first ten stages are–1. Jubb el-‘Umayrah; 2. El-Kerkirah (variant, Karkírah); 3. ‘Ajrúd, the well-known fort on the direct Suez-Cairo line; 4. Jisr el-Kulzum, where the Gulf was crossed; and, lastly, six Desert marches (Maráhil) to Aylah.[EN#67] The latter station is described as a fine city upon the shore of the Salt Sea, the meeting-place of the pilgrim-caravans from Syria,[EN#68] Egypt, and the Maghrib (West Africa). It has merchandise in plenty, and its people are a mixed race (Akhlát min el-Nás).[EN#69] Here also are sold the fine cloaks called Burdu habaratin, and also known as the Burd of the Apostle of Allah[EN#70] (upon whom be peace!). He resumes, “And from Aylah you march to Sharaf el-Baghl, and from the latter to Madyan, which is a large and populous city, with abundant springs and far-flowing streams of wholesome water; and gardens of flower-beds. Its inhabitants are a mixed race (Akhlát min el-Nás).[EN#71] The traveller making Meccah from Aylah takes the shore of the Salt Sea, to a place called ‘Aynúná (variant, ‘Uyún, plural of ‘Ayn, an eye of water, a fountain): here are buildings and palm clumps, and seeking-places (Matalib: see Lane for the authorities), in which men search for gold.” Dr. Badger draws my attention to the last sentence, which seems also to have been noticed by Sprenger (Alt. Geog. p. 32).[EN#72]
The following is from the Kitáb Asár el-Bitad (“Book of the Geographical Traditions of Countries”), by the far-famed Zakariyyá bin Mohammed bin Mahmúd, surnamed El-Kazwíní, who died A.H. 653 = A.D. 1255:–“Madyan” (p. 173, edidit. F. Wustenfeld, Göttingen, 1848) “is a city of the tribe (Kaum) of Shu’ayb upon whom be peace!): it was founded by Madyan, son of Ibrahim, the Friend (of Allah), the grandfather of Shu’ayb. It exports the merchandise of Tabúk between El-Medinah and El-Shám (Damascus). In it is the well whence Musá (upon whom be peace!) watered the flocks of Shu’áyb, and it is said that the well is of great depth; and that over it is a building visited by (pious) men. This settlement Madyan is subject to the district of Tabaríyyah (Tiberias); and near it is the well, and at it a rock which Moses uprooted,[EN#73] and which remains there to the present day.”
The Imám Abú’l-Abbás Ahmed ibn ‘Ali Takiyy el-Dín, better known as “El-Makrízi,” wrote his book El-Mawáiz w’el-I’tibár fi’ Zikr el-Khitat w’el-‘Asár (“The Admonition and Examples in Commemorating Habitations and Traditions”) in A.H. 825 (= A.D. 1421), during the latter part of the second Mamlúk dynasty; and he brings down the history to the reign of Kansu Ghori, whose fort we shall see at El-‘Akabah. He tells us (edition of Gottingen, 1848, Sahífah 48), “The loftiest mountain in Madyan is called Zubayr.[EN#74] . . . It is also related that amongst the settlements of the (Madyanite) tribe are the villages of Petræa (
The Marásid el-Ittílá ‘alá Asmá el-Amkanat w’el-Buká’ (“Observations of Information on the Names of Places and Countries”), which contains two dates in the body of the work, viz. A.H. 997 ( = A.D. 1589) and A.H. 1168 (A.D. = 1755), and which is probably compiled from El-Kazwíní, says sub voce Madyan, after giving the “movement” of the word: “It is a city of the tribe of Shu’ayb, opposite Tabúk, and upon the sea of El-Kulzum, six stages (Maráhil) separating the two. It is larger than Tabúk, and in it is the well whence Moses watered the flocks of Shu’ayb.” Finally, it repeats that Madyan is under the district of “Tabariyyá” or Tiberias[EN#79] (vol. iii. p. 64, edidit. T. G. J. Juynboll, Lugduni Batavorum, 1854, e duobus Codd. MSS.).
