ſº º ſº* , ， , ， º， º， º . ， , ， , ， , ， ， ， * * · * , ， , ， ， ， º！ º}Cºº ,º : * º. º∞ →■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ .e ` @ ***ſe º gael* * * * * * , ， ：• ſ-'，º （º， º* * · *• •º · … ，'.∞© º čº ſ gº·ej №rſ-~~ ~~~~， ，sae∞， ， ， ，~ ~№，----|-� ;***-（±√（√° ************************************** ！！！！！！！！！！！！！！!！！！！ --~--~- : ---- * * * =+-+ + + + 5 → - + - * ： · · ·، ، ، ، ، ، ، ، ، ، ، ، ، ، ، º … ：） --★ → • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •· · · · · · · · · * * *、 *∞ ſ. sº a & 8 * * * * * * * * * *, * ºr ºrº ºf a º - a & * * * * sº º Aº * * * * * * * ~ *-* * * : * ~ -r- ºr *** * *r = r * * *-* * * * * * * * * ~ *-* * * * * A 541571 & gº º zº ºr º .* **, * * * a a º y = A ---- …………………………………------------- - - - - -------- ------ - - - ----….……=…=……………！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！; （3）: №ſº• • •* •* • *-+ +----~~~<！-- ==><=~=~~======= <！-- --~~~~~ ！， ----.-.-.-- ~- - ~~~~=+，-，*，asº-~~~~<！--****… • • • •••••••••••• • •<==<！--***=***************= | l M. #Tººlbºy * Yaº res'W f : º F. - C i C TTTTTT.III ſº tº º is a c e a tº a sea - a sea c e s - a -aº - a cºa e º cº - jºſſ IIIT - \ºmmiſſiº ſº sº L of the (HIGAN *AN * É = E = Fº #: ſ |Jº f | TV)S 70 A3 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION WOL. II, A PERSON ATL NAIRBATIVE OF THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION BY WILLIAM FRANCIS AINSWORTH SURGEON AND GEOI, O GIST TO THE EXPEDITION PH. D.R., F.S.A.; F.R.G.S.; L.R.C.S.E. ; CORRESPONDING MEMBER OF THE GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY OF PARIS, OF THE GERMAN ORIENTAL SOCIETY, AND OF 'I'FIE MOLDAVIAN NATURAL EIISTORY SOCIETY I N T WO VO I, U M E) S WOL. II. ſº É º §2. §§ & lsº º º SS ſº $º ñº C §§ §§ G. §§ § § šš% $%lºš º º #Lº |\º º º º L ON DON IXEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, & CO., 1 PATERNOSTER SQUARE 1888 %- sº- (The rights of translation and of reproduction are reserved) Sº * CONTENTS OF T H E S E COND W O L U M E. BOOK IV—BABYLONIA AND KHALDAEA. CHAPTER I. THE PLAIN OF BABYLONIA . e † º dº II. BABYLON e g te e {e III. THE RIVERS AND CITIES OF BABYLONIA e & IV. TEIF BABYLONIAN MARSHIES • . e V. KHALDAEA . tº e gº - VI. THE FIGHT OF THE SACRED GROVE * & VII. THE MUNTIFIES ARABS . ë ge te º VIII. THE PALM GROVES OF THE EUPHRATES . * IX. BASSORA o © e & {º .* BOOK W.—WANDERINGS IN PERSIA. I. BUSHIRE tº e tº tº ſº tº II. THE PASSES OF THE PERSIAN APENNINES . III. A VISIT TO PERSEPOLIS . o o º IV. THE CAVE OF SEIAPUR e g tº § V. MUHAMMRAH-' A Bon E OF CONTENTION ' . . VI. THE TERRITORY OF MESENE ſº 6. & tº 4:04.885 & PAG I. 13 22 40 52 61 71 84 113 125 145 159 168 180 vi THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION BOOK WI.- ASCENT OF THE EUPHRATES, TIGEIS, AND KARUN. CHAPTER I. II. III. IV. V. VI. VII. VIII. II. III. IV. VI. VII. VIII. THE BIREAIKDOWN . * tº e gº ſº e THE CHA’AB ARABS. tº © g g g & THE SUGAR PLANTATIONS OF AHWAZ . & THE SAIBAEANS OR MANDAITES . THE EASTERN TIGRIS OR NAHR-WAN . THE HIGHWAY TO SUSA SELEU CIA AND CTESIPHON - THE CITY OF THE REIALIFS . tº s © e tº ſº BOOK WII.-KURDISTAN AND ASIA MINOR. KURD PASHALIK OF SULAïMANIYAH . THE GREATER AND LESSER ZAB A FIRST VISIT TO MOSUL AND NINEVEH NORTHERN ASSYRIA . § * º tº THE COUNTRY, OF THE JACOBITES . THE COPPER, MINES OF AIRG. HANA A BEAUTIEOl] S Bl]T NEGT/ECTIED COUNTRY FAREWELL TO THE ORIENT g * & APPENDIX. TABLE OF SITES ON THE RIVER, EUPHRATES TABLE OF SITES ON THE TIGRIS is a - º e * ISLAND OF MIELI]3CEA PAGE 191 205 219. 233 248 257 267 277 287 301 . 313 323 333 347 358 371 383 389 393 MOUNT ST. SIMON .. * DAPHINE SELETUCIA PIERIA MOUNT CASJUS 393 395 400 404 CONTENTS OF THE SECONI) VOLUME vii THE SYRIAN CROCODILE THE TELLS OR, MOUNDS OF NORTH SYRIA ABRAHAM'S FATHERLAND . CHAILCIDENE . HALAH CAIRCEIEMISH . D'URA BETEIAUNA SAOCORAS . FIERY FURNACIE NEHARDEA ARCHAEOILOGY OF KIHALDAEA . RUINS AT MU-KAYIR |UIR AND ORCHOIE IIST OF KIHALDAEAN KINGS TOMIB OF EZRA SULAïMANIYAH . TOMB OB' NAHUM . IROMAION AGER, . JEBEL JUIDI RABAHI JEZIRAH IIBN OMIAR NISIBIS MARDIN . CARICATEHIOCERTA AMIASIA . OSMANJIR TUSIYAH ANADYNATA TORAT . HAMMAM ALI THE IRENDIERING OF ORIENTAL WORDS INTO LETTERS INDEX . ROMAN PAGE 405 407 414 422 429 431 431 432 432 433 433 434 444 452 453 455 456 457 457 458 458 459 459 460 460 461 462 462 463 463 464 464 469 THE EUPEIERATES EXPEDITION. -->C= POOK IV.- BABYLONIA AND KHALDAEA. *-* CHAPTER I. THE PLAIN OF BABYLONIA. KALAH RAMADI, the Charmande of Xenophon, is thirty- two miles by river below Hit, and four miles below that is the district of Sura, with a canal and lake. This is the first derivative from the Euphrates, and is On the Arabian side. Neubauer, in his ‘ Géographie du Talmud, p. 365, calls it Nahr Sur or Sar. But it was also known as Sura of Rab, on Sura Lake, now Jazrün. Also as Sura of Perath or Frat (Euphrates). It is still called Sura, albeit pronounced at times Sora. According to the Talmud, Matha Meshaya, the Massices of the Romans, was a suburb of the city of Sura, one of the homes and seats of the learning of the captive Jews. The canal was also known to the Romans as the Nahr Sares, Maarsares, and Maarses of WOL. II. B 2 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Ptolemy. It was further, according to Pliny (vi. 24), the Chebar or Chobar of the Old Testament, the Kobar of the Septuagint (see also Cellarius, p. 630), and the Gobya of the Talmudists, upon the banks of which King Nebuchadnezzar planted a colony of Jews, among whom was the prophet Ezekiel. - It would appear that this canal was afterwards prolonged till it joined another derivative from the Euphrates, now known as the Hindiyah canal, and it became in after times the Pallacopas of Alexander the Great. - It is this union of two canals in the neighbourhood of the Birs Nimrūd (Bursif, or Borsippa) that led the Rabbi Petachia (p. 33) to identify the Chebar of the Captivity with the Hindiyah canal, and hence also after the junction it became the latter part of the Pallacopas as well as of the Nahr Sura. i It would appear also that Kalah Ramadi corre- sponds to the Ibn Hubeirah of Ibn Haukal as being on the way to the river of Sura, but it is not distinctly stated which side of the river the castle was on. The colonisation of the banks of the Habor or Khabür, and that on the Chebar or Sura, although confounded by Sir A. H. Layard, and of the district of Nehardea or Nahar Diyah, belong to different epochs. At a distance of twenty-two miles by river from the entrance into the plain of Babylonia is a site of interest in Babylonian history—the Sephar of Genesis (x. 30), and Sipar of the inscriptions, as also Tsipar sha Samas, or ‘Siphara of the Sun.’ It was also called Sepharvaim (Se Parvaim or Parvaim) in 2 Chron. iii. 6. THE PLAIN OF BABYLONIA 3 The site is known in the present day by the name of Sifarah, yet the Sipar of a remote antiquity became, by a mutation of S into H, the Hipparenum of Pliny, Hipparenorum Civitas, and the Harpanya of the Talmud. “Hipparenumjuxta Narragam, quicadit in Narragam, unde civitati nomen, says the Roman historian, and the site is only four miles distant from the canal also called Narraga by Pliny. This, perhaps the greatest and most important of all the derivatives from the Euphrates, is on the Babylonian side of the Euphrates, and it stretched from the upper part of the Babylonian plain to Accad, Baghdad, and Seleucia. The Narraga or Nahr-malcha, “the Royal river, washed the walls of a city and castle of olden times, called Abar, and which, under the name of Anbar, became the first seat of power of the Khalifs. It was known previously to the Persians under the name of Firüz Shapur, whence the Perisabora of Ammianus and the Schabor of the Talmudists. There was in the same neighbourhood a Nahar Agama which appears to have been connected with the lake to the northwards, for Akra de Agama was spoken of as a ‘fort On the lake.’ It was also known as Akka, Agama, Akra-Kanon, and Acracan, but the site has not been precisely determined. Known as the Saklawiyah in the present day, this first of the canals on the Babylonian side was anciently the Nahr-malcha or ‘Royal river’ of Babylonia. It is also so called in the Talmud (Neubauer, pp. 338–340) B 2 4 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Even in the time of Julian, Ammianus still knew it by the name of Naarmalcha. But the name appears to have become corrupted into Narraga by Pliny and Naarda by Ptolemy. The Naarda of Ptolemy has also been associated with Naharda, from dar, ‘a dwelling, nahar, ‘ On the river, and with Nehardea or Nahar Diyah, and hence the doubts as to the region of the Captivity, whether at Haditha, or on the Nahr-malcha. This canal has been navigated in recent times by one of Captain Lynch's steamers from the river Tigris to the Euphrates. Eight miles below the Saklawiyah canal is a village with an Arab castle, or square fortalice, which was in our time the place of starting for caravans for Baghdad. Major Estcourt and Charlewood having to go to the Residency in quest of specie, I was allowed to accompany them, and with Dr. and Mrs. Helfer, who might not otherwise have had an opportunity of visiting the city of the Khalifs, and Sayyid Ali for a guide, we made up quite a little party. | We had about half the distance to traverse on foot, to a point on the canal to which boats plied daily from Baghdad. Unfortunately we arrived at the place in question just as the boat had started. It was in vain that we made signals and fired our fowling-pieces; what in other countries would have been regarded as signals, were here looked upon as the imperious demands of kawasses or government authorities, who generally travel at other people's expenses. So no regard was paid to our noisy demonstrations. - We were thus reduced to the necessity of passing THE PLAIN OF BABYLONIA 5 the night supperless on the sand hills, for there were no huts in the neighbourhood, and were only too glad when at break of day an Arab peasant and his wife, who had seen the predicament we were in, no doubt, Over night, brought us some milk. At length the boatman made his appearance, and when Sayyid Ali had explained who we were, and that we were bound to the Residency, he was profuse in his apologies, and excused his not coming back on the plea that he thought we were travellers of quite a different description. We were, upon our arrival at Baghdad, courteously received and hospitably entertained by the then Resi- dent, Colonel Taylor. - We had, however, no time upon this occasion to ex- plore the great city. The steamer was waiting for us at Hillah, only two days' run from Felujah, so after a day's rest we started on our return journey across the plains of Babylonia. This was on the afternoon of June 8, 1836. We had charge of specie for the expedition, and as the moneys to circulate among the Arab peasantry were in coins of very small value (chiefly paras, equivalent to forty to the piastre of two-pence halfpenny), an in- considerable sum sufficed to constitute a donkeyload. The first part of the journey was, however, effected in a barge attached to the Residency, by which we de- scended the Tigris river for a short distance. Horses had been despatched in the morning, but owing to the detour rendered necessary by the flooded state of the plain, we did not come in contact with them until about 6 - THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION an hour after dark, at a spot where they were swim- ming across the river; so we had to bring up here, and bivouac until it was daylight, when we mounted our steeds to enjoy the cool air of the early morning, following for a time the banks of the river. On our way we came to the Nahr-malcha or Royal river before described. Passing through the heart of Babylonia, and connecting the Euphrates with the Tigris, this canal or river was, according to Herodotus and other historians, navigated by the Babylonians at a time when ‘ they took a pride in their ships, and emptying itself into the Tigris at a point where the Macedonian Seleucia arose upon the fall of Babylon, it was, according to Ammianus, the historian of Julian's exploits, the channel by which the Roman legions under Trajan and Severus, as well as those of the Eastern Empire under the apostate Emperor Julian, invaded the Greek colony and its opposite rival, the city of the Persians, After fording this canal, we entered the precincts of Seleucia by a gap in the long ridge of crumbling soil which, streaked with scraggy thorn bushes, marks out the ancient walls of the city. A few low mounds of debris, with fragments of pottery, is all that now re- mains on the surface of the capital of the Macedonians in this part of the world, and yet which retained, according to Gibbon, many years after the fall of their Empire, the genuine characteristics of a Greek colony — arts, military virtue, and the love of freedom –but sacked and burnt by the Romans, and enfeebled by the proximity of a too powerful rival, it was already a ruin THE PLAIN OF BABYLONIA 7 in the time of Julian, at which epoch there was near to it a hunting park or “paradise of the Persian kings, replete with long-maned lions, bears, and boars; and while only low mounds of ruins, brick and pottery, remain to attest to the former prosperity of Seleucia, there still arises, on the opposite bank of the river, the lofty arch or throne belonging to the palace of the Sassanian monarchs. We turned from the contemplation of these desolate ruins, which we had time to explore in greater detail at an after period, to proceed across the plain of Baby- lonia, coasting an extensive inundation, and came beyond it upon low, barren, and Sandy plains, whose only vege- tation was the ever-present mimosa or camel thorn, enlivened here and there by a few flowering plants, of which the ſaid damascena was the most beautiful and the most striking. The Caper-plant was also a pretty object, with a showy bloom. On Our progress we met a large caravan of Persians returning from a pilgrimage to the tombs of Hasan and Hussain. There were many ladies, carefully secluded in curtained tahkt-i-vans, and many of the pilgrims of the poorer classes followed painfully on foot; for this, as we have before observed, was in the month of June. The ground now began to rise in low undulations of gravelly soil, when on looking round for the donkey laden with specie, and which was under the charge of an Arab, it was nowhere to be seen. A little distance to the north of us was an Arab encampment, a horse picketed, and a black tasselled spear standing erect before each tent; so a kawass, attached to the Residency, 8 THE EUPHRATES ExPEDITION and who had been sent with us as a guide, Cantered away to the camp, and thence across the plain. The sun was now so powerful that pending the search for the donkey, most of the party had sought what little shelter they could obtain under the caper bushes. I had separated a little from the rest, not exactly liking the appearance of things, when I suddenly saw our kawass tearing across the plain, a mounted Arab behind him as if in full pursuit, with his spear bearing upon the flying Turk. I was mounted upon a beautiful horse, a Koshanli, belonging to Colonel Taylor's stud, so taking a pistol from the holster, I made what speed I could to intercept the Arab. As it happened, however, I only made a fool of myself; for observing the movement, both parties drew up, indicating that their equestrian evolutions were only by way of pas- time. - - Shortly afterwards the donkey came up from the southwards. The driver asserted that he had been going the most direct course, but he had for the time being been hid by one of those gentle and almost imperceptible undulations of the soil of which the Arabs know so well how to avail themselves. - As we were crossing a pebbly upland beyond this, we came upon a spot which the desert partridge or sand-grouse (Pterocles arenaria) had selected for a nestling place. So numerous and so close to one another were their nests, laid in slight cavities in the sand, that however painful it was to our feelings, we could not avoid trampling upon many. These birds are very gregarious, and I have seen THE PLAIN OF BABYLONIA 9 them come down on an evening to the river's brink in flocks of thousands to drink. Yet they were very diffi- cult to approach, and consequently never afforded us much sport as a game bird. Towards evening we came to a beaten path, much bur- rowed by the bee-eater, which seems to live at times in colonies; but, although the poor bird selects the trodden ground as more difficult for jackals and foxes to dig in pursuit of their nest, many of these appeared to have been recently dug up, and the bright-coloured wings of the bird itself were strewn plentifully around. This pathway led us in a short time to a much frequented khan on the plain, known as Khan Iskanderia. An absurd tradition exists that the Macedonian hero was buried at this place. But, after all, it is not more irreconcilable than history itself, for it is duly chro- nicled that the remains of Alexander were removed from Babylon to Alexandria; and yet Severus is described as immediately on his arrival at the first mentioned city sealing up the hero's tomb, which had been impiously broken open by the barbarians." We spent a part of the night at this khan, and I Selected as my place of repose a long seat of stone placed in the centre of the khan, and used by the Mussulmans to prostrate themselves in prayer. This I did, not on account of its sanctity, but to be further re- moved from the lively tenants of the alcoves and recesses of the place. * The tomb or sarcophagus of Alexander has, it is asserted, been recently discovered at Saida, ancient Sidon. If so, it must have been left there on the way from Babylon to Alexandria. I () THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Parting from such uncomfortable quarters at the first break of dawn, we passed a canal beyond which were the mounds of Toheibah, considered by some as belonging to one of the quarters of Babylon. Beyond this we stopped for breakfast at Khan Nassariyeh, where was a village amid a grove of date trees, and thence passing another khan and canal, we came upon a great mound of sun-dried bricks, which the natives heralded as ‘the mound of Babel.’ The sensation experienced on finding myself on the summit of the first of the gigantic mounds of ancient Babylon, from whence I could discern nothing around me but a succession of similar mounds of every shape and size, ruins of a city which has now only a home in the imagination, were of a very mixed character. Whatever may have been my previous expectations, Imore than found them realised by the size and solidity, and the immensity of labour, contained beneath these great piles and platforms thus artificially raised upon the plain; yet I could not help mingling with this feel- ing some disappointment at there not being some more perfect traces of the principal structures of this once mighty city. And not only was this the case, not only were the mounds not so lofty as I had expected to find them from prints that exaggerated their proportions, but when the elevation became afterwards subjected to actual admeasurement, it was so slight as to have since excited the incredibility of other travellers. Add to this, that while it is true that a few great mounds are loftier, better defined, and somewhat more THE PLAIN OF BABYLONIA 11 insulated than others, if they do not indicate the ex- tent of ancient Babylon, they may at least be supposed to have belonged to its more distinguished portion, and to be the remains of the palaces, temples, and towers, if not also the prisons, so renowned in antiquity; but even these were by no means so distinct as I had been led to opine from previous descriptions. The whole face of the country was covered with such a number of mounds of indeterminate figures, variety, and extent, as at first to almost preclude an attempt at arrangement. The shapeless heaps on which the traveller gazes cannot suggest in any degree either the nature or object of the structures of which they are the relics; and hence is it not at all remarkable that no two travellers, as Rich and Porter and others, have, after prolonged investigation, agreed either in the ac- count of their dimensions or in the more simple facts of their co-relation. About a mile from the mound of Babel is another group of mounds, connected together by a broad ridge like a causeway, but separated from the loftier and more isolated mound first mentioned by the dry channel of a canal or river, the former existence of which fur- nishes the best clue to the identification of the mounds with ancient sites. These mounds are also flanked by an embankment on the side of the Euphrates, and are further associated with, to the eastwards, a low series of mounds, which extend from a point about two miles north of Hillah for a distance of nearly three miles to- wards the South-east corner of the mound of Babel. The direction of these mounds is, however, so in- 12. THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION definite that they have been looked upon by Rich as circularly disposed, and by Porter as two straight lines converging to an angle. They appear to have em- braced the space now occupied by two great mas- sive mounds, the Mujaliba and the Kasr, and other smaller mounds, representing in fact the space and build- ings which according to Diodorus and Strabo were sur- rounded by three walls, of which the external was sixty stadia, or six miles, in circuit. Some of the officers of the Expedition had, a day before our arrival, disinterred a rude sculpture of co- lossal dimensions from near the ruin of the Kasr, which had been called a lion by Rich, but which they thought was rather an elephant with the trunk broken off. - Here I also found a solitary tamarisk tree, of a species which grows in Persia, but not on the Euphrates. An interesting fact, as showing that, whether springing from a seed or roots of the old hanging gardens or not, it, or its ancestors, had been Originally transported to the spot. A local tradition relates that Ali tied his horse to this tree after the battle of Hillah. The same day, passing the town of Hillah and the bridge of boats, we reached the steamer “Euphrates, which was moored above the bridge, and on the Arabian side of the river. CHAPTER II. BABYLON. HILLAH is a small town occupying both banks of the river, and connected by a bridge of boats. The bazaar is on the Babylonian side, where also dwell the few Christians and Jews that are to be found here. The Arabs solely inhabit that part of the town which lies On the right bank of the river, and their homes are mere huts of mud and palm branches; but they have an Arab castle in which the governor of the place resides. - We had a small quantity of Manchester goods on board, and Mr. Rassam found that he could not only dispose of them at almost fancy prices among the Jews of Hillah, but they would have taken the whole lot off our hands. This was not, however, the object with which they were brought. It was simply to test the markets we might be thrown in contact with. By crossing from Felujah to Baghdad, and returning thence by the central plain of Babylonia to Hillah —which is in reality the modern representative of Babylon—I missed some sixty miles of the river navi- gation. 14 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION I may therefore mention here, that the first canal met with below Felujah was at a distance of only five miles, the so-called Abū Ghurraib, the Nahr Isa of Yakut. Next, at a distance of six miles, came the Ruth- waniyah, with a ruin called Hüb es Sük. Then, nine miles more, the celebrated Mahmudiyah, or Nahr Malikah, which would appear to have been the chief canal in the time of the Khalifat. It is called the Nahr-Malcha-Saba in the Talmud, to distinguish it from the northern Nahr-Malcha (Baba Megia, 106 b.) Next, at a distance of twelve miles, comes the Al Kithr, with an imam known as Kutah, and hence sup- posed to be the site of the ancient Cush or Kutha. Near it is a khan, known by the name of Alexander (Iskanderia), and also as Khan Haswa or Kuhnaswah, a remarkable approximation to Cunaxa, or more properly, Kunaxa. Beyond this point comes the Nahr Kutiyah, with the so-called mounds of Muhammad—relics of olden times. Thirteen miles from Cush or Kutha is the Arab town of Mussaiyib, or Moseyb of Bewsher, with a bridge of boats. Four miles below this, the Hindiyah takes its departure on the Arabian side of the river. This was the Perath of Borsip, or “river of Borsippa,’ of the Talmud, and part of the Macedonian Pallacopas. Hence Rabbi Petachia identified it with the Chebar of Scrip- ture. Eight miles below the Hindiyah, on the Baby- lonian side, is the Muhawil, and six below this the Nahr Nil, or Nilus—the Babylonian Nile—the position of which, encircling as it did in ancient times the site of Babylon, assists in the identification of the existing BABYLON & h 15 mounds with the sites of olden times. The bridge of boats at Hillah crosses the river some four miles below the mounds. My explorations of the mounds of Babylon resulted in my determining that the great mound to the north, with a superficies of 49,000 feet, the Mujelibe of Rich, was known to the natives as the mound of Babel. This was in 1836, and it was so adopted by Loftus in 1849, and by Layard in 1850. Oppert assigned to the same mound the temple of Belus or Merodach, which rose upon the ruins of the tower of Babel, and which was afterwards a fortress. The second or central mound, with a superficies of 120,000 feet, is the Mujaliba, plural of jalib, a slave or captive, or the ‘house of the captives.’ It has also been read as if it were Mukallib, from Kilba, ‘the over- turned or overthrown. It was from being viewed in this light, and being the largest mound, that it was held by previous explorers as the site of Babel. It is sepa- rated from the north mound by the bed of an old canal —the Nile of Babylonia, and it has since been recognised under the name of Mujaliba by Layard and Loftus. Then come two mounds, the northerly of which, 700 yards in length and breadth, and called the Kasr or palace, was apparently the site of the royal residence of Nebuchadnezzar; while the southerly mound, known as Amran ibn Ali, with a superficies of 53,000 feet, appears to represent the queen's palace, and the seat of the hanging gardens. The name of Kasr was previously given to both mounds, presenting a superficies of 104,000 feet. 16 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Outside of this central group of mounds are a mound called Al Heimar or Hamra, “ the red, an Kalalah, with a superficies of 16,000 feet, and a ruin on the summit, whence its additional name, and a vast mass of mounds known as Ibrahim Khalil, or “Abraham the beloved,’ with a superficies of 217,000 feet, and a small mosque. TABULAR VIEW OF MOUNDS OF BABYLON FROM NORTH TO SOUTH. 1. Babel.—Square superficies 120,000 feet. Height 64 feet. 2. Mujaliba.--Superficies 120,000 feet. Elevation 28 feet. 3 and 4. Two mounds.- 1. North mound. Kasr or palace. 2. South mound. Amran ibn Ali. Hanging gardens. Total superficies 104,000 feet, and 67 feet high, or with the Beres or stone monument (47 feet 5 inches) 115 feet. • 5. Ibrahim Khalil.—Superficies 217,000 feet. Elevation 32. 6. Al Heimar am Kalalah.-Superficies 16,000 feet. Height 44, or with ruin on Summit, 92 feet. This rearrangement of the mounds met, as might have been anticipated, with some opposition when first published in my “Researches' &c., in 1838. Mr. James Baillie Fraser, a traveller in the same countries, and therefore an authority upon the subject, wrote in his work on ‘Mesopotamia and Assyria,’ 1842, to the following effect: “A late and very acute traveller, Mr. Ainsworth, whose work has already been referred to, has suggested a change of names for the several ruins which he thinks will simplify the investigation.’ ‘This (after discussing at length the views enter- tained by previous travellers), ‘the Mujelibe, he says, BABYLON 17 ought to be called Babel; and he applies the former term to the Kasr, which last appellation he again bestows upon the mound called by Mr. Rich “the embankment.” We do not know to what extent he prosecuted his dis- coveries on the spot, but it appears to us that, had he in- quired minutely, he would scarcely have found grounds on which to rest his new nomenclature’ (p. 144). Mr. J. Baillie Fraser also thinks that I am greatly in error in the elevation given to the different mounds. It is possible I may have made some mistake, ‘huma- num est errare;’ but I have gone over my original notes and measurements carefully without being able to detect such, considering how undefined are the real limits of the mounds. It is stated by Herodotus that the temple of Belus and the king's palace occupied two inclosed and fortified places, one on each side of the river. This statement has led to much confusion, the “river being looked upon as the Euphrates instead of what was meant, the Babylonian Nile. Hence Oppert and others have sought for the temple at Borsippa, and Heeren and others have sought for a western palace on the Arabian side of the Euphrates. But we learn from the Arabian geographers, espe- cially Abū-l-fada, that the Euphrates divided into two branches at Babylon, One flowing north of Babel, the Other, called the Nil, flowing between Babel and the Mujaliba and the Kasr or palace. This canal seems even to have been considered as the largest branch of the Euphrates, and was in its prolongation known as the Nahr Sares, a name which, being indicative of “fetid or sluggish, is applied to several other canals. WOL. II. C 18 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION The northern quarter of Babylon appears itself to have been known by the name of Nil, for Abū-l-fada describes what he calls the main stream of the Frat as flowing to the city of Nil, and giving off the canal of Nil, after which it is called Sirat or Sares. Hence D'Anville notices a town called Nilus, without having had a definite idea as to its position. . An eminent Assyriologist, Dr. Hincks, has, in the article “Babel’ in the ‘Bible Dictionary, after discuss- ing the views entertained by Rich, Rennell, and Pietro della Valle, who identify the Mujaliba with the ‘Mount of Babel’ and temple of Belus, adds:– Ainsworth re- claimed for the northern ruin the name of Babel, as that popularly given to it by the Arabs, and notwith- standing the opposition of Fraser, he has been followed by Layard and Loftus, and is now generally admitted to be right.’ - I need scarcely add that the archaeological re- searches of Layard and Loftus, and the erudition of modern Assyriologists, foremost among whom stands Sir Henry Rawlinson, have contributed since my time largely to our knowledge of the remains and inscrip- tions found at these mounds, adding thereby greatly to our acquaintance with the history and habits and manners of the ancient Babylonians; but they have not altered the disposition allotted to the sites as associated with the ruins, but on the contrary, both at Babylon and at Borsippa, have tended to confirm them. The Arabs of Hillah, although residing in a town, and under a Turk or Osmanli ruler appointed by the Pasha of Baghdad, had from the onset shown much RAIBYLON - 19 jealousy at the arrival of a steamer among them ; their anger concentrating against the person of Our pilot, without whose assistance they thought we never could have found our way to their town. The poor man was accordingly kept out of the way till the morning of our departure, when he was to go ashore, as previously arranged, under the protection of the governor of the place. - - The revengeful Arabs had, however, watched their opportunity, and One of them rushed at him in the transit between the vessel and the castle, and cut him down with a blow of his war-hatchet. Luckily for us the steam was just up, and such was the indignation felt, especially by our commander, whose guide the man had been on his first journey, at such a gross. Outrage, that all alike were prepared for retaliation. But the Arabs were prepared to sup- port their countryman, and Dr. Ross, who had accom- panied our party from Baghdad, and had been left on shore preparatory to Our departure, came alongside to inform Colonel Chesney that the Arabs were arming, which indeed was easily visible, for the dense crowd that lined the shore had disappeared, and only here and there the Arabs were seen, skulking from hut to hut, or taking up a position behind fences of date branches. The governor had ordered the bridge to be thrown Open, so that there was no communication except in their circular little gopher boats between the two parts of the town. Quitting the banks, where our position (the ship's decks being on a level below that of the bank) was C 2 20 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION most unfavourable to dictate terms, and still more so in case of active hostilities, the steamer sped its way down the channel, and passed through the bridge. Observing this, and fancying that we were beating an ignoble retreat, the Arabs came forth from their hiding places, and lined the banks, forming a dense body of musketeers, several thousands in number, and extending nearly a mile along the river banks. Their triumphant shouts of defiance rang through the date groves, and from side to side of Euphrates. ‘There are a good many of them,' I ventured to remark to the Colonel, who was standing near me on the aft-deck. (Sergeant Quin and his men had taken up their position at the nine-pounder on the fore- castle.) - - ‘The more we shall have to kill, retorted the Colonel—a rare mode of speech with him, who was always so favourable to the Arabs, and particularly opposed to quarrelling or fighting with them ; but he was really very angry, and perhaps he also spoke in such a tone, as he thought, to keep up my spirits. Orders to bring the steamer about and turn her head to the stream were now given; and, to our great satisfaction, and to the infinite surprise of the dusky warriors who lined the bank, the black-looking steamer (‘Eblis, as they had named her) now took her way up against the current with almost the same ease that she had gone down the stream, and again passing the bridge, took up a commanding position, which action on our part seemed to awe the enemy. They at Once saw the meaning of our proceedings. BABYLON 21 4-d They had been drawn, by ignorance of the steamer's power to stem the current, out of their cover. They knew, indeed, and they could see we had guns On deck, but happily not a musket was fired, or it would most assuredly have been a signal for hostilities. Their huts being built mainly of dry date branches, the discharge of a few rockets would have brought about an universal conflagration. - So, after a short pause, the ship was steered up to the castle, and Major Estcourt and Mr. Rassam started On the rather dangerous venture of going ashore in a boat ; but they landed in Safety, and gaining the governor's presence, assured themselves first, that the guilty party had been made a prisoner of, and that, Secondly, he should be sent to Baghdad, there to be tried under the eye of the British authorities. The governor also promised an indemnity to the wounded pilot. Thus ended a sad affair, which promised for a moment to bring about some dire catastrophe. 2 2 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION CHAPTER III. THE RIVERS AND CITIES OF BABYLONIA. THE lofty tower, called by the Arabs the Birs Nimrūd, was distinctly visible from the mounds of Babylon on the Arabian side of the river. Although I had not the time or means of paying it a personal visit, my attention, as well as that of others, was naturally called to so gigantic a structure rising Out of the plain. Looked upon by some as a quarter of Babylon, and by others as the remains of the tower of Babel itself, I pondered over what it might be. The word Birs could not be satisfactorily explained as in any way connected with the Arabian language, and I found that all attempts to deduce it from the Hebrew had failed, as they were founded on a change of the radical letters. In the Khaldaic Sidra Rablia of the Sabaeans, it is, however, mentioned under the name of Bürsif, and from this it was easy to proceed to the identification with the Borsippa of Strabo and other olden geographers. Strabo describes the city so called as being fifteen miles from Babylon, and as a famous manufacturing town. It was indeed from Birs, or Bursif, that the produce of the Birsaean looms derived its name. THE RIVERS AND CITIES OF BABYLONIA 23 ! Josephus in Apion (“Op., p. 1045), relates that Nabonnedus, flying from Cyrus, shut himself up in the town of Borsippa, which Heeren (in his ‘Asiat. Nat.,’ vol. ii. p. 202), reads was imprisoned there by Cyrus. Ptolemy notices the same place under the name Barsita. Beferences to Borsippa are also met with in the Inscriptions of Nebuchadrezzar II., as translated by the Rev. C. J. Ball, in the ‘ Proc. of the Soc. of Bib. Archaeology, vol. x. No. 2." ‘The temples of Borsippa I made, I maintained.’ “For the son of the house that shattereth the sword of my foes, his house in Borsippa I made. For Gula, the lady that maketh whole my flesh, Egula, Etilla, Ezibatilla, her three temples in Borsippa I made. For Rimmon that raineth the rain of plenty in my land, his house in Borsippa in fair wise I built.” Like all towns in Babylonia (if it can be so called, being in Arabia), it had its canal. The Hindiyah, still in existence, was, we have before seen, known to the Hebrews as the Perath or Frat of Borsippa, and Marudi, in his “Universal History,’ notices it under the name of Nahr al Birs. I was thus induced to identify the site with the Bursif or Borsippa of olden times,” and Sir Henry Rawlinson has since certified to the identity by finding the name of the place inscribed on its bricks. Dr. Hincks, in the ‘Bible Dictionary, art. Babel, * So Mr. Ball spells the name; but I have elsewhere held by the old Biblical Orthography. * Researches dºc., pp. 167, 168. 24 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION says: ‘It was maintained nearly fifty years ago by Rich, that this Birs Nimrūd . . . was not only the temple of Belus of Herodotus, but the Biblical tower of Babel. As to the former identification, he has been followed by Oppert and Rawlinson, and there can be no doubt that they are right.” - But this identification I believe to be founded upon a misconception, as I have before pointed out, of the meaning of Herodotus. What he says is that the temple of Belus and the king's palace occupied two inclosed and fortified places, one on each side of the river. The river here alluded to was the Nile of Baby- lonia, which in ancient times was as large as the Euphrates itself. It is evident that the context alludes to places in proximity to One another, not to places situate nine miles apart. Borsippa may have had a temple of Belus itself, and most likely it had such, but a glance at the country from the mounds of Babylon would satisfy the most casual observer that it never could have been either a quarter of Babylon or the seat of the temple of Belus in that city. “It is almost certain, however,’ say Dr. Hincks, “that Birs is a relic of the ancient name Borsippa. This was, we believe, first suggested by Ainsworth, but the identity of this site with the ancient city or suburb of Borsippa was first established by Rawlinson, who found in the ruins clay cylinders with inscriptions in which Nebuchadnezzar describes the works that he had carried on there, calling the place Borsippa.” Strabo describes the city as being fifteen miles from Babylon, and inhabited by Borsip- pean, in contradistinction to Orchenian Khaldaeans, THE RIVERS AND CITIES OF BABYLONIA 25 The name appears in the lexicon of the Talmud as Beresith, but as before observed, in the Sidra Rablia of the Khaldaeans as Bursif, and Berosus calls it Borsiph, from whence Strabo and Stephanus got their Borsippa. That it had its temple there can be no doubt, from the great edifice still extant, and which has been so minutely described by Sir Henry Rawlinson. This temple would be dedicated to the greatest of the Khaldaean deities, that is Bel, Ba'al, or Belus. Strabo said it had a temple to Apollo and Diana; that is to say, the Sun and moon, both worshipped in Khaldaea under other names. A number of Khaldaean priests and artificers had taken up their abode at this place, and hence it became as celebrated for its learning as its manufactures. Alexander the Great had the curiosity to visit the spot, from, D'Anville remarks, the desire he always manifested of discoursing with the philosophers of those countries which he visited. Justin, to whom we are indebted for this fact, calls it Barsita. This name appears to have been gradually corrupted to Birs. The Kamus notices Birs as a town or district between Hillah and Kufah. The Talmud, we have seen, notices its canal as the Perath of Borsippa, and Marudi calls it the Nahr al Birs. Arab tradition has, as usual, added to the name of the temple the name of the ‘mighty hunter, and called it Birs Nimrüd. There is one point in the identification of the mounds of Babylon which has always struck me as unsatisfac- tory, if not even objectionable. It is that one of its chief mounds and most centrally situated, should be called Mukallib, or ‘the overturned or overthrown.” As 26 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION to the tradition of Harūt and Marūt, handed down by D'Herbelot, that near the foot of the mound is an invisible pit, where rebels were hung with their heels upwards, and which has furnished some with the reading of Mukallib as the “overturned or overthrown, it seems to be very far-fetched. I have sought for an explanation of the name of the mound (Mujaliba) as the ‘home of the captives, pos- sibly the Jews; a view which is rather strengthened than opposed to the tradition attached to the place as one of punishment of rebellious prisoners. I have, however, since found this explanation to be corroborated by a passage in D'Anville, who obtained from the manuscripts of a barefooted Carmelite—the Rather Emmanuel of St. Albert, visitor of the missions of his order in the East, and who died bishop in partibus—a statement to the effect that the Jews estab- lished in Babylonia still designate the ruins in question as ‘the prison of Nebuchadnezzar; upon which D'Anville remarks, he ought rather to have said “the palace; but all the names and traditions of the place appear to coincide in the same view of the subject, and from this great edifice it is not improbable that Daniel may have expounded the mysterious warnings of the Most High, and upon the same site, Shadrach, Mesach, and Abednego may have experienced the signal pro- tection of that Almighty power whom they feared and obeyed." Let the name of the place be read either way, as Mujaliba, the ‘home of the captives, or Mukalib, “the * Appendix No. 16. THE RIVERS AND CITIES OF BABYLONIA 27 overturned or overthrown, it comes to pretty nearly the same thing—the prison of the rebels, or their place of punishment, and of their being hung up by the heels. The last cannot be made to apply, as some have done, to the overthrow of the tower of Babel. If so vast and so central an edifice was really a prison, it does not speak well for the humanity of the Babylonian monarchs, who must have had bewailing and grieving in their very midst. We find further corroboration of the destination of the place in the Inscriptions of Nebuchadrezzar II., as translated by the Rev. C. J. Ball, in ‘Proc. of the Soc. of Bib. Archaeology, vol. x. No. 2, p. 105, where allusion is made to ‘the house of victims, the exalted resting- place of the lord of the gods, Merodach.’ The importance of Babylon as a city, and its suc- cessful revolt after its conquest by Cyrus, obliged the first monarchs of the Arsacide or Persian dynasty to reside there alternately with Susa and Ecbatana at a time when Persepolis had risen into importance as the place of sepulture of the ‘Great Kings, and thus it gradually became the capital of the whole empire. We have, however, few accounts of the condition of the country at that period. Herodotus and Ctesias, the books of Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther, and the Zend Avesta of the Persians, are the chief authorities. In the time of Artaxerxes II. Xenophon makes known to us the ‘Gates of Babylonia, at the termina- tion of the Median Wall and commencement of the plain; the village of Cunaxa where the battle was fought, and Sitace, whither the ten thousand repaired 28 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION previous to crossing the Tigris. These latter names must be much corrupted. Cunaxa. Only exists in Plutarch, but Sitace was also known to Pliny, Ptolemy, and Strabo. Stephanus having written the word Psittaca, Bochart suggested that the name was derived from the abundance ‘ Psittaciorum, Seu, quod idem est, pistachiorum ' (pistachio nuts); which far-fetched ety- mology only proves how vain it is to speculate upon the origin of words which are themselves corrupted forms of the original. . The Athenian historian describes the plain of Baby- lonia as being at that time traversed by four canals, which were derived from the Tigris, each one hundred feet in breadth, and deep enough for barges laden with corn to sail therein. These are further described as being only three miles distant from one another, and having bridges over them. Xenophon is corrected by Arrian, Pliny, and Strabo, On the point as to the canals being derived from the Euphrates rather than from the Tigris, and also as to the distances given of the One from the other, which would appear to be an error arising from hearsay information, as the first must have been a slip of the pen. At this time, Opis, described by Xenophon as a large and populous city, stood at the departure of the Phys- cus, afterwards the Katur, from Tigris, and at the head or eastern extremity of the Median Wall. This city rose into eminence upon the decline of the great Assyrian cities, but it was soon destined to decay in its turn." * What remains in the present day of this once opulent city is minutely described by Dr. Ross in the tenth volume of the Journal of the Royal Geographical Society, p. 121 et seq. THE RIVERS AND CITIES OF BABYLONIA 29 When Alexander the Great took up his residence in Babylon, intending apparently to make it the seat of his Empire, he explored the marshes of Babylonia, and established an opening, or rather cleared an open- ing, for the outlet of Pallacopas, at a distance of seventy-six miles to the south of Babylon. The Euphrates, on the authority of Abū-l-fada, after giving off the Nil, was divided into two streams, the southernmost of which passed into Kufa (that is on the Arabian side), and going beyond it, was lost in the marshes of the Rumiyah. The map attached to Mr. Loftus' work gives a good idea of what these marshes are in time of flood—a state of things which Alexander endeavoured to remedy by opening the Pallacopas. He is also represented as having founded a city at the mouth of the canal, named as usual after himself, and which appears to be represented by the existing Diwaniyah. This, however, was in the time of Abū-l-fada ; for at a period anterior to that, this great Arabian canal, starting as the Chebar from Sura, flowed past Borsippa, where it was joined by the Hindiyah canal, also called the Chebar by some, onwards to Kufa, beyond which Alexander made an attempt to relieve its surplus waters, and thence by Ur or Orchoe (Mu-kayir), until it ultimately emptied itself into the Persian Gulf, in the neighbourhood of Teredon. A road attributed to Semiramis is also described as extending in early times across the plain from Babylon to Susa, and the traces of the bridge by which this road was carried across the Tigris are still to be 30 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION seen, and near it are extensive mounds of ruin on both sides of the river, respectively known as Sarūt and Filifat. After the death of Perdiccas, Seleucus Nicator laid the foundations of the city, which bearing his name— Seleucia—became the successor of Babylon and the capital of the Macedonian conquests in Asia. This, no doubt, in consequence of, after having driven the Persians from Babylon, they had still to confront the power of the Persians who held the other side of the river Tigris. This city is described as having attained great power, riches, and population ; but, Sacked and burned by the lieutenants of Trajan, this European colony in the heart of Asia owed its downfall more to the destruc- tiveness of the Romans than to the rivalry of the Persians. It had scarcely recovered when it was again burnt by the generals of Marcus Verus, and it was found almost deserted by Severus. Julian repaired its fortifi- cations preparatory to the siege of the Sassanian capital, Ctesiphon. Resuscitated by the Persians under Shapur's successor, Ardashir Babagan, it became, under the name of Wadi Sir, or the valley of Ardashir, the Guedesir of the historians of the middle ages, and the place of refuge of Khusrau Parwiz when flying before the victorious arms of Heraclius. Nothing but a number of low mounds, small frag- ments of ruin, and sepulchral urns, every now and then laid bare by the flowing waters, show where once dwelt six hundred thousand Greeks and barbarians. THE RIVERS AND CITIES OF BABYLONIA 31 But what a mine of wealth lies buried under these mounds, undisturbed for ages, to the archaeologist of the future ? The Persians, jealous of the power and prosperity of the Greek colony, and anxious to retain their own, pitched their camp On the plain opposite to Seleucia, and the little village of Ctesiphon, becoming the resi- dence of the Sassanian kings, soon swelled up to be a great city. It is unnecessary to detail the important part which this new capital was destined to play in the wars of the Romans and the Persians. Finally destroyed by the ruthless Arabs, under Sayyid, the lieutenant of Omar, the followers of the Prophet adopted the garden (Bagh) of Dad (a local deity) as the seat of their power, and a colossal ruin, One of the most remarkable on or ad- jacent to the plain of Babylonia, even when contrasted with the lofty brick edifices of the Birs Nimrūd and Akka Kuf, and designated as the Takht-i-Khusrau, or the throne of Khosroes, still remains to attest to the magnificence of the Sassanian capital. But the unformed masses of brick that still attest to the labour and industry of the Babylonians of old are invested with the glamour of a greater antiquity and the mystery of a civilisation which in the present day can rather be peered into than unfolded into the perfect light of day. Mention is made in antiquity of a town or fort in connection with Seleucia called Kochos or Koche, the true position of which it is difficult to determine. Ammianus (xxiv. 18) says that Seleucia, before it was 32 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION embellished by Seleucus Nicator, was called Koche, but the same author, in cap. xxi., notices Koche as beyond the Tigris. Arrian designates Koche as a suburb of Seleucia, while Eutropius (ix. 12) notices Koche and Ctesiphon as two noble cities, meaning, as Cellarius justly remarks, Seleucia. . - Nazanianzenus, speaking of the strength and re- sources of Ctesiphon, notices Koche as a castle attached thereto. “The ruins of Seleucia, says Bell in his “Geo- graphy’ (vol. iv. p. 181), “if such exist, lie three miles up the ancient canal of the Naharmalcha, and have been confounded by all travellers, even by Buckingham and Keppel, with those of Kochos.’ There are, however, few points on which antiquity is better agreed, even if the existence of the ruins was not deemed satisfactory, than that Seleucia was on the Tigris. Polybius (v. 48), Plutarch in ‘Life of Lucullus’ (p. 506), Strabo (xvi. 511), Isidorus of Charax (p. 5), all attest to this point. Pliny and Ammianus further tell us that it was founded at the point where the Royal river, or, as the historian of Julian's exploits calls it, ‘Trajan's canal, falls into the Tigris. D'Anville's opinion that Seleucia was built near to |Koche seems to be the best solution of the difficulty. This place was the same as the El Kürsh, as it is more correctly written by the Arabs, and it is particularly noticed by Elmacinus in his ‘History of the Saracens.’ Benjamin of Tudela says, that in his time “there were twenty-eight Jewish Synagogues in Baghdad and Alcorcha, which is beyond Tigris.’ It would appear from this that the place (if the name was not trans- THE RIVERS AND CITIES OF BABYLONIA 33 ferred to the western suburb of Baghdad), still existed in his time. But all testimony points to a site of this name, at a point, always of importance, as that of the junction of the Royal river with the Tigris, and hence frequently confounded with Seleucia itself. - When Anushirwan was deterred by superstition or resentment from approaching the gates of Ctesiphon, he established his residence at Dastagerd, the splendour of which has been the theme of much Oriental exaggera- tion. It is certain, however, that when Heraclius reached the royal seat, though much treasure had been removed and much had been expended, the remaining wealth appears to have exceeded the hopes of his followers, and even to have satiated their avarice. The city of Dastagerd appears to have risen near the site of ancient Opis. It became a Syrian episcopacy, under the name of Beit Saluk, and is now known as Eski or ‘old’ Baghdad. - - In the time of Nero or Vespasian, Vologeses, as he is called by the Latins, a king of the Parthians, founded a city called after himself Vologeso-Kerta, on the river Maarsares, and according to the Peutingerian Tables, only eighteen Roman miles from Babylon. I have not myself examined the site, which appears to have been on the Western Euphrates, not far from Borsippa. The kingdom of Hira appears to have been founded also in the Arabian portion of Babylonia, and on the same river or canal, at a very early period. The feeble- ness of the Persian monarchy had left the wandering Arabs possessors of the banks of the Euphrates early in the third century of the Christian era. Malik or WOL. II. . - D 34 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION ‘King’ the First established himself at Anbar, in Baby- lonia, but Amru, the third king, transferred the seat of power to Hira. On the Pallacopas, and near Vologesia, where it continued till swallowed up in the Muhammadan conquests A.D. 633. The epithet Al-Mundar attached to these princes of a short-lived Christian dynasty has caused them to be known in history by the name of the Almondar kings. After the death of Ali, an imām or mausoleum was erected to his memory at Hira, known as the Masjid Ali. This place is to the Persians what Mekka is to the Sunnis, a place of pilgrimage, and every devout Shi‘ah wishes to be buried at the sacred shrine. One of the sons of Ali, the prophet Husain, whose sad fate after the battle of Siffin, on the banks of the Euphrates, is so painfully narrated by Ockley, was buried in an adjacent site known as Kerbillah, and in which the imām or masjid erected to his memory is almost as holy a place as Masjid Ali. The possession of these two holy places of the Shi‘ahs has, from the emoluments they bring with them, been a frequent source of dispute and even warfare between the Sunnis and the Shi‘ahs. In the same neighbourhood was an ante-Muham- madan site, known as Kadesia, and renowned in history as the spot where the fate of Persia was determined by the prowess of the Khalif Omar. After the first conquest of Babylonia by the Saracens, they did not adopt any of the old cities on the plain as the seat of power, but preferred remaining on the Arabian side of the river, and on THE RIVERS AND CITIES OF BABYLONIA 35 the banks of the old canal not far from the marshes of Rumiyah. g To this place they gave the name of Kufa, which seems to indicate a habitation of reeds and earth, yet has it the reputation of being a school of learning, in which the cursive character of the Arabic language, so often seen on the coins of the early Khalifs, was used, and is hence known as the Kufic. The two first Khalifs of the Abbasside dynasty resided at Anbar, but the Khalif Abū Jaffer al Mansur, or the ‘Victorious, removed to a castle on the right bank of the Tigris, called Kushla Kalahsi, or ‘the castle of birds, where he founded a town which he called Dar Aslam, or ‘the house of peace, the Irenopolis of the Byzantine Greeks. His son founded another quarter on the opposite bank of the river, and named it Mahadi, or ‘the guide, and the two united became the renowned Baghdad, as Ctesiphon and Seleucia became Al Madayn, or the “two cities.’ As a long and important canal was derived from ancient times from the Euphrates to water the Arabian wilderness, upon which arose both towns and villages, so a canal was drawn from the Tigris to fertilise the regions east of that river. This canal was called by the older Arabian geographers, as Tabari and Zakariya Kazvini, the Katur, and is considered by them as more ancient than the Nahr-wan, which was indeed only a prolongation of the Katur carried out by Anushirvan, and put in repair by Harān al Rāshid. The Katur had its origin from three different derivatives from the Adheim, the Physcus of Xenophon, D 2 36 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION and Abū-l-fada says it was below the junction of these three streams that the canal lost the name of Katur and assumed that of Nahr-wan. - The canal, or One of its branches, was also known as the Nahr Dijal, or ‘Little Tigris, for it was on such a canal that Akbara was founded. When the praetorian guard of Turks rendered a residence in Baghdad irksome, the Khalifs used also to retreat to Sir-man-rah, which was founded in the same locality by Mutassim, the eighth of the dynasty, about A.D. 836. Opis, and afterwards Dastagerd, had preceded these retreats or summer residences of the Khalifs in the same neighbourhood, and upon one of these canals are the remains of the so-called leaden bridge (Kantarah Rasasi) which led to Imām Dur, a place which obtained celebrity as Rusa or Sura in the campaigns of Heraclius. mº Sir Henry Rawlinson has suggested that this was also the site of the Dura where Nebuchadnezzar erected the golden image, but Oppert prefers a site on the Babylonian plain called Mukhattat, said to be a mound of debris on a plain called that of Dura. Ibn Haukal describes a town called Sarsar as on a canal called Sarsak, at the distance of three farsakhs (nine miles) from Baghdad, and he says “it is a pleasant town and well cultivated.” After that, at a distance of two farsakhs, is the Nahr al Malik. There is a bridge Over it, and it is much more considerable than the river of Sarsar. The district of Nahr al Malik is better cultivated and affords more corn and fruits than Sarsak. - THE RIVERS AND CITIES OF BABYLONIA 37 From that one proceeds to Kasr ibn Hubaira, situated on the river Frat, and one of the most con- siderable places between Kufa and Baghdad. ‘Here, adds Ibn Haukal, “are many streams, so that the water is much augmented and passes on to the town of Sura. The great river Frat has not any branch more consider- able than this’ (the river of Sura or Chebar). “From Sura it proceeds to the Suwad, or villages in the neighbour- hood of Kufa, and after that falls into the river of Batayah’ (Rumiyah?). - The river Sarsar, or Nahr Sarsar, is also noticed by Idrisi, who speaks of the river and town of that name. Abū-l-fada indeed remarks that there was a town on each canal. Thn Hubairah of Ibn Haukal appears to have been the Kalah Ramadi Or Charmande of Xenophon, or the same as Anbar, as he proceeds thence to the river of Sura. - Abū-l-fada describes the Nahr Sarsar as flowing from the Euphrates two farsakhs, or six miles, below the Isa, and the Isa being identified with the Abū Ghurraib, this corresponds precisely with the distance of the next canal, marked as Ruthwaniyeh in Chesney's map. Nor must we omit a Small Canal which, derived from the Euphrates at Mussayib, flowed past the mounds of Tohaibah which have been identified by some with a quarter of Babylon. Mussayib is celebrated for its tobacco, called Hussaini, and which is next in repute to that of Shiraz. - Abū-l-fada tells us that the Euphrates, after passing the Nahr Kutha (or Kutha canal) by six farsakhs, is divided into two streams, one of which passes beyond 38 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Kufa into the marshes of Rumiyah, while the other and larger branch flows past Kasr ibn Hubairah, after which it is called Nahr Sura or Sirat. This passage is calculated to mislead. What I think is meant is that after passing the Nahr Kutha eighteen miles (seventeen in Chesney's map), the river is divided into two streams, one the Hindiyah, the other the Euphrates itself, but that the other or larger branch— the river of Sura or Chebar—took its departure beyond Rasr ibn Hubairah. This would identify the latter castle with Kalah Ramadi. Niebuhr and D'Anville both agree in identifying the Pallacopas of Alexander with theriver of Sura, of Borsippa, of Hira, and Kufa, but the Danish traveller carries this great Arabian derivative of the Euphrates—the Western Euphrates in point of fact—beyond the Lemlun or Babylonian marshes, as we have before seen, to Ur or Orchoe, and thence onwards to the Persian Gulf. Under however many different names the rivers and towns of Babylonia may appear in the present day, or have passed by at their several epochs of history, the researches of Chesney, Lynch, Selby, Bewsher, and others leave little doubt as to what actually exists in the present day. It is their comparative geography, or the history of the names which they bore at different epochs —Babylonian, Persian, Macedonian, Roman, and Muham- madan—that is at times involved alike in obscurity and doubt. It is therefore with much diffidence that I have ventured upon this chapter, in which I have attempted to reconcile the statements of historians, travellers, and THE RIVERS AND CITIES OF BABYLONIA 39 geographers to the best of my ability. I know full well that much still requires to be done to obtain perfect accuracy, but this has not prevented me making an attempt towards attaining such. As to the towns and cities of Babylonia, the subject is still more involved in doubt and obscurity than that of the rivers and canals. The researches of modern Assyriologists have, as Ibefore remarked, when speaking of the Biblical primeval cities of the world, received more light within the last fifty years than all that has resulted from the previous labours of centuries. The key to the knowledge is the decipherment of the inscriptions found at the sites themselves, and this is a branch of inquiry which is almost daily rewarded by new and important discoveries. We cannot be expected then to enter into so vast a field of inquiry, which extends to what is below the surface of the ground and is not visible to the naked eye of the traveller, but must hasten on with our gallant steamer to regions, Where from his loved Babylon Euphrates flies, as Ovid puts it (ii. 289). 40 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION CHAPTER IV. THE BABYLONIAN MARSHIES. THE captiousness of learning has in this country be- come almost a proverb, and the public mind is only at variance as to whether the mathematician Or the classical scholar is most severe in criticism. This painful truth has been recalled to my mind by reading the following passage, written by Foster, a commen- tator on Xenophon —‘Speaking of the magnitude of the Euphrates puts me in mind of what Strabo says of it, where he informs us that it runs through the middle of ancient Babylon, and was a stadium (two hundred yards) in breadth, which Calmet, with the generosity of modern writers, takes for granted, without examining what difficulties such an assertion is loaded with. Xenophon, who forded it himself, affirms that this river is four stadia (eight hundred yards) broad at Thapsacus, above five hundred miles higher than Babylon, and all the world is sensible that rivers do not grow narrower the further they proceed in their course.’ Now this overwhelming closet critic, who brings the whole world against the Amasian geographer and the generosity of Calmet, happens in this case to be in the THE BABYLONIAN MARSHIES 41 wrong, for the Euphrates, contrary to what is cer- tainly generally the case, narrows in its lower or Babylonian portion, and in the Babylonian marshes dwindles into canals of not even a hundred yards in width. The width of the river at Thapsacus is, owing to an unusual expansion of the waters, as described by the ac- curate author of the ‘Anabasis, about eight hundred yards, but on entering the plains of Babylonia it is at Once drained by two great canals or derivatives—the One on the Arabian side, the other on the Babylonian—and these are followed by others, chiefly on the Babylonian side, until by the time the Euphrates has reached Babylon, it is not much more than two hundred yards in width. Add to this, that when Strabo spoke of the river running through the middle of ancient Babylon, he appears to have meant that branch which flowed between Babel and the temple of Belus and the site of the prison of Nebuchadnezzar, of the royal palaces and hanging gardens, afterwards known as the Nil or Nilus—the Babylonian Nile in fact. The steamer Euphrates’ entered into the Babylonian marshes on a fine summer afternoon. Between Baby- lon and the marshes we had passed several extensive groves of date trees, especially in the neighbourhood of Diwaniyah, and the stream, though tortuous at times, had preserved a pretty equal width of from two to three hundred yards; but now it became not only more tortuous, but its bed was confined at times to a width of not more than two hundred feet, and was, indeed, in places nearly covered with vegetation. The 42 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION marshes were at the same time so low that the stream was only retained in its bed by artificial embankments, which, had the steamer run against them, would in all probability have given way, carrying river and ship together into the morass, to leave the latter in a short time, embedded like a huge fish amidst reeds and Sedges. The naval officers and a new pilot we had got on board were somewhat puzzled to find their way amid these intricacies, but at length we arrived at the reed-built town of Lemlun, which is situated upon a narrow tongue of land, advancing at a point where the river is divided into two branches, and having an Arab mud fort placed so as to defend the extreme point, and close to the fork of the river. This town is inhabited by Arabs of the Khazail tribe, Persians by descent and Shi‘ahs by persuasion. They feed buffaloes and cultivate rice in this marshy ground. But they were unquestionably the most wild, cunning, and untrustworthy of all the so-called Arabs we met with on the river. As we had to come back to their country, our acquaintance with them became only too familiar. Darwin had not at that time pub- lished his theory of evolution, but we were all struck with the unusual sinewy length and thinness of their limbs, a peculiarity of development which, as seen on a smaller scale in the shrimp girls of Boulogne, we could not but attribute to their living in a marsh. Their limbs, indeed, were often the subject of amusement, as approximating to those of storks or herons or other wading birds. THE BABYLONIAN MARSHES 43 The first proof of their faithlessness they gave us was by indicating a wrong branch of the river as the navigable one, and in consequence we had not followed it for above a mile or so, when the steamer, after overcoming many obstacles, finally stuck in the mud, and thus we were left to spend the night in a wilderness of waters, and enveloped in a cloud of mosquitoes which added greatly to the darkness of the night. Some smoked, others covered up their hands and faces, and the seamen, as usual, got up in the rigging to avoid the pest. But it was of no use; they WéI’é SO numerous, and so fierce in their attacks, that they penetrated everywhere, and through everything. But there was something so new and so striking in these vast morasses, that despite the mosquitoes I could not help being deeply struck by them. In my youth I had lost myself in the marshes of Clairmarais, near St. Omer; at a later period I had been almost mourn- fully affected by the great morass near Mohacs on the Danube. But they were as a swamp would be to a lake, compared to the Babylonian marshes. Beyond the channel we were in, calm, glassy, and diversified by flowering plants, we could distinguish from the deck that all around us was water, out of which grew plants of the reed, rush, and flag kind, and tall grasses, which in these latitudes assume the port and bearing of reeds, while the reeds themselves became bamboos. Amid this dense vegetation were meres or lakelets, interspersed with great white lilies and other large and beautiful flowering plants, amid which stately pelicans 44 TEIE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION sailed about as if proud of the undisputed possession of such safe and tranquil retreats. In the distance were Some grassy spots on which an occasional buffalo was seen feeding, or on the extreme limits of which some dusky encampment of Arabs was just perceptible, while on the very verge of the horizon, and rising out of the sea of reeds and grasses, the lofty mounds of sun-dried bricks of Khaldaea proper could be faintly discerned lighted up by the dying rays of the sun. When Alexander the Great was at Babylon, he de- termined, with his characteristic spirit, to explore the “Paludes Babyloniae, as they were called by the Roman historians; but the undertaking was not so easy as at first appeared, for on this Occasion many of the galleys lost their way, and in a gust of wind—probably a Simoom—the imperial tiara was blown from the con- queror's brows, and was brought up by one of those mounds which appeared, in those early times as at present, to have diversified the surface of the marshes. This incident was looked upon, at a time when much im- portance was attached to Omens, to be a forewarning of the fatality that attended upon the projected regene- ration of a doomed city. - - Islanded amidst this wilderness of waters, were also Occasionally to be seen the reed tombs of sheikhs or holy men, whilst a few of the living members of the dwellers in the marsh stole stealthily along in their light canoes, from mere to mere, by narrow invisible channels known only to themselves, till they got into the neigh- bourhood of the steamer. It really appeared as if these reckless men of the marsh thought they could place the THE BABYLONIAN MARSHES 45 vessel in such difficulties that we should not be able to extricate ourselves, and that we should ultimately fall into their hands. . I have already remarked upon the peculiarity in the long limbs of the Khazail Arabs. There is really nothing at all to surprise One in such a development. They live almost as much in the water as out of it. They can only communicate with their buffaloes nearly up to their middles in water, and their rice is grown in swamps. I have seen a baby Swinging in a cradle suspended from the top of a reed hut, while the waters were flowing in an unimpeded current through the hut itself. Their familiarity with water commences thus at a very early age, and considering that it lasts through life and that the same state of things has been handed down for generations, it is not at all to be wondered at that it should have resulted in an adaptation of form to habit. They were not only remarkable for their long spare forms—all ease and freedom—and their long legs, but their peculiarities were rendered all the more evident from their being almost entirely naked, whilst their almost uniformly black hair was plaited in long ringlets, which fell over their shoulders and did duty as an Arab kerchief to shelter them from the sun. • Sunset cast a red glare of Splendour over this extra- ordinary scene. Birds began to wing their heavy flights with prolonged screeches, and the far off villages were obscurely illumined by the early night fires, becoming so many beacons to the Khazailees, who now paddle, away in their canoes along the golden flood, rising up giant like out of the surrounding reeds and rushes, and 46 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION cheering their way home with songs and choruses re- sponding to one another, till the Savage sounds were lost in the distance and everything was enveloped in the stillness of night. Early on the ensuing morning the steamer was got free of the mud by carrying out an anchor and hawser astern and backing her paddles; and we returned to Lemlun, lying to at the further end of the town, near where the few last reed huts terminated in a grove of date trees. The Khazailees, who now grouped around us in crowds, absorbed our whole attention. Their ignorant astonishment and laughing wonder were only exceeded by their restless mischievousness and daring Cupidity. But they were the passions of Savages, irregular, and with little settled purpose, and manifested themselves in a manner that only afforded us amusement, not un- mingled with pity. - Some stood in groups laughing and jeering at us, and pushing One another towards the ship, which lay close to the bank, but from which they were speedily repelled by the sentries on duty. Others exhibited their aquatic prowess by leaping into the water when the cook threw the refuse of the kitchen over- board, which they devoured greedily. A bit of paper, accidentally blown into the river, caused a whole host to rush in after it, and they fought eagerly for its pos- session. But there were others who looked on in silence, with their brows contracted, and an expression of infinite malignancy. They were balancing the means of offence THE BABYLONIAN MARSHIES 47 and the chances against them, brooding mischief, yet undetermined how to proceed about it. Others again, among the most active and daring, were prying into holes and corners, and laying plots, as we shall see, for future action. - One thing above all others attracted their attention. This was Mrs. Helfer, the young and fair wife of the learned doctor of that name. To avoid impertinent curiosity and to favour the European habit of moving about in freedom, Mrs. H. had, as is frequently the case in the East, adopted an Egyptian costume which might be termed half masculine and half feminine, yet which is solely used by the males. But the quick-witted Khazailees soon distinguished her from others, and as she stood with the Officers looking at and enjoying the turbulent proceedings of the crowd, the greater admi- ration that dark and Swarthy people are said by some to entertain for females of their own colour met with a practical contradiction ; and their admiration, like their cupidity, was so great and under such little control, as to be manifested by looks and actions which admitted of no misinterpretation. I was a little annoyed during the course of the day that madame proposed to Fitz- james a stroll in the date grove, and he, seeing the inad- visability of the proceeding, asked me to accompany him. I could not refuse so pointed a request, and we went forth into the shady grove. Happily, however, the |Rhazailees did not molest us. My impression was de- cidedly that they would make an attempt to carry her off; but where to in these frightful marshes it would be difficult to conceive. Their Cupidity seems, however, 48 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION to have triumphed over their admiration for the fair S62X. - In the course of the day visits were made to the Sheikh of Lemlun. He was dressed, as were also some of the more wealthy of the Khazailees (probably for the occasion), in a long robe of dark green silk relieved by white stripes. This was characteristic of their Shi‘ah persuasion. The poorer classes, when not nearly naked, were clad in robes of dark brown coarse stuff, with a girdle round the waist. Others wore an abba or cloak with broad white stripes, generally thrown so that one broad white band sheltered the right side, leaving the rest dark, and giving an aspect of uniformity to a group ; but sometimes the stripe adorned the left side, while the chest was left entirely bare. These details, of ap- parently a trivial character, were not so with them, for they served to distinguish one family or sub-tribe from another. There was coquetry even in this land of the bittern and the night-owl. - The feelings of the Khazailees in regard to their British visitors had been so hostile all day, and their anxiety for mischief so clearly manifested, that when night came on, precautions were taken to prevent robbery or sudden surprise, and a sentry was placed on shore in addition to the usual One on deck.’ - The weather was hot, and most of the officers, as also Dr. and Mrs. Helfer, and part of the crew, took up their quarters on deck. Colonel Chesney, Murphy, and myself took to our cabins, as the after-deck was rather crowded. Estcourt, as was frequently his custom, per- Severed, notwithstanding the thieving propensities of THE BABYLONIAN MARSHIES 49 the natives, in carrying the few matters which consti- tuted his bed on shore. As a guard was mounted there, his position was not so bad as it might have been, yet he had not been long asleep before he was awoke by a tug, and found to his mortification that his silken coverlet had made its disappearance. He resigned himself, however, to his loss, and tried again to go to sleep, when he was once more awoke by a tug at his pillow; this second pull he endeavoured to resent by pulling a pistol from beneath, but the Khazailee was too quick for him, and was in a moment lost in the ob- scurity. At or about the same time, a loud shriek from Mrs. Helfer awoke almost the whole of the ship's company. Colonel Chesney and myself jumped up at the same time, and seizing our fowling-pieces met in the passage. “What is the matter P’ said the Colonel. “Oh they are carrying off Mrs. Helfer ' ' answered I, half awake, and with the memory of the day's occur- rences faintly gleaming through my somnolence, and in less than a minute we were both on deck. In the meantime, Estcourt, wearied at the tugging at his bed-clothes, had got up from his berth on shore, and taking his traps under One arm, and with a pistol in his other hand, had proceeded to make good his re- treat on board the steamer, At the very moment that he stepped on deck, he distinguished, but indistinctly in the dark, a Khazailee threading his way amid the crowd of sleepers towards the openings of the bulwarks, and who, before making a flying descent into the river, appeared by a sudden WOL. II. J. 50 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION dip and a clutch at the clothes of Mrs. Helfer, to have had some hopes of carrying her into the water with him. As the miscreant plunged into the river, Estcourt rushed forward and fired at him, but unsuccessfully. Others followed in the rear, but masked by the dark waters, and almost as practised in One element as in the other, his dive was so prolonged that he was not in the obscurity seen to rise again, so there was no oppor- tunity for the pops that awaited his appearance. When we were sufficiently recovered from our sur- prise to be able to coolly examine into occurrences, it was found that this daring Khazailee must have approached the ship by water, so as to escape observation on the part of the sentry on shore; he had then slunk along by the water line under the bulging part of the stern, so as not to be seen from the deck, till he reached the port- hole of the main cabin, into which he had by great dexterity introduced himself. Here he had endeavoured to take away one of the box chronometers, and he had actually bent the hands to a point, so as to give him a hold by which to draw it from its box, but being unsuccessful in this, he had appropriated to himself a watch belonging to Fitzjames, which unfortunately hung by the chronometers for com- parison. He had then passed along the passage between Colonel Chesney's and my cabin, had ascended the companion stairs and gained the after deck, where he made his last strange and desperate attempt to initiate Mrs. Helfer into the art of Khazail diving. The report of this daring exploit roused the whole town as well as the ship's company, and the night was THE BABYLONIAN MARSHES 51. P- passed in unwonted excitement. The Khazailees lit fires, danced around them, and sang their songs of triumph and chants of war and defiance ; and we expected every moment to be attacked—a most undesirable solution of the outrage—for a few rockets would have fired the whole town of reed huts in a few minutes; but although they did not know this, the sight of Our guns acted as a charm, and they found a safety valve to their hostility in dances and songs. It was in vain that we threatened and blustered next day, and demanded of the Sheikh that the watch should be returned, or we would visit the town with condign punishment. ‘Where am I to seek for it?’ asked the wily chieftain, who no doubt had it by that time in his possession. ‘Surely, if you, who are so well armed, cannot take care of your things, how can I be expected to do so P’ The Sheikh had decidedly the best of the argument. We had unquestionably been outwitted, and we had to quit this strange place, and its still more peculiar inhabitants, without any satisfaction being obtained. Perhaps, however, it might have been better if we had insisted upon such, for encouraged by their success, the Khazailees subsequently robbed and ill-treated an almost defenceless party On their way up the river. Mercy and clemency are often misunderstood, when you have unprincipled Savages to deal with, as want of courage and decision. 52 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION CHAPTER W. ICHALDAEA. THE so-called Babylonian marshes are, as pointed out in my geological researches," neither more nor less than ancient lagoons which have succeeded to one another as the land has gradually increased with a deposit of alluvium. Nor, geologically speaking, do they belong to a remote date; for I found species of fossil marine shells on the dry land that succeeds to the marshes, similar to what are found in the Persian Gulf at the present day. The second of these great depressions, going South- wards, is now occupied by the channel known as the Shat el Hie or Hai, and this was in the centre of the Khaldaean Lake of antiquity, bounded to the South by the territory of Messene on the one side and that of Teredon on the other. The emergence out of the Babylonian marshes is so gentle as to be scarcely perceptible. At first a gradual rise in the soil affords a territory which is for the most part mere brushwood, but which is also cultivated in parts at certain seasons of the year. This is followed by a clayey, and then a Sandy soil, totally reclaimed * Researches in Assyria, Babylonia, dºc., p. 145. Parkes, London, 1838. KHALDAEA 53 from inundation, and abounding in recent marine shells, but for the most part useless to man, and sparingly clad with the usually prickly shrubs and succulent plants of the wilderness. The first tract of dry land that is met with is marked by a mound of debris, indicating a Khaldaean site, and upon which stands the modern Arab castle called Kalah Girah, a name which recalls, with the rem- nant of old times, the Gerar which in Abraham's time was governed by Abū Malik, or the ‘father of kings.’ But although Kadesh might be sought for in the Kadisiya, renowned as the battle plain of the Persians and Arabs, and Shur or Sur, the Sur of Baruch, or Shur, may be referred to Sur or Sura. On the Chebar, there are insuperable objections to the former identification. The valley of Gerar, as it is described when Isaac digged there for wells of water, was in the land of the Philistines, and contained the well-known Beersheba. Beyond this a gigantic mound of truly imposing appearance rose out of the plain to the east of the river, with which it is, however, connected by means of a canal called Graiyim. This vast pile of ruin was called by the natives al Asayah, or the ‘place of pebbles, but it is also known by the name of Irkah or Warka, which Colonel Taylor long ago suggested might represent the Biblical Erech, and one of the four primeval cities. The site of Erech or Arach has for many centuries been involved in obscurity. The ancient and mediaeval writers were satisfied in identifying it with the classical Aracca or Areca, of which Tibullus said in his Elegies, Ardet Arecais aut unda per hospita campis, 54 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION which again, placed by geographers On the confines of Susiana and Babylonia, and renowned for its fountains of fire (naphtha), was afterwards the seat of a temple of Anaïtis—a place of pilgrimage with the Parsees, and the Babylonian Ecbatana—a mediaeval confusion of places, of Erech with Kir-Kuk. Mr. Fraser, who with Dr. Ross, was among the first in modern times to explore the territory of Khaldaea proper, which lies between the Babylonian and Khal- daean marshes, remarked that the name of Erech appears to be well preserved in the present appellation of Irkah or Warka, while its locality with reference to that of Babel appears confirmatory of the conjecture that it commemorates the second mentioned city of Nimrod. ‘Yet it is possible, he continues, ‘ that it may represent only the Orchoe of the Chaldeans, instead of Umgeiyer.’ And he further remarks that the word Orchoe may be nothing more than a modification of the ancient Erech, and Irkah or Warka a more modern pronunciation of both. To this I objected at the time, that Orchoe is itself a corruption of the Khaldaean Ur, the name being Urchoe in Ptolemy, as we see the subsequent Ur of the Khaldees, the Ur of Abraham, now called Orfah or Urfah. The primeval Ur was also, on the united testi- mony of Arrian, Pliny, and Salmasius, situated upon the Pallacopas, which was on the Arabian side of the Euphrates, while the mound of Warka is on the Khal- daean. The identity of the mound of Warka with Erech, and that of Umgeiyir or Mu-Kayir, the ‘place of bitumen, with the original Ur of the Khaldees, has KHALDAEA 55 since that time been fully established by the archaeo- logical researches of Sir Henry Rawlinson, Mr. Taylor, Mr. Loftus, and Sir Austin H. Layard. It is remarkable that the two last mentioned explorers saw many lions during their excavations of the mounds in the central parts of Khaldaea, whilst we met with none during the navigation of the river. There are also traditions of a member of the Simia tribe—some kind of Arabian ape—the predecessor, according to the Darwinian theory, of Babylonian and Khaldaean alike, dwelling in the woods to the west of the Baby- lonian marshes, and the same traditions, which have been fully discussed by Colonel Hamilton, an able naturalist, in the pages of Kitto’s ‘Cyclopædia of Biblical Literature,’ also exist with regard to the actual mounds of Baby- lon said to have been once tenanted by One of the monkey tribe, but we neither heard of nor saw any- thing to corroborate these curious traditions. The whole face of the lands in the midst of which we now advanced was interspersed or dotted with these mounds of debris. Stretching between two vast marshy districts, the territory in question appears to have been inhabited by the children of Shem only after they had attained power and prosperity in Babylonia, and at a time when the Khaldaeans exulted in their ships (Isa. xliii. 14). As the Borsippean Khaldaeans were distinguished by their love of science and their proficiency in the industrial arts, so the Orchenian Khaldaeans were re- nowned for their skill in astronomy and the mathe- matical sciences, while the men of Teredom were 56 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION distinguished for being navigators of distant seas and merchants of fame and enterprise. Hence it was that after the Captivity this region was peculiarly designated as the land of the Khaldaeans. ‘Behold the land of the Chaldeans; this people was not till the Assyrian founded it for them that dwell in the wilderness; they set up the towers thereof, they raised up the palaces thereof, and He brought it to ruin. It was for the same reasons, and after Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel, that the Greeks and Romans be- came accustomed to consider this country as Khaldaea proper, and which their geographers described as bor- dering upon Desert Arabia. Far more of the ruined towers which the Assyrians set up, and of the crumbling palaces and temples which they raised, exist in this country, so little explored until within recent times, than were ever dreamt of by our historians and geographers of even half a century ago. Unlike the “ruinous perfection' of remains of olden time which are met with on the banks of the Nile, the vestiges of ancient Khaldaea have, from their extremely fragmentary character, attracted little or no attention till a Loftus, a Layard, a Taylor, and a Rawlinson came to unearth and to decipher them. - To the archaeologist, to the historian, to the philo- sopher, and to the man of religion, a fragment however small, but which is of a positive character, has the same monumental interest as an entire pyramid. The traces of a laborious, a learned, and an aspiring people are, however, at Once numerous, of great extent, and of most imposing aspect, upon the Khaldaean plains. KHALDAEA 57 In whatever direction the traveller moves he meets with long, isolated, or continuous mounds, like hills or walls of ruin, and he finds at the same time the country to be intersected by canals of irrigation; and no matter which way he turns his eye, he observes the same colossal piles rising out of the uniform level, either close by, or in the far off dim and distant horizon — Chaldaean beacons, over the drear sand, Seen faintly from thick-towered Babylon, Against the Sunset. The present degenerate hordes of the tent and the spear still attach a name and sometimes a tradition to each of these lofty mounds of debris, but it is only since excavations have been carried on on the spot, and the decipherment of Babylonian and Khaldaean inscriptions has been made known, that there was any possibility of identifying then with ancient sites. The mounds designated as Jayithah and Tell Siphr, or ‘the mound of copper, lead the way to the great heights of Erech, at the same time that the canal, now called Graiyim, bears the waters of the Euphrates to a more extensive series of mounds, among which, One in particular is distinguished by its dimensions. It is called Sinkarah, and is one of a large number of mounds which form a sort of circle. To the north and east of these are several other clusters of mounds, the largest of which is called Yukkah. It is of considerable size, and towers up in the centre of a wide tract of debris. Further to the north-west was a lofty pyramidal mound called Tell Aidah, which is surrounded by the relics of old habitations. The circularly disposed ruins 58 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION of Sinkarah must have extended over a space of three miles and a half, but seven or eight miles to the north- east of the pyramidal mound of Aïdah are ruins of a city which must have attained still greater magnitude. The central portion alone of these ruins (and which are marked by walls that can be traced by irregular heaps converging at right angles to One another) form a quadrangle of at least five or six miles each way. At the north-east corner of this quadrangle stands a struc- ture like a great tower, built of sun-burnt bricks, with layers of reeds between each course, cemented with bitumen, and it rises to a height of at least fifty feet above the plain. The country around this enclosed space was everywhere covered with low mounds of debris, while long ridges stretch away to an almost boundless distance beyond. The Arab name of this site, Guttubah, bears some affinity to that of Chuduca, one of the few Khaldaean cities enumerated by Ptolemy. Towers such as are here described appear in ancient times to have been used not so much for the defence of a city as for that of the inner quadrangle, where were no doubt the residences of the chiefs, priests, and soldiers. The outer part of the city constituted the suburbs, just as in mediaeval times the cottages of the peasants were grouped around the feudal castle of their lord. We find such towers described as ‘towers of strength and places of defence “within the city, in Judges (chapters viii. and ix.). Pyramids or towers of a similar or analogous cha- racter occur in other parts of the Khaldaean plain, especially at a spot called Zibliyah, about thirty miles RHALDAEA 59 northward of these ruins. At this place four pyra- midal mounds, built of sun-dried bricks, rise abruptly out of the plain to a height of forty or fifty feet; while close by is a still loftier structure of about eighty feet in height, the exterior of which is formed of sun-dried bricks, but the interior of furnace bricks, like the tower at Birs Nimrūd. These towers or pyramids occupy a position nearly half-way between the Euphrates and the Tigris, and near to the latter river, in a north-easterly direction, is another group of mounds called Iskuriyah, of which the highest rises twenty-five to thirty feet above the plain. These mounds are remarkable for being covered with immense quantities of scoriae and slag-like stones, often Several feet square and several inches in thickness. This would seem to indicate that the place was destroyed by fire, and the Arabs have a tradition in connection with it, that it was the home of Lut (Lot), and that Heaven in its wrath showered these vitrified stones down upon its wicked inhabitants. Such, then, was the aspect of the central plain or strip of land, known as Khaldaea proper, as presented in the time of the Euphrates Expedition. Those who would wish to know more of the manners and habits of the vast population, to the existence of which these mounds testify so fully, we must refer to the works of Loftus, Layard, Taylor, Rawlinson, and others, whose archaeological researches make us more or less ac- quainted with their worship of sun and moon as em- blems of the Deity, and of local deities; combined with a general regard for the cone as an emblem of what is 60 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION expressed in other forms in the hieroglyphs of the Egyptians, and which indicated a state of feeling with regard to the divine institution of the sexes, which is totally alien to modern civilisation, but which must have been looked upon in primeval times in an utterly different light, and as a sacred and holy mystery." This great country of shepherds and manufacturers, of merchants and navigators, and the home of men of science and philosophers, now, save for the rare en- campments of nomadic Arabs, desolate and abandoned, still contains all the same elements of prosperity and riches as of yore, were it only in the hands of an in- dustrious and civilised people, with Order and property Secured to them by an efficient government. * Appendix No. 17. 61 CHAPTER WI. THE FIGHT OF THE SACRED GROVE. THE affection entertained by the ancients for their domestic deities—Lares and Penates, as well as Manes, spirits of their ancestors—hovering round the spot where their mortal lives had been spent, solicitous for the Welfare of their descendants—a belief still enter- tained and still practised in a modified form by some people of the far East—especially the Burmese—was not more marked than is in the present day the pious veneration paid by the Arabs to the tombs of their sheikhs, patriarchs, and holy men. The apotheosis of a Christian is, except when a tribute of public opinion, as testified by some public monument, a mere act of the Church, but that of an Arab sheikh is the simple expression of the lively regard entertained by the tribe or family during life- time for the piety, wisdom, and patriarchal virtues of their chief, and which, after his translation to the world of spirits, is made to assume the character of a public consecration. The tombs of sheikhs thus honoured are scattered all over the land of Islamism. They are of all magni- 62 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION tudes, and of various forms. The most common form is a simple square surmounted by a dome (a pyramid among the Izedis), and great attention is paid to the picturesque in their position; hence sometimes they are planted on the summits of old mounds of debris, or on the top of conical or isolated hills or eminences; at others they advance to the point of tall cliffs beetling over sea or river; sometimes they sparkle (for they are generally whitewashed) like lone white pillars on the desert; at others they are embosomed in shady groves, or shadowed, on the road side, by One or two gigantic plane trees. In the Khaldaean marshes (almost alone) they are often but frail memorials of the dead, being frequently rude structures, built of reeds, and torn by each angry blast that sweeps across the wilderness of reeds, rushes, and waters. These tombs—or, as the body of the deceased is generally placed on elevated masonry in the centre of a square but domed building, large enough to admit of relatives or pilgrims either to pray or to present offer- ings, I have preferred calling them generally sepulchral chapels—stand, however, apart from another class of sepulchral chapels, to which I have already had occa- sion to allude, and these are by some actually regarded as tombs of the prophet Elias, and are hence designated as Rhadr or Khidr Iliyas, but by others only resting places of the prophet, who being translated to heaven without undergoing the penalty of death, is supposed either still to wander over the earth, Or to pass by metempsychosis into the body of some other pious or revered individual. An unfortunate mistake, Originating in utter igno- THE FIGHT OF THE SACRED GROVE 6 3 rance on our part, that a certain grove on the banks of the Euphrates was an El Khadr, and one of the resting- places of the prophet Elias, led to an unlucky oc- currence, which might easily have been avoided had the superstitious and fiery-tempered Arabs only stated the fact to us or expressed their disapproval of our proceedings, before having recourse to actual violence. We had just got free of the Babylonian marshes, and were entering upon Khaldaea proper. The banks were higher and the soil dry and level, when a tract of wooded land was discerned. The upper portion was a grove of poplars, the lower portion wood and jungle; between the two was a modern Arab fort, and behind the poplars was a village belonging to the Beni Hiyakim tribe. There was also a large Arab fort on the opposite or Arabian side of the river. Totally unaware that this grove was in any way an object of veneration to the Arabs, the steamer drew up alongside, and the men were sent out to cut wood to replenish our stores of fuel. As usual on such occasions, knowing that there would be a few hours' detention in cutting and storing the wood, I took my fowling-piece and proceeded to the lower wood, on the chance of what I might find. On few occasions did the jungle on the river banks present me with such a profusion of game as did this little strip. The beautiful francolin flushed at almost every step, but my attention was still more riveted by wild animals—boars, hyaenas, wolves, and jackals— which appeared to have congregated from all parts of the plain in this little bit of cover. 