Encyclopaedia Britannica > Volume 3, Anatomy-Astronomy

350
ARABIA.
Arabia.
The great
dike.
El Yafa.
Hadhra-
maut.
rable metropolis of the Himyaritic kingdom, but neither he
/ nor any other European succeeded in penetrating to that classic
spot, till in 1843 an enterprising young Frenchman, Thomas
Joseph Arnaud, accomplished the task at the imminent risk of
his life. His description tallies with and confirms the accounts
of Niebuhr and others. Mareb, the splendid Mariaba metro¬
polis of Ptolemy, is now a miserable village surrounded by a
brick wall, but the environs are covered with ruins, testify¬
ing its past greatness, and marking the area it once covered.
The ancient residence of the queen of Sheba, or perhaps that
central portion of it which formed the city properly speaking,
was of a circular shape, about a mile in diameter, and encom¬
passed by a massive wall of free-stone. Within and without
its ruined precincts, lie scattered about innumerable fragments
of solid buildings, large square stones, portions of brick ma¬
sonry, friezes, and other house ornaments, and even whole
columns hewn out of a single block of the hardest limestone.
West of the ancient town are the ruins. They are the exten¬
sive remains of the outer wall of a palace which the inhabitants
call Haram Bilkis, “ the palace of Bilkis,” in memory of the
Sabasan or Himyaritic queen Bilkis, who is not only said to
have been the founder of that royal residence, but is also iden¬
tified with the queen of Sheba of Scriptural renown. A por¬
tion, about one fourth, of the wall is still standing, and covered
with Himyaritic inscriptions, of which Arnaud copied as many
as circumstances would allow him. Other inscriptions are
found on many of the large blocks which lie scattered about.
The ruins of the famous dike are to the east of the town.
There the bed of the Seil Dana, a torrent, dry in the summer,,
but swelling into a deep and impetuous river in the rainy sea¬
son, is hemmed in by two mountains, forming a gate through
which the flood rushes into the plain. Each of these moun¬
tains is called Balak. They are 600 paces asunder, and be¬
tween them the ruins of the stone dike occupy an area 300
paces long, between the bases of the two Balaks, and 175 paces
wide in the direction of the current. The portions leaning
against the projecting foot of the mountains are still in such a
state of preservation as to allow the examiner to guess their
destmation. _ There are many gates or openings in the wall
through which the water was allowed to escape into the plain
below ; they are in perfect preservation, and constructed at
difterent levels, so as to secure a regular supply. As far as
the travellers eye could reach from the adjoining hill, the bed
oi che Dana and the plain on either side was strewn over with
fragments of masonry, giving the whole the appearance of a
vast cemetery covered with tombstones. Previous to the
breaking of the dike, the wadi was fertile and cultivated for
a distance of seven journeys, but it is now a sandy desert
through which, m the rainy season, the torrent of the Dana
rushes on towards the interior. It seems to be the upper course
of the river which waters the Wadi Maifah, which opens to-
vards the sea below Nakab-el-Hadjar, and west of Hisan
w the Himyaritlc in!cripli0M whfch
tract bordered in the north by El Djof, and in the west
by the southernmost portion of the highlands of Yemen, and
^ Ras Seilan’iri tlie east by the Wadi
Y f ’TaVd 1Y} the south by the Indian Ocean, is called El
Y afa It is subdivided into several smaller districts. Along
the sea stretches a tehama. Above it rises a section of the
great southern mountain chain with peaks attaining an election
of above 5000 feet, such as Djebel Amzuk and Diebel Ham-
nmri. North of this chain the country is a high table land un
trodden by Europeans. The central portion of El Yafa is bi-
sected by a considerable river coming from Damar, in Yemen
and which, after baying washed the principal town, Yafa’
breaks through the high range and loses itself in the Land of
the tehama. But the river Meidam, on the frontiers of Yemen
is a permanent stream—a rare thing in Arabia—and in all
seasons of the year reaches the sea in the Bay of Tuwayi near
Aden. The high plateau of Yafa is barren, but the valleys
and slopes of the mountainous portion are fertile, well culti
vated, and well inhabited. Coffee is cultivated in Yafa but
only in its western parts.