I conclude this unpopular chapter with some remarks by Dr. Badger concerning the apparent connection of Jethro and El-Medínah:[EN#80] “It struck me when studying ‘Madyan,’ which is the name of a place as well as of a man,[EN#81] that ‘Yáthrib,’ the ancient term of al-Madínah, might have served the same double purpose. At all events, it was singular to find a Yáthrib somewhere near Madyan, and that the word was not far removed from the
which the new Arabic version of the Bible, published at Bairu’t (Syria), follows; making it
Hebrew (Exod. iv. 18) is also written
“My theory is this. Firstly, there is no dependence to be placed on the Masoretic points, especially when affixed to names of places. Secondly, we have no certain knowledge of the language used by the Midianites in those ancient times. Their territory extended northwards towards Palestine, and from their very intimate relations with the Israelites, as friends and as enemies, both nations appear to have understood each other perfectly. May not their language, then, have been a dialect of the Aramean?[EN#82] If so, the
might have been
pronounced Yáu-Alaha;
Yashuá-yau, etc., the final Beth
(heb) being converted into a
Yathrib)? Of course, this is only a conjecture of mine.”
Mr. E. Stanley Poole (loc. cit.) says that the Arabs dispute whether the name “Medyen” be foreign or Arabic; and whether “Medyen” spoke Arabic. He considers the absurd enumeration of the alphabetical kings (El-Mas’údi, quoted above) to be curious, as possibly containing some vague reference to the language of Midian. When these kings are said contemporaneously to have ruled over Meccah, Western Nejd, Yemen, “Medyen,” Egypt, etc., it is extremely improbable that Midian ever penetrated into Yemen, notwithstanding the hints of Arab authors to the contrary. Yákút el-Hamawi (born A.H. 574 or 575 = A.D. 1178-79, and died A.H. 626 = A.D. 1228), in the Mu’jam el-Buldán (cited in the Journ. of the Deutsch. Morgen. Gesellschaft), declares that a South Arabic dialect is of Midian, and El-Mas’údi (apud Schultens, pp. 158-159) inserts a Midianite king among the rulers of Yemen. The latter, however, is more probable than the former; it may be an accidental and individual, not a material occurrence.
The following list of ruins, some cities, others towns, were all, with two exceptions (Nos. 2 and 18), visited or explored by the second Khedivial Expedition. The Mashghal, ateliers or subsidiary workshops, were in cases learned only by hearsay:–
1. Old ‘Akabah (Aylah) Mashghal, up Valley el-Yitm. 3.
2. El-Hakl (pronounced “Hagul”), the
was seen from the sea, and notes were taken of its ruins and furnaces.
3. Nakhil Tayyib Ism, in mountain of the same name: its ruined dam (?) and buildings were surveyed by Lieutenant Amir.
4. Makná. Twice visited.
5. Magháir Shu’ayb. Two ateliers inspected, and one heard of on the Jebel el-Lauz: total, 3.
6. ‘Aynúnah. In Jebel Zahd (ruins and furnaces). 1.
7. Sharmá. An atelier on the Jebel Fás, and another on the Jebel Harb, both high up: total, 2.
8. Tiryam. An atelier in the Wady Urnub. 1.
9. Abu Hawáwít, near El-Muwaylah. Scoriæ found about the fort of El-Muwaylah and near Sharm Yáhárr. 2.
10. Zibayyib in Wady Surr. Atelier Sayl Umm Laban (Wady Sadr). 1.
11. Khulasah.[EN#83] Saw specimens of worked metal from Wady Kh’shabríyyah, and the upper Wady Surr; also ruins in the Sayl Abú Sha’r, south-west and seawards of the Shárr block.