64 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Whilst I was thus amusing myself, the sound of a great hubbub came out of the village, and being on the outskirts of the jungle, I saw the women and children hastening from the village and taking their way as it were into the wilderness. - It is difficult sometimes to account for the first thoughts that rush upon the mind, but mine were evi- dently influenced by what had struck me as very strange and very unusual, which was not only the number of wild animals that I had met with, but that they also seemed to make for the wilderness beyond. Putting the two together, I imagined that a lion had come down upon the village, and so impressed was I with this idea that I at once turned my steps towards the flying multitude. i At that moment, however, the sound of musketry and the whizz of a rocket told me plainly enough that something more serious had happened. I accordingly now sought to make my way to the steamer, between which and myself was interposed the fort before mentioned, and to reach which I must, unless I took a circuitous road back into the jungle, pass close to the now hostile village. The quick Sense, however, of the bad effect such a stealthy mode of proceeding would have upon the Arabs did not allow me to have recourse to the first mentioned alternative, so I walked—not fast, but quite composedly, towards the fort. As I approached, I passed within fifty yards of a group of armed Arabs who were watching me, but who, probably averse to shedding the first blood, or THE FIGHT OF THE SACRED GROVE 65 feeling that I was not an offender, or from some motive or other, did not fire at me, a proceeding which would unquestionably have been disastrous to me, although I was fully prepared to give them the contents of my two barrels in return. I found the fort occupied by Lieutenant Murphy and Corporal Greenhill, who had been engaged at the time of the outbreak in making some astronomical observa- tions, but who were now busy in putting up a rocket tube at the north-east angle of the fort, from whence the village was commanded. - Standing at the foot of the wall, I now first learnt the cause of the misunderstanding. It appeared that the grove was held to be a sacred one in the eyes of the Arabs, and instead of requesting that the trees should not be cut down, they had at Once had recourse to violence, had attacked and wounded some of the men engaged in cutting wood, and it had been with diffi- culty that they had been enabled to regain the ship. I got on board without any opposition on the part of the natives, and found all in the bustle of prepa- ration for reprisals. Hastening to my cabin I got, as usual, tourniquets, bandages, &c. in readiness, and then mounted on the quarter deck. Almost everyone had gone forward, as that part of the ship was nearest to the grove, and Our pièce de résistance—the nine-pounder —was also in the forecastle. A few seamen alone re- mained aft, and they were busy getting ready the swivel which defended that side. All this time the Arabs were concentrating in front of the village, On a little Open space between it and WOL. II. F 66 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION the grove, and whirling their muskets and war-hatchets over their heads, were careering round and round in their wild dance of defiance. They were joined every moment by others coming in from unseen directions, and on each new arrival the dance was renewed with additional zest, and the accompanying Songs and shouts became louder. Their holy prophet, the sanctity of their sheikhs, the beards of their fathers, the virtue of their mothers, and their own unconquered name, were invoked in turn, and cast in our teeth with epithets highly derogatory to our dignity. Two or three messages of peace had been sent in vain. More Arabs kept arriving, and many Swam across the river, which was here some three or four hundred yards in width, both above and below. A group of horsemen had also assembled in front of the castle on the opposite bank, and a rocket was sent among these, much to their surprise and dismay. The Arabs were at this time firing occasional pot- shots from behind the trees, but luckily without hitting any one, but except a rocket or two discharged from the ship, and by Lieutenant Murphy from the fort, rather to intimidate them than to hurt them, we had not attempted reprisals. The fires were, however, lighted, and the steam was getting up—a matter which gene- rally took from twenty minutes to half an hour. But before proceeding to extremities, Colonel Ches- ney determined, as a last resource, to send Sayyid Ali on shore with a flag of truce, offering that we would go away in peace and make an apology for cutting their wood, presenting them at the same time with an in- THE FIGEIT OF THE SACRED GROVE 67 demnity, if they would also tender an apology on their side for their attack upon Our men, made without any previous notice on their part. - The errand was not a very enviable one, for the Arabs of the Euphrates do not know much about flags of truce, but Sayyid Ali was the only one of us likely to be listened to in his character of a holy man. They therefore respected his white kerchief tied to a stick, although the interview produced no beneficial results. Like all semi-savages, they mistook our for- bearance for cowardice; and, they added, we had fired horrible missiles without being able to do them any harm, and that they would fight us and exterminate us, as foreign barbarians and infidels, from the land. Shortly after Saïd Ali's return, the Arabs ceased their dances, and advancing into the grove, each took up a position behind a tree or bush, from whence they took pot-shots at us, but with better intention than execution, for none of Our men were hit, and their powder was so bad, or they were so chary in the use of it, that many of their balls fell into the water short of the ship. I had taken up a position at the bulwarks, watching for a pop at Our assailants, just as I would have done for so many rabbits, but they kept so close behind the trees that I could not get a chance. The men were busy with the swivel, and fancying that they were rather slow, I went to give them a hand; in doing so, a ball passed between the heads of a young seaman and myself, just as we were stooping over the gun. He looked up at me, as if in intimation of the fact, and I Smiled, but it was a narrow escape for one F 2 68 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION of us. It was sharper work forward, and I heard Major Estcourt reprimanding some of the men for bobbing their heads. The steam was, happily for us, by this time On. Lieutenant Murphy and the corporal had come On board, and Colonel Chesney, being determined to give the Arabs some slight chastisement, the ship was, to their infinite wonder—for, as at Hillah, they had Only seen her going down with the current—now propelled upwards, till she brought to immediately opposite the grove from whence the firing proceeded. The nine-pounder carronade was now discharged loaded with grape-shot into the cover, and great was the fall of leaves and the creaking of branches. The firing then ceased for a moment, and I saw One Arab hopping away from the wood. He had evidently been hit in the leg. But the musketry fire was soon resumed, and once more the carronade vomited fire and grape into the wood and shrubbery. There was no more chance of getting pot-shots at these lithe and cunning Arabs than there was at a jackal, and less so. But the grape told in a most effectual manner. It routed them out of their cover, and hit them in what they considered to be their best sheltered spots, and num- bers were now seen limping away as best they could. Colonel Chesney had really only intended to give them a shot or two to attest our power, and he became annoyed at the reprisals being carried on beyond what had been intended. It is not, however, to be wondered at that, one gun being fired, it should have been followed up by others. The men who had THE FIGHT OF THE SACRED GROVE 69 been attacked in the wood were naturally intent upon retaliation; even the Mussulman attendants we had on board were in a state of the greatest excitement at our having been fired at for over half an hour with- out reprisals. Their indignation was indeed so great that they felt even the firing of the carronade and of the swivels to be too slow. They would have joined to a man (and I cannot help admitting that I had the same impulse), to land and tackle with the foe hand to hand. The carronade had, however, told its tale. The musketry began to drop off, and Colonel Chesney gave orders for hostilities to cease. Orders were given to turn the steamer's head round, and we went our way down the stream, pondering as to what had been the results of this strange and unexpected conflict. On Our further descent of the river, we visited the Sheikh of the Muntifik Arabs, the most powerful of all the Sheikhs in Lower Khaldaea, and to whom the Beni Hiyakim were subjects; and the opportunity was taken to represent how grieved the Colonel had been with this misunderstanding with the latter tribe, and what a pity it was that they had not sought for ex- planations, instead of having recourse at Once to violence. But the chieftain only laughed at the matter, and said that he did not know before that the Beni Hiyakim had been so warlike. He was, in fact, evi- dently delighted, and chuckled at the idea of their valorous display, without any re have cost them. gard to what it might Some time after this, on our re-ascent of the river, 70 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION we passed the sacred grove again. The tribe made some show at first of turning out, but the bugle having sounded, they were appalled, and speedily withdrew to their huts. The steamer having taken up a good position off the village, Mr. Rassam went on shore, and gave them a good lecture upon their folly. The women wept and said they had lost three men of the tribe, but this was unquestionably an exaggeration indulged in to excite our sympathies, so a present was made to them, and we left in peace, if not in good-will on their parts. 71 CELAPTER VII. T H E M UN TIF I R A R A B S. AT the lower part of the plain of Khaldaea, where the land sinks into perpetual marshes, and where the waters of the Tigris flow into the Euphrates—the precise re- verse of what occurs in Babylonia—is the territory of the Muntifik Arabs. This powerful tribe held dominion, a century ago, over but a small portion of this extensive tract of land and marsh. After frequent struggles, however, with the Turks and other Arab tribes, during the progress of which they met with many reverses, more especially from one Sulaiman, a Mamlük officer, who was sur- named Abū Laila, or ‘the father of night, from his terrible onslaughts made under favour of dark- ness, they were ultimately enabled to appropriate to themselves almost the whole of Lower Khaldaea, as also the Arabian side of the river Euphrates, a region rich in dates, buffaloes, and an admirable breed of horses, many of the best of which they send to the Indian market. This, however, under the Supremacy of the Osmanlis, who, under the Pasha of Baghdad, exact tribute, rather than rule over, these native races of Muhammadans. 7 2 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION The tribe is now strong in numbers and repute, and its hereditary Amir or Sheikh is rich and powerful. The possession of so much land has attached many to agricultural pursuits, others are commercial, and dwell in towns or villages, but the majority are still nomadic and pastoral, and breeders of Camels, horses, buffaloes, and sheep. The tribe is thus in a state of transitory civilisation. It has abandoned all roving and predatory habits, as still upheld by the great tribes of the Anizeh in Arabia, and the Shammar in Meso- potamia, without arriving at the Order or comfort attained by the Turk or the Persian. - Faithful then to the customs of his ancestors, the Sheikh still dwells in a tent, but attached to reed huts, and even mud habitations for the harim. Around, and extending for miles along the river banks, huts of a similar character cling to the residence of their chief- tain. The mode of building these huts is simple enough; clusters of reeds and bamboos, from fifteen to twenty feet high, are neatly bound with withes or bands, and planted in the ground in a double row. They are then made to bend over in an arch, in which position they are held down by other reeds disposed longitudinally. This framework is again covered, both on the sides and roof, with mats made of split reeds, and ornamented with neat lattice-work, according to the skill and taste of the builder. Sometimes these huts, which make an interesting transition from the ordinary black camel-hair tents of the Bedouins to more stable houses, stand in groups, surrounded by enclosures of reeds and bamboos. - THE MUNTIFIK ARABS 73 The apparently almost interminable succession of these reed huts produced on our first approach to the Muntifik encampment a striking effect, whilst the hosts of inhabitants plying their various vocations, hustling laden camels across the river, tending the leisurely buffaloes, or prancing about upon caparisoned steeds, imparted animation to the scene. It was like a city, and yet not a city. The steamer, however, upon this occasion continued its course past the long files of huts, nor did it lay to until it arrived at Suk al Shuyuk, or the ‘Sheikh's market, so called because it contains Ordinary habita- tions and a bazaar, surrounded by a mud wall. The town itself stands upon a mound of the debris of some ancient Khaldaean city, on the Arabian side of the river, and being embosomed in a grove of dates, had a pleasant and inviting appearance. The Sheikh's market town contains about five hun- dred families, and bazaars of some extent. Among these are a few Sabaeans, or disciples of St. John—a small sect who are chiefly employed in working in iron, and of whom we shall have to speak more at length hereafter. I visited some of these people of ancient |Khaldaean descent, in company with Mr. Rassam, and was much interested in finding in their possession an old astrolabe—a quadrant of rude manufacture—yet was it with such means that the Arabs of olden time carried out those astronomical observations which have taken permanent place in the history of science. Our friends of to-day were, however, more given to astrology than to astronomy. They had an almanack, which is pub- 74 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION lished by the Armenian monks of Venice for use in the East, and they argued that their science was of far greater importance than ours, for whilst we were fixing the latitude and longitude of places, they were deter- mining the future fate and destiny of men; that humanity took precedence of geography, and that the casting of nativities was a more ennobling study than the mere determination of localities. A ridiculous circumstance took place On Our return from the town. ‘Boat, if you please, shouted Mr. Rassam. “Listen, said some in the crowd that followed our footsteps; “he is calling for “Eblis; ”’ and they forthwith took themselves off as fast as they could. It was in this town, so rarely visited by Europeans, that two travel-worn, weather- beaten, irrecognisable English travellers, accidentally met a few years before. These adventurous persons were Colonel Chesney and Mr. Stocqueler. The Sheikh himself never enters this emporium of his people. This is more from a politic regard to the nomadic antecedents of his followers than from any real feeling. Sheikh Isa, as he was called, is a shrewd, wary, and self-interested Arab. He must have been laughing in his beard when he pretended to our good friends Mr. Baillie Fraser and Dr. Ross that he had never heard of Ispahan. The Muntifiks have close relations with the Persians, through whom, and by whose sailing vessels, the trade in horses with the Indian market is carried On, nor is the Sheikh's diwan often held without the presence of two or three black Kalpaks. It was only a rather more practical joke when his highness, rising the ensuing morning a little THE MUNTIFIES ARAIBS 75 earlier than his visitors, took himself and his entourage surreptitiously away from any further contact with the infidels. But he was just as capricious and unmanageable with ourselves, and our relations with him were of a some- what strained character. The misunderstanding which had taken place between ourselves and the Beni Hiyakim was, however, easily explained away. But it was less easy to get over certain remonstrances that we had to make as to impediments placed in the way of boats conveying coal up the river for the use of the Expedition. The intrigues of M. Fontanier, the French consul at Bassora, had also extended to this spot. That gentle- man, in a work since published," relates at page 299, that when passing Soug el Shioug (this is the French Orthography for Suk al Shuyuk), a number of Arabs advanced into the river, and attempted to stop the ‘Euphrates’ steamer. ‘These poor people, he observes, “imagined that this operation was the easiest thing in the world. They were foiled, however, and began firing their muskets, so that the steamer was compelled to discharge a couple of shots, which put them to flight.’ It is needless to say that no such occurrence took place, but it did happen that we were told here that M. Fontanier had recommended the Arabs to embarrass the steamer by throwing date trees into the river; and he probably confounded what he had heard of our encounter with the Beni Hiyakim with the interruption he had suggested, and which his * Narrative of a Mission to India, vol. i. 76 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION imagination presented to him as a feat actually per- formed. At a subsequent period, the, at that epoch, Honour- able East India Company's steamer, the ‘Hugh Lindsay,’ having arrived at Bassora with a mail, also unluckily brought as a passenger a missionary of the name of Samuel, a gentleman whose zeal, however useful to the cause, was, by exciting the religious hostility of the people, most prejudicial to friendly intercourse. They fancied that we not only plotted the subjugation of the country, but also their conversion to the Christian faith. The indiscreet zeal of the same missionary had once before nearly brought about the destruction of the British Residency at Baghdad. So was he, on this Occasion, the cause of an inimical feeling being mani- fested towards the ‘Hugh Lindsay’ and her crew, and to ourselves. It was after receiving this mail that the “Euphrates’ steamer bent its way up the river, and lay to immediately opposite the Sheikh's residence, to explain away these little misunderstandings, and a black, for- midable-looking little craft she was when put into trim for accidents. . A formal embassy, consisting of Colonel Chesney, Major Estcourt, Captain Cleveland, Mr. Rassam, and myself, went on shore to wait upon his highness. A divan had been extemporised for our reception, out- side of the Ordinary hut, and this was encircled by upwards of five hundred stalwart, swarthy, and armed Arabs, who maintained decorum and distance—albeit not dressed in any regular Order—as admirably as if THE MUNTIFIK ARABS 77 they had been a disciplined soldiery. It was expected, and I believe it had been previously negotiated, that to save the scruples which, as a Muhammadan, the Amir might have at rising to a Christian, that he should meet our commander, as if by accident, On his approaching the diwan. But this arrangement, somehow or other, broke down, nor, even after we had been some time seated, were there any signs of his highness's approach. To questions put to an elderly gentleman who with a long stick appeared to officiate as master of the ceremonies, the only answer that could be obtained was that the Sheikh was at his prayers. At length the Colonel lost all patience at the mani- fest slight put upon him, and waxing wroth, rose to take his departure. I accompanied him, and we had some difficulty in forcing our way through the ring that encircled the seat of audience. But, this accom- plished, and leaving the rest of the party behind, we repaired to a white canvas tent, occupied by an officer then on a mission from the Pasha of Baghdad, and where we were shortly afterwards joined by the others. Major Estcourt had, however, a friendly interview with the Sheikh at a subsequent period of the same day, and his son, a handsome youth of about four- teen years of age, paid a visit to the steamer, accom- panied by the old chamberlain, who turned out to be a business-like, sensible old man. The young prince wore the usual Arab costume, and had in his girdle a dagger the handle of which was profusely studded with precious stones. The youth was, however, extremely 78 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION timid and distrustful, and although every attention was paid, sweetmeats laid before him and a variety of presents made according to Oriental fashion, nothing could allay the fears and apprehensions that he seemed to entertain of foul play. And no wonder that the boy should have entertained feelings of distrust towards the representatives of a more civilised people, when his youthful mind must have been stored with memories of the antecedents of his own father and of his tribe. Although reclaimed from predatory habits, the Muntifiks have by no means lost the characteristic combativeness of their race; their fights for pasture grounds, especially with the powerful Shammar or Mesopotamian Arabs, are frequent and often sanguinary. The actual Sheikh Isa is renowned for an exploit of a more ferocious than chivalrous character. Sheikh Binnaya, much beloved and respected by the Shammar Arabs, was fighting against the Muntifiks, when his favourite mare fell with him, broke her leg, and left him on the ground hurt and disabled. While in this state and alone, a party of Muntifiks, headed by Isa, galloped past. Binnaya called to them and made himself known, saying that he was hurt and dying. But the cruel Isa thrust his spear through the wounded and helpless man, and several others followed his brutal example. They then cut off his head, and sent it to Baghdad to the Pasha, who ordered it to be thrown to his caged lions. But the Superstitious Arabs declared that the noble beasts would have none of it, and only sprang away from it in terror. The Shammar THE MUNTIFIK ARABS 79 obtained sanguinary revenge for this Outrage, and killed among others Sheikh Agal, brother of Isa. The ferocity of these blood feuds is still more signally shown in the origin of the so-called ‘Orphan's tribe, a sub-tribe of the Muntifiks. A quarrel had arisen out of a question of right of pasturage between two principal sub-tribes, the Malik and the Ajwad. Excited to desperation by the songs and remonstrances of the women, the war was carried on to extermination. All the Ajwad tribe, men, women, and children, fell, one after another, on the land where their fathers had fed their flocks; only one pregnant young woman was spared, and her son was the founder of the so-called ‘ Orphan's tribe.’ The spot where this savage event took place is still known as the Wady al Nissa, or the “valley of the woman.’ The sumptuousness and lavishness of this at Once princely and patriarchal life, such as is maintained by the Sheikh of the Muntifiks, is scarcely credible. He is maintained solely by the fealty of his followers, and he has, to Support this, to pander to their grosser appe- tites. A platform of wood is daily laid out in the divan, smoking with a heap of many hundred-weights of rice. Encompassing this centre-piece are ranged small platters filled with Sundry preparations of meat or pastry. Thirty Or forty Savage-looking beings sit round this banquet, their disordered locks hanging over the dishes, till with a loud ‘Bismillah l’ every hand is plunged arm deep into the rice, each man vying with his neighbour in the despatch with which he can make huge balls of the rice with the sauce of the stew, and 80 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION in the dexterity with which he can stuff this into his mouth. - Behind stands a still more extensive circle of ex- pectants, for their practice is, that as soon as anyone has satisfied his appetite he gives place to another. Thus, seldom less than ten to twenty sheep, and rice in proportion, are consumed at a meal, and on festal occasions the carcasses of as many as thirty Or forty sheep may be seen lying boiled or roasted upon hillocks of rice, and this is even repeated three or four times a day. After meals the guests arise and wash their hands, retiring to their carpets and cushions and taking their pipes, while coffee is handed round by bare-legged dark Ganymedes, with turquoise anklets, and similar ornaments suspended from their noses, and clad in coarse canvas shirts of pretty much the same colour as the beverage which they hand round. A lofty mound of ruin is to be observed from the IMuntifik encampment on the Arabian side of the river. It is called Mu-kayir, or ‘the place of bitumen, from the bricks that are disinterred from it being, like others of the same period, covered with bitumen. A huge quad- rangular tower rises out of this mass of ruin to a height of eighty or a hundred feet. This, which is, perhaps, one of the most perfect specimens of the Khaldaean temple, “built on high places, still extant (always ex- cepting the Birs Nimrūd and Akka-Kūf, which are Babylonian), is constructed with bricks many of which bear inscriptions in the cuneiform character, and is divided into stories, the upper of which diminish in size, as we see in Some Indian pagodas, and, looking THE MUNTIFIK ARABS 81 from the top, vestiges of a wall are to be traced which once encompassed the building. This ruin appears to have been first observed by Pietro della Valle in 1625, and it has been identified, both by Rennell and D'Anville, with the Urchoe or Orchoe of the Greeks, and the Ur of Khaldaea. Mr. Taylor has since carried on important excavations at the place, and Sir Henry Rawlinson has determined from the inscriptions its previously conjectured identi- fication with the Ur of the Khaldees and the birth- place of Abraham. - It is remarkable that among the relics discovered at this site were many of Egyptian Origin, showing the intercourse that existed from the most ancient times between the Khaldaeans and the Egyptians. This city was, according to the ancient geographers, situate on the Pallacopas, but Mr. Fraser says that no traces of such a canal were visible from the top of the temple. As, however, such were subsequently met with, as in the bed of that canal between Zobair and Jebel Sinam (Teredon), it must have followed the line of valley in which Mu-kayir is situated. It is not positively ne- cessary that it should have flowed close to the city, but it is more positive that it flowed through the territory of the Orchenian Khaldaeans, for Pliny re- marks—‘Euphratem praeclusere Orcheni, nec nisi Pasitigri defertur in mare.’ And Mr. Fraser tells us that other similar mounds of debris were to be observed still further to the westward." A great central depression furrows the lands be- * Appendix No. 19. WOJA.. II. G. 82 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION yond the Muntifik encampment. A channel bearing the waters of the Tigris to the Euphrates quits the former river in the neighbourhood of Kut Amarah, passing the modern village of Kut Hai, to reach Nushayit Wasut. This was at Once a place of importance, situated in the heart of the populous, rich, well cultivated, and flourishing country, and was, under the name of Waseta, a metropolitan town of the Khaldaeans. It appears also to correspond to the Cybate of the Theodosian Tables. Kut Hai corresponds to Hai Beni Lyt, near Amarah (Kut Amarah), quoted by D'Anville from “La Carte du Sabéisme, or the map of the Sabaeans or Sabaean churches. It appears that at one time the river flowing past Wasut, and into which the Nahr-wan also emptied, was the principal bed of the Tigris, for Abū-l-fada describes Wasut as being intersected by the Diglah or Tigris, which was spanned by a bridge of boats. It is from the same circumstance that Pliny and Others designated the lower part of the Euphrates, after it was joined by the Tigris, as the Pasitigris. This at least is the only possible explanation of the Statement, before alluded to, that the Orchenians blocked the Euphrates, so that it could only find its way to the sea by the Pasitigris. Beyond Wasut, the Shat al Hai, or Old Tigris, divides into two branches, the northerly one called Baji Hairat, being navigable to boats, while the southerly is called Shat al Amah, or ‘the blind, from not being navigable, and it flows past the modern Wasut al THE MUNTIFIK ARABS 83 Hai. The two channels then again unite to form the Sub Bil, which sends off canals to Shatrai and other villages, to divide once more at the Imām of Hamzah, the northerly branch being alone navigable, and flowing into the Euphrates fourteen miles north of Kut, as the en- campment of the Sheikh of the Muntifiks is designated. G 2 84 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION CHAPTER VIII. THE PALM GROVES OF THE EUPEIRATES. THE river Euphrates is, below the country of the Mun- tifik Arabs, almost continuously covered with groves of date trees. The only exceptions are some tracts of wilderness on the Arabian side, and still more exten- sive marshes on the Khaldaean. This continues beyond the junction of the Euphrates and the Tigris, down to nigh the mouth of the united rivers, known as the Shat al Arab. It is indeed in this lower estuary that the date groves are deepest, most luxuriant, and most fully developed. There may be some monotony in these long groves of date trees, but there certainly is nothing wearisome. Their naked upright stems rise up out of the plain like tall, well-proportioned columns (for which indeed they no doubt gave the original idea, adopted by all orders of architecture save the Gothic), while their gracefully pendent fronds blend into a dense verdant canopy above, or hang upon the forest skirts like a natural fringe. They thus not only present within themselves a scene of exceeding beauty, but as this is susceptible of THE PALM GROVES OF THE EUPHRATES 85 much variety at different times of the day and under different states of the weather, it is of an untiring character. The date tree bowers That erst, mysterious rites concealing, O'ershadow’d silent Pharaohs kneeling, as Lord Lindsay wrote, afford an admirable shelter to the thinly clothed Arab in the rainy season, and in fine weather they offer an equally inviting refuge from the broad glare of the sun. Many a day, and many a night, have I spent in their glorious recesses, rendered all the more pleasant and agreeable as there is no undergrowth, save here and there a tuft of the liquorice plant. - It is not on the long banks of the Euphrates as it is on the tax-oppressed verge of the Nile, where every palm tree is registered, and mulcted in a certain sum of money. No doubt a certain amount of taxation is enforced, especially upon dates brought to market or exported, but to count every tree would, especially on the Shat al Arab, be an unending task. The ‘banner of the climate, as it has been ex- pressively called, waves freely here, and within its warm sheltered recesses the Arabs repair at certain seasons of the year, to feed themselves and their families without either trouble or expense. On these occasions an open space between the trees is a ready- made house, and the native Scarcely deigns to mark the place of his abode, the ashes of the fire alone re- maining to indicate to these children of nature where they spent the date season of the year before. S6 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION There is property, however, in date trees. On a small scale they belong to a family, On a large scale often to a whole tribe, or to the sheikh, as the representative of the tribe, and where the limits are ill-defined, the possession of a date grove is sometimes the Occasion for open hostilities. But in the neighbourhood of towns, as Baghdad and Bassora, where artificial fructification is practised, the property in every tree is well estab- blished. What is called the “royal dish ’ among the Arabs is made of eggs and dates fried in ghee, and a right regal concoction it is. The palm forest is in the evening, and even at night, as magnificent an object as in the daytime. The Sun setting Over and beyond these green seas of waving leaflets, is one of the most glorious visions of the East. There is a peculiar vivid green tint communicated to the horizon, which, once seen, can never be forgotten, and the bright orb of day seems to be sinking into some distant prairie, or quitting the desert for the verdant realms of fairyland. This last brilliant scene over—and night after night have I watched such sunsets from the deck of the steamer in rapt admiration—and the palm-trees Bending Languidly their leaf-crowned heads, Like youthful maids when sleep descending Warns them to their silken beds, appear all slumbrous, like the scenery of a dream. Milnes, as well as Lord Lindsay, seems to have been most struck with the palm forest at this intermediate hour. THE PALM GROVES OF THE EUPHRATES S7 ‘Princess of the sylvan race,’ he says, She reigns ! and most, when in the evening shee The stable column and the waving plume Shade the delicious lights that all around illume. But even this is merely transitory, to the mystic splendour of cloudless moonlight. At such an hour, when stem, frond, and leaflet are asleep and still as painted things, and the bold relief of the occasional light only renders the shadow still more dark by its closely severed contrast, then there is in the end- less succession of these natural temples and their obscure shadowy vistas, a mysterious enchantment, which by adding feelings of awe and wonder to the sense of the beautiful, begets a feeling of positive sub- limity. - • How much is the wayward and cynical traveller to be pitied, who, labouring to say something new rather than wishing to enjoy the beautiful in sincerity of heart, asserts that the eye is so much pained by the sight of so many sharp-pointed leaves; that it amounts to ocular impalement.' But there is no accounting for tastes. I have known those who never could see anything attrac- tive in the silver foliage and tortuous rugged trunks of the olive tree. But this is not the feeling of the Italian or the Greek, with whom the olive is the emblem of peace and plenty. These date forests were in Lower Khaldaea the seat of many villages, the inhabitants of which were more alarmed at the appearance of the steamer than those who dwelt in the open. So terrified or so revolted were S8 - THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION they by this unwonted intrusion in their midst, that I have seen women expose themselves in utter nudity to the whole crew, apparently indicative of their abhor- rence, or as it would be better expressed in their own peculiar sense of congruity and incongruity, to put them to shame. - Having lain to One night at One of these villages, Major Estcourt proposed that he and I should carry our traps on shore. We had no sooner made ourselves comfortable than I became aware of a very powerful odour. I thought it might be some peculiar plant, and looked around as far as the light would permit. But at length Major Estcourt, who had been as much per- plexed at the scent as I was, having appealed to me, I was obliged to admit that it was very like the smell of snakes in Our proximity, whereupon the gallant Major packed up his traps to go on board, and I need scarcely say that I followed suit. * * Arriving at a south-easterly bend of the river, we came within sight of the great Khaldaean lake, the waters whereof were only separated from the river bed by a narrow strip of soil, clad with rushes and reeds, which at this point assumed the port and bearing of bamboo canes. But although so lake-like in appear- ance, it is more of a marsh than a real lake, having groves of date trees visible at points, reed huts islanded in the desert of waters, and channels by which the natives navigate their frail barks, and to each of which they attach a name. The whole district was known as Jezayir, plural for Jezirah, and expressive in this case of a region of islands. A narrow but navigable channel THE PALM GROVES OF THE EUPHRATES 89 was by them called Jabiyah, plural Jiyayib, whilst a channel which spreads out and has islands or clumps of dates, is called Burj, being like a tower, or Burjah, pl. Burjayit. The river, as it flowed tranquilly through these great marshes, was wide and yet deep. Having deposited its mud, it was also clear and pellucid. The Arabs say that the fish of the Lower Euphrates attain a size equal to a camel load, but looking Over the bulwarks one day, I saw, in this instance, not a great siluroid, but a dead barbel floating down the waters, which I am sure no camel could have carried. On June 18 the steamer arrived at Kornahor Kürnah, where the confluence of the two great rivers, the Euphrates and the Tigris, takes place in the midst of verdant palm groves. An Arab castle and a few mud huts constitute the modern town of Kornah, and these, which occupy a Small tract of comparatively dry land. On a point be- tween the two rivers, are almost hid in date trees. The changes in the course of the rivers have been SO numerous that but slight data remain in the present day for identifying the existing town with Apamaea in Messene, the Ampe of Herodotus, the Aphle of Pliny, the Digla of Trajan's wars, and the Digua of Ptolemy, which was at the mouth of the Tigris. The Pallacopas, which flowed by Teredon or Diri- dotis, now Jebel Sinam, was looked upon by Nearchus, by Strabo, by Arrian, and by Pliny, as the Euphrates, whilst the branch which passed through the Khaldaean 90 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION marshes was known as the Pasitigris. The ancients had therefore an ostium occidentale and oStium. Orientale to the Tigris, and a site at its mouth may have been near, or at, either. Ibn Haukal, however, has an Ableh which he places opposite to the mouth of the Kerah river. I have discussed the vexed question of sites at the mouths of the rivers Euphrates and Tigris at such great length in my “Researches &c., in the endeavour to deter- mine the rate of progress of the alluvia of this vast delta, that there is no use entering upon the discussion again. Only one point I have to mention is that Captain Lynch informed me, that on an excursion made to visit Jebel Sinam, that hill was found, instead of being a mound of debris, to be a basaltic rock. This would certainly be a strange phenomenon in a delta of such recent Origin, but as it lies on the borders of the Arabian desert, I had not an opportunity of personally exploring it." If, however, this is the case, we must return to the old theory of Zobair, or Old Bassora, as it is also called, situated upon a canal now called the Nahr Salah, or Jarri Zaid, as representing the Teredon of Nebuchad- nezzar and subsequent Diridotis. This canal, the bed of the old Pallacopas, remained navigable as late as the Muhammadan era, and Ayishah is said to have fallen before the walls of Zobair beneath the swords of the vic- torious followers of Ali. The town is still inhabited, and * It appears from Mr. Taylor's researches that beyond the mounds of Mu-kayir there is a region known as the Hazem, which is composed of Sandstones and gravel; whilst beyond it again is the Hejerra, so called from the numerous blocks of black grante—Dolerites ?—with which it abounds. - THE PALM GROVES OF THE EUPHRATES 9] supplied with water for irrigation by the inundations of the Euphrates. I shall, however, return to this ques- tion upon the Occasion of a subsequent personal ex- ploration. d Arrived at this remarkable point in the progress of the Expedition, we met with an earnest of our approach to an estuary of the sea in the presence of a rickety and disabled Turkish sloop-of-war which lay off Kornah, and which returned, after a long delay, the salute with which we honoured the Sultan's flag. 92 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION CHAPTER IX. BASSORA. IT is but a short distance (thirty-eight miles) from the junction of the rivers Euphrates and Tigris to Bassora —diminutive of Basra, or ‘Little Basra’—and the united rivers, or the Shat al Arab, as they are now called, con- stitute a wide estuary, easily navigable, so that the paddles of the steamer soon annihilated the interval that lay between Kornah and the renowned port of the |Khalifs. We anchored off the city on June 19, and celebrated the safe descent of the river, and gratified our feelings of loyalty and attachment for the King under whose patronage the enterprise was being carried out, by firing a number of guns equivalent to the age of a now- regretted monarch. The city itself is scarcely visible from the river, the banks of which are densely clothed with date groves, especially on the Arabian side. The crumbling walls extend, however, to a point On the river side where a dilapidated fortress and a custom house mark the en- trance of the canal by which the town itself is reached. The first house that is met with upon this canal is BASSORA 93 the British Residency, at the time tenanted by an Armenian agent called Agha Barsaik. To the left of this, a very ordinary bazaar led the way to the central square, where a few handsome Saracenic edifices of olden times were still to be seen, whilst the chief bazaar of the town branched off to the southwards. Beyond this, with the exception of the mosques, with their prepossessing minarets, but none of which have any pretensions to either magnitude or architectural beauty, the more solid but still more unpretentious churches of a still lingering Christianity, and a few private mansions reminding One of the merchant princes of old, nothing but crumbling walls meets the eye, and a death-like silence pervaded the streets and city gene- rally. . . The whole extent of the city, if it can be so called, interspersed with gardens and date plantations, is en- circled by walls which embrace almost the whole of the land that is now cultivated, as well as that which is built upon, in their vast circumference; and these walls, although perpendicular on the outside, are sustained by a sloping embankment within, and are thus as much adapted to keep Out inundations as an invasion of Arabs. . * , The fact is that the Euphrates, which once flowed past Zobair—Old Bassora—is only held in its course, after its south-easterly bend above Kornah, by artificial em- bankments, and when these give way, which is not un- frequently the case, the whole land between Bassora and Zobair is laid under water. - The canal which intersects Bassora in the present 94 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION day is called the Ashar. That part of the town which lies on its north-western bank is called Nadhran. Many lesser canals are derived from the Ashar towards the south-east, where are other divisions of the city. The first of these is Boraiha, the inhabitants of which are chiefly potters and mat-makers. This district adjoins upon the suburb with canal, and the old port, where lie the Turkish ships of war, and known as Minawi or Minawiyab–the ancient Abolah. The other districts are Tufhat al Abbas, Saimar, Mahallat Ahlid Deir, Al Huz, Mishrak, Suk al Ghazal, Muhammad al Jawad, Adhaibah, and Nabbat el Jebel. The district at the entrance of the canal is called Almin Hissar. - We were welcomed on Our arrival at Bassora by M. Fontanier, the French consul, and the only Euro- pean resident in the place. The appointment of this gentleman had been subsequent to that of the Expedi- tion, whose movements, indeed, appeared to be the chief, if not the sole, object of his attention. But he also found leisure to mingle himself up with the in- trigues of the Turkish and Arab parties in the town; and the history of his proceedings during the presence of the British steamers on the river is at once curious and amusing, and affords a strange picture of what a French agent may be, when placed in some remote, yet not less responsible, quarter of the globe. His intrigues also involve themselves not only with our subsequent navigation of the rivers of Susiana, but also with the capture of Muhammrah by the Persians, which led to the invasion of that country by the British BASSORA - 95 and Indian forces under Outram and Havelock in 1856–7. - Nor is there aught of caricature in these quasi-poli- tical revelations, for I shall state nothing that is not corroborated by M. Fontanier himself in a work, a translation of which has been published (as far as the first volume is concerned) in this country, under the title of ‘Narrative of a Mission to India &c.’ In this work M. Fontanier avows that he considered it to be his duty, as the representative of France in the Persian Gulf and on the rivers Euphrates and Tigris, to oppose, in every manner that lay in his power, the aggrandisement of Great Britain in that portion of Asia, and to exert himself to the utmost to undermine its influence. So far, all fair; it was merely supplanting international amity by international enmity. The curiosity of the thing lies in the steps taken to insure Sll CCéSS. The first was to recommend the Muntifik Arabs to bar the passage of the river with the trunks of palm trees; a recommendation which led M. Fontanier into the extravagant error, as recorded in his work, of taking credit to himself for having brought about hostilities between the Arabs and Ourselves. gº This little transaction—Our acquaintance with which was officially transmitted by myself, under the instruc- tions of our commanding officer, to this worthy repre- sentative of France—did not prevent M. Fontanier hastening to welcome us on our arrival at Bassora. He did so, he says in his published work, most sincerely, for he had studied the details of the Expedition with 96 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION great care, and although he knew the result aimed at, he did not imagine the projectors would flatter them- selves that they should succeed all at once. “My mis- trust, he says, “was directed to the future, not to the present.’ M. Fontanier resided at the time in a house attached to the Roman Catholic Mission, which he afterwards changed for the convent when its last tenant, Kaz Hannah, or ‘John the Goose -who, originally a dealer in tobacco, had failed and turned priest—took his departure at a time when the ascendency of the Sheikh of Zobair had compelled the Turk Mutesellim or governor to seek satisfaction at Baghdad. M. Fontanier had, on his arrival, accepted the hospi- tality of the British agent, and had been introduced by him to the governor. But he fancied that Agha Barsaik had not given him the best apartment ; he also got possessed of the idea that no one was allowed to visit him without the Agha's sanction, and worse than all, he believed that he was looked upon as a protégé of the English. - He accordingly extricated himself from this bundle of dilemmas by insisting on his rights, as the repre- sentative of France, to be entertained by the Catholics, He had even then still a grievance; he had not a flag- staff, or a flag, to proclaim his dignity, and what was worse, no funds to obtain such. This difficulty was, however, overcome by pulling down a portion of the French factory, upon the repair of which the French Bishop of Baghdad was reported to have spent quite recently a large sum of money, and BASSORA. 97 selling the materials; he was enabled by this ingenious proceeding at once to set himself up in funds, and to float the insignia of national honour and of his own personal importance, over the whole of Bassora. ‘ Once installed,’ says M. Fontanier, in his amusing narrative, ‘I received frequent visits from all those who disliked the authority of the English.' And an incident soon occurred which, he relates, made it in- cumbent on him to check the influence of England. This was the approach of the Euphrates Expedition, and the request made by Colonel Taylor, then British Resident at Baghdad, for permission to establish coal and wood depôts at five different points of the Euphrates. M. Fontanier designates the unfortunate coal depôts as so many military posts and magazines, and he adds, that to ask permission to construct these posts, and to establish communication between them by means of steamboats, was neither more nor less than to propose to take possession of the river. Imagine five coal and wood depôts holding eleven hundred miles of river (at a distance of over a hundred miles from one another), and some six millions of Arabs in subjection But this was not the only mare's nest discovered by the sagacity of the French consul. The arrival of a company of Sepoys on their way to Bassora to relieve the guard at the Baghdad Residency, was converted by him into a military occupation of the country, and when the Sepoys relieved returned on their way to India, he asserts them to have been the same men, sent back by his remonstrances. So highly was his political impor- tance raised by this imaginary triumph, that he exclaims, WOL. II. H 98 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION in a paroxysm of self-congratulation, that his mere presence had now become a serious check to British influence, and that false greatness no longer glittered when exposed to light. * . Yet was all this published after M. Fontanier had himself been taken up the Tigris to Baghdad, and been hospitably entertained at the Residency, when he can- not but have satisfied himself that the guard of Sepoys was still there. At the time when the so much-dreaded steamer ‘Euphrates’ arrived at Bassora, the government of the town was nominally vested in the hands of a Turk called Mehemet Chelibi, but the real power belonged to Tajib Oghlu, a Turcoman by birth, also known as Mehemet ben Tajib. Some few years previously, the Sheikh of Zobair (a town which, representing Old Bassora and the ancient port on the Euphrates, is only separated by two or three miles of open land, when not inundated, from the Bassora of the Khalifs), and belonging to the Zayir tribe, had superseded the Turks in the government of the city. The Turkish troops, under Daud (David) Pasha, were assisted by the Arabs of the Muntifik and Tajib tribes in recovering possession of the city. This was ultimately effected, but not until three brothers of the Sheikh of the Zayir had been slain, whilst a fourth escaped to Aleppo. In return for the assistance thus afforded, Tajib was established as Sheikh of Zobair, and the government of Bassora was farmed out to Mehemet Chelibi. But Tajib soon showed his ingratitude to the Turks by BASSORA 90 making Zobair the centre of a large Smuggling trade, and otherwise embarrassing Mehemet Chelibi in his fiscal arrangements. The latter was well affected towards the English as friends of the Turks; this was sufficient for M. Fontanier to declare himself in favour of Tajib. “Ben Tajib, he says, “sought my support, and my credit was at Once established.’ The Turkish governor, with a rival in the city openly supported by the representative of the French govern- ment, being unable to carry on affairs any longer, repaired shortly after our arrival to represent this untoward state of things to the Pasha of Baghdad. A plan essentially Turkish was then resolved upon. The days of obedience to a bow-string Order were gone by. Mehemet Chelibi was entrusted with a secret firman authorising the putting to death the rebellious Sheikh. Armed with this firman, Mehemet quitted Baghdad as secretly as possible, but not sufficiently so but that Tajib was apprised of his departure, and had time to collect his partisans. He was thus prepared to defend himself if the governor had been accompanied by such a number of followers as to have excited his suspicions. Mehemet Chelibi, however, took care to commit no such blunder, when the Arabs were as ten to one of the Turks, but he pretended to be, and very probably was really afraid of the Sheikh, and he remained two days' at the castle at the entrance of the canal, and did not venture into the town until the third day. It was at this conjuncture that M. Fontanier states himself to have been made acquainted with the pro- H 2 T00 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION jected execution by a young Jew whom he protected. ‘I had time, he says, “to put him (Tajib) On his guard, but I did not ; it was in my power to save him, but my duty forbade me. I was obliged to forget that this man had never rendered me other than kind Services, and to leave him to his wretched fate.’ + Mehemet Chelibi had taken the precaution to bring with him one of the Zayir Arabs—Ben Mutchari. Together they entered the town with great pomp, and proceeded to the hall where the diwan was usually held. Ben Tajib met them there, and embraced the governor, as also the representative of the rival Arab tribe, but he notified to the latter, at the same time, that he must quit Bassora within twenty-four hours. All parties then seated themselves, conversation en- sued, followed by the kadi being called upon to read aloud the firmans for the new appointments. That of the governor was read, and after it that of the kadi, before any mention was made of the Sheikh of Zobair. Ben Tajib was annoyed at this breach of etiquette, but the governor, to divert his attention, remarked that it was useless in the season of the Ramazan to keep fatigued Mussulmans under arms, and declared he could no longer listen to the firmans. The Arabs who had accompanied Ben Tajib were upon this turned out of the court of the palace, and the soldiers of the governor were dismissed, with the exception of those who were employed, according to custom, in firing the cannon during the reading of the firmans. - -- - • ...: ; At length the reading was resumed, and Ben Tajib, BASSORA - 101 finding that the matter still related to the kadi, rose with the intention of withdrawing. Whilst he stooped at the door of the diwan to put on his slippers, an attendant shot him with a pistol in the loins, and the man who had charge of his pipe having drawn his sword, he too was despatched. On the report of the pistol the gates of the palace were closed, so that the followers of the murdered Sheikh could not enter; they, however, threatened an assault, and did not disperse until the stripped and lifeless body of their chief had been thrown out of one of the windows. Bassora was founded by the Khalif Omar, and there- fore preceded Baghdad as the residence of the Khaliſs. The first colony was composed of eight hundred Moslems, and the building of the new city was, according to Ibn Haukal, carried out by Atbak ibn Ghazuan. But the necessities of the commerce of the Persian Gulf had always demanded that there should be a port and em- porium on the Euphrates, and the Bassora of the early Moslems only succeeded to the Teredon of Nebuchad- mezzar and to Old Bassora, as also to the Khor Abulah of the Persians and the Apologos of the Macedonians. The historian Tabari, who wrote in the latter half of the ninth century, relates that in the later times of the dynasty of the Sassanides, the Persian kings had fortified the city of Abulah, and that place served as a bulwark against the invasions of the Indian fleets. In the earlier times of the same dynasty, the reverse was the case, and the Persians issued from the Euphrates to extend their empire. Thus we have the testimony of Hamza of Ispahan, that Khusrau Anushirwan subdued the capital 102 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION of Ceylon, which could not have been done without a goodly fleet. Nor were the Arabians indifferent to the commerce of the Persian Gulf anterior to Muhammadan times. The Christian kingdom of Hira was more particu- larly engaged in this commerce, and two Oriental historians, Mas’udi and Hamza, state that in the first half of the fifth century the citizens constantly saw ships at anchor before their houses which had come from India and China. This must have been on the Western Euphrates or Pallacopas, and the so-called ships vessels of small tonnage, like the modern baggalas. The commercial relations which existed between India and the Indian Archipelago and the Persian Gulf date back, indeed, to Babylonian, Phoenician, and Israelitic times. We have seen that Teredon, afterwards Diridotis, was, on the authority of Abydenus and Euse- bius, founded by Nebuchadnezzar, and probably pre- ceded Eziongeber on the Red Sea, from whence in Solomon's time commercial communication was main- tained with Hadramaut and Saba, as also with Ophir or Sofala; and the most powerful and wise of the kings of Israel founded, as we have before seen, Tadmor in the desert as a station between Jerusalem and Teredon. Heeren gives his reasons at length for believing that Teredon became at one time a Phoenician colony. In the time of the navigation of the Persian Gulf by Nearchus, the port is designated Diridotis. Eratosthenes, Pliny, Ptolemy, and Strabo all notice the port, and Ortelius identified it with Bassora (Old Bassora). : : The same old commercial relations were maintained * BASSORA 103 in the time of Alexander and of his successors. Near- chus was sent to explore the markets by sea to India, and although founded probably as a check to Persian power, still, commercial prosperity had everything to do with the rise and wealth of Seleucia on the Tigris— a city which on that account was endowed with peculiar privileges. While the Ptolemaean kings were founding harbours of refuge and stations for commerce along the coasts of the Red Sea, as far as to Zanguebar (Zanzibar), and to Ophir (Sofala), on the south coast of Africa, the Seleucian dynasty sought for the same purpose to avail themselves of the islands and harbours on and near to the Persian Gulf. But the port which shared most in the prosperity of Seleucia was Apologos, which we learn from the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea, was the place of relay for ships which ascended and descended the Tigris and the Euphrates. In the first year of our era, the merchandise of India poured itself into this emporium, among which we find, in Dean Vincent’s ‘Commerce of the Ancients,’ especial mention made of the wood called tekka by the Malabars, and teak by the English (T.ectona grandis), of which wood most of the houses were built. An admirable and erudite work was this of the worthy dean, attesting to enormous labour and research, and all it wanted was the identification of ancient sites with existing places or their ruins. The identity of the Apologos of the Macedonians and of the Abulah of the Persians has been admitted by D'Anville and other geographers, and Abū-l-fada 104 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION describes the canal of Abulah as being joined by that of Muakal, flowing from the Shimal or ‘north, at Miniyah or ‘the port’ near Bassora. Now this port still exists under the name of Minawi, South of modern Bas sora, and within it are the stranded sloops of war of the Turks, so that there is every reason to believe that is the position of the port of the Macedonians and the Persians. The Sublime Porte is, strange to say, as ignorant of the state of the empire as any foreigner. I remember, some years subsequently, Hafiz Pasha saying to me, ‘You have been to Bassora ; we have a fleet there ! . His eye kindled with patriotic enthusiasm, but it fell as quickly when I had to tell him that there were some ships of war, but I doubted if any one of them could take to Sea. . - “Ah!’ he said, ‘that is the misery of our country. The Porte depends upon its Pashas. Their short and uncertain tenure of Office is devoted to making ade- quate returns for their holdings. They have not the means, if they had the will, to make good the lăches of their predecessors. So they report that there is a fleet, but omit to say that it is not seaworthy.’ The Nahri-l-Abulah was considered by the Persians to possess so many natural beauties and such perfection of climate as to qualify it to constitute one of their four terrestrial paradises; the three others being the plain of Damascus, the garden of Samarcand, and the entrance defile of Farsistan. This paradise of Abulah is now a grove of palm trees, having an undergrowth of liquorice plant and the dark green mariscus with elongated spike- lets, the banks of the canal alone being fringed with BASSORA * 105 the graceful foliage and bright yellow blossoms of the acacia. The idea of a paradise misled Gibbon, who speaks of Bassora as pure and healthy in its climate, and its meadows as filled with palm trees and cattle. The date forests merely line the river banks or extend inland along the canal borders, but beyond, instead of meadows is nothing but unproductive plains or exten- sive inundations. The unhealthiness of Bassora is in the present day proverbial, and in the autumnal season scarcely an inhabitant escapes the fever of the country. It may, however, not have been so in olden times when more attention was paid to the maintenance of its canals and watercourses. Zobair and Zilha, the par- tisans of Ayisha, the favourite wife of Muhammad, erected the standard of revolt at the town which still bears the name of the former, and where was fought that cele- brated engagement known to the Arabs as the day of the Camel, from an animal of extraordinary size being ridden by the mother of the faithful. Bassora, we have seen, was founded, according to Ibn Haukal, and succeeded to Zobair, in the time of the Rhalif Omar, and so rapid was its rise in wealth and population, that in the time of Mirwan II., the fourteenth and last Khalif of the Ommiade dynasty, Bassora, following the example of Damascus and Kufa, asserted its independence; but the Mesopotamian “ass,’ as the Commander of the ‘Faithful” was complimentarily called, from his courage and perseverance, soon brought the citizens to order. After the foundation of Baghdad by the Abbasside 106 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Khalifs, the fortunes of Bassora attached themselves to those of the capital. It had, however, its own particu- lar adventures, having been pillaged in about A.D. 871 by the Zend or coloured natives of Zanguebar, and sacked in 928 by the fanatic followers of Karmath. It had also its domestic broils and conflicts, the same as have ever belonged to it since, in the time of Sulaiman the Great, it fell under the rule of the Osmanlis. But still those were the palmy days of Bassora. It almost equalled the capital itself in its scholastic reputation and in the number of celebrated authors and the treatises which they produced. It was in the rival schools of Bassora and Kufa that the greatest subtleties of the Kuran were expounded, and the beauties of the language of the Kuraish were analysed and the rules of composition fixed. It was from Bassora that the Arabian sailors, re- nowned in antiquity— Omnis eo terrore AEgyptus, et Indi, Omnis Arabs, omnes vertebant terga Sabaei– went forth and established themselves in the seventh and eighth centuries on the coast of Guzarat, Cambay, and Malabar, where the Romans had before carried on an active commerce, but had left no traces of their power. They established themselves at Canton in A.D. 758, and Harūnal Rāshid was the first to send an embassy to the Celestial Empire. It is with this palmy epoch in the history of Bassora that the legendary hero of the place, “Sindbad the Sailor,’ is associated. The ‘Alif Lila wa Lilin,’ or ‘The Thousand and One Stories, had, however, more of a BASSORA t 107 traditionary than a legendary origin. They had at first no more durable tablet than the memory of itinerating story-tellers, long before they were consigned to paper, and must have undergone many changes. No two copies of these tales have been found alike. For example, M. Langlès gave a translation of ‘Sindbad the Sailor’ in Savary's Arabic Grammar, from the text published at Calcutta in 1814, and which contains geographical notices of a far more defined character than what are met with in the text of the Breslau and Cairo editions. This would indicate that the Calcutta edition had been touched up by some learned person. Baron von Hammer Purgstall suggested some years ago, On the authority of Mas’udi, that these stories were not Arabian but were translated from the Indian to Persian in the reign of the Khalif El Mamun. But it has been justly observed of this theory, which would give a legendary instead of a traditional origin to the tales, that no foreigner could have succeeded in giving so ac- curate a description of Arabian life and scenery. Mas'udi, it is true, speaks in his “Muruj al Zahab (Silvestre de Sacy, “Recueil des Notices et Extraits, ix. 404), of a work which bore the title of “Sindebad, as Originally composed in India, and which refers to a king of China, his seven vizirs, his queen, and of a son and his tutor. This is the “Sindebad’ which Mr. Thomas Wright informs us in his instructive work upon the literature of England in the middle ages was translated into Latin at least as early as the thirteenth century, and became popular in almost every language in Western 108 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Europe under the name of the ‘Romance of the Seven Sages.’ This “Sindebad' is, according to Loiseleur Deslong- champs, ‘Essai sur les Fables Indiennes, Paris, 1833, admittedly of Indian Origin. It was translated at a very early period into Arabic, and occurs in the Breslau and Cairo editions of the ‘Arabian Nights' Entertain- ments.’ M. Reinaud obtained from the text of Hamza of Ispahan, published in St. Petersburg, a quotation from the author of the ‘Modjem al Tivarikh, to the effect that among a number of works that were written in the time of the Arsacide kings, was a book entitled “Sinde- bad.’ Some Orientalists have gone so far as to deduce from this that the narrative of “Sindbad had a Persian Origin, subsequently modified and altered by the Arabs.” But in the testimonies here quoted of Mas’udi and Hamza, mention is made of Greek, Indian, and Persian books, and there is, therefore, every reason for believing that the book of “Sindebad’ alluded to refers to the Indian “Sindebad’ and not to the Arabian “Sindbad, or Sinbad, the Sailor.” Persian writers also notice, under the title of “Sinde- bad Nameh, certain narratives which, at first compiled in prose, were afterwards recited in verse. An account of one of these has been published by Mr. Forbes Falconer, in his “Analytical Account of the Sindebad Nameh, London, 1841. These poems are but repro- * Relations des voyages faits par les Arabes et les Persams dams l'Inde et la Chine, &c.,’ par M. Reinaud (Paris, 1845). * Mohl. Le Livre des Rois. . BASSORA 109 ductions of the same Indian story, altered and adapted to the Shi‘ah form of belief. There is every reason to believe that the narrative of the real Sindbad—the traditionary hero of Bassora— is of Arabian Origin; that it is, in fact, a compilation from the narratives of travel and adventure current among the Arabs in the middle ages. Richard Hole published in 1797 a dissertation entitled “Remarks on the Arabian Nights' Entertainments, in which the origin of Sindbad's travels, and of other Oriental fictions, is considered, and a distinguished geogra- pher, M. Walckenaer, has published a memoir on the same question; but none have treated the subject so elaborately as M. Reinaud, who, in the transla- tion of a text originally published by M. Langlès, and which contains the narratives of the journeys made by various Arabian travellers to India and China in the ninth century, shows that these narratives agree, in their main points, with the corrected text of “Sindbad, and hence leads us to believe that they may have mate- rially assisted in the compilation of the popular fiction. These narratives were collected by one Abū Sayid, or Zeyd Hassan, a native of Surat, at that time the chief port in the Persian Gulf. The principal narrative, which serves as a basis to that of the other merchants, is that of one Sulaiman, who travelled about A.D. 851, an epoch when the commercial relations between the Rhalifat of Baghdad and the Empires of India and China had attained their greatest activity. Those glorious days of material prosperity and literary attainments are now utterly and entirely gone 110 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION by. Bassora is now farmed for about 16,000l. sterling per annum. About thrice this amount is raised by the custom-house duties, by the sale of government dates and taxes on others, by the capitation tax, by the farm- ing of spirits, and by monopolies, and by extortion (jūrūm). - A hundred and fifty boats, averaging sixty tons each, come annually to Bassora for dates, and about 2,500 horses are annually exported to India. The custom dues are eight per cent., and at that rate each bag of dates brings in 18. 8d., slaves 32s., and valuable horses as much as 6l. * Bassora also exports salt, rose-water, pearls, sweet- meats, seeds, and drugs. For six months of the year the rivers and canals abound in such swarms of fish as to feed the whole population at little or no expense, and for the six other months they are provided with an equally cheap and abundant diet from the vast date forests. But they have also meat and poultry and eggs, the usual fruits and vegetables of an inter-tropical climate, and they import corn from Suk el Shuyuk, rice from Lemlun, and tobacco from Persia and Baghdad. The facility for obtaining the necessaries of life induces much idleness and makes labour expensive. Yet beggars thrive well, and M. Fontanier relates that a Roman Catholic professional mendicant saved 45/. in the space of six months. There are not many places gifted with so many advantages as Bassora. Its river affords wide and safe anchorage; its date forests, which constituted it a paradise in the eyes of the Persians; its soil, easily BASSORA. III irrigated, and capable of producing cotton, rice, or sugar; its position at the junction of three great rivers —the Euphrates, the Tigris, and the Karūn—reminding one of the garden of Eden, and commanding the pro- duce of thousands of miles of navigation, all contribute to adapt it to be the home of population, wealth, and prosperity. - Yet it is difficult to imagine a place more fallen than is the Bassora of to-day. The bazaars and cara- vanserais, where the wealth of India and Persia found a market, and merchants congregated from all parts of the globe, have ceased to have even an ordinary attrac- tion. Its colleges for youths, its academies of learning and poetry, its halls for theological and grammatical discussions, are nowhere to be found, except in a few ruins with high-sounding names. - No Atbak ibn Ghazuan superintends modern archi- tectural improvements, no living Sindbad narrates his adventures in its now deserted coffee houses. The port of Abulah is filled with mud, and its paradise remains only in its date grove. The canals, which were reckoned by Bilab ben Abi Berdah to be 120,000, on which boats were employed, are now, thanks to Turkish indifference and Arab wilfulness, converted into One great and continuous inundation. The tombs of Al Kara ben Sarir, of Talhali ben Abdullah (‘peace be to their memory !'), and of other learned and pious men, have no longer any pilgrim visitors to their crumbling shrines; the proud fleet of the Turks is foundered, and does not possess a vessel 112 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION that could move from its place. Bassora is now a poor, dilapidated, half-populated, ruinous, and sickly town. Only a solitary tradition of the Bassora of yore remains; the pir or head of the booksellers' guild in Constanti- nople is the descendant of Abdullah Yatimi, the first of his trade in Bassora. - - BOOK W. WANDERINGS IN PERSIA. *-m-m-m-mºssºms CHAPTER I. BUSHIRE. THE territories upon the Shat al Arab dependent upon Bassora are distinguished into the Shemal, or those of the north, and the Junub or those of the south. The Shemal is for the most part fringed on the river side by date groves. It is pierced by many canals, among which are the Nahr Omar and Deir ; it also contains several villages, as Robat, Dan, and Shireh ; also the ruins of Deir, “the monastery’ celebrated for its tower of colossal dimensions, and of Ableh, or Abulah, a site of still greater antiquity. The upper portion of this district is constantly exposed to inundation from the breaking down of the dykes of the Euphrates and the flooding of the various canals. - Fath. Allah ibn Alwan il Kaabi, in his ‘History of Bassora, entitled “Zad ul Musafir, written a century and a half ago, speaks of Deir or Dair, a town north- west of Bassora, remarkable for a tower of such colossal dimensions and beautiful proportions as to appear to be the work of genii, Ibn ul Wardi, in the Khausilat ul WOL. II, I 114 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Ajaib, adds that strange sounds are occasionally heard to proceed from the interior of the tower. The district of the Junub presents similar characters —a fringe of date trees and scanty vegetation succeeded inland by a naked plain. This district has, however, many villages and canals dispersed along the date groves on the river banks. The extensive level and marshy tracts which extend beyond the Junub to the shores of the Persian Gulf are called the Dawasir or ‘water country’ by Niebuhr, Choa- bedeh by Sir H. Jones, and Jezirah Khadr or ‘green islands’ by Thevenot. The extreme limits of the alluvial soil are clad with a kind of rush, which resembles the Mariscus elatus of India, only that its spikelets are much more elongated. The mud banks of the Shat al Arab near its mouth were tenanted by a very curious small fish which, having labyrinthiform gills, can live out of the water, and during the recess of the tide they lie in myriads basking in the sun, but withdrawing with wonderful celerity into holes in the mud when anything disturbs them, such as the approach of a boat. The evening of our departure from Bassora we had the misfortune to lose a man, a black, who in coming off from shore with another man, both the worse for the arrack of the bazaars, in a native canoe, managed to upset it. The Englishman was saved, and every effort was made to rescue the black, especially by Charlewood, who persevered for a long time in dragging the river, but in vain. In the evening of June 21 we dropped down the river, RUSHIRE 11 5 having left Major Estcourt and Lieutenant Murphy in the Residency at Bassora, whilst Dr. and Mrs. Helfer went on in the ‘Hugh Lindsay’ to India, and after passing part of the night on the stream, started with the break of day for the Persian Gulf. The “Euphrates’ steamer, having been built for river navigation, she was very low in her decks, her paddle- boxes were not very strongly fitted together, and she could not in many points be considered as seaworthy, so it will not be surprising if some anxiety was felt as to how she would behave in the open sea, in crossing the head of the Persian Gulf to Bushire. After getting over the bar of the river, where there was a vast accumulation of Snakes, apparently brought down by the river, and anxious to get back again when they found themselves in salt water, though the steamer rolled a good deal, she faced the waves boldly and made headway very well; nor did we meet with any contretemps, till towards evening we were obliged to pull up suddenly, with six feet of water, off one of those numerous banks which line the coast off the north-east point of the Gulf. We were so involved in these shoals at the mouth of the Oroates—variously designated Arosis and Tab Indiyan, whilst the delta is better known as Barcan— that it was deemed safer to lie to for the night than persevere in a perilous navigation. The next day (June 23) we sailed with a fair breeze along the now more rocky coast of the mainland, with the island of Kharaj or Karak to the windward. Still Our progress was effected so cautiously that we did not I 2 116 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION arrive in the roadstead of Bushire till five o'clock in the *. evening. . There were at that time a frigate and cutter belong- ing to the East India Company as well as a sloop of war belonging to the Imām of Mascat in the harbour, and the crew of the former manned their yards and gave us three hearty cheers in acknowledgment of our safe descent of the river and of our short but danger- ous passage of the Gulf. The same evening Captain Hennell, the British Resident at Bushire, came on board and kindly undertook to assist us in carrying out those repairs and the thorough cleansing which our journey down the river had rendered an imperious necessity. The steamer, drawing but little water, was enabled to bring-to immediately off the quays, and whilst a native bungalow was hired to dispose of the crew and of stray objects for the time being, a small house, with its accompanying badgir or ‘wind tower,’ and a terrace to sleep upon, was engaged for the officers. This whilst the repairs and cleansing of the steamer were going on. I never observed a thermometrical difference of two degrees between the temperature of the square space below the badgir and that of the shade, yet the relief derived from the draught of air was very great— infinitely more so than would be expected from the mere difference of temperature. The badgir appeared to be a decided improvement to the sirdabs or under- ground rooms of Baghdad and Mosul, but then again, there are few or no breezes to be caught inland, and the wind-tower would be useless in the city of the Khalifs. BUSHIRE - 117 Bushire, whose proper name is Abū Shahir or ‘father of cities, softened into Abushire and Bushire, being the principal sea-port of Persia, presents an aspect of bustle and trade, to which the Anglo-Indian Residency and the almost constant presence of One or two sloops of war contribute in no small degree. The flat-roofed houses are grouped irregularly along the beach, and among these are a few public buildings, more especially the caravanserai, a sort of exchange or commercial mart which leads to the bazaar and the residence of the Governor. The British Residency Occupies a point of land looking out upon the Gulf, and is a kind of fortified mansion, having a guard of Sepoys. The mosques have the usual cleanly appearance, and peeping through the brick latticed walls, it was not uninteresting to observe the sacred ablutions going on in their various compartments, groups of boys chanting the evening hymns, and Occasional female forms flitting along the dark corridors. - Morier and Fraser have both spoken disparagingly of Bushire, but everything is only comparable to what is analogous to it; and Bushire, with its well-provided market and its gigantic flasks of Shiraz wine, some- times covering half a quay, appeared to us to be a port redolent with comforts and luxuries infinitely superior to anything that we had hitherto fell in with in our travels. The cargoes of assafoetida, piled up by the side of the array of flasks (often imperfectly stopped with Cotton), were certainly objectionable, and after a 118 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION hot day they perfumed the atmosphere to a degree that was overpowering. . The water at Bushire is also execrable. It is ob- tained from wells sunk without the city, fourteen to sixteen feet deep, in a sandy soil with an argillaceous substratum, and the water is always brackish to a greater or lesser degree, and is charged for accordingly —a very saline draught being cheaper than a less purgative and bitter beverage. Wherever these wells are met with there is a cottage or two, with a few palms and a tree tamarisk or two. I observed the roots of the latter penetrating to the bottom of several of the wells. The water is drawn up by oxen in leather buckets with long spouts, which are held upwards as the rope is drawn over the roller, but which fall down and discharge their contents on arriving at their destination. The cottagers lived by the sale of the water, and had also to support their oxen. It is needless to enter into details upon the com- merce of Bushire, since such are to be found in the popular compendiums of MacCulloch and Macgregor. I will confine my observations to the physical aspect of things, upon which my personal observations may furnish more that is new. Bushire is built upon a rocky bed of calcareous sandstone, of such recent date (geologically speaking), that it contains sea-shells similar to those which are met with in the Persian Gulf at the present day, and this rock is peninsulated from a low and sometimes submerged tract. This peninsula corresponds to the ancient Mesembria, and is over eleven miles in length, rising BUSHIRE - 119 nowhere more than forty feet above the level of the S628,. The rock upon which the town itself is built is not above a mile and a half in width by a mile and a quarter in length. It forms cliffs of about twelve feet in height to the south-west, but on the land side the approach is often cut off by high tides. To the south the same recent marine formation is succeeded by higher lands, where the remains of the Portuguese settlement of Rushire (Rû-al-Shahir, or ‘the city at the Cape’), are still visible, the cottages in the neighbourhood being built of the ruins of the older town, and where there also exist the ruins of a large residence designated as that of Shah Selim. Cinerary urns are also found in the same vicinity. Beyond Rushire the sea-cliffs become more lofty, and are intersected by wide and deep ravines, till at Hallilah they begin to lower again. The eastern side of the peninsula, which fronts a wide expanse of sand, rises in cliffs of nearly a hundred feet in height. The best water on the peninsula is obtained at Sheikh Abū and Hallilah. At Rushire the water is very bitter, and I found One spring strongly impreg- nated with hydro-sulphureous acid, probably produced by the decomposition of marine Organic products. The greater part of the peninsula is under culti- vation, chiefly of cotton. The central elevated plat- form is, however, completely barren. A fringe of date trees occupies the line of junction of the rock with the marine sands to the east and south-east, indicating a percolation of water. The neighbourhood of Sheikh I20 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Abū, and the coast from a mile and a half south-west of Bushire to Hallilah, is for the most part occupied by cotton plantations. There are also occasional date groves. Near Bushire the roots of the vines are pro- tected by circular stone walls, but they do not thrive vigorously. The fleet of Nearchus, when sailing along this coast, not being able to double the Cape in the evening, anchored in the bay to the south-eastwards. The place was called Hieratis, and near it was a canal called Heratemis. D'Anville identifies the site with the Kirazin of Idrisi, and Dean Vincent with Hallilah. The description, however, appears to refer to the island at the mouth of the Khor Kayir. The next day the fleet sailed to Mesambria, and anchored at the mouth of the torrent called Padargus. Mesambria means a peninsula, and by a torrent is meant a dry summer bed, such as nearly crosses the peninsula at Rū-al-Shahir. From that station, the fleet sailed twelve miles and a half to Taoke, which Vincent, by an inadmissible duplication of numbers, carries to Bund-i-Naik. But to have sailed round the peninsula to Bushire would be quite sufficient to meet the statement of the Mace- donian navigator. Arrian, in his ‘Periplus, further tells us that Taoke was thirty-six miles from Gennaba, and the position of which, now Gunnava, is known to correspond to that distance from Bushire. Strabo also notices a palace of the kings of Persia as being on the sea-coast of Persia proper (Farsistan) and he calls it Oke. - BUSHIRE . . . . 121 The great natural feature of the coast consists, over and above the few promontories or Mesambriae, in a low littoral district, abruptly succeeded at a varying distance inland by a hilly and rocky territory, the boundaries between the two being at times almost marked off as by a wall. The low territory is dis- tinguished as the Gurmisir or ‘hot climate, the hilly as the Sirhur or “cold climate.’ The former is, how- ever, more generally known as the Dashistan. Niebuhr, Sir Harford Jones, Dean Vincent, Rousseau, and Dupré are all at variance with regard to the boundaries of these districts, the precise demarcation of which is not, however, of the slightest importance, as the fact of a high and low territory, and of a hot and a little cooler district, remains the same. The Dashistan was known to the ancients as the Syrtibole, and in the parallel of Bushire it attains a breadth of twenty miles, a low plain extending that distance, more or less, between the sea and the hills. The British force which carried on brief hostilities with the Persians on this plain in 1857, arrived at Bushire on February 1, and on the 3rd moved off to Char-Kota, arriving there on the morning of the 4th. The nights were cold at that season of the year, and much discomfort was experienced from high winds which enveloped the country in dust, and which were succeeded by storms of rain. On the morning of the 5th the force reached Brasjoon, or Bürüzjūn, where the enemy was supposed to be posted in strength, but the place was hastily evacu- ated upon the approach of the British troops. Great 122 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION quantities of ammunition of all kinds, together with grain and camp equipage, fell into the hands of the latter. Some treasure was also discovered, and many horses and carriage cattle secured. Captain Hunt, the historian of the expedition, justly remarks of the hills that flank the Dashistan, that they are both bold and formidable, and with the exception of two or three routes or rather pathways in use, utterly im- passable ; and even on these, a handful of determined men might at every turn in the road stop an army. The force did not, however, move beyond Bürüzjūn, but commenced the return march to Bushire on the evening of the 7th. Previous to their departure, a large quantity of the enemy's powder, stated to have been thirty-six thousand pounds, was exploded, and a most magnificent as well as extraordinary spectacle it Occasioned. The Persians, notwithstanding the cowardice ex- hibited in abandoning their entrenchments at Bürüzjün without a blow, seemed to have been stirred up by what they would put down as the retreat of the British division, and they began to harass the supposed retreat- ing army the same night, and their skirmishing but well sustained fire occasioned many disasters. At dawn next day the Persian army was descried, as the mist cleared away, in position. They were drawn up in line, their right resting on the walled village of Khūsh- aub and a date grove, their left on a hamlet with a round fortalice tower." Two rising mounds were in their * Ab, ‘water,' but pronounced Aub; hence Captain Hunt's spelling of the word. . : BUSHIRE 123 centre which served as redoubts, and where they had their guns, and they had some deep nullahs on their right front and flank, thickly lined with skirmishers. Their cavalry, in considerable bodies, were on both flanks. Their strength was estimated as over six thousand infantry and two thousand horse; and they were commanded by Süja (il Mülkh, reputed to be the best officer in the Persian army. - A rapid cannonade on both sides commenced the battle of Khūsh-aub, the lines advancing directly the regiments had deployed; and so rapidly and steadily did the leading one move over the crest of a rising ground, that it suffered but little. The artillery advanced at the same time to closer action, making most beautiful practice, and almost silencing the opposing batteries. Some bodies of horse also soon presented an opportunity for a charge, and this was done with such effect as to fairly drive the enemy's horse off the field. The infantry lines were still advancing rapidly, and in steady Order, to sustain this attack, and were just getting into close action, when the enemy lost heart, and his entire line at once broke and fled precipitately. The men cast away their arms and accoutrements, and, as the pursuit continued, even their clothing. More than seven hundred of their dead were left on the field, although they never came to close quarters, whilst on our side, we had only one officer and eighteen men killed. - The return journey, to Bushire, effected after this brilliant exploit, was rendered most distressing by heavy rain, cold winds, and sticky mud. The troops, however, 124 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION managed to reach Chuga-dûk, between Char-Kota and Bushire, by ten o'clock of the 9th, and Bushire itself the same night ; having traversed forty-four miles from the battle-field within thirty hours. Very different was the weather at the time of the year when the Euphrates Expedition was at Bushire. It was intensely hot, and lying in the open with only a sheet for covering, and a Persian fan in the hand, still it was difficult to procure any rest. Colonel Chesney had taken refuge with Captain Hennell in a cottage on the plain, where they had a punkah. They sent in the body of a hyaena they shot on the plain for me to skin, but the hornets attacked me so ferociously that I had to give up the attempt. Happily, at this time I obtained permission to visit the interior, and after in vain trying to induce One or Other of the officers to accompany me, I started, attended by an interpreter, a muleteer, and three mules. 125 CHAPTER II. THE PASSES OF THE PERSIAN APENNINES. I LEFT Bushire in the cool of the evening, accompanied by a young Armenian, who had been kindly recom- mended by Captain Hennell as an interpreter, but who turned out to be a most unprincipled young rogue; by a muleteer, coarse and rough of manner, and with whom I was always at variance, as I wanted daylight to geologise, and he wanted night to protect his mules from flies; one pair of Saddle-bags, to carry a change, being all the luggage we were encumbered with. Advancing across the neck of the peninsula, an uniform and almost desert level of about seven miles in extent presented itself, without a trace of vegetation, but at times covered with a snow-white crystallisation of salt. When we had got over this uninteresting tract, the soil became a little more diversified, the lower saline beds were partly covered with articulated membraneous evergreen plants, belonging to the genera Salsola, Sali- cornia, and mesembryanthemum. The drier and more elevated soil was equally partially clothed with woolly labiate and leguminous plants, enlivened by some bright flowering species of the composite order, that were 126 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION capable by their stubborn and hardy structure of resist- ing the most burning Sun. Arborescent mimosae, with elegant foliage and bright yellow blossoms, also covered occasional tracts, where the soil was light and the ground broken up and uneven. The country was also now further diversified by cultivated lands, groves of date trees, gardens, and villages. - We passed a few hours of the night at one of the latter, and started again before daybreak, for the mid- summer sun would not allow us to travel after about eight o'clock on the torrid Dashistan. The cottages of the peasants on this remarkable tract of land were constructed of the branches of date trees, low and cylindrical, three or four being generally enclosed in a common fence, rather gracefully made up also of fronds of the same tree placed erect, and in close contact. These huts were also for the most part grouped around mud forts, generally quadrangular, with round towers at the angles. These served as places of refuge during the predatory conflicts that are ever recurring in these imperfectly governed countries. The men of the plain are a fine handsome race, accustomed to the use of arms, and habituated to look each to himself in case of aggression. This habit develops an amount of personal independence that is quite unknown in civilised societies, where the distinc- tion of classes, and the mutual dependence of the one upon the other, swamps the individual in the mass. Yet, on the other side, was this individual capability of no avail against the disciplined forces of civilisation. THE PASSES OF THE PERSIAN APENNINES 127 Although backed by as intense a religious hatred as the Sunnis of the Sudan bore to the infidels, they—a Shi‘ah sect—abhorring even anything touched or polluted by a jawûr, could not for a moment, even when collected together in their thousands, stand the firm phalanx of British troops opposed to them at Bürüzjūn or Khūsh- aub. - It is much to be doubted also if the Persian, be he Arab, or Tajib, or Turcoman, entertains precisely the same firm belief that is still to be found among the Sudanese, of babbling fountains, groves of palms, and fair houris to be met with in another world, if killed in fighting against infidels. - The ladies are altogether opposed to the tradition, and it is therefore never broached in the tent. Then again, the Persian is in the East what France is in the West—a quick-sighted, ingenious, and sceptical person. The Sun SOOn put a stop to Our progress, and we were glad to take refuge in a date grove, where I deposited my bags and lit a kaliyun. I had brought with me from Bushire two large water melons, and the tremendous heat of the midday sun made me appeal to One of them for refreshment, for what little milk I could obtain from the villagers was almost as bitter as the water. Having made a grateful repast of a fruit that can Only be properly appreciated under such circumstances, I converted the other one, for precaution's sake, into a pillow, and resigned myself to a siesta in anticipation of a night's march. 128 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION I was, however, destined to be outwitted, although not by the Armenian or the muleteer. It requires some practice to get a nap in the shade of a palm tree. As the earth keeps revolving in a circle, the place selected must be at the extreme point of the south-eastern fringe of shade. Then there is a chance of rest till the shade has passed entirely by. The heat of the first beams falling upon the slum- berer wake him up at Once, and so it was with me. And what was my annoyance, when on waking my eyes met the steady but wondering gaze of a huge black- whiskered buffalo, who had been busy devouring my pillow from under my head, which was buried amidst the luscious fragments. - Resuming my journey across the Dashistan, I must say that, notwithstanding the reiterated complaints made by preceding travellers of the drearingss and solitude of the plain, I found much to amuse and to please me. The novelty and the variety of the forms of animal and vegetable life presented an unending source of inte- rest. Animal life on these hot plains is indeed extremely prolific. As the break of day began to unveil the far off horizon, troops of gazelles were to be seen browsing on the scanty herbage in almost every direction, flights of small bustards rose On Our approach, gigantic lizards occasionally crossed the pathway, the bright blue bee- eater screeched over Our heads, while the beautiful blue crow sat on the prickly thorn, silently watching us as we passed by. As evening approached, jackals and hyaenas began to prowl about. The exceeding indifference of the latter to the THE PASSES OF THE PERSIAN APENNINES 129 presence of man was the cause of my being placed in a most undignified position before my interpreter and muleteer. We had passed Bürüzjūn, the village so hastily abandoned by the Persians when the British troops came up, and at this time held by one Ali Khan, most probably the same who was knocked off his horse for waving his kalpak to the enemy, and were approach- sº ing Dalaki, at the foot of the hills, when the impertur- bable proximity of a bristly old hyaena excited an uncontrollable wish to make a closer acquaintance with so surly-looking an antagonist. My pistols were loaded for self-defence, and not caring to use them, I drew my sword and trotted up, rather to see how near the beast would let me come than with any other object in view ; but as the animal scarcely condescended to move off at more than a walk- ing pace, I put my mule to a quicker step, and think- ing that I might come up with him, got somewhat excited with the chase. The mule I rode was a sorry Bushire hack, the plain was covered with huge broken rocks, and I had just got up to the grizzly quadruped, and was stooping over the mule's neck to take a cut at him, when the beast went down upon both knees, and sent his rider sprawling below the hyaena's nose, his sword arm extended and his knees in contact with a bit of rock, and that so rudely as for a moment to make the brain reel. The magnanimous, albeit ill-looking animal, did not take advantage of the fallen position of his foe, but moved off with a snarl of contempt, a feeling in which he was joined by my two attendants, enlivened by a further sense of ridicule. WOL. II. K 130 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION It was dark before we reached Dalaki, a village celebrated for its naphtha fountains, which are several in number, and the precious oil is carefully collected as it OOzes up. - The next day we entered upon the Sirhur, or ‘hilly country.’ These hills are in reality only a portion of that long belt of rocky mountains which stretches from the Indian Ocean to the Taurus—the long range of Per- sian Apennines to the south, and the Gordyaean or Kurdish Alps to the north—inhabited by a numerous and hardy population, and revealing in their interior so many relics of an obscure and little explored anti- quity. The entrance into this region of hills was charac- teristic enough. It was a narrow stony pass with walls of rock on either side, and a stream struggling among fallen rocks for a bridle path. We gained the valley of the Shapur river by this first pass, but found it, at this season of the year, to be too salt to be pala- table, and yet it abounded in small fish, of which numerous piebald kingfishers were making an abundant repast. The valley of the river was replete with various and beautiful scenery. At its entrance was a tower or fortalice, now untenanted. The cliffs on either side rose up to a height varying from four to five hundred feet, and they were not more remarkable for their bizarre stratification and flexuous contortions than for their bright and contrasted colours. * The path lay along the bed of the river, which was soon wedged in by the approaching cliffs, and we THE PASSES OF THE PERSIAN APENNINES 131 passed under the arch of a broken-down bridge, on which sat a lonely cormorant, and a little beyond, at a second ruined bridge, we forded the river, and com- menced the ascent of the first of the Kotuls, as the passes are called, this one being the Kotul-i-Mullu, and of the appalling character of which a good idea may be obtained in Fraser’s ‘Persia.” ‘The traveller,’ says that distinguished Orientalist, in reference to this pass, ‘has sometimes to guide his horse along the slippery surface of a projecting ledge, at others suddenly climbing, or as rapidly descending, he must thread his way among the crevices of huge unshapely blocks hurled from lofty peaks above, and which seem placed to forbid the passage either of man or beast. The track formed by the feet of the passengers, unaided in the least by art, resembles the dry bed of a torrent, and actually passes for miles among the ruins of the Overhanging mountains.’ - These assume the boldest and the most fantastic shapes, sometimes seeming ready to close overhead, at other points disclosing numerous ravines and hollows, whence occasionally trickles a salt stream to pollute the clear river. No vegetation enlivens the grey-yellow rocks, except a few bushes of the wild almond; and the grotesque forms of the surrounding cliffs, the peaks and masses riven from the native mountain, and standing forth in the pale moonlight—for to avoid the scorching heat of day, the passage of this Kotulis most commonly made by night—together with the black mysterious shadows of the deep ravines, form a picture which the traveller will not easily forget. K 2 132 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION These ‘black mysterious shadows’ of this strangely fantastic pass are not at all exaggerated figures; and such an impression had they upon myself, that when, on gaining the summit, the forms of two armed Persians, guardians of the place, made their appear- ance among the rocks, the only doubt was, were they robbers, or something unreal—fit companions for such unearthly scenery and chaotic confusion. Two ruined towers or fortalices stand at the head of the pass, which is succeeded by the plain of Khaist, or Konar Tacht, elevated about a thousand feet above the sea. This is a fine Open plain, about ten miles wide, for the most part cultivated, with here and there villages embosomed in date groves, and a khan by the wayside. I spread my carpet in one of these groves, whereupon the chief of the village came and pressed me hard to sleep in his house, and when I declined, told me he could not be answerable for my safety if I slept out. This was an old story, and was utterly disregarded, much, however, to the annoyance of the muleteer and Armenian, who, like many others I have known, always preferred the heat and insects, with the protection of an interior, to the imaginary terrors, but cool and certain rest, of the Open air. A rocky but wooded district led us down from the plain of Khaist to the valley of the Shapur river, the bed of which we again followed for a short time. At length after winding by the side of a ridge of rock, which rose almost vertically from the river, we found ourselves at the foot of the Kotul-i-Kumarij, the second of these remarkable passes. THE PASSES OF THE PERSIAN APENNINES 133 It was a very narrow fissure, up the perpendicular sides of which the road ascended in zigzag fashion, and some security is given by a parapet skilfully thrown athwart the salient and re-entering angles, for a false step would hurl man and horse into a frightful abyss. It was at this pass that Kurum Khan finally defeated Azad Khan, and by his after treatment of his enemy converted him into an attached friend. At the summit of this pass the road is carried by an arched causeway across a rivulet of Salt water, in which the mules, fatigued by the toilSome ascent, and drooping beneath a summer Sun, sought in vain to quench their thirst. As the defile of Mullu terminated upon the plain of Khaist, so that of Kumarij leads to a plain of same name. This is the most distinctive feature of these passes, which are but so many steps of one gigantic “ladder, rising from the sea to the interior uplands of Central Persia. This is indeed the term used by the historians of Alexander the Great to de- scribe these klimakes or ‘passes, more particularly that of the Kalah Sifin. The plain of Kumarij was about eight miles in length and five or six in width; upon the wayside was a ruinous caravanserai, and a little to the north the village of Kumarij, close by which is a mine of salt, which I turned off the road to explore. There were two beds, one of which was upwards of forty feet in thickness, and of a degree of purity and transparency that far exceeded anything I had before met with in rock-salt." * The geological structure of these passes is minutely described, assisted by diagrams, in my Researches in A88'ſ ria, Babylonia, déc. 134 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION At the further extremity of the plain, the ruins of Old Kumarijskirted the hill-side, and a sleepy fortalice with a few tall trees, apparently shadowless beneath a vertical sun, pointed to where the plain narrowed to a rocky pass, known as the Tenk-i-Turkhan, or Turk's defile—another step in this long-enduring ascent. Although the pass was the least precipitous of any, the road was very stony and slippery, so much so that one of our mules fell, and cut a portion of the integuments clear off the frontal bone. This pass was shaded in places, and within it were also some springs of good water. Beyond, the country opened upon the plain of Shapur, at the western extremity of which are the ruins of the Sassanian city of same name, and where a rivulet issues from a moun- tain-girt valley, while to the south, the valley of Razerün stretches away to a lake which apparently receives the waters of Dasht Arjun, which are sub- terranean at their origin, and subterranean during the greater part of their course. About three miles from the pass was a guard-house, in front of which a group of idle, dissolute, ill-dressed soldiers were grouped under the shade of a plane tree. The sergeant of the guard approached, rubbing his thumb and finger, after the fashion of the aged mis- creant on the Euphrates, and insisting, in which he was backed by my worthy Armenian follower, that it was de rigueur to give backshish. I accordingly dealt out a karuni, which he tossed in the air with such ineffable contempt, that I rode up and took it away from him, somewhat to the surprise of all the witnesses THE PASSES OF THE PERSIAN APENNINES 135 of the little open-air drama. The same afternoon we reached the truly rural and beautiful town of Kazerún —a mass of cottages and villas embosomed in verdure. I had just dismounted, and was standing in the vestibule of an Armenian's house, when there came a violent shock of an earthquake from the north-east. The heat had been oppressive all day—the sky cloud- less, with a slight breeze from the north-west. Luckily it did no damage beyond the temporary alarm it created. In fact I suspect, from the little concern shown by the people, that they were quite accustomed to such phenomena. It is to their frequent occurrence that is to be attributed in part the dilapidated condition of their towns and villages, and still more so the rock- encumbered character of their wonderful passes. Kazerún is, however, a pleasant, cleanly-looking town, and has left lasting impressions of a delightful spot and of hospitable and kindly treatment. The houses are mostly built of stone, and the walls whitewashed, which adds to the cleanly appearance of the place. Nearly every court-yard had its palm tree. I had scarcely been seated, when an unknown friend sent me a present of apples, whilst my host, who had once been in attendance upon Sir John Malcolm, amused me with imitations of the guttural tones of that distin- guished officer. - In the evening I took a stroll to the palace of one of the exiled Persian princes, who visited this country many years ago, when Mr. Baillie Fraser was appointed to take charge of them. I afterwards had an oppor- tunity of making their acquaintance at Mardin. 