Hadhramaut was a terra incognita until a very recent date
J he Europeans had heard of a Wadi Doan, praised by the
Arabs for its fertility, its numerous well-built towns, and its
flourishing commerce. But its position remained uncertain, aralii
Niebuhr, following the vague statements of some natives of . a'
Hadhramaut, who probably intended to deceive him with a
view to deter him from proceeding thither, placed it in the
far north-east of that province, at many hundred miles from
the place where it was subsequently discovered ; and all later
geographers blindly copied the mistake, although Seetzen, who
had drawn his information from more credible sources, deter¬
mined its position with approximative accuracy as early as the
beginning of this century. The lovers of Arabic geography
and antiquities, nevertheless, kept their eyes on that cele¬
brated wadi, as it was. expected that monuments and other
traces of the ancient Himyaritic power would be found there.
At last .the late Lieutenant Wellsted discovered Himyaritic
inscriptions at Hisan Ghorab, near Ras Kell or Dog Cape, and
others at Nakab-el-Hadjar, in the Wadi Maifah, which he had
ventured to visit. His account excited unusual interest in Eng¬
land and on. the Continent, and several distinguished scholars
devoted their energies towards the deciphering of these time-
honoured mysterious characters. Moved by such and similar
considerations, a man now entered the arena of discovery who
already takes rank among the most eminent explorers of Arabia,
although his sojourn in the unknown land was shortened by the
jealousy of fanatic Bedouins, and the account of his researches
has not yet been placed before the public.
. In the year 1843, the same in which the Frenchman Arnaud The Barer
discovered the ruins of Saba, the Baron von Wrede, a Ger-von Wrede,
man gentleman, who, during a long sojourn in Syria, Egypt,
and Arabia, had made himself thoroughly acquainted with the
Arabic language and oriental manners, started from Cairo with
a firm determination to explore the Wadi Doan and other parts
of Hadhramaut. He succeeded, though only partially, but
still at. the risk of his life. Travelling in the disguise of an
Egyptian, on a pilgrimage to the tomb of the prophet Hud,
he passed as such, in the eyes of the natives, for a consider¬
able time. Suspicion, however, arose, and he was ultimately
discovered to be a European and a Christian. He was thrown
into prison, and kept there during three days, hourly expect¬
ing death ; but the Sultan of Grein having succeeded in quiet¬
ing the fanatical Bedouins, who cried for his blood, granted
him life and liberty on condition of his leaving the country with¬
out delay. He did so under the safeguard of the sultan, but de¬
prived of his wardrobe, his money, his instruments, and many,
but fortunately not all, of his papers and drawings. After his
return to Cairo, he wrote an account of his researches and ad¬
ventures, from which the following outlines of Hadhramaut are
extracted.
. “ Hadhramaut” is said to mean “ the country of death,” Name,
either in allusion to its pathless deserts, or to the curse of the
prophet Hud, who, according to an old Arabic legend recorded
in the Koran (chap, vii., El Ahraf, and chap, xlvi., El Akhaf),
punished the unbelieving and blasphemous tribe of Ad, who
dwelt in that part of Arabia, by sending a fiery wind into the
country, which reduced the fertile fields to burning deserts, and
destroyed its inhabitants. But this etymology is questionable.
In its larger meaning, Hadhramaut comprehends the immense
tract between Yafa and Oman, which is separated from the
heart of the peninsula by the desert El Ahkaf. The traveller
only visited the south-western portion of it, namely, the Wadi
Doan., its environs, and the tract between it and the sea.
1 his province of Arabia, like all others bordering on the Mountains,
sea, consists of three distinct physical portions, yiz., firstly, a
narrow tehama intersected in some places, as at Ras Farlak,
by spurs of the inland mountains advancing upon the ocean,
and torminglofty projecting capes; secondly, a serrated moun¬
tain belt rising in terraces over the low land ; and, thirdly, an
inland plateau of great elevation overtowered here and there
by lofty peaks ; and, in other places, rent asunder by deep fis¬
sures which gradually expand into cultivated wadis and wide
luxuriant valleys, watered by streams which, according to the
season, are sometimes, ripling rivulets, at others impetuous
torrents. The mountain belt, an almost alpine chain, stretches
m one uninterrupted line from Yemen to the borders of Oman,
where it diminishes in height; but no general name having ever
been applied to it, that of the “ Himyaritic chain ” may be
lere suggested as not quite inappropriate. Beyond, that is
o ie north of, the high plateau, there is a sudden steep de-