12. Ma’ el-Badá, alias Diyár el-Nasárá, in the upper Wady Dámah.
13. Shuwák, the
el-Sání. 1.
14. Shaghab, another large city mentioned by El-Makrízi.
15. Ruins of El-Khandakí. Broken quartz, and made road at El-Kutayyifah; two other ateliers in Wady Ruways to the west: total, 3.
16. Umm Amil. Near it an atelier still called El-Dayr, or the Convent. 1.
17. Ziba’, old town; Umm Jirmah to the north. 1.
18. Majirmah (pronounced M’jirmah), one day’s march south of Zibá. Large ruins, supposed to have been the classical Rhaunathos.
Thus, besides a total of eighteen ruins, more or less extensive, twenty ateliers were seen or heard of; making up a total of thirty-eight–not far removed from the forty traditional settlements of the mediæval Arab geographers.
In the plateau of New Red Sandstone called El-Hismá, ruins and inscriptions are said to be found at the Jebel Rawiyán, whose Wady is mentioned by Wallin (p. 308); at Ruáfá, between the two hills El-Rakhamatayn; and at sundry other places, which we were unable to visit. Beyond the Hisma’ I also collected notices of El-Karáyyá, large ruins first alluded to by Wallin (p. 316).[EN#84]
During our exploration of the region below El-Muwaylah (my Southern Midian), and our cruise to El-Haura’, the following sites were either seen or reported:–
1. Ruins in the Wady Dukhán, south of the Wady el-Azlam: north of El-Wijh.
2. El-Nabaghah, in the Wady el-Marrah: north of El-Wijh.
3. Ruins, furnaces and quartz-strews, in the Fara’t Lebayyiz.
4. El-Wijh, the port of Strabo’s “Egra” (?).
5. Inland fort of El-Wijh; an old metal-working ground.
6. The great mine and ruins, Umm el-Karayya’t, everywhere surrounded by ateliers.
7. El-Kubbah, a small isolated ruin to the east of No. 6.
8. El-Khaur, a working-place to the west of No. 6.
9. The large works called Umm el-Hara’b, with two ruined ateliers near them.
10. Aba’l-Gezáz, a working-place in the watercourse of the same name, an upper branch of the Wady Salbah.
11. The fine plain of Bada’, with the Mashghal el-‘Arayfát heard of to the north.
12. Marwát, ruins on a ridge near Badá, and signs of a settlement in the valley. In the Wady Laylah, remains also spoken of.
13. Aba’l-Marú, probably the Zu’l-Marwah of Bilázurí; extensive remains of buildings; a huge reef of quartz, carefully worked, and smaller ruins further down the valley.
14. The classical temple or tomb on the left bank of the great Wady Hamz, dividing Southern Midian from El-Hejaz in the Turkish dominions.
15. Large remains, in two divisions, at El-Haurá.[EN#85]
Concerning the ateliers, details will be found in the following pages. Many of them suggest a kind of compromise between the camps and settlements of the Stone Age, where, e.g. at Pressigny and Grimes’ Graves, the only remnant of man is a vast strew of worked silexes; and the wandering fraternity of Freemasons who hutted themselves near the work in hand. And I would here lay special stress upon my suspicion that the ancestors of the despised Hutaym may have been the Gypsy-caste that worked the metals in Midian.
For the date of the many ruins which stud the country, I will assume empirically that their destruction is coeval with that of the Christian Churches in Negeb, or the South Country,[EN#86] that adjoins Midian Proper on the north-west. It may date from either the invasion of Khusrau Anúshírawán, the conquering Sassanian King Chosroes (A.D. 531-579); or from the expedition, sent by the Caliph Omar and his successors, beginning in A.D. 651. But, as will appear in the course of these pages, there was a second destruction; and that evidently dates from the early sixteenth century, when Sultán Selim laid out his maritime road for the Hajj-caravan. Before that time the Egyptian caravans, as will be seen, marched inland, and often passed from Midian to El-Hijr.
Chapter V.
Work At, and Excursions From, Magháir Shu’Ayb.
By the blessing of Nebi Shu’ayb and a glance from his eyrie, I at once suspected that the western Shigd was the “Mountain on a mountain” alluded to by Haji Wali;[EN#87] and, on January 12, 1878, I ascertained that such was the case. The old man had given me a hand-sketch of the most artless, showing a gorge between two rocks, a hill of two stages to the left or west, and a couple of Wadys draining it to the sea; one (Wady Makná) trending northwest, and the other (Wady ‘Afál) south-west. The word “Ishmah,” affixed to the northern part of the route, is evidently the Hismá plateau, and not, as I had supposed it to be, the Jebel Tayyib Ism.
Nor had we any difficulty in discovering Haji Wali’s tree, a solitary Mimosa to the right of the caravan-track, springing from the sands of the Shigdawayn gorge. The latter is formed by the sister-blocks before alluded to. The western Shigd, on the right of the Wady ‘Afál, is composed of carbonate of lime and sandstones dyed with manganese, the whole resting upon a core of grey granite; the formation is the same as the eastern feature, but the lines of the latter are gentler, and the culminating tower is wanting.
The western Shigd, indeed, is sufficiently peculiar. It is the southern apex of a short range, numbering some four heads: the eastern flank discharges the Wady Kizáz, which feeds the ‘Afál; and the western the Wady Makná. The summit of the broken and spiny cone is a huge perpendicular block, apparently inaccessible as a tower, and composed of the dull yellow ferruginous conglomerate called “El-Safrá:” the tint contrasts strongly with a long line of bright white Rugham (gypsum), bisecting the head of the Wady Makná. Below the apex is a thick stratum of manganese-stained rock: the upper line, with a dip of 15 deg. towards the main valley, looks much like a row of bulwarks which had slipped from the horizontal, while still bluff between the north-east and east. Indeed, the shape is so regular that M. Lacaze, at first sight, asked if it was une construction.
As soon as the washing-trough was brought up from Sharmá, we opened operations by digging a trench, at least twelve feet deep, in the re-entering angle of the bed close to the Mimosa tree. The sand, pink above and chloritic yellow below, ended in a thick bed of water-rolled pebbles, not in ground-rock; nor did it show the couch of excellent clay which usually underlies the surface, and which, I have said, is extracted through pits to make sun-dried brick, swish, and other building materials. We also secured some of the blood-red earth from the eastern tail of the northern “Shigh,” the manganese-stained Tauá and the gravelly sand washed out of the Cascalho-gravel, the latter very promising. The result of our careless working, however, was not successful; the normal ilmenite, black sand of magnetic iron, took the place of gold-dust. And this unlooked-for end again made us suspicious of my old friend’s proceedings: the first occasion was that of his notable “malingering.” Had he bought a pinch of “Tibr” (pure gold) from the Bedawin, and mixed it with the handful of surface stuff ? Had the assayer at Alexandria played him a trick ? Or had an exceptionally heavy torrent really washed down auriferous “tailings”? I willingly believe the latter to have been the case; and we shall presently see it is within the range of possibility. Traces of gold were found by Lieutenant-Colonel W. A. Ross, through his pyrological process, in the sandy clays brought from the mouth of Wady Makná.
Meanwhile, despite our magnificent offers, the Arabs managed to keep inviolate their secret–if they had one. An old man, now a rich merchant and householder at Suez, had repeatedly declared to Mr. A. G. K. Levick, that in his young days the Bedawin washed gold in Midian, till the industry fell into disrepute. During my last visit he was unfortunately absent upon a pilgrimage; after our return he asserted that he had sent for specimens of the sand, but that it paid too little even for transport. This ‘Abd el-Hámid el-Shámi, interviewed, after our return, by Mr. Clarke, declared more than once, and still declares, that many years ago he obtained from the Wady Zibá, behind the settlement, a certain quantity of reddish sand which appeared auriferous. He roasted and washed the contents of three small baskets called “Coffas”[EN#88] by Europeans; and this yielded a pinch of “what looked like pure gold.”
In camp our men spoke freely of Tibr stored in quills, carried behind the ear, and sold at Suez–not at Cairo for fear of consequences. Yet neither promises nor bribes would persuade the poorest to break through the rule of silence. The whole might have been a canard: on the other hand, there was also a valid reason for reticence; the open mouth would not long have led to a sound throat. So our many informants contented themselves with telling us frequent tales of gold ornaments picked up after rain; they showed us a ring made from a bit found on the Tabúk road, and they invariably assure us that we shall find wondrous things–about the next station.
At Magháir Shu’ayb we wasted a whole fortnight (January 11-24, 1878) in vain works; and I afterwards bitterly repented that the time had not been given to South Midian. Yet the delay was pleasant enough, after the month which is required to acquire, or to recover, the habit of tent-life. The halting-day was mostly spent as follows: At six a.m., and somewhat later on cold mornings, the Boruji sounds his réveillé–Kum, yá Habíbí, sáh el-Naum (“Rise, friend! sleep is done”), as the Egyptian officers interpret the call. A curious business he makes of it, when his fingers are half frozen; yet Bugler Mersál Abú Dunya is a man of ambition, who persistently, and despite the coarse laughter of Europeans, repairs for quiet practicing to the bush. We drink tea or coffee made by Engineer Ali Marie, or by Quartermaster Yusuf, not by Europeans; two camels supply us with sweet milk; butter we have brought; and nothing is wanted for complete comfort but bread.
We then separate to our work, after telling off the quarrymen to their several tasks. Inveterate idlers and ne’er-do-weels, their only object in life is not to labour; a dozen of them will pass a day in breaking ten pounds’ weight of stone. They pound in the style of the Eastern tobacconist, with a very short stroke and a very long stay. At last they burst the sieves in order to enjoy a quieter life. They will do nothing without superintendence; whilst the officer is absent they sit and chat, smoke, or lie down to rest; and they are never to be entrusted with a water-skin or a bottle of spirits. The fellows will station one of their number on the nearest hill, whilst their comrades enjoy a sounder sleep; they are the greatest of cowards, and yet none would thus have acted sentinel even in the presence of the enemy. These useful articles all expect a liberal “bakhshísh” when the journey is done, with the usual Asiatic feeling: they know that they deserve nothing, but my “dignity” obliges me to largess. On this occasion it did not.
Those told off to dig prefer to make a deep pit, because fewer can work together at it, rather than scrape off and sift the two feet of surface which yield “antíka’s.” They rob what they can: every scrap of metal stylus, manilla, or ring is carefully tested, scraped, broken or filed, in order to see whether it be gold. Punishment is plentifully administered, but in vain; we cannot even cure their unclean habits of washing in and polluting the fountain source. Three Europeans would easily do the work of these thirty poor devils.
Mr. Clarke is our camp-manager in general: he is also our jäger; he shoots the wild poultry, duck and partridge, sand-grouse, and “Bob White” the quail, for half our dinners; and the Arabs call him the “Angel of Death belonging to the Birds.” He failed to secure a noble eagle in the Wady ‘Afál, whose nest was built upon an inaccessible cliff: he described the bird as standing as high as our table, and with a width of six to seven feet from wing to wing. He also brought tidings of a large (horned?) owl, possibly the same species as the fine bird noted at Sinai. The Arabs call it classically Búmah, and vulgarly Umm Kuwayk (“Mother of Squeaking”): the Fellahin believe that it sucks out children’s eyes, and hence their name, “Massásah.” Here, as in the Sinaitic Peninsula, “the owl and the hyena are used as charms; and the burnt feathers of the former, and the boiled flesh of the latter (superior filth!), are considered as infallible specifics for numerous disorders.” In other parts of Arabia the hooting of the owl portends death; and the cry, Fát–fát, is interpreted, “He is gone, gone.”
The two Staff-officers make plans and sketches of the new places, or they protract their field-books, working very hard and very slowly. I have but little confidence in their route-surveys: sights are taken from mule-back, and distances are judged by the eye. True, the protractions come out well, but this is all the worse, suggesting the process commonly called “doctoring.” For the style of thing, however, “dead reckoning” did well enough.
M. Lacaze is the most ardent. Accompanied by his favourite orderly, Salámat el-Nahhás, an intelligent negro from Dár-For, he sets out after breakfast with a bit of bread, a flagon of water, a tent-umbrella, and his tools, which he loses with remarkable punctuality, to spend the whole day sketching, painting, and photographing. M. Philipin is our useful man: he superintends the washing-cradle; he wanders far and wide, gun in hand, bringing us specimens of everything that strikes the eye; and he is great at his forge: the Bedawin sit for hours, gazing attentively as he converts a file into a knife, and illustrating the reverence with which, in early days, men regarded Vulcan and Wayland Smith.
At eleven a.m. the bugle sounds Tijrí taakul! (“Run and feed”), a signal for déjeuner à la fourchette. It is a soup, a stew, and a Puláo (“pilaff”) of rice and meat, sheep or goat, the only provisions that poor Midian can afford, accompanied by onions and garlic, which are eaten like apples, washed down with bon ordinaire; followed by cheese when we have it, and ending with tea or coffee. George the cook proves himself an excellent man when deprived of oil and undemoralized by contact with his fellow Greeks. After feeding, the idlers, who have slumbered, or rather have remained in bed, between eight p.m. and six to seven a.m., generally manage a couple of hours’ siesta, loudly declaring that they have been wide awake. One of the party seems to live by the blessing of him who invented sleep, and he is always good for half of the twenty-four hours–how they must envy him whose unhappy brains can be stupefied only by poisonous chloral!
At two p.m., after drinking tea or coffee once more, we proceed to another four hours’ spell of work. As sunset and the cold hours draw near, all assemble about the fire, generally two or three huge palm trunks, whose blaze gladdens the soul of the lonely night-sentinel; and, assembling the Shaykhs of the Arabs, we gather from them information geographical, historical, and ethnological. The amount of invention, of pure fancy, of airy lying, is truly sensational; while at the same time they conceal from us everything they can; and, more especially, everything we most wish to know. Firstly, they do not want us to spy out the secrets of the land; and, secondly, they count upon fleecing us through another season. During the whole day, but notably at this hour, we have the normal distractions of the Arabian journey. One man brings, and expects “bakhshísh” for, a bit of broken metal or some ridiculous stone; another grumbles for meat; and a third wants tobacco, medicine, or something to be had for the asking. I am careful to pay liberally, as by so doing the country is well scoured.
Dinner, at seven p.m., is a copy of what was served before noon. It is followed by another sitting round the fire, which is built inside the mess tent when cold compels. At times the conversation lasts till midnight; and, when cognac or whisky is plentiful, I have heard it abut upon the Battle of Waterloo and the Immortality of the Soul. Piquet and écarté are reserved for life on board ship. Our only reading consists of newspapers, which come by camel post every three weeks; and a few “Tauchnitz,” often odd volumes. I marvel, as much as Hamlet ever did, to see the passionate influence of the storyteller upon those full-grown children, bearded men; to find them, in the midst of this wild new nature, so utterly absorbed by the fictitious weal and woe of some poor creature of the author’s brain, that they neglect even what they call their “meals ;” allow their “teas” to cool, and strain their eyesight poring over page after page in the dim light of a rusty lantern. Thus also the Egyptian, after sitting in his café with all his ears and eyes opened their widest, whilst the story-teller drones out the old tale of Abú Zayd, will dispute till midnight, and walk home disputing about what, under such and such circumstances, they themselves would have done. To me the main use of “Tauchnitz” was to make Arabia appear the happier, by viewing, from the calm vantage-ground of the Desert, the meanness and the littlenesses of civilized life–in novels.
The marching-day is only the halting-day in movement. By seven a.m. in winter and four a.m. in spring, we have breakfasted and are ready to mount mule or dromedary; more generally, however, we set out, accompanied by the Sayyid and the Shaykhs, for a morning walk. The tents and, most important of all, the tent-table are left to follow under the charge of the Egyptian officers, who allow no dawdling. With us are the cook and the two body-servants, riding of course: they carry meat, drink, and tobacco in my big tin cylinder intended to collect plants; and they prefer to give us cold whilst we fight for hot breakfasts. After resting between ten a.m. and noon in some shady spot, generally under a thorn, we ride on to the camping-ground, which we reach between two and three p.m. This is the worst part of the day for man and beast, especially for the mules–hence the necessity of early rising.
The average work rarely exceeds six hours (= eighteen to twenty miles). Even this, if kept up day after day, is hard labour for our montures, venerable animals whose chests, galled by the breast-straps, show that they have not been broken to the saddle. Accustomed through life to ply in a state of semi-somnolence, between Cairo and the Citadel, they begin by proving how unintelligent want of education can make one of the most intelligent of beasts. They trip over every pebble, and are almost useless on rough and broken ground; they start and swerve at a man, a tree, a rock, a distant view or a glimpse of the sea; they will not leave one another, and they indulge their pet dislikes: this shies at a camel, that kicks at a dog. Presently Tamaddun, as the Arabs say, “urbanity,” or, more literally, being “citified,” asserts itself, as in the human cockney; and at last they become cleverer and more knowing than any country-bred. They climb up the ladders of stone with marvellous caution, and slip down the slopes of sand on their haunches; they round every rat-hole which would admit a hoof; and they know better than we do where water is. They are not always well treated; the “galloping griff” is amongst us, who enjoys “lambing” and “bucketing” even a half-donkey. Of course, the more sensible animal of the two is knocked up; whilst the rider assumes the airs of one versed in the haute école. The only difficulty, by no fault of the mules, was the matter of irons: shoeless they could travel only in sand; and, as has been said, the farrier was forgotten.
Amongst our recreant Shaykhs I must not include Furayj bin Rafí’a el-Huwaytí, a man of whom any tribe might be proud, and a living proof that the Bedawi may still be a true gentleman. A short figure, meagre of course, as becomes the denizen of the Desert, but “hard as nails,” he has straight comely features, a clean dark skin, and a comparatively full beard, already, like his hair, waxing white, although he cannot be forty-five. A bullet in the back, and both hands distorted by sabre-cuts, attempts at assassination due to his own kin, do not prevent his using sword, gun, and pistol. He is the ‘Agíd of the tribe, the African “Captain of War;” as opposed to the civil authority, the Shayhk, and to the judicial, the Kázi. At first it is somewhat startling to hear him prescribe a slit weasand as a cure for lying; yet he seems to be known, loved, and respected by all around him, including his hereditary foes, the Ma’ázah. He is the only Bedawi in camp who prays. Naturally he is a genealogist, rich in local lore. He counteracts all the intrigues by which that rat-faced little rascal, Shaykh Hasan el-‘Ukbi, tries to breed mischief between friends. He is a walking map; it would be easy to draw up a rude plan of the country from his information. He does not know hours and miles, but he can tell to a nicety the comparative length of a march; and, when ignorant, he has the courage to say M’adri, “don’t know.” He never asked me for anything, nor told a lie, nor even hid a water-hole. Willing and ready to undertake the longest march, the hardest work, his word is Házir–“I’m here”–and he will even walk to mount a tired man. Seated upon