136 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION The garden attached to the palace, all I was admitted to see, was enclosed in shrubbery of laurel and pome- granate, with avenues of roses and clumps of cypress. There were also long straight avenues of orange trees. The pathway was made of pebbles embedded in cement, and so raised as to afford a dry walk even in the rainy season. There was a kiosk or summer house, but it had nearly tumbled to pieces owing to earthquakes or family misfortunes. I selected this pleasant spot for my night's rest, and bade my carpet and kaliyun to be brought to me—my host attending affably to my wishes, and providing me with the coffee so essential as a preservative against malaria. When I awoke early next morning, I caught a glimpse of a beautiful girl who had been assiduously fanning me in my slumbers. The opening of my eyes was the signal for a precipitate retreat, and I had to leave Kazerün without the opportunity being afforded to me of thanking the young lady, perchance a scion of a princely house, for her favours. To have asked who she was, Or how I could see her, would have been an unpardonable breach of Persian etiquette. At the southern extremity of the valley of Kazerān, we came to an abrupt rocky termination of the easterly range of hills, from the foot of which issued an abundant stream of water, while close by was a neat and well-kept khan, and up above, upon the precipitous face of the rock itself, was a rude sculpture representing Taimur Khan, the youngest of the before mentioned exiled brothers, with a tame lion, a priest, and attendants by his side. When meeting the prince himself I made re- THE PASSES OF THE PERSIAN APENNINES 137 ference to this sculpture, and he took great pride in it, no doubt from early reminiscences, for Taimur was a thorough sportsman, and actually loved and petted his dogs. He could not have admired the sculpture, the figures of which were coloured, with the examples of those of the period of the Sassanians to be met with not very far away. Beyond this cliff with painted sculptures, the traveller approaches an amphitheatre of rocks, and the road be- gins to rise gradually till it reaches the foot of a mural precipice, up the face of which it is carried in a zigzag fashion. Although not to compare in point of elevation with the zigzag approach to Rawandiz in Kurdistan, which it otherwise closely resembles, this pass, known as the Kotīāl-i-dochter, or ‘Girl's passage' (a curious affinity of words to our daughter), is among the most picturesque in this succession of defiles. - The masses of rock are not so detached as in most of the other passes, but they start in bold relief from deep and half-illumined recesses, and succeed one another in rugged and fantastic forms, decorated with an infinite variety of wild flowers, and enlivened by bright-coloured snakes and lizards, and birds of beau- teous plumage. . - This pass is said to have been brought to its present tolerably secure state by two merchants, who were con- stantly suffering losses by such a dangerous perpendicular ascent and descent. - When once the pass was surmounted, the descent to the eastward was gentle and easy. At this point was a guard-house, and close by the sepulchral chapel of some 138 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION holy man, where the muleteer stopped to pray. A little beyond this, a prospect of exceeding beauty presented itself. This was a park-like valley or plain, everywhere dotted with oak trees, which also advanced some distance up the side of the hills that encompassed it as with a framework. It was designated to me as the vale of Abdui, and Fraser calls it by the same name, but the Baron de Bode says its correct name is Dasht-Ber, Abdui being the name of the village. Most of the passes were named after the villages, or the villages after the passes. The Persians curdle their milk with the leaves of the oak, and a most refreshing beverage it made in such a climate, lapped up by a capacious spoon of pear-tree wood. - The pleasure and relief of travelling through this shady and delightful natural park was much marred by the fierce attacks of great flies upon the mules, and we had not proceeded far before we met a mule coming towards us, covered with dust and foam, and rendered uncontrollable from pain. It carried two panniers, but had deposited their contents in the course of its mad career. A little further on we found a pillow, then another, and finally we came upon two disconsolate damsels, who having been deposited from their panniers, and being little accustomed to use their feet as means of progression, were slowly assisting themselves on with poles which seemed more like young trees than walk- ing-sticks. How they would ever overtake their mule appeared to me a very puzzling question, unless some kind peasant stopped it—a thing which we ought to have done, but I never dreamt it had had a living freight. THE PASSES OF THE PERSIAN APENNINES 139 Turning our mules to grass in a shady and pleasant glade, the Armenian went to the village of Abdui close by, in search of dinner, which consisted of the usual bowl of sour milk. But it is not because I, with small means at my command, was content with humble and wholesome fare, that others should do the same. There is in Persia, for those who have a genius for ‘aristological science, as Mr. Walker used to designate it, much to exercise their powers of invention and combination upon. There is even much in such extempore repasts that is susceptible of tasteful arrangement and deserving of study. It is to be observed, however, as a leading point, that simplicity, which should be adhered to upon prin- ciples of general hygiene, as well as from good taste, but which in our own country merely evidences a proper respect for the assimilating organs, cannot, under the circumstances we are now speaking of, be infringed without danger of disaster. Decidedly then, for the use of the future traveller, we should say that the best overture to a wayside repast is a water melon, not cut in slices, as is done by some neophytes, but eaten like an egg, One end being cut off, and the cellular parenchyma within extricated with a wooden spoon—that of the pear tree is the best—the roseate fluid percolating all the time to the bottom, and affording a fragrant beverage when the first proceeding is over. For a second course, a cold fowl, with slices of snake cucumber, can be recommended; and for hors d'oeuvres, the most refreshing are sour milk with chopped sage or rose leaves, also eaten with a pear-wood spoon, or 140 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION cucumber smothered in sour cream. In Farsistan, ice can frequently be obtained to add to these cooling pre- parations, which may also be flavoured with rose-water. For dessert, the most easily procured dainties are prepared cream or “kaimak' flaked with sugar, fresh almonds, iced rose-water sweetened with honey or ren- dered more fragrant with the aroma of mountain thyme and absinthe or wormwood. Bread is made of acorns and must be avoided. Sometimes a kind of bec-à-figue can be obtained. They must be cooked on a skewer of cedar. The young Onion is less ardent in these countries than with us. Many little additions, to make up the “poetry of a repast, may be occasionally obtained, as a bunch of delicious grapes, suspended for an hour under the moistened frond of a date tree, figs served up in cream, dates lightly fried in olive oil, or apricot paste dissolved in fresh milk. The repast must be followed by a chibük or a kaliyun, according to taste or habit. But the one is tobacco, the other a herb akin to it; the One is smoked, the other is inhaled. Coffee is de rigueur, and wine may be indulged in to the extent of one, or at most two glasses. Upon this point tastes may differ. There are several kinds of Shiraz wine, and some of the best are spoiled by being simply corked with a ball of cotton. But in my humble opinion, a good Shiraz wine has a flavour of burnt grape that is far superior to any sherry I ever tasted. I do not mean a flavour of burnt or volcanic soil obtained from the roots, like the Walpurheimer of the Rhine, or of burnt sands, as with some Cape wines, but as if the grape itself had been touched with the Sun. THE PASSES OF THE PERSIAN APENNINES 141 My meditations over a bowl of sour milk remind me of one or two long day's journeys I have had in my life-time, without any gastronomical resources, while my imagination clung pertinaciously to the anything but aristological diet of turkey and sausages; a repast, however, worthy of a Sybarite when ‘dining out,’ that is to say, al fresco or by the wayside, and still more so when dining upon fresh air. The next ridge, that separated the Dasht Ber from the Dasht Arjun, was not passed without toil on the part of the mules. There were seven long miles of ascent, and four of descent, across the loftiest range that the traveller meets with in passing from the sea into the interior. The road was not so steep, however, as it was stony, and the rocks were on both sides clad with shrubs and trees. At the Summit of this pass, called the Kotul-i-pir-i-zun, or ‘the pass of the head or chief of old women, there was a khan, and not far from the khan were some abundant springs, depositing deep incrustations of travertino, and among the plants, the common brookweed (Samolus Valerandi) awakened pleasing reminiscences of home. The temperature of these springs indicated a mean annual temperature of 59° Fahr. This would attest to an elevation of little less than 3,000 feet. When the Baron de Bode crossed the pass in the month of January, it was covered with snow, whilst in the Dasht Ber vegetation was still green and the air balmy and warm. From the summit the different ranges of hills that had been surmounted by so many successive defiles and passes, appeared like the frozen 142 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION waves of a stormy sea, pointing their bare splintered crests towards the rising Sun. As we descended towards the plain of Arjun, through a thin covering of Oaks, the flies bit the mules so severely that their guardian upbraided me bitterly for travelling in the daytime. I had, however, no alterna- tive, for the chief object of my journey was to determine the geological structure of these celebrated passes, and I could not have told a sandstone from a limestone in the dark. The plain of Dasht Arjun is so called from the abundance of wild almond trees, which here cover whole tracts of hilly land. The plain itself was grassy, and gave nourishment to numerous herds of cattle and sheep. The studs of the late Firman Firmah, viceroy of Farsistan, and father of the exiled princes, used to graze here, and the young princes often visited this spot, there being abundance of game, large and small, boars and birds, and deer and felines in the mountains. I ought not to mention that hyaenas were so common in the passes at night-time, that some surly old brutes would scarcely move Out of the way of the mules. At the further end, or north-easterly extremity of the plain, we came upon a delightful spot, where numerous streams of pellucid water flowed from out of gaping caverns, situate at a considerable height on the vertical face of a precipice, while the waters flowed downwards beneath the shade of trembling aspens and far-spreading chinars or plane trees, towards a lake that occupied the eastern extremity of the plain. So remarkable a spot has long been deemed holy, THE PASSES OF THE PERSIAN APENNINES 143 and close by was a mosque, beyond which was a ceme- tery, in which were many sculptured lions. The lion was the emblem and favourite funeral ornament in |Farsistan and Luristan, just as the black ram is in the old cemeteries of Azerbijan. The lion is indeed essentially Persian, while the ram is Turcoman, one of the chief tribes being known as the Kara Kayanlu or ‘black ram.’ To the eastward was a large village of about three hundred houses, but it appears to be only inhabited during the summer months, for De Bode found the villagers in the winter-time at Khan-i-Zenund. We ascended from this pleasant spot to an elevated and gently undulating country, passing a round tower on the summit of the Sineh Sifid, or ‘white breast, and gaining thence the banks of a mountain stream which abounded in fish. We reached Khan-i-Zenund about two o'clock in the morning of the last day of June, and the thermometer indicating a temperature of Only 41°, the sensation of cold was so intense, after leaving only a few days before the plains of Dashistan, with a temperature of from 90° to 100° in the shade, that I was glad to get off my mule and walk at a brisk pace. Such great vicissitudes of temperature have a marked influence on the character of the vegetation, which was both various and interesting, and which, from beneath a shrubbery of dwarf evergreen oak, almond, and astragalus, presented an infinite variety of flowering plants, among which were our garden favourites—pinks and carnations, growing in tufts, 144 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION assafoetida and gum-ammoniac plants, the Tartarian statice, splendid hollyhocks, gorgeous fritillarias, and beautiful gentians, and I observed a superb species of Michauxia, differing totally from the only known species, which is the more singular as Andrew Michaux himself travelled this road. A low range of hills led us from these flowery tracts into a mountain-environed plain of great extent and exceeding beauty. Streams of water were carried over the soil in every direction for purposes of irrigation, the land was tilled and marked out in definite portions, the mules began to wade through submerged rice fields, which were dotted with white vultures, feeding appa- rently on frogs and Snakes. As we proceeded, the road became more and more distinct; ranges of tall poplars marked the course of a distant stream, and at length we espied the battlemented walls of a city, breaking through thickets of cypress and pomegranate, and then peering above a vast and irregular extent of wood, and grove, and garden, the lofty minareh and glittering domes of the renowned Shiraz. The hum of human voices began to break upon the ear, and the wearied mules, as well as ourselves, seemed to be sensible of our approach to a great city. CHAPTER III. A VISIT TO PERSEPOLIS. I was received at Shiraz at the house of Colonel Shee— at that time in command of the troops in Farsistan— and who had had, in his time, many an arduous conflict with revolted Kurds. Every comfort and luxury was to be found at the charming residence of the gallant officer, and so great was the change, that I was glad to enjoy the refresh- ment of a swimming bath, and repose in the gardens and terrace. My intention being only to make this city a halt on my way to Persepolis, Colonel Shee, whose unbounded hospitality will always secure a grateful reminiscence, kindly offered to accompany me on the proposed trip. So we started the same evening, no longer a lonely traveller, with a deceitful terjiman and a surly muleteer, but one of a large retinue. A spare horse, splendidly caparisoned, was led before the Colonel; this was fol- lowed by a horseman, from whose saddle a little bucket of fire was ingeniously suspended, and next an atten- dant charged with the important service of the kaliyun. We followed behind, both admirably mounted, while in WOL. II. L 146 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION the rear were other attendants. Colonel Shee owed it to his position in the country not to travel without a certain state. Orientals have no respect for those who do not regard outward appearances. Our way lay by a mountain pass, known as the Tenk-i-Allah Akbar, so called because the traveller approaching from that direction gains from its crest a first view of the great city—a sight which is supposed always to call forth the pious exclamation, Allah Akbar !—‘God is the greatest of beings.’ Our first visit on the mountain was to the Colonel's ice-house, where we laid in a store of that luxury, and thence we proceeded downwards at a leisurely pace, and in the cool of the evening, halting occasionally, when, without dismounting, the kaliyun was charged, a live coal crowned the pile of tambak of Shiraz—the best in the East—and we indulged in a few amicable whiffs. After getting on in this manner for an hour or two, we halted at a custom house, where we indulged in a cup of tea improvised under a tree so full of grass- hoppers or locusts, that it was impossible to hear a person shouting at the top of his voice. The Colonel told me the customs on this road were farmed out for 700l. a year. Had my informant been my terjiman, he would have told me 7,000l. - We were glad to mount and get away from the horrible din—I never experienced anything like it—and passing a plain on which was an encampment of Ilhiauts, or nomadic Turcomans, we came to the Bende- mir or Bund (dam) of the Amir (prince), so renowned in fiction – A VISIT TO PERSEPOLIS 147 There’s a bower of roses by Bendemeer’s stream, And the mightingale sings round it all the day long." Le Bendemir renommé par ses rivages verdoyants et Ombragés.” The bulbul or nightingale of Persia is a different bird to ours, and, as Moore has it, correctly, sings by day, but then it should not be called a nightingale; and as to the roses that hung over the Bund-i-amir and the groves that shaded its fertile banks, they have, alas ! all disappeared. All is now nakedness, save an occa- sional bush of tamarisk, beneath which the hyaena crouches away from the sun's glare, and a little pink- flowered rest-harrow like our own. The great plain of Merdasht now extended before us, with rocky hills in the distance, one of which was called the Seh Gumbedan, or ‘the three domes,’ from as many isolated craggy heights, with a low rocky range beyond, at the foot of which were the ruins of Perse- polis. On the plain itself were occasional villages with gardens, all walled in like forts; some of the land was, or had been, cultivated, but the greater part was clad with a sparse growth of crassulated plants, Ononis, or rest-harrow, liquorice plant, and a few tamarisks. The dusky encampments of Thiauts, who led their flocks to where there was verdure, were also to be seen in the distance. The glowing Sun had now risen high in the heavens, and we were glad to Canter across the plain and take refuge in one of the walled-in gardens, which we found to be divided into straight walks, shaded by rows of chinars, beneath which were bushes of roses. * Lalla, Rookh. * Maltebrum, Géog., p. 220. I, 2 I 48 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Various fruit trees grew up in the intervening spaces, beneath which gourds, melons, cucumbers, baydanjan, baniyah, and other esculent vegetables and herbs were cultivated. Colonel Shee amused himself during the heat of the day practising with his rifle. He was a wonderful shot, and would, lying on his back, knock the head off a little bird sitting on some adjacent tree. I, in the meantime, was sketching the singular aspect of the rock that bore Istakhar Castle, and its twin sisters, Sheikusteh and Shemgan, with their respective forts; beyond all of which, and yet not far from us, was another isolated’ rock, or rather insulated cliff, bearing the castle of Shah-Rik—a king or governor who is said to have been slain in defending the place against the Saracens in the seventh century. When the afternoon became a little cooler we started for Persepolis; and my heart beat with anxious expectation, which was soon succeeded by surprise and wonder, when the long platform, hewn from the rocky mountain's side, with sculptured front, and surface crowded with columns and colossal structures, burst upon my view, with so much variety of form, such apparent confusion, and yet such profusion of beauty, as at Once to perplex and Overwhelm the mind. There was no necessity for dismounting on our arrival. A broad flight of stairs, hewn out of solid rock, led from the plain to the terrace above, up which the horses could ascend easily. This staircase consisted of two double flights, meeting at a first landing place, from which sprang a second double series of steps, of A VISIT TO PERSEPOLIS T 49 which ten or twelve steps would be cut out of the same block of marble, and which terminated on the terrace. I sought for and found here the holes mentioned by Niebuhr, but did not feel at all satisfied that they attested to the existence of gates to the terrace. Hero- dotus certainly makes mention of gates of brass at Babylon; the original name indeed—Bab-el-had refe- rence to a gate of gold, and the late researches in Assyria, # especially Ormuz Rassam's discoveries in Assyria, attest to the existence of gates in that ancient empire. A gigantic portal now stood before us, formed of two massive blocks, like the propylae of the Egyptians, and the ‘pillars’ of the temple at Jerusalem, with the front and interior sides carved into the resemblance of colossal animals. What these “bucolic sentinels, as they have been called, represent has been a puzzle to travellers. Her- bert and Chardin saw something of the rhinoceros and the elephant, Sir W. Ouseley and Sir R. K. Porter both saw bulls, whilst Niebuhr considered them to be unicorns. All observant men and learned and erudite travellers; and therefore all that can be said is that the real intention of the sculptures is very imperfectly made out. Whatever they are, they have collars of roses and short curled hair. It seems most probable that they were rude representations of sphinxes— fabulous animals—but which represented here, as in Egypt, the unknown, and mysterious, and never to be known Godhead. This view of the subject is further strengthened by the important fact that, eastward of this portal, after 150 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION passing two handsome fluted columns—all that remain Out of four—and in the same direction, is a second portal similar to the first, and upon which are figures admitted to represent diadem-bearing sphinxes, with beards and wings of curiously minute sculpture. The wings, it is to be supposed, are emblematic of the angelic character of the Deity, or of Cherubim and Seraphim. It is therefore natural to suppose that the figures on the second portal would reproduce those which were on the first. The Chehel Minar, or ‘hall of forty columns, stands at right angles to the direction of the last portals, and upon a still more elevated platform, the basement of which is ornamented by those remarkable sculptures which have been the admiration of all who have visited these ruins. This disposition suggests, in a very forcible manner, that the second portal was erected for the sake of symmetry, while the grand entrance was carried. directly from the central group of pillars, or rather from the building which they sustained, or which they decorated, by a marble fountain and tank, the ruins of which still exist, to the staircase leading to the Chehel Minar. Such an arrangement serves to illustrate what is also presented to us in the disposition of Egyptian and Hindhu temples, the love for mystic arrangements that predominates in such edifices when of high antiquity, and formed, indeed, no inconsiderable appendage to the power of an early hierarchy. The second set of figures are, we have before ob- served, admittedly sphinxes, and examples of a combi- A VISIT TO PERSEPOLIS 151 nation of the human and bestial form such as are met with in the sphinxes of Greece and Rome, transmitted from the original sphinx at the foot of the pyramids. They may also have had their human meaning. Anquetil de Perron pronounced them to be symbols of Noah; De Sacy, the emblem of the Paishdadian dynasty (Jamshid or Dejoces); and they have still more generally been looked upon as emblems of Cyrus, whose successes were prophesied by Ezekiel (i. 7, 10) under almost the same figure. Daniel also foretold the reign of the same prince under a similar union of the human with the bestial form (viii. 4). But these were only after-thoughts; the original sphinx unquestionably re- presented the unity of the Godhead, the embodiment of the inscription on the temple of Isis, the records of the Old Testament, and the traditions of the Hindhus; the unknown, the mysterious, the never to be seen or known, but still the omnipotent and almighty Creator and Ruler of the world, as also unity in the universe. What there was human in the emblem represented Intelligence; what there was bestial was of the lion—Power. Whether this second semi-portal has been covered, or had a gate or door, can only be a matter of conjec- ture. The ancients would scarcely have called such structures propylae ‘for gates’ or substitutes for gates, if they really had such. Such propylae are designated as pillars in our version of the Old Testament in 2 Chron. iii. 17, where Solomon is described as rearing up two ‘pillars’ before the Temple, ‘and called the name of that on the right hand Jachin, and the name of that on the left Boaz.’ 152 6. THE EUPFHRATES EXPEDITION We have before remarked that the basement of the Chehel Minar is ornamented with bas-reliefs. They represent chiefly processions made to monarchs, as sup- posed by Sir R. K. Porter and others, or political (and we would add ecclesiastical) institutions and ceremonies, as advocated by Herder. - The style of these works of art is much above mediocrity, but still they cannot be considered so re- markable for beauty as most of them are for accuracy. The figures of the animals are sometimes admirable; the chariots, with their wheel-spokes, start from the stone, but the figures want spirit and character, and we see here, as we do in the Nineveh sculptures, an upright monarch combating a huge monster with the stiffness of a wooden doll. In this respect the Persepolitan sculp- tures cannot be compared with the eloquent expression of the Grecian friezes. - Among the animals represented is the unicorn. This fabulous animal has been supposed to have sprung from the attempt to represent the bull in profile, which would bring the two horns into One ; but it so happens that we have in the same sculptures at Persepolis the bull in profile with two horns, and near it the unicorn, differing in physiognomy and in general character as much as in its one-horned front. It is impossible to suppose that the intelligence which delineated the bull so accurately would have gone Out of its way to delineate a fabulous animal—except in the case of the sphinx, which is emblematic, and placed elsewhere, and does not figure in the processions. The French naturalists (as Cuvier in the notes to Pancoucke's edition of Pliny) have ridiculed A VISIT TO PERSEPOLIS 153 our national predilection for the unicorn—the mon- strosity of the licorne, as they call it—as inconsistent with the laws of symmetry. But have we not a one- horned rhinoceros, and a narwhal or Monodon mono- ceros ? It is possible that the unicorn represents an animal that has become extinct within historical times. We have examples of such in the urus of the Romans, the thur of Poland, the Caledonian ox, and the Irish elk. The Ostrich has disappeared from Arabia since the time of Xenophon; the wild ass still exists, but is very rare. Ascending the stairs which lead from these remark- able sculptures, we found ourselves in the hall of forty columns, of which there were thirteen standing. Accord- ing to the information we could obtain, the two that were wanting, since the last accounts, were overthrown for the purpose of getting at the lead (to be used for bullets) by which the segments are joined. Probably more have been Overthrown since. The columns of Persepolis rival the cedars of Lebanon in the discre- pancies of travellers as to their numbers. To the south of the platform with columns, which from their style attest to more modern times—times when the Takht-i- Jamshid became the Persepolis of the Greeks—are a series of apartments which may have belonged to Paishdadian times. These apartments have massive openings for doors and windows constructed of black marble, which takes a very high polish, and are orna- mented with sculptures representing a king combating a wild animal, and a king with an attendant bearing an umbrella and fan. 154 THE EUPPIRATES EXPEDITION All travellers have agreed in regarding these apart- ments as the sanctum Sanctorum of Persepolis, and have chosen one of them to leave the reminiscence of their visit in their carved names. This is not the same commonplace list that we meet with on the top of St. Peter's or on the tower of Sträsburg. There are but few names still legible, and these are all historical. Pietro della Valle, Niebuhr, Kaempfer, Le Brun, Herbert, Olearius, Thevenot, Chardin, Porter, Morier, Bridges, Rich, Kinneir, Taylor, Bethune, and Belanger (the natu- ralist). Those of the seventeenth century are almost all, in one spot; part of those of the eighteenth are more ambitious; and lastly the nineteenth century is repre- sented by the mission of Sir John Malcolm, with the names of its members carefully engraved on a tablet. Many other masses of ruin are met with in the same neighbourhood and its vicinity. Beneath the platform are also ruins of aqueducts by which the place was supplied with water. - We must especially not omit to mention the tombs or sepulchral grottoes. There are two remarkable for their dimensions, and both are hewn out of the solid rock. We were enabled to enter one of these by a low aperture which led us into a semi-circular recess where was a stone coffin or sarcophagus, filled with water. Above this were colossal sculptures of a king before a pyraeum or fire altar, and the usual little winged angel above. It has been advocated from the presence of these tombs of kings, by Heeren and Hoek, that the whole ruins are sepulchral monuments, but this conclusion is A VISIT TO PERSEPOLIS 155 militated against by the separation of the tombs from the buildings on the terrace, from which they are at some distance, by the existence of rooms and apart- ments, and by the provision of water for the living, as well as by many other details. These taken all into consideration together, especially with the representa- tion of fire altars on the portals of some of the rooms, would lead to the conclusion that, as was not uncommon in the East, the same group of buildings contained the throne and the home of kings, places of worship, and sepulchres of the dead, beyond and outside of what was at Once palace and temple. Neither the name Takht-i-Jamshid, or ‘ the throne of Dejoces,’ nor Persepolis, ‘the city of the Persians,’ is indicative of a mere mausoleum. We slept among the ruins of Persepolis, undisturbed by wild beasts, and the next day crossed the Kur Ab or river of Cyrus, to visit the sepulchral grottoes of Nakib-i-Rustam, which are excavated on the face of a precipitous cliff, and adorned with colossal sculptures, as also by a singular structure of white marble generally admitted to be a pyraeum or fire altar. The natives call it the Kaaba of Firdusi, and the Nokarah Khaneh of Jamshid. - We made several vain attempts to get into these sepulchral grottoes. They are placed too high on the front of a cliff to be attainable without proper appli- ances. There are four of them, and above them are sculptured designs similar to those which are observed at the Takht-i-Jamshid. At the foot of the tombs are also several sculptures, 156 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION but these all belong to the Sassanian epoch. In One, Ormusd presents to Ardashir (Artaxerxes) a kusti or belt, with streamers, inseparable from the religion of the Parsis. There are two inscriptions, one in Pehlvic, the other in Greek, which attest to the age of these monu- ments. A second sculpture represents a lady receiving the kusti from the king, probably a foreign princess accepting the religion of her lord. A third represents a king on horseback, holding a prisoner by the hand, while another supplicates before him. This appears to represent Shapur (Sapor I.) and the unfortunate Valerian. Morier in his second journey (p. 79) designates these sculptures as the Harim-i-Jamshid, no doubt from the presence of a female figure. They are called by Fraser Takht-i-Taus, or ‘the throne of the peacock.’ Colonel Shee, an admirable Persian scholar, said they were called Takht-i-Kur, or ‘the throne of Cyrus.’ The fact is that the traditions of the natives vary; better to rest con- tented with what the monuments themselves say. Not far from this spot, there are further sculptures known as Nakchi Rejib, and indeed most of the rocks in the neighbourhood teem with such monuments, and I regretted not to have time to visit the tomb of Cyrus on the plain of the Murg-Abbeyond. The evening of the second day we took refuge at the village of Bund-i-amir, on the other side of the plain of Merdasht. The son of the Khan came out to meet Colonel Shee, and the peasants were assembled at the entrance of the village to greet the chief. A repast was also prepared for us, but with the usual dilatoriness of Persian ladies, it was not served up upon the roof A VISIT TO PERSEPOLIS 157 of the house till past one in the morning, so by the time it was disposed of it was also time to start before the sun should get hot. It was not a pleasant way of spending a whole night, but we made up for it after the sun had become powerful by a siesta beneath an overhanging rock, proceeding on Our journey in the cool of the evening. On approaching Shiraz we were met by a Persian officer who had come out in search of the Colonel, and who brought the unwelcome intelligence that the Mahmud Sunni tribe, followers of Wali Khan, whom the Colonel had been three years endeavouring to bring to submission, and whose chief he had taken prisoner a year before, in a mountain fortress, from which the women, rather than Surrender, had precipitated them- selves with their children down a perpendicular cliff, were once more in rebellion, and that the road from Shiraz to Bushire was closed up. We arrived at Shiraz at sunrise, and found the city in a state of great excitement. A number of Khans supposed to be in complicity with Wali Khan had been arrested; the gates were closed and the guards doubled, whilst hosts of horsemen were hurrying from various directions towards the city, their gay accou- trements and burnished arms glittering in the first rays of the rising sun as they issued from the clouds of dust that enveloped their galloping steeds. Colonel Shee advised me, under the circumstances, that unless I wished to be shut up in the city for an indefinite period, I had better continue my journey before the rebellion had attained greater proportions. 158 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION This, with the statement made that the road was closed, was not a very pleasant prospect, but as there was no alternative I accepted the situation as cheerfully as I could, making my way in a direction from which every One else seemed to be retreating. CHAPTER IV. THE CAVE OF SHAPUR. My attempt to return forthwith to Bushire was not, as may well be imagined, so easily carried out as entered upon. I had not got above five miles from Shiraz, and arrived at the hilly districts, when, having to pass a guard- house, I was at Once put under arrest as an emissary from Colonel Shee to the British Resident at Bushire. In order to make this understood, it must be mentioned that the Wali Khan, before noticed, was the most powerful partisan of the deposed princes, to whom I have also previously had occasion to allude. Colonel Shee, however, remained firm inhisallegiance to the Shah, by whom he had been appointed commander-in-chief in Farsistan, and having made a prisoner of Wali Khan, he held him in his clutches. Ultimately (although this is anticipating events) he took him to Teheran, expect- ing at least a lakh of rupees for services rendered, but instead of that the Wali was received in favour, and the gallant Colonel's campaigns were utterly ignored. But the feeling of the people was in favour of the deposed princes, and the guard, which was supposed to represent the Shah's interests as carried out by Colonel 160 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Shee, were the first to arrest me as a supposed emissary of the Colonel's to Bushire. I succeeded, however, in satisfying them, with the assistance of my interpreter, that, although a guest for the time being of Colonel Shee, I had nothing at all to do with Farsistan politics, and was liberated and permitted to continue my journey early On the ensuing morning. Passing the plain of Dasht Arjun, with its beautiful lake, its tree-embosomed mosque, its grottoes with rush- ing fountains, and burial-ground strewed with sculptured lions, I turned from the great road and advanced into a wooded and mountainous district by which I gained the village of Abdui. I had a letter from Colonel Shee to the Khan of this place, who after throwing the usual difficulties in the way, was prevailed upon to supply me with two armed guides with ropes and candles, to explore the cave of Shapur—a point I had much at heart—as I had read of its being so extensive as never yet to have been ex- amined to its innermost recesses. After a day and a half journeying, I arrived at the entrance of the valley before noticed as watered by a rivulet, and in which were two small villages, constitut- ing a pleasing landscape shut in by lofty mountains. The cave I found to be situated at the foot of the cliffs, at some height above the rivulet. The valley itself gradually narrowed, and the rock terraces lowered to a pass, on both sides of which the sculptures so celebrated among antiquaries were exposed to view. Beyond this the rivulet flowed into an open plain, where were the ruins of a once favoured residence of Shapur, THE CAVE OF SHAPUR 161 the monarch whose name they bore. The ruins of an ancient castle also crowned the summit of an adjacent eminence. The ascent to the cave was easy enough, but a broiling sun made it irksome. On the way I killed a most beautiful snake, four feet in length, very slender, and of a brilliant grey colour, with a long red stripe along its back. Much natural grandeur was imparted to the entrance by its width and height, and the sudden change from a temperature of 108° to 76° of Fahr. was inexpressibly delightful. The colossal statue of Shapur lay near to the entrance, never removed from the spot where it had been sculptured. The head was crowned with the royal diadem, and there was the usual ponderous wig, the collar of gems, the sword and kusti with streamers, common to all the sculptures of the same age, here and at Persepolis. This statue, which Mr. Fraser says, with the exception of the mutilated remains at the Takht-i- Bostan, is the only thing of the kind in Persia, would if erect have stood twenty feet in height without its pedestal, nor was it badly executed. I had left the interpreter and muleteer with the mules and baggage below, and my two guides and my- self were very thirsty. Beyond the statue there were two tanks cut in the rock, and beyond these a great circular hollow about thirty feet deep, but in none of these was there any water; however, a short time after I found some in a recess, within a hollow in the rock, and taking a first full and satisfactory draught, Ireturned to the entrance to announce the discovery to the guides. WOL. II. M T62 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Colonel Johnson, a traveller who partly explored this cave, penetrated some two hundred feet further than the last mentioned cistern into an irregular ex- cavation, beyond which were other vaults and entrances, but he states that he was forced to return after spending a considerable time there, convinced that he had not penetrated half through these extensive vaults. This is so true, that if he had turned after passing the cistern only a few yards by the first passage to the right, a magnificent spectacle would have presented it- self. A vast cavern extending to impenetrable darkness, and above and below decorated with grotesque and glittering stalactites and stalagmites of gigantic pro- portions. On our entrance into this great cave the Persian guides stood aghast, nor could they be induced to pro- ceed to a further exploration, as a steep rocky incline, but covered with mud, presented itself beyond. They, however, lit a candle for me, and taking off my shoes and stockings as a precaution against slipping, I pro- ceeded alone. As I got farther and farther from my guides, still visible from their little star of light held at the entrance, my hopes of success became fainter and fainter. In vain. I lifted my candle before and above me to render objects more distinct. I only brought forms, each more fantastic than the other, of pendent stalactites and columnar stalagmites into view, rivalling anything I had seen at Adelsberg or read of in Antiparos. Sud- denly my whole attention was riveted by what appeared to be a female in drapery. I even fancied for a moment THE CAVE OF SHAPUR. 163 that I had found some statue of an Anahaid or Astaroth. I stumbled over slippery rocks to get at this new Curiosity, but lo! it was nothing but a huge solitary stalagmite of marble whiteness. I had begun my descent, and although muddy and slippery, I persevered till I came to the bottom of a watercourse, with much mud but very little water, and that ultimately dwindled to a mere fissure in the rock, blocked up with mud. This was at a point of exactly 464 paces from the entrance of the cave, and 150 from the beginning of the descent. Although there was no running stream at this time of the year, it was evident from the mud that a considerable body of water flows through the cavern during the greater part of the year. The temperature of the water in the little fount, main- tained by droppings, was 62°Fahr., which may be fairly considered as indicating the mean annual temperature of the place. I returned to the Outer cave triumphant. I had followed to its extremity a cave concerning whose im- penetrable extent and innumerable ramifications many exaggerated tales had been long current, partly derived from native reports and partly from visits made there by travellers (see Fraser’s ‘Persia, p. 205, and Balbi's ‘ Géographie, p. 678). There were, however, other ramifications to the left of the main entrance; many were long, and beautiful from their bright and various con- cretions, ‘ vegetations of rock, as Tournefort calls them, but none were so extensive or SO long as the main cave. I followed the longest a distance of 100 paces, when further progress was stopped by a mass of fallen rock. M 2 164 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION After descending from the cave, which is situated on the north side of the valley, I proceeded downwards to where the rocks narrow, and where are the celebrated sculptures of Shapur. I had to cross the rivulet again to make sketches, and to do so, took off my shoes and stockings, but unfortunately in my progress I was bit by a centipede, the suffering from which did not cease till the ensuing day. It would be tedious to detail all the minutiae of these sculptures, although my notes are very lengthy, as they have already been made the subject matter of careful description by previous travellers. The main tablet is a repetition of that near Persepolis, which also belongs to the Sassanian epoch. The second is a tablet divided into three compartments, all of which have reference to the same subject. Fraser has adopted the opinion of Morier and others, and which is the most probable one, that these sculptures commemorate the triumph, so flattering to Persian pride, of Shapur or Sapor, over the unfortunate Valerian. De Sacy alone thought that they represent the successes of Ardashir Babegan over Artabanes—the last of the Arsacidae. - It would appear that the third tablet, representing the meeting of the two kings, has reference to a domestic event, and, according to Sir William Ouseley, to the association of Shapur, the first of his dynasty, as co- emperor with his father Ardashir. The subject represented on the fourth tablet— soldiers, a caparisoned horse with globe ornaments, an executioner holding a human head, as if of the late pos- sessor of the royal horse, and several followers behind, THE CAVE OF SHAPUR 1.65 each bearing a head, has reference to some regal Persian tragedy. - * All the regal figures in these sculptures are adorned with the kusti with streamers—the fillet of the fire worshippers celebrated by Moore — Hold! hold ! thy words are death ! The stranger cried, as wide he flung His mantle back and showed beneath The Gebr belt that round him hung. It is made to encircle the body; it is represented as an emblem and held out to a visitor, and as being held out to a pyraeum or fire altar. According to the sacred books of the Persians, the kusti was not only the sign of union among Parsis, but it also put demons to flight. All the good works of the person who was not girt with it became useless and without merit in the eyes of the law. The Parsi was enjoined to make four knots in his kusti. By the first he confessed the all-important point, the unity of God; by the second he acknowledged the superimposed truth of the religion of Zardusht or Zoroaster; the third was a testimony which he rendered to the divinity of the mission of the latter and his quality as a prophet; and lastly, by the fourth, he at- tested to the firm resolution he had taken to do what was right and tò eschew all evil. According to the same books of the Zend Avesta, the kusti further terminated in two small tails at each end to denote the four seasons, whilst three knots on each tail presented in the aggregate the twelve months in the year. These are what, for convenience sake, are 166 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION designated as “streamers’ attached to the kusti in the sculptures. The cord was itself twisted of seventy-two threads, such being the number, according to the interpretation of the Magi, of the known kingdoms of the world in the time of Hushen, Jamshid or Dejoces, their first legislator. Herodotus assigns the same number to the nations under the sway of the Persian monarchs; and accord- ing to tradition, the same number of columns Once Sup- ported the throne of Jamshid at what was afterwards known as Persepolis. - - The kusti was, as evidenced by its numerous repre- sentations in various parts of Persia, variously worn by different peoples and sects. It appears to have been the Origin of the turban, for it was worn as such, the ends hanging down loose frcm the head. The bushy head of hair of the Sassanian monarchs is surmounted by the kusti rolled into the form of a turban or balloon-shaped Ornament—one that has puzzled many archaeologists. It even decorates the heads of horses in that form. It is also represented as a circlet to link the arms of two royal personages together, or is held as Such as if in Opposition to one another. It is also re- presented as tied round a fire-altar. It is also probable that the slings, which according to Quintus Curtius adorned the head of the Mardi, and were at the same time used as weapons, were kusti. The same emblem was transferred with the Parsis to India. The record of this emigration is contained in the Kisseh-i-Sanjan (Sanjan being the name of the port at which they first landed) as also in the ‘Parsi Prakasa.’ THE CAVE OF SHAPUR I67 But differences of opinion sprang up with the lapse of time as to the meaning of the kusti. These will be found related at length in the ‘Mauzab-i-Zartusht’ of Ed ul Daru; the ‘Parsis of Bombay, by Rajendralala Mitra, LL.D; and in the ‘History of the Parsis’ (2 vols., Macmillan and Co., 1885). Of the city of Shapur, little, as I have before observed, remains, save foundations and heaps of ruins. Here was the famous pyraeum called Gavish, particularly noticed in the admirable work of Hyde, ‘De Religione veterum Persarum et Medorum. The houses appear to have been rude edifices of stones and mud. Of the castle there still remain several round towers, some arches, and fragments of walls which are carried down the sides of the rock in a zigzag manner. Whilst I had been exploring the cave and making sketches with detailed descriptions of the sculptures, my worthy young Armenian dragoman had been busy ran- sacking my valise and helping himself to the majority of the few karunis with which I had been supplied for the purposes of the journey. I did not, however, find this out till next morning, when I had to dismiss the guides with a backshish. For I passed the night in this beautiful rocky Valley—guides and all disturbing me much by vociferous chants. The next day we reached Khaist, and the second Dalaki; and on the third we traversed the Smothering Dashistan. I arrived the same day at Bushire, and the next started with Colonel Chesney in the yacht attached to the Residency for the opposite coast of Arabia. 168 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION CELAPTER W. MUHAMMRAH-' A BONE OF CONTENTION.’ WE landed, on the way from Bushire to Graine, at the island of Kharak, properly Kharaj. It is a rocky islet, with a port for boats, a few huts for pilots, and a sepulchral chapel, in a hollow with One or two banyan trees, and a vegetation more tropical than even the Dashistan. The rest is all rock, but I was much pleased in scrambling among these with the little inlets and basins of pellucid water, so clear and transparent, that the fish were seen passing by, and the corals and madrepores lying beneath. I should have liked to have spent a week here. Graine, or Koweit, as it is also called, and to which we next proceeded, is a genuine Arab town; a group of mud houses with flat roofs, a port with a Sheikh's house, and a trifle of life and bustle, but by far the greater part of the town uninhabited or in ruin. The rare vegetation and absence of trees gave to the place an unwonted character of aridity. The object of Colonel Chesney's visit here was to get the Sheikh to forward a mail Overland, and this having been accom- plished, and having partaken of the Sheikh's hospitality, we forthwith returned to Bushire. MUHAMMRAH-A BONE OF CONTENTION 169 On our arrival here we found that news had arrived of Lieutenant Murphy's serious illness at Bassora, and the Residency yacht was, by the kindness of Captain Hennell, placed at my disposal to go and afford what succour was in my power. This, however, proved to be a very dilatory affair. On the first day we got no further than Kharak, and lay to between that island and Korgo for a pilot. This was Saturday the 13th of August, and the temperature of the water was 86° of Fahr. On the 16th we reached Akiyarin island, and some of the lascars who composed the crew of the ‘Cyrene, as the yacht was styled, were laid up with sickness. On the 19th we entered the Euphrates, when, to my surprise, I found the skipper of the yacht expected me to supply himself and the crew. I had no funds for that purpose, only a few karunis in my pocket. I suc- ceeded, however, in obtaining a sheep for three karunis, about 5s. English, and six fowls for two karunis. We went on shore here off a mud-bank, and were some hours before we could get off. The next day some Arabs came alongside in a boat, offering a sheep and dates, as they said, as a present. They did not, they said, know the value of money, but were not the less glad of an equivalent. They had two kinds of dates, one brown and good-sized, which they called Hillo Hamar, or ‘red dates, the other, yellow and smaller, Hillo Aswah. There were plover, egrets, and bulbuls in the groves, pelicans on the river, and plenty of a striated variety of fresh-water mussels on the banks. I arrived at Bassora, at last, on the 20th, having 170 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION been a week on the journey, and Only to find that poor Murphy had succumbed to the low fever of the country. I went with Major Estcourt to see his grave, but the Armenian church in which he was buried was so dark that we had a difficulty in finding the few square tiles that covered the remains of a worthy I]] all. - The next day I started on my way back, and the current being now in Our favour, progress was not so unsatisfactory. Unfortunately the simoom or shamal was blowing from the interior, and notwithstanding the protection of the date groves, it so darkened the atmosphere, covering everything with dust at the same time, that we could not see the banks of the river till we were close upon them. The pilot managed in con- sequence to get us upon a shoal, and we did not get off till the next tide. Off Muhammrah we fell in with the “Sir Herbert Compton, and I got a letter from Charlewood bidding me hasten to Bushire. We arrived off the river on the 23rd, and I had a better opportunity of studying the amphibious habit of the gobius, that lived on the banks, as I also had, the next day, of seeing the Snakes off the bar. One of them, which I captured, was five feet long and nine inches in circumference. On Friday the 25th we arrived at Graine, having received instructions to call and inquire if a mail had arrived, but the Sheikh had no news of such, nor did he know when it might be expected ; SO we set sail at Once to cross the Gulf, and arrived at Bushire on the evening of the 26th. Here I found to my dismay that the “Euphrates’ MUHAMMIRAH-A BONE OF CONTENTION. 171 steamer had left for the river on the 24th, in tow of the ‘Elphinstone.” Captain Hennell was away in the country. I had but a karuni or two left, and scarcely knew what to do. There was, however, a hordi or boat in the harbour, that was bound for the Euphrates the same evening, and the Reis or skipper willingly undertook to take me as a passenger, the expenses to be defrayed when he put me on board the steamer. So leaving Murphy's things, of which I had charge, with Captain Gurnell of the ‘Cyrene, to be transmitted to the Residency, I started forthwith in the native boat. It came on, however, to blow, so that we were detained all night and the ensuing day off the island of Korgo. On the 30th we were off Bunder Delim, On the 31st off the Indiyan, on September 1st off Bunaderah, on the 2nd off Maidan Alah, and at last, on the 3rd, fetched the mouth of the Shat al Arab, after seven days' tedious navigation. On Tuesday, the 5th of September, after beating up the river for two days, we found the “Euphrates’ at anchor off the town of Muhammrah, and glad enough I was to get back to my own cabin, after sleeping, cramped in the after part of a small boat, or —as a luxury—on the naked sands of banks and islets. Muhammrah was at this time busy and lively; a kind of fair or market was being held in huts of branches, and in the open air, on the north side of the channel, and which was attended not only by Per- sians, and Arabs, but by a few Hindhus. The Sheikh dwelt on the south shore, where was a castle and a few 172 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION houses, and I went the same day with Colonel Chesney to pay him a visit, and also to explore the mouth of the Bahmishir. The next day, September 6, an attempt was made to ascend the Karūn, and so facile was the navigation of the river, that we effected a distance of sixty-eight miles in ten and a half hours. For about ten miles beyond Muhammrah we met with villages and date groves, but beyond was little but the usual jungle of tamarisk, with a few poplar trees. The banks were low and variously coloured, red when there was a pre- dominance of salt and iron, dark-coloured when bitumen predominated. What peculiarly struck me was that these beds presented flexures and contortions, as if they had been acted upon by forces from below or by subsi- dences. - Having been stopped by a bank at a village known as Ismaila, we returned after a further ascent of some few miles, on the 7th, and having the current in our favour, reached Muhammrah the same day. I had an opportunity of making better acquaintance with the river and its branches, as also of the region between it and the Persian Gulf occupied by the Cha’ab Arabs On a subsequent occasion, but I will take this oppor- tunity of making a few remarks upon this navigable river, which derives so much importance as opening communication between the Persian Gulf and some of the most productive provinces of Persia. The river Karān, the Ulai of the Scriptures, by its various tributaries and numerous derivative canals plays the same part to ancient Susiana and Elymais MUHAMMRAH-A BONE OF CONTENTION. 173 as the Tigris did to Assyria and the Euphrates to Babylonia and Khaldaea. It appears to have flowed in former times to the Persian Gulf by a channel now known as the Karān al Amah, or ‘the blind Karān,” from its bed being blocked up with mud. This channel appears to be the same as that which was ascended by Nearchus on his way to Aginis, now Ahwaz. - - The change in the channel appears to have been occasioned by the opening in subsequent times of a canal to the Bahamshir or Bahmishir, a corruption of its original name, Bahman Ardashir. This channel was in olden times one of the main outlets, if not the actual main outlet, of the Euphrates, but from which it is now separated by the channel or creek of Muhammrah, which is upwards of two miles in length. This latter channelis called the Haffar, and the waters of the Karūn, thus drawn away from their old bed, not only flowed into the Bahmishir, but also by the Haffar into the Shat al Arab, or estuary of the Euphrates and Tigris rivers, and having a swifter current, although not presenting so large a body of water as the Shat al Arab, they appear to have driven the waters of the latter to the westward, and it is only at high tide that the waters of the Shat al Arab now flow into the Haffar or Muhammrah channel. - This may appear to be a trivial detail, but an impor- tant question is connected with it. When we were at Muhammrah the Turks held possession of the place, the Sheikh held his office under the Governor of Bassora, and the customs revenues were collected by him. But 174 - THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION the Persians, who unquestionably hold possession of the Karūn throughout its course, also claimed the port of Muhammrah, and the mixed commission appointed to determine this and other points in litigation as to the boundaries of the two countries, taking the actual state of things into consideration rather than the historical view of the question, decided in favour of Persia. We have seen that all that portion of the Karlin which flows past its now deserted bed, onwards to the Bahmishir, is said to have been originally an artificial channel, and it is noticed in the ‘Jihan Numa' as being four farsakhs, or ten miles in length. It was called the Haffar, but that name appears in the present day to apply only to the Muhammrah part of the channel, whereas in olden times it would have applied, as the distance given would indicate, to that part of the Karlin which lay between its old bed, the Karūn el Amah, and the Bahmishir. - Muhammrah, although with its palm groves and wide channel, its quays built of trunks of date trees placed crosswise, its castles and huts of mud, reeds, matting, and date branches, a pleasant and picturesque place, is very unhealthy. The experience of the com- missioners for the demarcation of the Turco-Persian frontier appears, however, to have differed from that obtained by others. Captain Selby says continued sick- ness prevailed, and food could not be retained in the stomach long after a meal. Captain Jones and the officers of the ‘Nitocris, on their arrival each month from Baghdad, were seized with the same complaint. MUHAMMRAH-A BONE OF CONTENTION 175. The party were also sorely vexed by mosquitoes of un- usual size, whose bite was so virulent that no one could endure them. We did not suffer from either of these inflictions, but no one was in perfect health, and I found that the slightest abrasions among the crew festered and entailed bad SOres. - At the time of the Anglo-Indian Expedition of 1857, Kharak was held as a coal station, and when the vessels arrived off the mouth of the river, the mud village of Mahamur was occupied by Persian horse and infantry. Strange to say, such were the effects of the climate, that not only Major-General Stalker died by his own hand, but Captain Ethersey, the commodore command- ing the squadron of the Indian navy, also committed suicide, whilst a young lieutenant, Sinclair, totally un- climatised, perished from fever. The preparations for an attack upon Muhammrah, which had been strongly fortified, were made about three miles below the place. Troops, horses, and guns were transhipped into the lighter draught steamers and vessels, and on the morning of March 26 firing was opened from mortars placed on a raft, the attacking ships getting under weigh as the first shot was fired, and proceeding to engage the batteries. The leading ships passing the lower batteries, which had all been extemporised for the defence of the place, and opening their guns as they could be brought to bear, were soon at their respective posts, followed in quick succession by the rear division, and but a few minutes elapsed before the action became general, the Persian artillery replying with great Spirit. 176 THE EUPHIRATES EXPEDITION The practice from the ships on the enemy's works is described as being most admirable, and the effect of the fire soon became apparent, embrasures and carefully revetted parapets rapidly losing their original shape, and the crash of the falling date trees around affording ample proof of the storm of shot. . For about three hours the Persian artillerymen stood manfully to their guns, but their fire then slackening, the signal was seen flying for the infantry to move up and disembark. The ‘Berenice' steamer, carrying the Highlanders, as well as a company of Sappers, and General Havelock and the staff of the second division, led the column. The light company of the Highlanders and the grenadier company of the 64th were the first to land, the enemy's skirmishers falling back on their advance. All the infantry, with a field battery and some fifty Scinde horse, were on shore by two o'clock in the afternoon, but the rising of the tide had filled the creeks, so that only the infantry and a few of the Scinde horse could advance. The Persians were found occupying two encampments in the rear of the town, and were drawn up to oppose the advance. The Shahzadeh was him- self in command, and the Anglo-Indian force had much difficulty in forming, from the creeks and marshy nature of the ground. - The compact red battalions moved, however, steadily to the front, and the leading skirmishers had arrived within gun-range of the enemy's camp, the field-battery guns actually trotting up to assist them with their fire against the salutes of round shot and grape momentarily MUHAMMRAH-A BONE OF CONTENTION 177 expected, when the Persian army seemed literally to have vanished, and, but for the tents still standing, would almost have induced a belief that an illusion of mirage, rather than the presence of an armed host, had been so recently formed up in battle array. Immense stores of arms, accoutrements, and ammuni- tion were found in the camp, as also eighteen brass guns and mortars in the town, with a great quantity of grain. Everything, indeed, left fell into the hands of the victors. It would have been better for some of the fugitives if they had fallen into the hands of the British, for the Arabs mercilessly butchered every one of the helpless wretches that they discovered. . Captain Hunt (from whose work, “Outram and Have- lock's Persian Campaign,' I have abbreviated the fore- going details) gives an admirable description of what Muhammrah really is: ‘The town of Muhammrah, then in British possession, was found to be a filthy collection of mud buildings, although Once a place of considerable trade and importance. Situated at the junction of the Karān with the Euphrates, it is possessed of every advantage which the water-carriage of two magnificent rivers can give, and is the depôt for all merchandise, to or from India, for the Upper Persian provinces, as well as Bussora and Baghdad. A rather large and well- supplied bazaar, in the usual Eastern state of filth, and a good sized garden near the governor's house, are the sole attractions.” In the garden were apple, apricot, and mulberry trees, growing side by side with the plantain, shaddock, and pomegranate, all equally thriving. The country WOL. II. N I78 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION surrounding Muhammrah is alternate swamp or sandy desert with patches of cultivation, and has the appear- ance of being annually inundated for miles around, which is actually the case. The date trees are strictly confined to the belt skirting the river side, and have but little brushwood or jungle among them. No high land is visible in any direction. The philosophy of the contention for the holding of this place, if there is any philosophy at all in it, is that the Persians in olden times established by means of an artificial channel, communication between a river of their own and the Euphrates. That this channel becoming the bed of the river by reason of a better slope, and flowing into a tidal estuary of the Euphrates, after driving the waters of the latter river into the river of the Arabs, became to be considered as a Persian river throughout the whole length of its usurped course. That hence the possession of Mu- hammrah, at its mouth, became a bone of contention, and a source of frequent quarrels and occasional fights between Turks and Arabs and Persians. That the Arabs consider it as their territory, no matter under which power it exists for the time being. That the territory was Persian in the palmy days of Persia, but Arabian under the Khalifat. That the mere fact that it is situated on the left bank of the river of the Arabs no more entitles the Persians to its possession than it does to Baghdad, also on the left bank of the river, because their ancestors Once held Ctesiphon. That the Karūn now flows into the river of the Arabs, and is therefore Persian, the Turks being unable to uphold their claims MUHAMMERAH-A BONE OF CONTENTION 179 by force of arms. That the mixed commission decided in their favour, and as a complimentary return for such a decision, the British troops shelled and destroyed the place, for what the Persian ambassador once emphati- cally said to me, was all a mistake. N 2 180 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION CHAPTER WI. THE TERRITORY OF MESENE. THERE is another river of Susiana which empties itself into the Shat al Arab between Imām Gharbi at the mouth of the Tigris and Muhammrah, called the |Kherkhah—the ancient Choaspes. On it at a little dis- tance inland is the Persian town of Hawisah, and below that the river forms a delta and extensive marshes, known as the Samargah and Samida. As this territory is admittedly Persian, it is so far an argument also for Muhammrah being the same. - These lakes were known to Pliny as formed by the Eulaeus and Tigris near Charax; and they are distin- guished from the Lake of Khaldaea, the Tigris being correctly described as, after flowing between Seleucia and Ctesiphon, emptying itself into the Khaldaean lake (vi. 27; 23). Herodotus describes Ampe, a place where Darius settled the Milesians who were made prisoners at the capture of Miletus, B.C. 494, as on the Erythraean Sea, and he adds, near which the Tigris flowing by, empties itself into the sea (Herod. vi. 20). This has been supposed to be the same place as the Jamba of THE TERRITORY OF MESENE 181 Ptolemy and the Ampelous of Pliny (vi. 28), who calls it Colonia Milesiorum. Stephanus describes the Tigris as being divided in Mesene, or as some read it at Apamaea (as the notice is under that heading); and Pliny also notices the division into two (vi. 27) channels, near Apamaea, one of these watering the territory of Cauchae or Coche, near Seleucia. This district of Mesene is, however, described by Strabo (xvi. 739) as being south of Khaldaea, and between Babylon and the Persian Gulf. There can, therefore, be little doubt as to the general acceptance of the term, as embracing at One period all the terri- tories at the mouth of the rivers south of Khaldaea. Thus, in the narrative of Xiphilinus, we learn that after Trajan had taken Ctesiphon, he determined to navigate the Red Sea, that is the Gulf of Persia. (The Erythraean or Red Sea is frequently confounded with the Persian Gulf by old authors.) ‘There is an island there formed by the Tigris, called Messana, under the government of Athambilus; this Trajan reduced with- out difficulty, but was himself brought into great danger from the season of the year, the violence of the stream and the inundation of the tide (?). The inhabi- tants of To Spasinus relieved him, however, by their friendly reception of him into the place. This fortress is in the territory of Athambilus.’ And here, according to his historians, Trajan wept because he could carry his conquests no further. It only remains then to determine the site of To Spasinus to form a proximate idea of the extent of Mesene 182 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION southwards at that time. There can be little doubt, from identity of name, that the To Spasinus of Xiphi- linus is the same as the Charax Spasinus of Stephanus (13, s. v.; Ptol. vi. 3; ‘Res. &c.” p. 182), although that site is placed by some in Characene, which may be con- sidered as a province or part of Mesene. Pliny tells us that the place was originally founded by Alexander the Great, and called Pellieum. Some time afterwards, the greater part of the town was de- stroyed by a flood, and it was restored by Antiochus Epiphanes, who called it Antiochaea. It obtained the name To Spasinus or Charax Spasinus when it was occupied by Pasines or Spasines, the son of the so-called Sogdonacus, the chief of the Arabs, who lived in the neighbourhood. This out-of-the-way spot was, how- ever, the birthplace of two distinguished geographers of olden time—Dionysius Periegetes and Isidorus of Charax. According to Sir Henry Rawlinson, who quotes Tabari and the Murasidu-l-Attila as his authorities, this place was rebuilt by Ardashir Babegan, under the name of Kerkhi Musan or Misan (the Messene of the Greeks) or Ushtunabad, and it seems also to have been called Asterabad by the Sassanians and Mahersi by the early Arabs. - Mr. Loftus says: ‘The province of Characene, whose capital was Charax, appears to have especially flourished under the dominion of the sub-Parthian kings. The British Museum possesses several remarkable copper coins referring to the kings of that province. They bear rude Greek legends in connection with busts of a THE TERRITORY OF MESENE 183 peculiar character—diadems, long peaked curled beards, and the characteristic enormous coiffures’—a peculiarity which I attribute to a rude representation of the kusti, worn as a kind of turban. There is abundant proof that Spasinus was in Mesene, as well as in the sub-district of Characene. Josephus (lib. i. ‘Antiq. c. vii.) speaks of Mas, ‘who was called Mesas, and who built the city of Mesanaeos, which in our time is called the Castle of Spasinus.’ Stephanus says distinctly, “Spasinus Charax is a city situated in Mesena on the Tigris.’ As to the reading To, or Ton Spasinus, sometimes met with, Cellarius remarks that it is a superfluous addition of a prepo- sition. - Dean Vincent, in his ‘Commerce and Navigation of the Ancients’ (vol. i. p. 424) says that ‘ the tract between (what he calls) Cossina Bony and the Bami- shere is called Meuan and Mucan, corresponding to the Mesene of Xiphilinus (or rather a Southerly pro- longation of that territory) with Khor Musa or Musu, and with Ptolemy's river Moseus. At the head of this Mesene, near the Haffar cut, was placed the Spasini Charax, or fort of Spasinus.’ This would identify Spasinus Charax with Muhammrah. The Dean further remarks that the canal of Haffar is older than the time of Alexander, for Nearchus mentions that part of the fleet passed through it into the Tigris (Shat al Arab) when Alexander came down the Eulaeus to the sea. This may, however, supposing, as Sir Henry Raw- linson does, the Bahmishir to have been the ancient outlet of the Euphrates, and the outlet of the Karun or 184 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Eulaeus, have been effected by means of a channel, which we navigated in a native boat when visiting the Sheikh of the Cha’ab Arabs, and which would have opened a way from the Eulaeus to the Haffar canal. This channel was indeed known to Herodotus, but whether the Persians of old opened the Upper Haffar, or channel of the Karūn between its old bed and the Lower Haffar canal, is not so clear. Dean Vincent also remarks that D'Anville has been led into error when he places Mesene west of the Shat al Arab instead of east, ‘ and what induced him to adopt this system is by no means apparent, as he knew well that the ancient geographers place the fort of Spasinus in Mesene.' True ; but the ancients com- prised all that part of Khaldaea which lay south of the Shat al Hai or Pasitigris, in Mesene. But they do not comprise in that region the ancient mouth of the Euphrates at Teredon. The old bed of the Karūn, called in the present day |Khor Musa or Moosa, and Ptolemy's river Moseus, is the next channel eastwards of the Karān al Amah, and it probably constituted one of the outlets of the Karlin in olden times, and also constituted the eastern boundary of Mesene, as the district of Teredon with its canals did its western boundary. - There are, however, so many old channels in Dorak- stan, as the country of the Cha’ab Arabs is called, that it is difficult to determine the original course of the main streams. After the Shat al Arab comes the Bahmishir, still a watercourse; then the Karān al Amah or blind Karūn, with water only at its embou- THE TERRITORY OF MESENE 185 chure; then the Khor Musa, also called Moi Allah ; then the Faig ; then the Hi-ay; then the Kurawasa, a channel of the Jerrahi river, the main outlet of which is called the Lasba ; and lastly, the Indiyan river. There is a navigable channel from the Karān at Ismaila to Dorak-the castle and town of the chief of the Cha’ab Arabs, at the mouth of the Jerrahi–but I cannot speak from personal knowledge as to the amount of water in the other channels. I know, as all navi- gators of the Persian Gulf know, to their disagreeable experience, that these channels have deposited a vast amount of alluvium, covered with marine sands, at this north-easterly extremity of the Gulf—some submerged, some dry at low-water, and some always dry. And I have had to sleep on the latter, not at all with disagree- able impressions. The sands here are not, as Captain Hunt describes those near Muhammrah, when our troops were encamped upon them, full of fleas, and the atmosphere of flies, nor were there even that most abominable of pests—sand-flies. Unquestionably the Jerrahi and Indiyan streams would have at all times determined the boundaries of the low country, Mesene, now the territory of the Cha’ab Arabs; but what changes have taken place in the course of the Karūn and of those smaller rivers it is, with the exception of the few historical facts before alluded to, almost impossible to determine. The delta of the Euphrates, Tigris, and Eulaeus is very peculiarly circumstanced. It has not, like the Nile and most other great rivers, expanded with the progress of time in an open sea to the right or left, 186 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION according to prevailing currents or winds. It has always been hemmed in by a comparatively narrow gulf. It is the same, but not to so great an extent, to the westward of the actual embouchure of the Euphrates as it is to the eastwards. There are several khors or embouchures, sometimes partly filled with tidal waters, in that direction. . But the rock formations come down further on the Arabian side, and have limited the extent of the delta in that direction. - We have seen how the pliocene sandstones come, in the Keishan Beital or Hasan Hills, and in the Mena- wiyah range, close to the right bank of the ancient Pallacopas, and the same rocks come down almost to the banks of the great river itself in Khaldaea. Nedjef is, according to Mr. Loftus, built on a cliff of sandstone. Mr. Taylor also describes a long low range of sand- hills called the Hazem as bounding the district west of Mu-kayir, and remarkable from the presence of blocks of ‘black granite, or more probably Dolerites. To the south is the Kasaim Dafneh, a ridge com- posed of sand and pebbles, which forms an almost uninterrupted boundary to the low country bordering on the Euphrates, not far from the Bahr-i-Nedjef. The sandstones come down on the plain of Bassora to Zobair, and the Jebel Sinan, rising out of the same plain to the Southwards, and supposed to be a mound of ruin, is said to be in reality of volcanic origin. It will be understood from this conformation of the country, why the Euphrates has in the lower part of its course a constant tendency to flow towards the south- THE TERRITORY OF MESENE 187 east, while to the eastwards the sandstones which approach the Tigris below Kut al Amara cross the Karun at Ahwaz at a distance from the Shat al Arab, leaving a considerable space for the delta of Mesene and of the Cha’ab Arabs. It is evident from the con- formation of the country, geologically and not his- torically speaking, that the sea once occupied the whole of the region now known as Khaldaea, and that when that territory rose out of the northerly prolonga- tion of the Persian Gulf, it was, just as what is seen going on at the head of the Gulf in actual times, a series of alluvial banks and sands, enclosing lagoons which afterwards became so many lakes or marshes. - The most marked of these are the hollows now occupied by the Affaij marshes and inundations, the Bahr-i-Nedjef, the Lemlun marshes, the Shatra marshes, the Samida and Samargah marshes, and the Kaaban or Dorakstan marshes. The first of these correspond to the valley of the Pallacopas, the second to the Babylonian marshes, the third to the Khaldaean marshes, the fourth to the Susian marshes—at a time when probably Dorakstan and Mesene were still in great part submerged. Marcian, speaking of Spasinus Charax, says, near this part lies an island called Apphadana, which some attribute to Arabia. The Arabian geographer Edrisi describes Abadan as a small fort attached to the main- land, but situated near the sea ; and six miles below the fort lay Al Shasiyabat, which signifies a stage raised upon piles in the sea, where a watch was kept, and those who were appointed for that purpose repaired to 188 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION the stage in boats. This name of Abadan is that by which the whole of the territory between the Shat al Arab and the Bahmishir is now known. | Sir Henry Rawlinson also speaks in the Journal of the R. G. S. (vol. viii.) of the island of Abadan as lying between the Bahmishir and the Shat al Arab, and he adds that this territory answers to the Southern Mesene of the Greeks, and the Misan of the Arabs and Tal- mudists. The name in the inscriptions of Sennacherib, which has been read Khupapan, Ought, he thinks, to be pronounced Hubadan, the same as the Abadan of the Arabs and the Apphadana of the Greeks. - The early Persians, this distinguished Orientalist and geographer further tells us, named the island Miyan Rudan, ‘between the rivers, evidently after the Greek Mesene, from which term also the Oriental Misan was probably derived. - According to the same authority, ruins which are to be observed on the right bank, or Arabian side, of the Shat al Arab, about two miles above the Muhamm- rah Creek, were on an island in the time of Sennacherib called Billat. He considers this to have been an island up to the time of Alexander, being mentioned under the names of Aphle and Apologos. As Abūllah, this place became the great entrepôt, under the Sassanians and the early Arabs, of the commerce running up the Euphrates. This determination of the site of Abūllah does not precisely agree with the records of the Arabian geographers, as noticed in the chapter on Bassora, but it may be the correct one ; for, as Sir Henry Rawlinson himself observes, every two or three hundred years a THE TERRITORY OF MESENE 189 new port was founded on the shore of the great estuary, that it was then left dry, and the people were obliged to desert it and form another port lower down. Sir Henry Rawlinson, it has been before observed, says the early Persians named the island of Abadan Miyan (or Mizan) Rudan, ‘between the rivers, evidently after the Greek Mesene, from which term further, he adds, also, the Oriental Misan was probably derived, for the title is unknown in the ancient inscriptions, and has no meaning in the Semitic tongues; but it would rather seem that the Greek Mesene was derived from one or another of the old Arab designations, Musan or Misan, as still met with in the Khor Musah, than that the Arabs or Persians derived their designations from the Greek. 191 BOOK WI–ASCENT OF THE EUPHRATES, TIGRIS, AND KARUN, CELAPTER I. THE BREAKDOWN. WE left Muhammrah on the 13th of September, after receiving mails from the ‘Shannon.” There was a great deal of sickness on board, and One of our engineers, Mr. Caldon, died suddenly from the bursting of an ab- scess in the liver. He had been ailing some time, and the most active measures failed to stop the progress of the malady. He was buried, after the usual autopsy, at Magik, a country residence of Colonel Taylor's, situated in the date groves a little north of Bassora, and whither we had proceeded after taking M. Fontanier on board as a passenger to Baghdad. A curious circumstance occurred during Mr. Caldon's last illness, which has been narrated by Sergeant-major Quin, R.A., in a work devoted to anecdotes of the Royal Artillery. I was one day attending him in the company of the worthy Sergeant-major, when he expressed a wish for some fish. “How can I get fish at the rate we are going through the water P’ I remarked, and at the very 192 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION moment a big fish was thrown or jumped in at the port- hole. - We arrived at Kornah the same evening and took in coals next morning, making, however, about thirty miles of ascent in the afternoon. The date groves did not extend far above Kornah on the Tigris, and were suc- ceeded by a marshy vegetation of reeds and flags, and these by a jungle of tamarisk which with some inter- ruptions continued all the way to Ctesiphon. We found that there were ruins of walls and other debris to the north of Kornah, belonging probably to the ancient Apamaea. We were much troubled in this lower part of the river with mosquitoes and a large speckled obstrus or horsefly. On the 16th we had a dense fog and stuck for some time on a shoal, but managed to get up the river another twenty-nine miles. On the 17th we passed a large village of the Abdul Muhammad Arabs. Beyond this we came to an encampment of the Beni Lam. It was situate at a point where a canal was drawn from the Tigris, communicating with Hawisah on the Kherkah or Choaspes. There was an imām or ziyaret at the spot, in a little grove of poplar trees. Corporal Black, who had taken the place of the deceased engineer, got his finger in the machinery and received a severe injury, but the member was ultimately saved with the loss of the nail. The temperature was now 74° of Fahr. at sunrise, rising to 86° at noon. The temperature of the water was 76°Fahr. We made seventy-nine miles this day. On the 18th we got into a better country; the banks THE BREAKDOWN 193 were marly, with hills in the distance in the east, one of which attained a considerable elevation. The plains were also enlivened by flocks of sand-grouse. A party of armed Beni Lam came to claim tribute, but we need scarcely say that their claim was ignored. A tribute of thirty shamis was said to be exacted from all native boats passing through their territory. We also spoke a Baghdad boat, and got letters. On the 19th we reached Kut al Amarah, a stationary village opposite to where the Shat al Hai took its de- parture; there was, however, very little water in this ancient bed of the Tigris. We lay to in the afternoon at a village above this called Korti. The tamarisk now grew to a height of from fifteen to twenty feet, with, on the borders of the river, much undergrowth, but getting clearer, with glades and poplar and other trees, which almost entirely superseded the tamarisk on the borders of the desert, giving birth to a most delightful fringe of park-like verdure, much frequented by wild beasts. The natives spoke in terror of the lions, but although I always went out shooting when the steamer stopped to cut wood, I never saw one. - Only once I came upon a hunting tiger purring itself in a glade, and I went on board and got a couple of artillerymen to take their rifles, which were loaded with ball (I had only small shot), but when we got to the glade the beautiful feline had taken itself off, although we preserved the utmost silence. I, however, bagged two brace of francolin at Kut al Amarah, these beauti- ful game birds now becoming common, and still more SO as we ascended the river, especially on the Khaldaean WOL. II. O # 194 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION side, where the jungle was lower and often a mere cover of mimosa, rest-harrow, and glycyrrhiza, resembling Our heaths. We were detained all day getting in wood on the 20th, so I went out shooting both in the morning and evening, killing a few francolin and One very beau- tiful game bird with a long tail, which I believed to be the Syrhaptes Pallesii. In the evening, getting out into the more open glades on the limits of the desert, I met several hyaenas prowling about, and disturbed some from their lairs. But they simply skulked away, and I did not trouble them. September 21st we got upon a bank. Large flocks of sand-grouse were seen coming down to water at a sandy point—no doubt well known to them. The 22nd, 23rd, and 24th present nothing remarkable in my journal beyond that I had plenty of sport in the jungle, and that in the evenings, wolves, hyaenas, jackals, and wild boar came down to drink and afforded much amuse- ment to the crew. One wolf actually swam across the river in front of the ship's bows, but although several shots were fired at it, they failed to hit him. A hook baited with meat was fixed firmly in the ground on the water's edge, and it was soon devoured. Charlewood and I went ashore in a boat and got a close shot at a wolf, but although it must have been killed, so dense was the brushwood that we could not find it. It pro- bably had vitality enough in it to drag its way for some distance in the jungle. Colonel Chesney joined me one afternoon in my usual perambulations of the jungle. I took him to the beautiful glades at the outside of the jungle, and he was as much delighted with the quiet THE BREAKDOWN 195 forest scenery as I had been, and we both felt so happy as to give up the search for game and sit down and enjoy an agreeable half-hour's converse. - On another occasion we passed a small sandbank with some four or five pelicans in a group. With Colonel Chesney's permission I took a shot at them from One of the wall-guns fixed on pivots to the bulwarks, one on each side. They were loaded with grape, and although the island was rather far off, one was struck in the wing and disabled. The others flew away Scatheless. - Manning a boat, I went to secure my prize, but the bird fought so effectively with its long bill that I had to retreat to the boat to obtain an oar, with which I knocked it over and secured it. The incident afforded great amusement to the crew, who were all watching the proceedings and roaring with laughter at my dis- comfiture. The bird measured 9 ft. 9 in. from tip of wing to wing, and stood 5 ft. 10 in, in height. Passing Ctesiphon without landing, but which inte- resting spot I had subsequently a full opportunity of exploring, the steamer unfortunately stuck on a bank on the evening of the 28th of September, about six miles below Baghdad. Dr. Ross, of the Residency, having come down to us in a native boat, Colonel Chesney took the opportunity to precede us in our arrival at the city of the Khalifs. - We did not indeed get off the bank until the 30th, and in the meantime one of our best men, Macdonald, of whose life I had long despaired, was taken away from us. He was buried on the banks of the river, and O 2 196 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION I had the melancholy task of reading prayers over his last remains. Although we did not get off the bank till the after- noon, steam was put on and we were enabled to reach Baghdad by five in the evening. Here we received Colonel Chesney and Colonel Taylor on board with a salute of eleven guns, and the bridge of boats having been opened, the steamer proceeded up the river past the Pasha's Serai, and then turning round took up a station opposite to the British Residency. I went on shore with Dr. Ross in one of the native coracles or kufas—round wicker boats covered with bitumen—and a tame lion. We also took Corporal Greenhill with us, as he was one of the greatest invalids, where almost all of us were more or less ill. We remained here four days, and this being the first time that a steamboat had ascended the river up to Baghdad, we were surrounded all the day long by the people in their boats, who peered most unceremo- niously into all the cabins and every recess possible. As I had little opportunity of exploring the city at this my first visit, I shall defer any attempt at a de- scription of the place to another and a longer stay made a few months later. We started on the descent of the river on the morn- ing of October 5, but owing to the many shoals that obstructed the river below the city, we did not, although the current was in our favour, make more than twelve miles by sunset. The next day we stopped to get in wood, and I had some shooting. I found the clayey alluvium which THE BREAKDOWN 197 supports the wonderful growth of tamarisk, at times enlivened with clematis, to lie over part of the debris of ancient Seleucia. When dry it divided into penta- gonal or rhomboidal masses. Whence this tendency to assume definite forms in clays, in basalts, in Fontaine- bleau and other sandstones, and in magnesian lime- stones? Is it an elementary attempt at crystallisation ? The temperature got much cooler this month; an average of 60° at sunrise rising to 70° at midday in the shade. Water 72°. But there was still a great deal of sickness, chiefly ague or malaria, on board. On the 8th we passed Kut al Amarah, but so tedious was the navigation rendered by the necessity of getting in wood, and by the occasional sticking on shoals, that we did not get to Kornah till the 16th. I observed upon this Occasion that a kind of causeway was carried across a peninsula. Some miles above Kornah. Here we found the ‘Hugh Lindsay’ with a mail. Unfortunately the Muntifik Arabs had been in open hostility with the ship. They were not even allowed to land at Kornah and obtain fresh provisions. It was re- presented to the Sheikh that the English were quiet people, friends and allies, and paid for whatever they got. “The English, said the old Sheikh in reply, are like ants; if one finds a bit of meat, a hundred follow.’ They even sent a deputation on board the Honourable East India Company's ship, asking what they wanted there. “Was it dates or corn ? If so, they should be loaded; if not, let them go away.” Colonel Chesney, with his usual determination, at once put a stop to this state of things by taking up a 198 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION position alongside the town, and threatening it with destruction unless amicable relations were re-esta- blished. More serious news came by the same mail, and which no doubt led to the breaking up of the Expedi- tion. This was to the effect that M. Boutanieff had re- proached the Porte for allowing steam navigation in the interior rivers of the Empire to a nation whose policy was avowedly opposed to that of Russia, and he further declared that if, in consequence of the difficulties thrown in the way of the Expedition by the Pasha of Egypt, England felt itself in any manner called upon to take reprisals, Russia could not remain a mute spectator. It also appeared that the Porte, having lately re- solved upon repairing the fortifications of Baghdad and Bassora against the encroachments of the Pasha of Egypt, had urged with Lord Ponsonby the claims of alliance and friendship to obtain the use of the steamer On the Euphrates for the transport of material. All this was making mountains of molehills. The difficulties thrown in the way of the Expedition by Ibrahim Pasha were quite nominal, and Russia, which now threatened to interfere if those difficulties entailed reprisals, never interfered at the capture of Acre. And as to any intentions of the Pasha of Egypt to encroach upon Baghdad and Bassora, there had been no more signs of such a movement than there ever were of forti- fying the two cities, with crumbling walls and a stranded fleet ! Since that period there has been regular steam communication between Bombay and Bassora and Baghdad, THE BREAKDOWN I99 On October 20 we left Kornah early in the morning on the ascent of the Euphrates, and reached Suk al Shuyuk the same day. The inundations seemed to be more extensive than ever, but there were patches of cultivation, of rice, dhurra, and beans. A village of evil name, Um al Buk, the ‘mother of mosquitoes, seemed to constitute the extremity of the inundations on the right bank, but inland they stretched further. The next day a further ascent was made to Kut, the residence of the Sheikh of the Muntifiks, but Our reception was anything but friendly, although our real and peaceful proceedings were explained at length. Mr. Samuel, the missionary before alluded to as brought up by the ‘Hugh Lindsay, had been busy disseminat- ing tracts among the Arabs, and added the fire of reli- gious fanaticism to the latent fuel of scepticism as to our objects in navigating the river. Even at Suk al Shuyuk, where we had been so well received in our descent of the river, the people yelled at us and the boys threw stones. Along the river banks the women also exposed themselves in abhorrence of our presence. On the 22nd we passed El Argof, at the mouth of the Hai, the lofty mounds of Mu-kayir, Al Asaya, ‘the place of pebbles,' a lofty dome-shaped mound, and others at varying distances from the river, till we came to anchor a short distance from Al Khadr, the site of our previous misunderstanding. There was still a deal of sickness on board, but happily nothing serious. We had on board two passengers, a Mr. Alexander and Mr. Stewart, mer- chants from Bombay, the latter of whom, although a 200 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION young man, was a great invalid. I Ought to mention that to conciliate the Muntifik Arabs I performed a successful operation on the eyes of one afflicted with ectropia. 2. Mr. Alexander accompanied me One day on a shooting excursion in the jungle, but he could not quite reconcile himself to it. He wondered how I could thus expose myself in a country where natives and wild beasts were alike hostile, but I reassured him when I told him I had never met with a mishap. On this occasion I noticed, what I had before seen in the Tigris, colonies of ants that made their abodes of sands agglu- timated into tubes like the sabellae of the seashore. Upon entering the Lemlun marshes the channel was so narrow and the course of the river was so devious, that there was no getting On. It was impos- sible to bring the head of the steamer round so as to surmount the short and sharp curves. A number of Khazail Arabs were hired to assist the steamer with a hawser at the bows, for if we could once have got through these marshes it would have been all right with us. These children of nature were utterly intractable. They would pull for a moment, then have a dance. Then they would have a song; the refrain of which was the beards of their fathers. But quiet and steady they could not be. They were like a parcel of schoolboys just let loose from their lessons. At length the climax came. On October 28, when every exertion was being made to double a point of land, the engine broke down, and we were left helpless in the stream. THE BREAKDOWN - 201 There was no alternative under the circumstances but to obtain a native boat to convey the mail to Hillah, under charge of Fitzjames, with the two pas- sengers Messrs. Alexander and Stewart, and Saïd Ali as an interpreter. It took a day to accomplish this, and they left us on the 30th, but only, as we afterwards heard, to be robbed and imprisoned when they arrived at Lemlun, from which place they had indeed great difficulty in making their escape. On Our part, after making every possible effort to even temporarily repair the engine, we were obliged, by November 2, to simply drop down the river with the current. When we got into the more open channel beyond the marshes we assisted ourselves with sails. And now came a time of gloom and despondency such as had never before been seen on board the dear old steamer ‘Euphrates’ even in time of sickness and death. All felt that it was a break-down, and nothing but future movements were the subjects of conversa- tion. - Worse than all, the funds of the Expedition were exhausted. Major Estcourt communicated to me that there could be no more pay. This was nothing new, for I had never received any. I had paid my own expenses in the explorations south of Antioch. I had incurred some small professional expenditure, and I had been provided with a small sum for the expenses of the trip to Persepolis, and the expenses of the search for coal in Kurdistan and return home were paid, Mr. Rassam acting as treasurer and purser, as he did upon the 202 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION occasion of a subsequent expedition to Kurdistan, sent out by the Royal Geographical Society and the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge; but, as far as I can remember, I never received a farthing of the seven shillings and sixpence a day I was to have—certainly not directly. I believe, however, some small matters, such as clothes and boots or shoes, were put down to my account. - Partly sailing, partly dropping with the current, we managed to reach Bassora on November 8, and found there the ‘Hugh Lindsay, by which ship Colonel Chesney decided to proceed to Bombay, in order to try and procure funds for the further uses of the Expedi- tion. We also obtained the use of artificers, both from the ‘Hugh Lindsay’ and from Bassora, to put the engines in Order—a work which was, happily, success- fully accomplished. - In the meantime Colonel Chesney made a last little trip to Zobair, the inundations at this epoch permitting of such an excursion, and he kindly took me with him. We crossed an almost level plain of mud and sand, without pebbles or shells, or a single plant, for eight miles before we reached the site of Old Bassora. All that remained were a few towers and ruins of buildings. Zobair bore South-west from us three and a half miles. The Nahr Sa'ada, the bed of the ancient Pallacopas, or its continuation, lay between us and the latter place, and was about forty feet in width. An imām with dome, called Tella or Sheikh Ali, bore S. 75 E. The mound or rock of Sinam at a distance S. 12 W. The same mound bore from the top of Sheikh THE BREAKDOWN 203 Ibrahim’s house at Zobair S. 22 W., and was declared to be five hours' distance. There were indications of extensive sites having Once occupied this old mouth of the Euphrates, for low mounds of debris were met with all over the plain from Old Bassora to Zobair, three and a half miles. An imām with an obelisk-like tower dedicated to Hassan Basni bore S. 20 W., and Drimri, a village with date trees, S. 6 E. about four miles. Zobair is a walled town, and the walls are main- tained in a tolerable state of perfection. There are about eight hundred houses, but barely half of them are tenanted. The wells have to be sunk several fathoms to obtain good water. The soil consisted of sand lying upon a calcareous sandstone, and as the country began to rise gradually beyond the ancient port of the Euphrates, evidently stood at the extreme point of the rock formations. But it is difficult, with- out an exploration of the mound of Sinam, to say if Nebuchadnezzar's Teredon was situated here, or at that place, as seems most likely. Niebuhr notices the tombs of Zobair, of Hassan, and of Tella, as being in the vicinity. Sir H. Jones long ago pointed out that the Palla- copas branched off from the Euphrates by the Nahr Saleh, probably the continuation of the canal of Urchoe, and flowed past Jebel Sinam, or Diridotis—that is Teredon. Dean Vincent imagined Sinam to be the same as Zobair. The people of the country still preserve a tradi- tion of the first Bassora having stood at Sinam. The second, to which Ayisha was taken prisoner upon the 204 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION defeat of her followers by Ali, was at or near the actual Zobair, and the third Or actual Bassora was, as before observed, founded by the Khalif Omar in the fourteenth year of the Hejra. On November 14 we bade adieu to our gallant commander with three hearty cheers and a salute of eleven guns, and proceeded, under charge of Major Estcourt, Cleveland and Charlewood, to Muhammrah, which place was saluted with five guns and the compli- ment was returned by one. Powder was scarce there till the Persians came down in force to oppose the British troops. -- 2 0 5 CHAPTER II. THE CHA’AB ARABS. ON November 18 Major Estcourt, now in charge of the Expedition, started, accompanied by Charle- wood, Rassam, and myself, on a visit to the Sheikh of the Cha’ab Arabs, whose capital is called Dorak by the Persians, but Gaban or Cha’aban and Fellahiya by the Arabs. Hence also is the province known as Dorakstan by the Persians, but by the Arabs as Gaban. We arrived about three miles above the last of eight small villages that are met with on the right bank of the Karān, called Gisbar, at the exit of the old channel of the Karūnal Amah or ‘blind Karān,” with the village of Sabla, like the others, on the right bank of the Karūn proper, and where were ruins of dwellings of a bygone period of prosperity, probably belonging to the time when the Karūnal Amah was navigable. There is still water in the old channel, and it is said to con- stitute a continuous watercourse at high tides. The bed of this old channel of the Karūn was about 200 yards in width. We entered hence a canal which led from the Karūn al Amah to Dorak, and which was hence known as the Gaban, and night coming On, we were obliged to lie 206 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION to before getting any distance. An Arab peasant and his wife came and asked permission to pass the night in our vicinity by way of protection. Our boatmen were lazy, idle fellows, and they pushed along this narrow and tortuous watercourse, which was partly lost in a marsh, at such a slow rate that we did not get to Dorak until seven in the evening of the next day. - The residence of the Sheikh was a castellated build- ing of considerable dimensions, and although as seen by daylight it had the usual crumbling aspect, at night time the long front facing the canal had a very impos- ing appearance, and looked like a Venetian palace—-an illusion which was still further sustained by the low portal which constituted the entrance on that side, and which had a very forbidding and inquisitorial appearance about it. - The Sheikh did not receive us that night, nor did he send us any refreshments. Charlewood had shot a wild duck on Our way, but there was no getting the attendants to cook it, so we had to lie down on our rugs dinnerless and supperless. The next morning there was the usual public recep- tion, with a motley assemblage of black-capped Persians, blue-turbaned mullahs, and kerchiefed Arabs. We on Our part claimed, as navigating the river, friendship and protection; they, On theirs, could not suppress their Surprise and disapproval of Our leaving, as they said, Our wives and country, to go poking about in other people's lands and territories, where our presence was neither sought for nor desired. We met these rebuffs THE CHA’AB ARABS 207 with the usual arguments of commerce, civilisation, inter- communion of peoples, and general intercourse. They did not or would not see it. But as the Jerrahi, a river flowing past Dorak, gave an Opening to the Gulf, the Sheikh was really not so obtuse as he pretended to be in the presence of the Persians. He knew the English from having been at Bushire. He was a middle- aged man of fair intelligence, and at Subsequent private interviews we found him to be friendly, and hospitably inclined towards us. The town of Dorak was found to be but a poor place, most of the town being in ruins or uninhabited, the people dwelling for the most part in reed huts, and the bazaar a nominal institution. As at Muhammrah, there were a few Sabaeans residing in the place. The name of the tribe which occupies the whole of the low and marshy country extending between the Shat al Arab, the river Karān, the Jerrahi and Indiyan rivers, and the Persian Gulf, is variously written. Otter spells it Kiab, Sir H. Jones Chaub ; von Hammer has, however, Cha’ab, and this is the pronunciation we caught. The Persians call their country Dorakstan, after the name of the capital, but they themselves called it Gaban or Cha’aban. They are said to have originally emigrated from the Arabian coast of the Persian Gulf, and being buffalo herdsmen, they settled at Wasit on the Shat al Hai; but, driven from that country by the Muntifik Arabs, they settled in the delta of the Karūn, equally well suited to their avocations. They still maintained a profound hostility against the Muntifik, and boasted to us of their prowess against them. Here 208 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION they founded the town since called Dorak, but also known to them as Ka'aban or Gaban, and it is noticed by the Arabian geographers under that name. From hence they extended their settlements up the Jerrahi, the ancient Hedyphon, pitching their tents round an artificial mound—the remains of Some old city of Susiana—and upon which rose the modern town of Fellahiya. The neighbouring tribe of Afshars objected to this encroachment, but the Cha'abs excused themselves by saying that the pastures of the Jerrahi were better suited to their buffaloes than Gaban, where they did not prosper. Soon afterwards a ditch was dug around the mound, upon which the Afshars again remonstrated. The Cha’abs replied that the ditch was dug to preserve their buffaloes, which were carried off almost every night. The following year a stout mud wall arose within the ditch, and the Afshars, finding that the Cha’abs were setting them at defiance, invited a neighbouring tribe to assist them in expelling the intruders. The Cha’abs on their side applied to the Wali of Hawisa to assist them in holding the footing they had acquired on the Jerrahi. ‘We are Arabs, said they, ‘and consequently the Sayyid is a brother. It is better that we should be his subjects than those of the Afshars.’ The Wali con- sented, and marched against the Afshars, who were thus driven altogether out of Dorakstan, and took refuge at Lehrowi, where they built a castle, which, according to Layard, still bears their name. The Cha’ab Arabs, whose claims to the territory on THE CIIA’AB ARABS 209 which they pasture their buffaloes are about the same as that of any other tribe settled in, Babylonia or Khaldaea, were not, however, allowed to remain long in peaceful possession of their annexations. At the acces- sion of Shah Abbas, Imām Kuli Khan, Governor of Farsistan, headed an expedition against them, and forced them not only to return part of their encroach- ments to the Afshars, but also compelled them to pay a certain tribute to the crown of Persia, thus subjecting them to their rule. Taking advantage, however, of the state of anarchy which succeeded the death of Nadir Shah, the Cha'ab Arabs repossessed themselves of the whole of Dorakstan, and forcing the Afshars and sundry Turcoman tribes that pastured their flocks in the same territory to decamp, they made themselves masters of all the terri- tory that intervened between the Euphrates, the Karān, and the Indiyan or Hindiyan river." The name of the Cha’ab Arabs became first known in this country about the latter part of the last century in consequence of their piratical exploits in the Persian Gulf.” They had then attained their highest power under an enterprising and adventurous Sheikh—Sulai- man by name. This Sheikh, the founder of the present family of the Ali bu Nasir Sheikhs, constructed dams across the rivers, dug canals, built houses, founded villages, planted date ‘A Description of the Province of Khusistan.’ By A. H. Layard, Esq. Trams. of the Royal Geographical Society, vol. xvi. * Dean Vincent's Commerce and Navigation of the Ancients, vol. i. p. 427, 4th ed., 1817. WOL. II. - P 210 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION trees, and encouraged commerce—legitimate and ille- gitimate—he was not particular. Above all he sought to aggrandise his dominions. He subjected all the less powerful tribes in his neigh- bourhood, and extended his conquests in the direction of Bassora, and Niebuhr describes him as having in his possession in his time all the territories and islands adjoining the Shat al Arab." ... . . . " . . It was the possession of the mouths of the Karūn. and Euphrates that led this enterprising Sheikh to turn his attention to navigation. He constructed his first ship in 1758, and in 1765 he had already ten large sized vessels and seventy-six small ones. With these vessels, instead of pursuing a peaceful commerce, he commenced the career of a pirate, capturing all European merchantmen that came to trade at Bushire and Bassora, and he took among others, many English ships. He also particularly assisted the tribes of the coast south of the Indiyan in destroying the Dutch factory at Kharak, and he also made himself master of several large districts in Khuzistan. r At length Kerim Khan, the successor of Nadir Shah, invaded the territory with so strong a force that Sheikh Sulaiman was obliged to fly with his ill-gotten treasures beyond the Euphrates. The Persians, after sacking Fellahiya, advanced westward, and broke down the dam which had been constructed to force the waters into the Gaban mouth of the river, but the plague having broken out in the army, it was obliged to retrace its Steps. * Voyage en Arabie, tom. ii. p. 160. Swiss edition of 1780. THE CHA’AB ARABS 2II No sooner had the Persians withdrawn than the Turks advanced in their turn against the Sheikh of the Cha’abs for violation of their territories, and tossed thus between two antagonistic powers, Sulaiman had no alternative but to submit to the one or the other, and being a Shi‘ah, he gave the preference to Kerim Khan, from whom he subsequently received, in return for signal service rendered to the Persians at the siege of Bassora, cession of the town of Indiyan and its depen- dencies in perpetuity, but somewhat in the nature of a feudal tenure, on the condition of his paying 1,000 tomans yearly to the Persian government. So long as the Sovereigns of Persia have been strong enough to enforce payment of this tribute, the Cha'ab Sheikhs have met the demand, but whenever they thought they could withhold it, they have never failed to do so. This has led to constant petty warfare between the two. At the commencement of Feth Ali Shah's reign they held aloof, but Muhammad Ali Mirza, Governor of Farsistan, having sent an expedition against them, they were obliged to pay tribute, and that partly in a stipulated number of their noble breed of horses. In a similar manner, after the accession of the reign- ing Shah, and while Colonel Shee was besieging the fort of Guli Golab, then in the hands of the revolted Mamasini, Manucha Khan, Governor of Fars, sum- moned the Cha’ab Arabs to supply the troops with provisions. The Sheikh made answer, that as there existed no precedent of the Cha’ab Arabs having furnished Sursab Or provisions for a Persian army, he P 2 212 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION could not comply with the demand, but after the fort had been captured he changed his mind, and in addition to the required supplies, paid in several thousand tomans to the Persian treasury. - At the time of Kinneir's travels, the revenues of the Sheikh were estimated as amounting to five lakhs of piastres, or some 50,000l. a year, and it was said he could bring five thousand horse into the field. At the period of our visit Sheikh Thamar ruled over seven tribes—the Ali bu Nasir, Idris, Nasara, Muhaisen, Bawi, Beni Temin, and Haiyada. The annual tribute to the Persians was 3,400 tomans, equivalent to 1,700l., and there were, as at the court of the Sheikh of Sulai- maniya, and other border provincial seats of govern- ment, plenty of black-caps to look after the interests of their government. Sheikh Thamar affected the character of a prince after the fashion of the Sheikh of the Muntifik, rather than that of a mere Arab Sheikh. He had his wuzir, his kadis, his masters of ceremonies, his mullahs and scribes. There were, as before observed, several Persian officials at his court, as also Mir Madhkur, Sheikh of the Sheriffa tribe. Sheikh Thamar was an enlightened ruler. He favoured agriculture and commerce, and had made Muhammrah a free port. He had also made of Fellahiya a depôt for merchandise supplied to Khuzistan from the Shat al Arab. Although the town, palace, and citadel (in the latter of which were still to be seen some guns, relics of the piratical propensities of his great ancestor) were in the THE CHAAB ARABS 213 usual dilapidated condition, the Sheikh is credited with looking carefully to the preservation of the canals and watercourses upon which the prosperity of the country depends. At this epoch Karayid, Sheikh of the Nasara tribe, Occupied with his followers the fort on the south side of the Haffar canal, whilst Ahmed, Sheikh of the Hayada, dwelt in Muhammrah itself. Unfortunately, however, the opening of the latter place as a free port had induced the traders who had previously resorted to Bassora to resort thither, and this had entailed a con- siderable loss of revenue to the governor of the latter place, and so, indirectly, to the Pasha of Baghdad. We have seen that upon each successive visit to Muhammrah the market was very busy; there were Persians and Arabs, native merchants from Bombay and Surat, and others from the Persian Gulf. It was a master stroke of policy on the part of the Sheikh of the Cha’ab to make of it a free port. But in proportion to the prosperity of the place, so was the ire of Ali Riza Pasha kindled, and he deter- mined to destroy the rival port. M. Fontanier, the French consul, takes credit to himself in the work before alluded to for having wrought the destruction of this nascent free port, and he says he was impelled to advise hostile measures from the fact of the “Euphrates’ having stopped some days at Muhammrah, of its having ascended the Karān, and of a visit having been paid to Sheikh Thamar, at Dorak or Fellahiya | The rising emporium was accordingly given up to devastation and plunder. Not, it is to be suspected, on 214 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION account of M. Fontanier's jealousy of our harmless movements, but because, as a free port, it deprived Bassora of certain sources of revenue. - ‘It is utterly impossible,’ says M. Fontanier, triumphant in his policy, “to exaggerate the pillage, for everything in the place was seized by the soldiery, who carried off even the women and children, and when the place was completely stripped, the Pasha and his troops gratified themselves by burning it.’ At this conjuncture, Sheikh Thamar, instead of, as he ought to have done, seeking assistance from the Shah, whose vassal he was, obtained the aid of another more powerful and equally rebellious vassal as himself, Muhammad Taki Khan, chief of the Baktiyari Kurds, and with the assistance of a force of Kurdish horsemen, he succeeded, when the Pasha's army had been with- drawn, in turning out the governor appointed by the Turks to rule over the place, and regained possession of it. * ... • Ajil, Sheikh of the Bawi tribe, dwelling on the Karun and suspected of subserviency to the Turks, was put to death, and Ahmed, Sheikh of Muhammrah, who was also supposed to have played a false part, having been deposed, Hajar Jabar, Sheikh of the Mühaisen, who also dwell on the Karān, was appointed governor, and the little port began to rise up gradually from its ashes. This happy state of things was not, however, destined to last long. Muhammad Taki Khan, being obliged to fly before a Persian army, Sheikh Thamar, in gratitude for the assistance received in recapturing Muhammrah, THE CHA’AB ARABS 215 gave him an asylum in his territory. The consequence was that the Mütamidu-a-dûlet, or Persian viceroy of Kirmanshah, became as much interested in suppressing the power of Sheikh Thamar as he had been in sub- jecting Muhammad Taki Khan. * The tribe of the Sheriffa living on the Indiyan, and in the district called that of Zaitun, or the “Olive groves, under Sheikh Madhkur, and the newly ap- pointed Sheikh of the Bawi, were first seduced from their allegiance to Sheikh Thamar, and the Persian viceroy was thus enabled to march against the latter with a reinforcement of 2,000 foot and 700 horse of the Sheriffa, and 1,000 mounted Bawis, and with a loss to the power of resistance on the part of Sheikh Thamar equivalent to what had gone over to the enemy. Sir Henry Layard happened to be at Fellahiya at this very time, and he describes Sheikh Thamar as having collected to oppose this force about 7,000 men, of whom 3,000 were well armed with muskets and matchlocks, 1,000 were horsemen, and 3,000 indif- ferently armed with spears or swords. The Persians advanced from the plain of Ram Hormuz along the Hedyphon, but they were so effectually resisted at the canal, called Um ul Sakkar, that they were obliged to give up the idea of attacking from that quarter. In the autumn of the same year a body of troops were assembled at Shuster and Dizful, and floated down the Karūn to Muhammrah, and after bringing that un- fortunate port into subjection, they proceeded by the Gaban (the same canal that we had navigated), to Dorak or Fellahiya. Sheikh Thamar, abandoned by a 216 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION large portion of his followers, had no alternative left but flight, and Sheikh Fars was appointed to be the chief of Dorakstan and the Cha’ab territory by the Persian government. - The Turks were not prepared, however, to see part of the delta of the Euphrates, and a port the possession of which was once geographically theirs, when that river flowed by the Haffar canal, and which had recently been sacked by Riza Ali Pasha, pass into the hands of the Persian authorities. - The Porte protested energetically against the as- sumption that the territory was Persian, although held by Arabs tributary to Persia, and then reduced to sub- mission by the same power. - The question, with a number of others, all alike affecting disputed points in the boundaries of the two countries, was at length, with the mutual agreement of the two powers, left to the decision of a joint commis- sion of Turkish, Persian, Russian, and English members, among whom, on the English side, was Sir W. F. Williams of Kars. - Mr. Loftus, who was in the country at the time, gives an amusing account of the attempt made to settle the question as to which of the two powers Muhammrah belonged to. By the treaty of Erzerum, it was agreed that that place should be finally made over to the Persians, but On its being proposed, when the commis- sioners met on the spot, to carry out the spirit of the treaty, an unexpected difficulty arose. The Turkish commissioner argued like Portia in the ‘Merchant of Venice ’: THE CHA’AB ARABS * 217 This bond doth give thee here no jot of blood; The words expressly are, a pound of flesh : Take then thy bond—take thou thy pound of flesh. And so the Osmanli argued that the treaty said Muhammrah, but not the territory. Take the town if you will, but we claim the land. According to the letter of the deed, he was content to deliver up the town, but not an inch of territory would he give up. Conference after conference was held on this mo- mentous point. Durwish Pasha stood his ground, and would consent to no other terms. Upon this, Mirza Jaffir Khan, the Persian commissioner, instigated Sheikh Jabar to raise the Persian flag upon the walls of Muhammrah. Thus there was danger at the outset of the commis- sioners assembling that the whole affair would fall to the ground, and only bring about a recommencement of hostilities. Fortunately, European counsels were listened to ; the obnoxious flag was removed, and the point at issue was referred to the four governments for decision, and it was ultimately resolved that a careful survey should be taken of the whole frontier line ; and the result of this inquiry was that Muhammrah was declared, in the present state of things, to be Persian territory. There can be no doubt that the territory belonged formerly to Turkish Arabia, but the Persians, having opened a channel for the Karān into the Haffar canal, the mere fact that the tides pass into that canal in the present day does not constitute it Turkish terri- tory. The determinations and decisions of the commis- 218 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION sioners will do a great deal towards the maintenance of peace, and relieving local Pashas, Khans, Sheikhs, and rulers of minor degree from a constant and irritating Source of jealousy and disquiet. . But such decisions cannot, from the nature of things, be expected, no more than in the delimitation of the frontiers of Russia and Afghanistan, or of Russia and Persia and Armenia, to have any permanent value. Among the infinite divisions of tribes that exist along these ill-determined boundaries, more especially in Kurdistan, which Ought to be Kurdish, as what is in Arabia ought to be Arabian, the influences of religion, as in the case of Russia—of Christian v. Mus- sulman—or in that of Kurdistan and Arabia, of Sunni v. Shi‘ah—the influence of clanship strong all along the borders, and the influence of personal interests and convenience, added to the traditions of the past, will always outweigh all mere arbitrary and political con- siderations, unless upheld by force of arms. As it is, almost all the limitrophal tribes are more or less independent, and as we have shown in the case of the Cha’ab Arabs, submissive under effective rule, rebellious under a weak government. It is simply a case of va, victis. And this is to be met with in Central Europe as well as in Central Asia ; on the Rhine and the Danube as well as on the Euphrates and the Oxus. 2I9 CHAPTER II]. THE SUGAR PLANTATIONS OF AHWAZ. WE left Dorak or Fellahiya on the morning of Novem. ber 22, keeping along date groves and gardens on the left bank of the Jerrahi river for about a couple of miles, when we turned to the north-east, fording on our road a canal, having two large villages (Mendonan and Delgi) on its banks. There were many more canals in the same neigh- bourhood, with their respective villages, and they were Crossed by bridges of strong reed ropes, supporting bundles of reeds. But strong and ingeniously contrived as they were, they were sometimes carried, away by the floods. An instance of this kind presented itself after a pro- gress of some five miles, when we came to a canal, the bridge of which had been carried away, and we were obliged to travel two miles out of our way till we came to a village where the horses provided for us by Sheikh Thamar were swum across a channel of forty-feet in width, whilst ourselves and baggage were ferried across in a boat. From this point we crossed a plain with scanty vegetation of tamarisk and succulent plants to the 220 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION village of Oreiba, where for want of accommodation the whole party had to sleep in the open air. Sundry cormorants were sleeping in the date trees around us. These canals abound in fish, and the natives move about from place to place in boats of reeds, catching the fish while their buffaloes feed in the marshes. They take their pots and pans and their scant furni- ture with them upon these excursions, and when they stop for a time at a suitable place, the boats are taken to pieces and converted into huts with dome-shaped roofs, having a rather prepossessing appearance. As Oreiba lay pretty nearly in the same parallel of longitude as Ahwaz, our road to the latter place lay north a trifle east, across a nearly level plain, with a ridge of sandstone beyond, and over which, when the sun rose (for we started before sunrise) we could discern the snow-clad summits of the Baktiyari mountains. On our way we came to a reed-clad rivulet abound- ing in water-fowl—geese, ducks, teal, and Sanderlings or sandpipers. We tried to shoot some of the former, but they were too wary, and would not let us come within shot. Our guides, who were unacquainted with the range of fowling-pieces, were rather disgusted at our not firing, and One of them, dismounting, placed his matchlock across his saddle, and lighting it, after a time it went off, and so did the geese. We re-established our credit, however, by shooting some of the smaller fowl, and still more so by shooting some sand-grouse, which abounded on the plain, when On the wing—a feat which filled them with wonder, as they had never seen small shot. THE SUGAR PLANTATIONS OF AHWAZ 221 To our great delight, we found on arriving at Ahwaz, after a ride of some forty miles from Oreiba, the steamer safely at anchor below the rocky bund or dam of the river; but before going on board we paid a visit to the Sheikh of the town, to see if we could obtain horses with which to proceed to Shuster. These were not to be obtained, as the Sheikh would not trust his horses in purely Persian territory; so we had—that is, Major Estcourt, Charlewood, and Rassam and myself—to make an attempt to ascend the river in a native boat. It may be mentioned here that, although the “Euphrates’ could not pass the rapids at Ahwaz, Captain Selby succeeded in so doing at a subsequent period, in a smaller steamer of lighter draught. - We effected a start on November 25, but so dilatory were the proceedings, that we actually did not get 500 yards above the town on the first day. About nine miles above Ahwaz was an abandoned fort called, like the town on the Tigris, Kut al Amarah (Kut seems to designate the residence of a Sheikh, and it is the name given to the encampment of the Sheikh of Muntifik), and a mile and a half further up the stream was a village called El Kraada. The river was here from 100 to 150 yards wide, deep, and with a sluggish current. The banks were clothed with jungle of poplar and tamarisk. The next day, Sunday the 27th, we came to a large village called Weis. Rassam went on shore to obtain provisions, but so fanatically bigoted were the inhabi- tants, that they not only refused to sell provisions to 222 | THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION infidels, but they actually hooted our good friend out of the place. ‘. . Luckily for us, a flock of sheep were feeding on the . river bank, so we appropriated one of them, paying them the full value of the animal, and left the place and its jeering crowd with a strong conviction that the best right to laugh lay with the winning party. About an hour before sunset we arrived at Bund-i- Kir, or ‘the dam constructed with bitumen, with a village and canal at the junction of two rivers, and having a custom house. The stream on Our right came from Shuster, the other on the left from Dizful, and was hence called the Diz. The latter was about sixty yards in width, and the magnetic meridian passed between the canal and the town, the Karūn bearing 15° East, the canal 10° West, and the Diz 20° in the same di- rection. - - . - As we were here politely informed that being Euro- peans we should not be allowed to proceed any further up the river, we lay to for the night, with the view to having the matter discussed in the morning. Accordingly, next morning an official calling himself a Sheikh came on board our small craft, when he was shown a permit of commerce bearing the lion crest and the signature of Muhammad Shah. “Muhammad Shah l’ repeated the supposed official, affecting great contempt; “We do not care for him.’ After some further argument recourse was had to presents, and a small sum of money was tendered, as also a piece of Calico. But this Only served to make matters worse, for four more so-called Sheikhs came down with THE SUGAR PLANTATIONS OF AHWAZ 223 their attendants, some armed with muskets, others with spears. This new party, finding that we had been con- ciliating the first comer with backshish, at once en- hanced the price of Our proceeding to 400 shamis— about 281. English money. • - It was in vain that our worthy interpreter wasted all his eloquence upon these greedy Officials—if officials they were. After Smoking a pipe and drinking coffee, they took their departure, unsatisfied, for we were cer- tainly not going to pay SO exorbitant a sum merely to visit Shuster. * - . Our nokaddar or head boatman volunteered to go to the town Orvillage beyond, to try and arrange matters, but only came back with word that he had induced the ‘authorities’ to lower their demands by one half. He supplemented this statement with the offer to drop down the river at night, for the people of the place had resolved in case of our persisting in our refusal that the boat should be sent away with a message to Ahwaz, and that we should be detained as hostages until ransom came from the steamer. The third epoch in the history of these ridiculous proceedings embraced the visit of an elderly gentleman with an expansive beard, dyed with henna to a deep orange colour, and who respectfully intimated that our captain, as he termed him, must be detained until ransom came. He was just as respectfully ushered out of the boat. This accomplished, Major Estcourt and Charlewood went on shore to get up the boat's kedge or anchor, which was half buried in the mud. But this movement met with instant Opposition. Estcourt 224 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION and Charlewood persevered, and at length, after a few minutes' scuffle, they succeeded in getting the anchor on board. I remained sitting on the stern with my fowling-piece on my knees. I dreaded every moment to see Estcourt cut down with the swords of the irate Arabs, but I had hopes that before such a thing could have happened I should have been able to prevent it by a quick shot at his assailant. I was at all events in a better position to afford assistance than I should have been on shore. The boatmen, although they had not offered any assistance against their countrymen, gave a willing hand to get clear of the miscreants, and in a few moments we were dropping down with the current, and out of the way of further molestation, although de- prived of the means of visiting Shuster and Dizful, and, if we could have done so, the tomb of Daniel at Susa. At a subsequent period I narrated the outrage com- mitted upon us at Bund-i-Kir to one of the Persian princes at Baghdad, and he expressed much annoyance at hearing of it, but, to screen his countrymen, said they were Arab robbers. The descent of the river was naturally much more easily effected than the ascent, and passing the inhos- pitable fanatics of Weis without interruption, we arrived the same day (November 29) at Ahwaz. This place derives its interest not only from its being situated at a point on the river where a ridge of tertiary or supra-cretaceous sandstones cross the otherwise gentle, almost imperceptible, slope upwards towards the Kurdish mountains, some hundred miles away, yet THE SUGAR PLANTATIONS OF AHWAZ 225 visible almost all day, but also from having a not un- interesting history of its own. - The town itself is nothing beyond the usual collec- tion of miserable hovels, constructed of mud and stone, grouped together without attempt at regularity of street Or thoroughfare, and, as is peculiar to the East, where it is most imperatively necessary, utterly without drainage or provision for cleanliness of any kind. The population may be estimated at from fifteen hundred to two thousand souls, almost all Cha’ab Arabs. There is some trifling cultivation, and a few scattered date trees around it, and a pretty wooded island directly opposite, in mid stream. Ledges of rock, as before observed, impede here the navigation of the river, and a few hundred yards below the town, a regu- lar reef, called the Bund, stretches from bank to bank, giving rise to rapids which are sometimes dangerous to native boats. On this bund are the ruined remains of an ancient wall or dyke, which Once spanned the rapids between the shelves of rock; a few small arches still remaining are of a very singular construction, the bricks used being exceedingly small and hard, and covered with vitrified bitumen, so as to shine like por- celain. Tradition dates this bridge back to the time of Alexander the Great, but it appears to be of much later date. In the rear of the town and On the eastern front of the ridge of rocks is a large cave full of rock pigeons. After driving out the jackals and foxes which held possession of the place, I shot several as they flew out of the cave; but I could not get any One to be at the WOL. II. Q 226 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION . . . . . trouble of feathering or cooking them for our mess. The actual Ahwaz represents a site known to antiquity as Aginis. Strabo calls it a village of Susians on the Pasitigris. He describes it as being situated at a point where, as in the present day, boats had to be unloaded and the goods carried a short distance by land—a portage as they would call it in Canada. This intima- tion of a natural obstruction on the river, which was apparently called the Pasitigris as well as the Shat al Hai, serves at once to determine the identity of Aginis with Ahwaz. - The same place, under its modern denomination of Hawaz or Ahwaz, which is another form of the Arabic Huz or Haz, ‘a body of people,’ was formerly, we learn from Abū-l-fada, the name of a district, one of the largest and most prosperous in Khuzistan or Susiana, and the town itself was known as Sukul Ahwaz, or the market place of the province. - - This district, we further learn from the ‘Tohfat ul Alim, a modern work composed for the information, and at the desire, of the celebrated Mir Alim of Hydera- bad, by Mir Abdul Latif, a learned relative and a native of Shuster, and a translation of a portion of which work relating to Ahwaz was communicated by Colonel Taylor to Captain Mignan, comprised all that portion of the country which is watered by the Karūn from Ahwaz upwards to Bund-i-Kir, while the dam or dyke, partly natural and partly artificial, at Ahwaz itself, restrained the waters so that they overflowed the land, and ‘not a drop was lost to the purposes of cultivation.’ THE SUGAR PLANTATIONS OF AHWAZ 227 The town and district attained the zenith of its prosperity in the time of the first Khalifs of the Abas- side dynasty, and to whose power it was always subject except in times of rebellion. Abū-l-fada describes the river of Ahwaz as that portion of the river Karūn which was comprised between Bund-i-Kir and the place so called, and as having its banks adorned with gardens and pleasure houses, and enriched by extensive planta- tions of sugar cane and other valuable productions of the vegetable kingdom. - The ‘city’ of Ahwaz, says Mir Abdul Latif, was one of the largest cities of Khuzistan or indeed in the other kingdoms of the world, few are to be seen equal to it in size and extent. What are now thick and imper- vious woods were once extensive plantations of Sugar- cane. Large vats and manufactories of Sugar were also in existence, and millstones and other implements of the art of sugar making are even now so profusely scattered over the ancient site that it is impossible to number them. - “During the dynasty of the Abassides,’ says the same writer, who was not a little given to Oriental exaggeration, “the city was at the height of its pro- sperity. Its extent in breadth is supposed to be forty parasangs (over a hundred miles), throughout which ruins and remains of magnificent edifices, baths, caravan- Serais, and mosques are strewed. The Khalifs, within whose dominions was comprehended most of the inhabi- table world, named the city “the source of food and wealth,’ the inhabitants of which in their riches and luxury excelled the rest of the world. 228 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION As, however, to use the words of another Oriental philosopher, ‘wealth is the parent of pride and insubor- dination, the people of Ahwaz revolted from the Khalifs, and Ali ibn Muhammad, surnamed Al Habib, “the astrologer, and also called the Prince of the Zanghis, from his having recruited his army from the Zanghis or Nubian slaves who were employed in the Sugar planta- tions, took the field with a powerful force and contended for years against the then Khalif of the Abassides. But the so-called ‘Prince of the Zanghis” was ulti- mately defeated, and obliged to surrender his person and state to the discretion of the Khalif, and our own historian Gibbon, who gives to the Prince the euphonious name of Harmozan, possibly from his chief residence being at Ram Hormuz, has related at length the interview of the prisoner with the triumphant Khalif as illustrative of the manners of the time. Ahwaz, however, never recovered the blow. The Zanghis were, after the licentious excesses of a war of rapine and plunder carried on at the mouths of the Euphrates and the Tigris, unwilling to return to the more peaceful pursuits of sugar manufacturing, and the remaining population fell, with the loss of wealth and prosperity, into bickerings and feuds. Anarchy and oppression followed in their train; the Khalifs were too idle and too sensual to interfere, and the place fell into neglect and decay. According to Samaani (“Kitab ul Ansad,” art. Ahwaz), already in the twelfth century of our era the pristine fame and prosperity of the place no longer existed, any more than its luxurious villas or their wealthy tenants. The last poor remnants of a THE SUGAR PLANTATIONS OF AHWAZ 229 once prosperous population neglected their canals and plantations and the other sources of their riches and destructive pride, and ultimately abandoned the place altogether, and the buffalo-feeding Cha’ab Arabs took their place. º Ahwaz was, as before observed, at the time of our visit to the place a mere village under Sheikh Madhkur, a Cha’ab ruler, but there were still a few Sabaeans resi- dent in the place. The great flat circular mill-stones used in the ancient sugar factories were, however, still to be seen. Many of them were from four to six feet in diameter. They attest to the existence of a branch of industry at this place which might under a more enlightened government be revived. It is said that the existing government views with disfavour the revival of industry, as leading, by the experience of the past, to a spirit of independence which may prove dangerous to the present régime. If it is so, it is to be hoped that more enlightened views of political economy may gradually find their way into these benighted regions. Immediately in advance of the town, and above the ruined dam, are traces of a bridge which crossed the great canal, by which the waters of the Karān were formerly drawn off, and the ground around is strewn with fragments of hewn stone, kiln tiles and pottery. Kufic coins in gold and silver, intaglios in cornelian and onyx, and other gems, are Occasionally met with. Flights of hewn steps are still to be seen on the sandstone rocks which rise more precipitately on the eastern side of the ridge than on the western, where the 230 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION rock is broken into ledges and fragments, which assume at times rhombohedral and at others fantastic shapes. There are also sepulchral grottoes and cisterns for water, besides the great cave before alluded to. The exaggerated report of Mir Abdul Latif led Captain Mignan into an amusing mistake." He actually fancied that he saw in these broken ledges of sandstone, on the western side of the ridge, the remains of the city of old. ‘Here too,” he says, “ commences the whole mass of ruins, extending at least ten or twelve miles in a south-easterly direction. I could not, he adds, “find any person who had been to the end of these ruins. According to the inhabitants, their extent would occupy a journey of two months.” No wonder, when the same ridge extends north-westwards to nigh the river Zab, and south-eastwards to the hills that lie between the Jerrahi and Indiyan. - - ‘Let me not be supposed to exaggerate,’ adds the same traveller, after describing the rocks as lying in ‘ naturally-formed strata,’ ‘when I assert that these piles of ruin–irregular, craggy, and in many places in- accessible—rival in appearance those of the Baktiyari, and are discernible from them, and for nearly as many miles in an Opposite direction.’ Not the least amusing point in this strange hallucina- tion on the part of an otherwise intelligent traveller and observer, is that he takes Colonel Macdonald Kinneir to task for having visited the same place under the auspices of Our ambassador, and yet neglected to investi- gate ruins of such vast extent and magnitude * Travels in Chaldaea, p. 303 et seq. - 2 THE SUGAR PLANTATIONS: OF AHWAZ 231 The only parallel I can find to such a misconcep- tion is that of M. de Saulcy, when he found himself among the strewn masses of basalt on the plain south of Capernaum, on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee, and fancied himself amidst the ruins of a great city. - - This range of sandstone hills crosses the river Karūn in four distinct ledges of rock, two of which are covered with water during the greater part of the year. The remains of the bund or dam which helped to turn the water off into the canal above Ahwaz are, we have before remarked, perfectly visible. On the One side the waters fall over the rocks and masonry like a cataract, but on the other side they have worn away the bank, so as to leave a deep channel varying at different seasons of the year from twenty to forty yards in width, and through which Captain Selby succeeded in gallantly carrying the steamer “Assyria’ in the year 1842. When the Persians fled before the British troops from Muhammrah, they took their way to Ahwaz. Sir James Outram at Once determined upon a pursuit, and for this purpose the ‘Comet, “Planet, and ‘Assyria’ steamers were despatched with One hundred men on board each, and each had a gunboat carrying two 24-pounder howitzers in tow. Traces of the retreating army were found all along the banks of the river, and on nearing Ahwaz the enemy was descried in force, but on the right bank of the river, Ahwaz being on the left. A boat was captured here in which was a splendid 12-pounder brass gun. 232 THE EUPHRATES, EXPEDITION. The Arabs of Ahwaz, being followers of Sheikh Thamar, were hostile to the Persians—a point Captain Hunt (to whom we are indebted for the narrative of the expedition) does not seem to have been aware of; but he describes the Arabs as coming on board and informing them that the garrison of Ahwaz did not exceed five hun- dred infantry and thirty horse left to protect the stores. The next day a landing was effected, supported by the fire from a gunboat. The garrison, however, de- camped the moment the red-coats deployed in front of the town; the Sheikh came out to tender submission, and it was granted, with an assurance that private houses should not be searched so long as they assisted in point- ing out the places where the stores were secreted. The said stores were found to be more valuable than was anticipated. Besides immense quantities of grain and flour, fifteen cases of perfectly new firelocks and bayonets were captured, ‘all bearing the Tower mark; fifty-six mules in capital condition ; a handsome horse of the Shahzadeh's ; a number of pack saddles, and a great many tools and implements, and a large flock of sheep, were among the prizes. - About noon of the same day a great stir was visible in the Persian lines on the right bank, and soon a decided movement in retreat became visible. ‘A most exciting, as well as, under the circumstances,’ says Captain Hunt, “a most extraordinary spectacle it was—an army of nine or ten thousand men, and in perfect order, retiring before three hundred. Yet so it was.” And this was the end of the campaign * * * * 2 3 3. CHAPTER IV. THE SABAEANS OR MANDAITES. WE left Ahwaz on December 2, passed the Nahr el Matur, or ‘cut canal, fourteen miles below, where are some fragments of ruins of olden times, perchance those of a castle of Eumenes, and arrived at Ismaila, a small town of some four hundred houses, with a group of imāms or sepulchral chapels, a few date trees, and some fine acacias. It is to be regretted that while the sheets of Captain Hunt's account of the campaign in Persia were going through the press, the gallant author died of cholera, and had no opportunity of correcting the proofs. Hence many mistakes are met with which would not otherwise have occurred. Ahwaz is throughout spelt Akwaz, and Ismaalia, of which an illustration is given, is spelt Ismaini. - The next day we reached Kut, or Kut el Abd, and anchored off the village at five o'clock. This is a pretty bend of the river, with jungle of poplar, acacia, and tamarisk. The jungle of the Karān is reputed to be infested with lions, but we never saw one. The Arabs say there are two varieties. One that if, on meeting or passing it, the Muhammadan shibboleth is repeated, it 234 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION allows you to go by, but the other has no respect for a declaration of faith. This disrespectful lion is said to be hirsute and to have a black mane, Walking out into the jungle at this point, I found the first band of vegetation, next the river, to consist mainly of reeds, poplars, and tamarisk, the second acacia, the third rest-harrow, and the fourth succu- lent plants. Hares, bustards, and francolin were met with. - -- On December 5 we were once more at Muhammrah, and on the 6th we sailed into the Shat al Arab to speak the Company's ship the ‘Koote.’ A little excursion was made before leaving Muhammrah, with Major Estcourt, Charlewood, and a few of the men, down the Bahmishir and across the plain towards the old bed of the Karūn. But little of interest was met with. I put up a hyaena from behind an almost solitary bush, and the men had a shot at it, but did not hit it. There were porpoises in the lower part of the Bahmishir. I had not seen any in the Euphrates. Probably here they were undisturbed by navigation. - . : This was on December 7, and on the 9th we left for Bassora, anchoring off the town. We took four officers of the ‘Koote' with us, and the next day had some shooting on an adjacent island, where there were plenty of wild boar. These young officers were very unfortu- nate, for, going out a short time afterwards to shoot on an island, they were by some accident benighted in the jungle and caught so malignant a malaria, or blood poisoning, that several of them died in consequence. On the 12th we anchored off Kornah, and on the 13th THE SABAEANS OR MANDAITES 235 began the ascent of the river Tigris. The rice harvest was now in full swing, small boats went down the creeks and narrow channels in the marshes and brought up the rice to larger boats in the river. Previous to our departure from Bassora, two boats laden with coal had been sent on ahead, to prevent delays in cutting wood. On the 14th we came up to one of these, which had been detained by a Sheikh for tribute. We at once relieved it from this detention, but a few miles further overtook the other boat, which had been detained by another Sheikh, and which we had also to set free. It is to be hoped that these irregular demands for tribute by hundreds of Sheikhs along the river banks have been put a stop to since the river has been more frequently navigated. It would indeed be better for themselves, for they often fight with one another in defence of their imaginary rights, and we had on one occasion to run the gauntlet between two parties of belligerents who were firing at One another from the opposite banks of the river. - On the 16th we passed a mound of Babylonian bricks, about 200 feet in circumference and 20 high. There were also other mounds in the same vicinity, denoting an ancient site. Close by was an Arab castle. The ruins were called by the Arabs Felalil, and the castle Serút. About a mile beyond the latter were the remains of a bridge, simply known as ‘Jisr by the Arabs. A causeway is visible on the banks, and so are Some of the piers at low water. - - Kinneir (“Trav. in Asia Minor, &c.’ p. 501) describes this bridge as built of stone, but Mignan (“Trav, in 236 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Chaldaea, p. 30), who seems from a sketch accompany- ing his text to have seen a large portion of the bridge, says it is built of the finest kiln-burnt bricks. They were all buried under water at this season of the year. The bridge appears to have constituted part of the highway which history records to have existed between Khaldaea and Susiana in ancient times, going from Wasit or Cybate to Sus. We had slight frosts now at night, and ice was found upon the decks. We arrived at Kut al Amarah on December 17, and a halt was made here to take in coal, for we had the two boats in tow since their detention by the Arabs. I had a very exciting day's sport on the 18th. On the 19th we made a further ascent of about thirty miles. But we had five days' more navigation before we arrived at Ctesiphon, where we spent the Christmas as best we could, for it was both wet and cold. I had, however, an opportunity of more fully ex- ploring the ruins of this well-known site and of taking bearings. I found the central mound to be 2,045 paces from the Takht-i-Kesra. And it having rained recently I found many Kufic coins on the surface, but they were so worn as to be utterly illegible. The Takht-i-Kesra, or arch of Ctesiphon, is so lofty that an ordinary fowling- piece would not kill a pigeon sitting on its top. On Monday the 26th we arrived at Baghdad, where we found Mr. Hector, who had been left behind at Anah to try and recover salvage from the lost steamer ‘Tigris.’ As my stay was prolonged here until the 1st of Febru- ary, I had plenty of time to explore the city. We also made an excursion in the steamer to the site of Opi, THE SABAEANS OR MANDAITES 237 and another on horseback, accompanied by the Persian princes, to the great ruin at Akka Kuf. Before, however, I come to the final break-up of the Expedition at Baghdad, it is desirable to say a few words as a summary to the navigation of the Tigris. And first with regard to the Tigris below the Shat al Hai, one of its olden channels known as the Pasitigris. A line of almost unbroken forest and jungle extends from Kut al Amarah, a distance of thirty-six miles, to the Arab encampment of Al Mendeliya. In all this long interval we have only one small village called Kut al Umailah, four miles below Kut al Amarah, and a tower or fortalice in ruins, called Hassan Kut or Kut al Faili. Beyond the Mendeliya, the country opens a little, and with it population comes streaming down to the banks of the river. We have the Sharki and the El Habat Arabs on the right bank, and Sayyajed Muhammad Alak’s tribe on the left. The Sheikh of the Sharki boasts of a mud serai, two villages called Wayat and Ed Dawaya, and a goodly encampment at Sarayaha. The Habat Arabs are chiefly grouped around the castle and sepulchral chapel known as the Imām Gharbi. On the left bank small groves of date mark the sites of the reed huts of Sayyid Muhammad Alak's Arabs. Seven miles below Imām Gharbi are the remains of a brick bridge called ‘Jisr 'Or Al Kantarah, and before noticed. Beyond this we have fifteen miles of conti- nuous jungle to Imām Sharki, or ‘the eastern Imām's sanctuary.’ Then twenty miles of jungle to Sheikh Mishgu's village, near which are the stumps of two clay pillars. *. - 238 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION A little more than five miles beyond this, and oppo- site to the imām of Muhammad Abū Hasan, either a northern branch of the river Kherkah or Choaspes, finds its way to the Tigris, or a canal has been opened to that river. It is called the Shat al Hud or Khud, and also the Sidd al Hud. • This river or canal constitutes the boundary between the Abū Muhammad and the Beni Lam Arabs, the latter of whom dwell chiefly among the extensive marshes known as the Samida and the Samargah, and which occupy the whole of the space between the Al Hud and the Kherkah, a distance of some fifty miles. It is fifty-seven miles from the Shat al Hud to Kor- - nah, at the junction of the Euphrates and Tigris, and the district to the west is just as much a land of marshes and islands as that to the east, and hence it has come to be designated as the Jezayir or island region. The Beni Lam occupy both banks of the Tigris, the sub-tribes being chiefly the Abū Muhammad and the Ibn Libiyah. Yet, according to the verdict given by the commission in the case of Muhammrah, the territory between the Shat al Hud and the Kherkah, and between the Kherkah and Muhammrah, should be held to be Persian territory. The waters of the Shat al Hud, whether, like the Haffar, originally a canal or not, decidedly flow into the Tigris. The Beni Lam constitute, however, a powerful tribe, composed, like the Muntifik, of many sub-tribes, often divided among themselves. But I doubt if tribute was, when we were in the Country, paid to either Turk or Persian. The nominal chief of the tribe was Sheikh THE SABAEANS OR MANL)AITES 239 Madhkur, who, however, having made Muhammrah his chief residence, had to share in the unenviable fate that befell that unfortunate port. : But he has, or had, a rival named Sheikh Nameh, who was at the head of several sub-tribes. The number of families, allowing for Oriental exaggeration, is esti- mated at 80,000; but Sheikh Madhkur is allowed not to have more than 15,000 combatants at his command, of whom four to five thousand are horsemen. Whatever inde- pendence the tribe enjoys is really due to their dwelling on islands and Occasional tracts of dry territory in the old Khaldaean and Susianian lakes. When they take their rice and dates to market, they are no doubt proportionately mulcted. So, while Muhammrah re- mained a free port, it was a god-send to them as well as to the Cha’ab Arabs. r - - The Kherkah, better known as the classical Choaspes, ‘the drink of none but kings, has its sources near Hamadan in the Persian uplands. It flows through the Kurdistan mountains and Sweeps past the ruins of Susa to the north, on to the town of Hawisah, beyond which it divides into three separate channels, two of which, the Shat al Hud and the Rattah, flow into the Tigris, and the third into the Shat al Arab, not far below the junction of the Euphrates and the Tigris. Since the fall of Muhammrah, Sheikh Madhkur has taken up his residence at Amarat, a village situated on the Tigris a little below the Shat al Hud. Many families of the Beni Lam encamp Occasionally on the banks of the Kherkah, within the territory of the Wali of Hawisah. On these Occasions they are often at- 240 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION tacked and plundered, as happened in 1841, when cattle, horses, and sheep were all carried off. The Wali or governor of Hawisah claims descent from a Sayyid or descendant of the Prophet, who emi- grated thither from Medinah. One of the family, called Wali Sultan Husain, built a castle at Hawisah on an island on the river. The same chieftain induced a family of Sheriffs to settle at this place, and collecting together the neighbouring tribes, under the banner of so much sanctity he attained to great power and pros- perity. - It is to be observed that the Shi‘ah Sayyids are all alike Sheriffs who claim descent from Hassan and Hussain, the two sons of Fatma or Fatima, the only daughter of the Prophet, by Ali. They were originally divided into two classes. Those who devoted them- selves to the peaceful arts and the church were called Sayyids; those whose profession was arms were called Sheriffs. It is almost needless to say that the distinc- tion no longer holds good among the Shi‘ah Sheriffs any more than among the Sunni—whose chief Sheriffs are those of Mekka, Damascus, and the Hedjaz. The power of the Walis of Hawisah declined, how- ever, rapidly, and the final blow to the prosperity of the place was given in 1837, when the river having risen to an unusual height in Spring, the bund or dam by which the surrounding country was irrigated gave way. This occurred during the night, and the town, which on the previous evening had been traversed by a noble river, stood in the morning in the midst of a waterless wilderness. As no steps have been taken THE SABAEANS OR MANDAITES 241 since to repair the dam, none but small boats called baylams or ‘cotton pods,’ from their diminutive size, can now reach the town. - Hawisah is consequently now a poor place. When Sir A. H. Layard, and he is the only traveller I know of who has visited the place, was there, he describes the population as scarcely exceeding five hundred souls, who were divided into four families; the Sadat, equiva- lent to the plural of Sayyid, ‘lord, or pre-eminent in holiness, the Neir, the Kuti, and the Saki—the latter a family from Luristan—with a sprinkling of Sabaeans. The author of the Moajum (the celebrated Yakut of Harna) gives rather a different version of the origin of Hawisah, which he says is the diminutive of Hauzah, “a collection of people.’ This district he tells us was peopled and organised by Amir Dabis ibn Ghadhb, the Asadi, in the time of the Khalif Tāyaa Allah, and who founded colonies there of his tribe and dependents. This Dabis bore the same name as the reputed founder of Hillah. What is narrated by Yakut must either refer to an early epoch in the history of the place, or to an episode in the fortunes of Hawisah, for at such a time the inhabitants must have been Sunni, whereas they appear to have been more generally Shi‘ah. In 1839 Muhammad Taki Khan, the great Baktiyari chieftain, took possession of Hawisah, and attached the district to the province of Arabistan, by which the Persians designate the territory of Shuster and Dizful. The conquered Wali Mollah Faraju Allah was mulcted by the Persians in an annual tribute of 6,000 tomans, WOL. II. R. 242 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION not being able to pay which he was imprisoned by the Motamid in Kirmanshah, but with characteristic Oriental duplicity, he earned favour by vindicating the claims of Persia to the territory of the Cha’ab Arabs. He became the chief adviser of the expedition of the Prince of Kirmanshah against these Arabs, and was at the same time restored to his government. It is to be observed here that the existence of a people who call themselves Sabaeans in most of the towns on the Lower Euphrates and Tigris, and even on the Karān and Kherkah rivers, recalls to mind the memory of the learned men who diffused an early science over all Asia till their altars were overthrown, first by the Magians, and finally by the followers of the Prophet. The mere name is, however, a thing to mislead as much as to assist in an inquiry as to their origin and character. It is well known, for example, that in our old authorised version of the Scriptures, the term is applied to three different tribes; to the Sebaiim, the descendants of Seba, who settled in Ethiopia; to the Shebaiim, the descendants of Sheba son of Joktan, the Sabaei of the Greeks and Romans, who settled in Arabia Felix Or Hadramaut ; and lastly, to the Shebans, a horde of Beda win marauders in the time of Job. The proper name, as Gesenius has pointed out, in an excursus in his translation of Isaiah, “On the Astral Worship of the Chaldaeans,' or the Khaldaean star-wor- shippers, Ought to be rendered Tsabians, not Sabeans or Sabaeans, from the object of their adoration, the host of heaven; but this does not at all affect the question at issue, whether or not the so-called Sabaeans dwelling THE SABAEANS OR MANIDAITES 243 in Khaldaea have any claim to be considered as descen- dants of the Khaldaeans of old. Gibbon did not hesitate to say, from a comparison of the statements made by the learned Hyde and by Pocock, Hettinger, Sale, and D'Herbelot, that ‘a slight infusion of the Gospel had transformed the last remnants of the Polytheists into the Christians of St. John at Bussora ; note, ‘D’Anville will fix the position of these ambiguons Christians; Assemannus may explain their tenets. But it is a slippery task to ascertain the Creed of an ignorant people, afraid and ashamed to disclose their secret tradi- tions.' And Gibbon is right. Mr. Rassam, himself a so- called Khaldaean by birth, took as much interest in these poor people as I did, and we had together some long in- terviews with them, especially at Suk al Shuyuk and at Muhammrah. Yet we gathered little that was satisfac- tory or conclusive. One important point determined by Mr. Rassam, who as a linguist may be considered an authority in the matter, was, that though they converse in Arabic, they read their prayers in Khaldaean. The spurious hermaphrodism of Christianity and Islamism with which they have been charged as en- grafted upon their original astronomical tenets, did not in any way manifest itself. They professed to believe in the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, as unity in Trinity, yet they did not believe in the divine inspiration of Moses nor in the divinity of Jesus of Nazareth. They baptized in the name of St. John. Their astronomical science had merged into astrology, as we particularly found to be the case at Suk al Shuyuk, but they and the same historian adds in a - R 2 244 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION considered the polar star as being the only fixed One, as the residence of the Supreme Being. Much progress has been made, however, since the days of Gibbon, in ascertaining the nature of the tra- ditions handed down by these descendants of the Khaldaeans of old, more especially through the exertions of Colonel Taylor, the late learned and much esteemed Resident at Baghdad. (It is much to be regretted that his relatives have never collected or assorted the vast mass of material which the industrious Colonel collected during his long residence in Baghdad, and given it to the public.) It was, indeed, under Colonel Taylor's auspices that the well-known missionary and philan- thropist, Wolff, was induced to open a school for the young Sabaeans at Bassora. It appears from the researches of these gentlemen, that the Sabaeans not only claim to be descendants of the Khaldaeans of old (as we also found to be the case); but they also claim to be descendants of a brother of Abraham who dwelt at Ur of the Khaldees. They call themselves ‘Mandayi Ayah, that is to say, ‘followers of the Living God,' and whence the name of Mandaites. They relate that when Abraham proclaimed the unity of the one God his brethren followed him, but when Abraham established the rite of circumcision they looked at him with horror and separated from him. But they continued to worship the one Living God by three names, significative of a form of life of a first, second, and third degree. - When John the Baptist appeared they received baptism at his hands, and they say he was buried in THE SAISAEANS OR MANDAITES 245 ancient Susa. At the advent of Jesus they also acknow- ledged the Messiahship, and they have ever since had two kinds of priests, one called Turmeda, who is a representa- tive of St. John, the other called Gaz-Aura, who is the representative of Jesus Christ. If they have since added to these doctrines any of the principles of Islamism, they keep it carefully to themselves when conversing with Christians. With Muhammadans it might perhaps be different, but it is not likely. The claim of the Sabaeans or Mandaites to be called Christians has been repudiated by a writer in the “Cyclopædia of Biblical Literature, because they are supposed to pay Superior homage to John the Baptist; but the same objection would apply to the Abyssinian, or more correctly Abesinian, Christians. It is also stated on the authority of Norberg, that the Mandaites, who are called Sabionna in the Kuran, derive their own name from that which they give to the Baptist, which is Abū Sabu Zakriyu, “the father who grew old with Zacharia.” But this is not substantiated by themselves, as they claim to be Khaldaeans, nor is it consonant with the peculiarly local and patriotic tendency to uphold olden forms of belief and traditions when the Christians of Hira and of Mesopotamia succumbed to the yoke of Islamism. Nor does this obscure etymology appear to be borne out by the researches made by Colonel Taylor, Dr. Wolff, and ourselves on the spot. The Sabaeans have one great book called Sadra Raba, the authors of which they say were Seth and John the Baptist, and it is said that the representative of Jesus Christ is baptized every Sunday by the 246 . THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION representative of St. John the Baptist. Colonel Taylor and Dr. Wolff derived this statement from the Gaz- Aura, the priest representing Jesus himself, and whose son went to Dr. Wolff's school and made considerable progress in learning English. ‘Two things are very remarkable, observed Dr. Wolff in connection with this small sect on the Lower Euphrates and its tributaries, “with respect to small sects. They always maintain that great numbers of their body are residing in distant countries. Thus the Mandaites assert, and the Samaritans at Nablus told me the same thing, that great numbers of their people lived in London and Paris, and the Baptists in England rejoice very much to hear that there exists a sect on the Euphrates who like them are called disciples of St. John the Baptist, and who baptize in rivers. This anxiety on their part indicates catholicity to be a natural and inherent principle.’ The same amiable traveller, who went so generously to the succour of Stoddart and Conolly, also vindicates the claims I have advocated in my “Travels and Researches in Asia Minor &c.’ to the so-called Nesto- rians being Khaldaeans, in opposition to the views en- tertained by some of the American missionaries, and especially by Dr. Grant, who supposes them to be descendants of the lost tribes. ‘I am pleased,’ says the Doctor, in the ‘Narrative of a Mission to Bokhara, vol. ii. p. 238, ‘to find that Mr. Ainsworth agrees with me that the Chaldaeans are not Nestorians, and the details in his admirable work are such as may be fully relied on, for I have confirmed by THE SABAEANS OR MANDAITES 247 personal experience a large portion of the matter in his highly interesting volumes.’ The celebrated geographer, Professor Petermann, is said to have passed nearly the whole of the year 1854 at Suk al Shuyuk among the Sabi or Sabaeans, who work in iron at that town, and much valuable informa- tion was obtained with regard to their religion, habits, and manners. Mr. Loftus, who believes, like ourselves, that they are probably a relic of the old inhabitants of the country, tells us that a few families reside at Dizful and Shuster, where they are dreadfully persecuted by both Persians and Arabs. Sir W. F. Williams of Kars, with characteristic humanity, obtained a firman from the Shah for the protection of the last remnants of the Khaldaeans of old. 248 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION CELAPTER W. THE EASTERN TIGRIS OR NAHR-WAN. WILLAGES and canals of communication or irrigation abound much more in the Jezayir (the Khaldaean marshes and Upper Mesene) on the right bank of the river Tigris than on the left, the region of the Samargah and Samida (Susian lakes). We find in fact, between the Shat al Hud and the Kherkah, Only some six stationary villages, Amarah, Jerah Sayid Fallah, Sudra Jemsha, Sami al Ezan, Mozerah, opposite to Kornah, and Um Dulaiman at the lower mouth of the Kherkah. We have also in the same district only one imām which is a ziyaret or place of pilgrimage, and that is sacred to one Abd Allah ibn Ali, a name which comprises great pretensions to sanctity, as ‘the servant of God and of Ali,' that is to say a Shi‘ah. On the Jezayir side, at least fifteen stationary vil- lages are met with, and no less than eleven canals, one of which called Um Jemal, or ‘the mother of camels,' is said to cross or to have communication with the Euphrates. There are in the same region several mounds of debris attesting to the existence of olden sites. Such are the mounds of Razi and Yuwar, and of Gaspi Yort, in the same vicinity, indicating a site of THE EASTERN TIGRIS OR NAHR-WAN 249 some importance. Such are also the group of mounds now crowned by the sepulchral chapel of Abū Khalkal, and the Hamayeh mounds, the Malab mound, and the Gumruk Zejeyak. There are no want of imāms, or sepulchral chapels or mausolea, in the same region. Among the most remarkable are those of Muhammad Abū Hasan, opposite to the Al Hud, of Abū si Sheikh, of Abū Khalkal, before mentioned, and of Saj Ismael, in a date grove opposite to the Rattah affluent of the Kherkah. - But by far the most important monument of this de- scription is the reputed traditional tomb of the prophet Ezra. This tomb is called by the Arabs Azair, Ozair, or Irza, their pronunciation of Ezra. It is surrounded by a kiln-brick wall, attesting to its antiquity, within which is a spacious domed cloister, enclosing a square mausoleum. The dome and cloisters are paved with blue tiles. Over the doorway are two tablets of black marble, with Hebrew inscriptions attesting to the au- thenticity of the site. This indeed is corroborated by a statement in the Talmud, to the effect that Ezra died at Zamzuma, a town upon the Tigris, probably now represented by the mounds of Hamayeh. The prophet is said to have perished here on his way from Jerusalem to Susa to plead the cause of the captive Jews. According to Josephus, Ezra died, and was buried with great magnifi- cence at Jerusalem, but the traditions of the Babylonian Jews appear to coincide with the Talmudic statement. The Rabbi Petachia, whose travels we have before had occasion to refer to, relates that he travelled from 250 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION . the tomb of Ezekiel (the site of which, on the river Chebar, was determined by Mr. Loftus), and turned to the east, and came in six days to the grave of the Lord Ezra, the Scribe. The Jews still make pilgrimages to the tomb of their great scribe, upon which occasions the Arabs are said to almost invariably waylay them, and even at times to strip them, in which state they have to return to their homes. It is necessary to observe here, that as the Euphrates has been drawn from time immemorial by Sura, Bor- sippa, Hira, and Kufa, into the plains of Arabia to the westward, and as the waters of the Euphrates and Tigris have been carried since the first dawn of history out of their channels to water the rich and fertile plains of Babylonia and Khaldaea, so has the Tigris been carried in olden times into the plains east of that river by the so-called Nahr-wan canal. The most northerly arm of this great canal is called by the Arabian geographers Katur and Katul. It is described by Tabari as a work of the Sassanians, and Zakariya Kazvini distinctly ascribes it to Anushirwan ; but Sir Henry Rawlinson has justly remarked that it is most probable that the Sassanians Only repaired an ancient excavation, which dated back to the time of the Assyrian monarchs. - It was derived from the Tigris at three different points, the most northerly of which was near Imām Dur. Abū-l-fada says near the ‘Kasru-l-Motewekil, or ‘the palace of the ruling prince, commonly called El Jaferi, a short distance above the great city of Kerkh, the Beit Saluk of the Syrians; and this arm was evidently, THE EASTERN TIGRIS OR NAHR-WAN 251 according to Tabari, the original Katur, though subse- quently the two branches were known by the same Ila,I\le. Sir Henry Rawlinson, who identifies Imām Dur with the Dura of Nebuchadnezzar (a point upon which Oppert differs with him), also considers this northern arm of the Katur, the bed of which is above a hundred yards in width, to represent the Torna of Theophanes and the Tornadatus of Pliny, which Heraclius passed by the bridge now called Kantarah Rasasi, or the “leaden bridge,’ from the clamps by which the blocks of stone were fastened together, to occupy the city, which under its various names of Kherkh, Dastagerd, Beit Seluk, Beit Germa, and Beklam of Cedrenus, continued to be the metropolis of all Southern Assyria during the whole period of the Sassanian empire, and the site of which is now represented by the ruins designated as Eski Baghdad, or ‘Old Baghdad.’ It is also to be observed, that the identification of the site of Opis must obviously depend upon the antiquity of the Katur or Nahr-wan canal. From the account given by Xenophon, we certainly should not be led to suppose the canal to have existed at the time of the Katabasis, or the retreat, but if it could be proved to have been of an earlier age, then the Physcus of the Athenian historian will be represented by the canal rather than by the river Adheim, and Opis must be re- moved from that river, its present generally supposed position, to Kerkh or Eski Baghdad, which seems to be the most likely position for a large and opulent city. General Chesney, taking the distances given by 252 THE EUPIITATES EXPEDITION Xenophon from the Zab backwards to the order of the retreat to Opis, has identified the latter with a site called Kaim or Kayim, on the second or central arm of the Katur; but considering the permanence of sites in the East, it is most probable that it would have been upon the first and original Katur, and that it was a Greek name given to the once great city which stood upon that canal, and which is now known as Eski Baghdad. The difference in distances would be very slight, so much so as to be scarcely worthy of notice in traversing so long and devious a route as that from the Nahr-wan to the Zab. The ruins of Imām Dur are little more than two miles north of the canal; those of Eski Baghdad are South of it. The ruins of Sammara, or Sur-man-ra, as also of the Summer palace of the Khalifs, at the same place, are some ten miles South of it, but as the canal follows a South-easterly direction, the said ruins are not more than five miles from the channel, and thus the country throughout the whole district south of the Ratur was fertilised by the Tigris on one side and by the Katur or Nahr-wan on the other. According to Abū-l-fada the canal lost its name of Ratur below the junction of the three arms, and assumed that of Nahr-wan, but Yakut distinguishes the two canals Katul and Nahr-wan, as he writes them, from one another, and attributes to them a different age. This is quite probable, as it is not likely that the three arms were excavated at the same period. The Katul he de- scribes as the canal derived from the Tigris in the vicinity of Sammara, and as prolonged to the Diyalah THE EASTERN TIGRIS OR NAIHR-WAN 253 at Bakuba. It was first excavated, he says, in remote antiquity, and subsequently repaired and enlarged both by Anushirwan and Harān al Rāshid (agreeing in this point with Sir Henry Rawlinson), whilst the Nahr-wan was derived from the Diyalah at the city of Nahr-wan— probably the Arba of Theophanes, Narba of Cedrenus, and Narban of Heraclius, and prolonged hence through the desert to Wasit. The only difference here chronicled would be that the Nahr-wan was not so called at the junction of its three arms, but after its junction with the Diyalah, and to this is added the important geographical fact, that it was prolonged east of the Tigris to the point where that river was carried westwards across Khaldaea by Wasit, and by what was known to the Romans as the Pasitigris. As this canal, whether Katul or Nahr-wan, was carried past Baghdad and Ctesiphon across the Adheim or Dokalah and the Diyalah rivers, this must have been accomplished by the usual Oriental resource of bunds or dams carried across these rivers." This great canalis said to have fallen into ruin during the troubles in which the Khalifat was involved on the rise of the Seljukian dynasty of Turks. And when the canal became blocked up, Sir Henry Rawlinson opines that the Diyalah, which had been before absorbed in it, continued to flow from Bakuba to the city of Nahr- wan, and on this account assumed that name in the lower part of its course. * Rawlinson, in Journal of the Royal Geographical Society, vol. x. p. 79 et seq. Yakut's Mojemo-l-Beldam, under the head of Nahr-wan, and Hamdullah's chapter on rivers. 254 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Fraser describes the Nahr-wan as the most magnifi- cent of all similar works achieved by the ancient kings of Babylon. Its sources, he says, are three-fold. The first, issuing from the river Tigris at the point where it cuts the Hamrin hills (this is the same Sandstone ridge that is prolonged to Ahwaz), ran distant from the parent stream about six or seven miles towards the ancient town of Sammara, where it was joined by a second conduit. This last, leaving the Tigris at a place called Kan- tarah Rassasi, or ‘the leaden bridge, fell into the other, which then received the name of Nahr-wan, and the united current ran nearly south-south-east towards the Adheim, absorbing first the superfluous waters of the Nahr But, then the Adheim itself, next the Nahr Raathan, and finally a third cut from the river at Kaim or Kayim. Hence it proceeded, generally at the distance of from six to twelve miles from the course of the Tigris, as it flowed in those days, but approaching it at Baghdad; a little after which it crossed the Diyalah, exhausting its contents, which were raised to a proper level by a bund. In like manner, this gigantic aqueduct stretched Onwards till, reaching Khusistan, it absorbed all the streams from the Lur and Baktiyari mountains, and at length joined the Kherkah, or as some say was lost in the marshes of that part of Susiana. This account of the Original extent of the Nahr-wan, although it differs from that given by the Arabian geo- graphers, who limited themselves more to what pre- THE EASTERN TIGRIS OR NAHR-WAN 255 sented itself in the time of the Khalifat, is probably the COrrect One. - That at that epoch the canal should, according to Yakut, have emptied itself by the Shat al Hai and Wasit into the Euphrates, would necessitate One of two con- clusions; either that the waters of the Tigris were dammed up, so as to drive them into the Shat al Hai or Pasitigris, or that falling into the Tigris at a point opposite to the exit of the Shat al Hai, they were looked upon as flowing by that stream to Wasit or Cybate. I have had opportunities of seeing the now dry bed of this ancient canal at different points along the course of the Tigris On its eastern side, when my shoot- ing excursions carried me beyond the confines of the jungle and woods. This in the parallel of Kut al Amarah as well as that of Ctesiphon. Wherever I came in contact with it, its course was marked by low mounds of debris at intervals, with bricks, tiles, and pottery, attesting to the former population existing along its banks. Captain Mignan also explored its banks in places. He describes ruins as extending for nearly a mile in length, and as about four miles from the river. On one mound, higher than the other, he found blocks of black stone four or five feet square, but honeycombed from exposure. On excavating the mound, these were found to rest on stones of the same size and character. In its long course from Opis to Susiana, this great canal is said to have equalled the Tigris in size, being from 200 to 450 feet in width, fertilising a vast district of country now barren and untenanted, and sending off 256 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION numerous canals, both of irrigation and communication, on both sides. On its banks are found ruins of towns, villages, farms, khans, and other buildings, but excepting what Captain Mignan found, very few relics that belong to Babylonian times. The times of its greatest prosperity appear to have belonged to the epochs of the Sassanian monarchs and the Khalifat. Were there any gigantic mounds of ruins such as characterise Babylonia and Rhaldaea, they would be seen towering over the jungle from the river Tigris. But still enough exists to attest to a very great amount of population, and to the fer- tility of its now desolate banks. 2 5 7 CHAPTER WI. THE HIGHWAY TO SUSA. IT is not that similar ruins, as well as existing villages and camps with their limited tracts of pasture or arable land, are not also met with along the banks of the Tigris, but Owing to the impracticable jungle, they are few and far between, whereas the banks of the Nahr- wan were comparatively free of jungle, and appear to have been generally cultivated. There is not a single town on the Tigris (where were once Ctesiphon and Seleucia), all the way from Baghdad to Bassora. Kut al Amarah, as the seat of a custom house, and Kornah, as a port at the junction of the Euphrates and Tigris, are looked upon as towns by the Arabs, but they are mere villages. Only a few miles below the arch of Chosroes we have fragments of ruin known as Al Hammam, ‘the baths, on the right bank, and others called Etebai on the left. There are ruins also designated as Thesbani, and others known as Ashik wa Mashukah, or ‘the lover and his beloved, at the junction of an old canal, supposed to be the same as the Kutha of Abū-l-fada, eight miles by river below Al Bostan, or the ‘garden, of Chosroes. WOL. II. S 258 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Then again, only a couple of miles south of this, we have a ruin called Haddara; further on, four miles distant, another ruin called Zar Abd Allah, and on the opposite (left bank) at a great bend of the river, Tafit, a Sheikh's tomb erected on a mound of ruin. Close by are further ruins, merely known as Zawiya, or the ‘corner’ mounds. These are in the country of the Dawar Arabs, the Jebār occupying the right bank. We have after this twenty-four miles of continuous jungle, only interrupted at one point by the dry bed of a canal formerly communicating with the Nahr-wan, till We come to a remarkable bend in the river, where the Zobaid Arabs have entrenched the peninsula with a wall of defence, known as Balimeiya or Ras el Ziljeh. This entrenched camp is probably only used in times of tribal conflicts, for the enclosed space is partially covered with jungle. It might be imagined that this jungle could be cleared off, but it is not so. Both the tamarisk and liquorice plant (glycyrrhiza) prolong their roots till they reach water, and this is at times at a depth of some twenty feet or more. So if the jungle were cut down or burnt, it would spring up again from the roots. Four miles beyond this we meet with the first stationary village below Ctesiphon. It is called Um al Tobul, or ‘the mother of drummers.' Between this point and the gardens of Chosroes groups of mounds rise up out of the plain, at distances varying from four to five miles, showing that there was once a line of towns or stations extending at this point from the Tigris to the Euphrates. Traces of canals are also met with. THE HIGHWAY TO SUSA 259 Two of these groups are called respectively Al Rishad and Bender. Ten miles further down the river, two remarkable mounds mark the starting points of another line of ruins which extend by Sinkara to the great group of Zibliya and Janam in a south-westerly direction towards the Euphrates. And from this point down- wards to Kut al Amarah, a distance of some forty miles by river, but not above twenty-five in a direct line, we have tells or mounds rising up out of the low Khaldaean plains at irregular distances, diversifying the whole surface of the territory that is included between the rivers Tigris and Euphrates, north of the Shat al Hai. The latter, the ancient Pasitigris, and once the prolongation of the Eastern Tigris or Nahr-wan, starts from opposite Kut al Amarah, passes through the Hor or marshes to the village of His or Hai, a little beyond which it divides into two branches, one called the Amah, or ‘the blind, passing by Zubernek, or ‘the seven poplars, to Wasit, the ancient Cybate, Sheikh Zuad, and Imām Hamsa, to Kalat Sheikh Husain. The other, called the Bu Rayat, has no villages on its banks, and it joins the El Amah at Kalat Sheikh Husain, the united branches being known as the Shat al Ra, and they flow past an imām at Ziyareah, and enter the Euphrates at Argaſ, a little above Kut, the residence of the Sheikh of the Muntifiks. There are, however, some little discrepancies in the accounts given by travellers of the Shat al Hai; some call the canal at its junction, after being divided into two, as the Sub-Bil, and describe it as dividing again S 2 260 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION into two branches near the tombs of Hamzah, and flow- ing into the Euphrates by two or more separate outlets, one at Abū Sef and the other at Al Arkah. These canals are indeed alike numerous and intricate in Lower Khaldaea. The town of Wasit has been visited by but few travellers, among whom, Captains Mignan and Ormsby, but neither appear to have found any remains worthy of notice. It is said to consist of forty or fifty wretched houses built of mud and fragments of bricks taken from the old city, which last is merely to be traced in the presence of sand-covered hillocks, without a single object to give an interest to the scene. Yet has this probably, from its central position on the old bed of the Tigris, been a site of wealth and prosperity in its day. “Waseth, as Ibn Haukal calls it, “is situated on the two banks of the Diglah' (and in the present day the village is on One side of the canal, and the fort on the other). ‘It is strongly built, is a populous town, and well supplied with provisions.’ Idrisi con- firms these observations, and Abū-l-fada says, “Waseth is a city separated into two parts by the Diglah (Reiske, in his translation, says the Tigris), called after Ahmed son of Jacob l’ Kateb, or “the scribe,” and it is situated at fifty parasangs distance from four great cities—from Bussorah, from Kufa, from Ahwaz, and from Baghdad.’ Such a central position made it a site of much strate- gical importance in the civil wars of the Khalifat. I have sought to identify it with Cybate, which is mentioned in the Theodosian Tables as half-way from Babylon to Susa, and the conversion of Waseth or Wasit THE HIGHWAY TO SUSA 26] to Cybate is perfectly admissible, but still the identifi- cation is purely conjectural. Mr. Fraser, who calls it Waasut, says its mediaeval name was Cascara, and it was the seat of one of the Bishops of an early Christianity. Benjamin of Tudela notices Wasit or Waset, as it is written in the Hebrew text, as containing in his time about 10,000 Jews (!), the principal among whom was the Rabbi Nedain. It is also noticed by Assemanus as a metropolitan town of the Khaldaeans under the name of Waseta. As Cascara is mentioned in the same list of the metropolitan towns in Khaldaea with Wasit, it must have been a different place. The route detailed in the Theodosian Tables was the one that led by Wasit or Cybate to Susa by the lower bridge on the Tigris. The city had no doubt its Khaldaean name, which may yet be deciphered from the bricks. The place at present derives its chief interest from the part it played in the civil wars of El Mamun and Al Amin, the devastations of El Habib and his Zengians, and the revolt of Ibn Wasel. Upon the decline of the |Khalifat, Wasit, which had succeeded Erech as the capital of Irak, became the first appanage of the Emirs al Amoa. About nine miles above Kut al Amarah are the ruins of a bridge, called according to Mignan Mumlah, and according to Kinneir Mumlihah. The name of Jaubal was added to these by the Zobair Arabs on the right bank of the river; the Shammar, Suda, and Dawar tribes dwell on the left bank. The ruins consist of three piers of kiln-burnt bricks, and at the time when Captain 262 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Mignan went up the Tigris, there were sixty feet of building above the water, having seventeen in breadth, and the height of the most perfect pier was eight feet. There is a wall of furnace-burnt bricks 372 feet in extent, with a round tower on the left bank of the river above the bridge, and several mounds of debris are seen upon the plain around, extending more particularly in an easterly direction. The southerly bridge on the Tigris appears to mark the position of the highway that led from Khaldaea to Susa by Cybate, the northerly bridge that of the high- way from Babylon to the same city. This celebrated military and commercial high road is described by Herodotus as extending all the way from Sardis by Babylon to Susa, a ninety days’ journey. It is even said to have been paved throughout (most likely in its Babylonian and Susian prolongation), and to have been provided at intervals of about fifteen miles with stations or public hostelries, no doubt after the fashion of the modern khans or kirwan-Serais (caravanserais). Tradition, as usual, attributes this great work, at least in its Babylonian portion, to Semiramis. Herodotus describes the road as carried from the Tigris to the Gyndes, and the Choaspes (Kerkah river) to Susa. The two latter rivers being crossed in boats, as the Diyalah, generally identified with the Gyndes, joined the Tigris above the site of this bridge, it would appear that the Nahr-wan existed as far back as the time of the father of history, and was known to him as the Gyndes. What occupied ninety days of travel in his time could THE EIIGHWAY TO SUSA. : 263 be accomplished in a few days by the modern appli- ances of railway transport. It is impossible to contemplate this relic of olden times without being struck by the thought of how many great personages of old, renowned alike in Biblical and profane history, have wended their way by this bridge. The conquering Nebuchadnezzar, the proud Belshazzar, the distinguished queen from the north country (Van), and Daniel, so favoured by the Almighty, whose dwelling- place was alternately at Babylon and at Susa, must have passed and repassed by this highway. Then came the powerful Cyrus, and with him a new domination; the period of the exertions of Ezra in favour of his exiled countrymen, and whose mausoleum decorates the bank of the river; and then the fair Jewish damsel whose name was ‘myrtle’ (Kadassah), before she was received into the royal harim of Ahasuerus. Lastly, the Macedonian hero and his turbulent suc- cessors trod in the same footsteps, the traces of which were probably extinct at the time when Trajan envied and endeavoured to emulate the past glories of his great predecessor. And how are all these great powers fallen now ! Their greatest highway has until lately not even been sought for, and it is only traversed by half savage shepherds and lawless robbers. Is there a future in store for lands so deeply endeared to us by the memories of the past, or are they like a geological era gone by for ever ? In the age of mythology begat it is said by the 264 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Phoenicians, the river was crossed otherwise than by a bridge. Plutarch, in his little treatise on rivers, tells a story of an Indian nymph whose name is Hellenised into Alphesiboea, who was passionately loved by the god Dionysus, but who was not won till the god turned himself into a tiger, and thus compelled her by fear to allow him to carry her across the river, which from this circumstance obtained the name of Tigris. This pretty but fabulous explanation of the origin of the classical name given to the river is not borne out by the fact that its more ancient name was Digla in the Aramaean (Teger in Zend and Tegera in Pehlvi), from whence its Arabian name of Digla, expressive of its rapid, arrowy character (Sanscrit ‘tigra,' sharp, swift; ‘tir, an arrow, in Persian). Strabo (ii. 527) and Pliny (vi. 27) were aware that, in the language of Media, Tigris signified arrow. When the Hebrews introduced the Tigris into their Scriptures as one of the four rivers of Paradise, under the name of Hiddekel (Gen. ii. 14; Daniel x. 4), they committed the same pleonasm as is done when we say King Pharaoh, or King Chosroes ‘Kai Khausrau, or Alcoran for Al Kuran—the Koran: ‘hid’ being a prefix, denoting rapidity, to ‘dekel, which already conveyed the same idea. It is further illustrative of the Shat al Hai having been the old bed of the Tigris, that that river loses its name of Digla below Kut al Amarah, when it is called Shat al Amarah, whilst the Arabian geographers are unanimous in calling the Shat al Hai the Digla. On a Babylonian cylinder which has been engraved THE HIGHWAY TO SUSA 265 by the late Mr. John Landseer in his ‘Sabaean Researches, we see a bearded figure, wrapped from head to foot in a winter robe, pouring water into two separate streams, from a vase on a small globe or star without rays. This Mr. Landseer supposed to represent that star of the first magnitude which the Arabians called Fomalhaut, and which, still retaining its Arabian name, Occupies the very place in the sphere where the stream from the pitcher or situla of Aquarius ends at present; this fact of the fluxion from the vase of the water-bearer ending at Fomalhaut having undergone not the slightest altera- tion in descending from the Khaldaean ages to our own times. In this figure, which may be pronounced with con- fidence to be the Khaldaean Aquarius, two streams flow from the same vase, as according to the ancients the Euphrates and the Tigris both issued from Mount Taurus, to unite at their extremities. This sculptured metaphor possesses greater simplicity than the Egyptian Aquarius, as it is represented in the celebrated zodiacs of Esneh and Denderah with an urn in either hand, emblematic of the Nile—one river flowing from two SOUICCéS. - - - - The Khaldaean Aquarius was thus distinct from the Egyptian, and being the most simple of the two, it was possibly also the most ancient ; and the introduction of a symbol indigenous to the country, and certainly not transplanted or adopted from any other country into the celestial constellations, is, in very singleness of interpre- tation, One of the earliest effusions of a primaeval poetry and science united. 266 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION On some of the medals which were struck in com- memoration of the subjection of the Parthians by Trajan, we see the Emperor attired in military vestments, with a spear and parazonium, standing in the attitude of a conqueror, with his left foot on a vanquished foe (a metaphor as old as the Rameses), and who by the crenated mitre and the trousers, appears to unite in one figure the symbols of an Oriental sovereign and of a province. On each side is a river deity, reclining on an affluent urn, and holding an aquatic reed. These typify the Euphrates and Tigris. z A small Euphrates through the piece is rolled, And little eagles wave their wings in gold, says a poet, who has endeavoured, although erroneously, to express the comprehension of So much design in so Small a Space. The four rivers of the Hebrew Paradise may, it is to be observed, be either the Euphrates and the Western Euphrates, and the Tigris and the Eastern Tigris, or the Euphrates, Tigris, Choaspes, and Eulaeus, or they may be four channels derived from these within a more limited area, but the first appears to be the most probable interpretation. 2 6 7 CELAPTER WII. SELEUCIA AND CTESIPHON. THE date groves of Baghdad do not extend far south of the city. A little beyond the junction of the Shat al Alik and Dawadiya canals and the island of Al Gherarah, we have barren country tenanted by the Jebur Arabs, and not far from the Diyalah river Hajji Abdullah Aga's garden. - Eight miles below the junction of the Diyalah and the Tigris, and eighteen from Baghdad, or twenty-one by river, are the ruins of Ctesiphon on the one, and of Seleucia on the other side of the river. The site of the olden city of the Macedonians is marked by low mounds, the remains of a wall or en- trenchment in the form of a parallelogram, the longer side fronting the river for a distance of about two miles. The materials of Seleucia, having been in part used by the Khalifs in the construction of public buildings in Baghdad, nothing remains in the present day within the entrenchments but low mounds and heaps of ruin. Three of these groups make themselves conspicuous by their extent and elevation, one of which is designated as Suwaidiyah or Seleucia, the central one as Sir, and the Southerly One as Baruch, 268 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION In connection with the Sir group of mounds, it is to be observed that Wadi Sir or Nahr Sir is a contraction of Nahr Ardashir—a name given to Seleucia by the Persians when the place was re-edified by them in the time of Ardashir Babegan. The mediaeval writers cor- rupted the name into Guedisir. Thus Khusrau or Chosroes is described when pursued by Heraclius as crossing the Tigris in his alarm from Ctesiphon to Guedisir. The name of Wadi Sir remained attached to the place as late as the Arab invasion, and it was during that time one of the chief cities of Babylonia (see Ibn Athir; the Rauzetú-l-Ahbab of Ataullah ; the Tariki Baghdad; Yakut, and Abū-l-fada). y This name continued until the time of Yakut to denote the suburb of Madayn, as the “two cities — Ctesiphon and Seleucia—were collectively called. The group of mounds named after the faithful friend and scribe of Jeremiah–Baruch—have an uncertain reference to the descendant of the tribe of Judah. It has been justly remarked by Biblical scholars that if Baruch, the scribe of Jeremiah, be the author of the apocryphal book which bears his name, he must have removed from Egypt to Babylon immediately after the death of Jeremiah. The Rabbins allege that he died in Babylon in the twelfth year of the exile. Rabbi Petachia relates a curious tradition in connec- tion with the tomb of Baruch. ‘The monarch, he says, ‘who reigned in the days of Rabbi Shelomoh, father of Rabbi Daniel, was a friend of Rabbi Shelomoh, because the monarch was of the seed of Muhammad, and the head of the captivity, descended from King David, and SELEUCIA AND CTESIPHON 269 he said to Rabbi Shelomoh that he wished to see the tomb of the prophet Ezekiel who performed miracles. ‘And Rabbi Shelomoh and the elders said to him, “My lord and king, Baruch son of Neriah, his disciple, is buried near the enclosure of the prophet. If it be thy will, uncover the grave. If thou canst see his dis- ciple, then thou mayest see his master.” He then as- sembled all his princes and commanded them to dig. But every one that dug into the grave of Baruch son of Neriah fell down immediately and died. “There was there an old man, an Ishmaelite, who said to the monarch, “Tell the Jews that they should dig.” The Jews replied, “We are afraid.” But the king said, “If you keep the law of Baruch son of Neriah, he will not hurt you, for every Ishmaelite that dug fell down dead.” - ‘Then Rabbi Shelomoh said, “Give us three days' time, that we may fast in Order to obtain his pardon.” “After three days the Jews dug and were not hurt. The coffin of Baruch son of Neriah was between two marble stones, he being between the two. A portion of his praying scarf protruded between the stones. The king said, “No two kings make use of the same crown. It does not become this righteous man to be near Ezekiel. I will transfer him to another locality.” " “They then carried away the marble stones together with the coffin. When they came to a distance of a mile from the grave of Ezekiel, they could not stir from 1 ‘This,' says Dr. Benisch, in his notes to the Rabbi Petachia's Travels, ‘is a rabbinical saying, and means that two dignitaries with the like powers, within the same jurisdiction, cannot co-exist.’ 270 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION the place. Nor could any number of horses or mules move the coffin from its place. Then said Rabbi Shelo- moh, “Here the righteous man wishes to be buried.” And they buried there the coffin, and built a beautiful palace over his grave.’ . Benjamin of Tudela describes the tomb of Ezekiel as it existed in the time of the Khalifat, and he makes mention of the sepulchres of Ananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, as being within half a mile of the synagogue, and covered with a large cupola, but he makes no mention of the tomb of Baruch. Asher, in his notes to Benjamin of Tudela, says that the sepulchre is called Iggereth Jechustha, and that it has been for ages a place of pilgrimage to the Jews and Muham- madans. Niebuhr calls it Kefil, but neither he, nor Rousseau, Mignan, Loftus, or Layard, who have visited the tomb of Ezekiel, makes any mention of a tomb of Baruch. May not then this mound in Seleucia repre- sent the ruined mausoleum which preserves the name of the pseudo-prophet, be the place to which the Jews conducted the Khalif P Ctesiphon, besides its numerous mounds of debris, from which coins, we have seen, may be collected after a day's rain, its walls or entrenchments, and some few relics of Muhammadan times, contains one remarkable object. This is the celebrated arch or throne of Chos- roes, variously written by travellers; as the Taki Kesra (Sir H. Rawlinson, “Journ. R.G.S., vol. x. p. 96). Fraser calls it Tauke Kesra ; Mignan, Tauk Kesra. Sir Henry Rawlinson, when speaking of the throne of Solomon, calls it Takhti Sulaiman, and of the throne of the Queen SELEUCIA AND CTESIPHON 271 of Sheba as Takhti Balkis. The same distinguished Orientalist, describing the memorial of the captive Vale- rian near Shuster, calls it ‘Takhti Kaisar’ (‘Journ. R.G.S., vol. ix. p. 78). So also is the throne of Jamshid gener- ally known as Takhti or Takht-i-Jamshid. Wherefore then should not this celebrated arch be called Takht-i- Khusrau ? Kesra, Khosrau, or |Khusrau, the Chosroes of the Greeks, being not so much a name as a distinctive affix to the name of the Persian sovereigns, just as Pharaoh, Caesar, Arsaces, and Shah, were to sovereigns of other dynasties. The arch in question has been regarded by some as the façade of a very magnificent building that appears never to have been completed, but I am quite contented in looking upon it as One of those open-arched rooms which are met with in almost every house of wealthy Orientals both in Asia, Africa, and even in the patios of Spain. In these the head of the house sits and smokes the calumet of peace with his neighbours during the heats of the day. But the same arcade, open to the court when erected for a serai or palace, becomes the divan or divan; and when for a monarch, and on a scale proportionate to the power and magnificence of monarchy, it became, as is still to be seen at Al Hadhr, as well as at Ctesiphon, a so-called ‘throne, or canopy to a throne, from which justice was administered and edicts went forth. The building as it at present stands is 284 feet long, over 100 feet in height, with walls 12 feet in thickness, ornamented with four tiers of pilasters, having niches like windows rising one above the other, the higher 272 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION ones diminishing in height and increasing in number as they approach the top. In the centre is an arch which rises to a point, the apex of which is 100 feet from the ground, and of eighty feet span. This gives entrance to what has been a noble hall, 153 feet long, of which the arched roof is in great part entire, though there are in it some extensive chasms. It was plastered and per- forated with holes, from which according to tradition there hung in the time of the Sassanian kings a hundred lamps. These no doubt disappeared at that great sacking of the city which is so graphically described in the pages of Gibbon. -- Ctesiphon, humbled by Trajan, sacked by the generals of Verus, and pillaged by Severus, yet recovered suffi- ciently to defeat the less warlike legions of Julian; but Al Madayn, or ‘the two cities, as Seleucia and Ctesiphon were called after they were united, were, with the ex- ception of the arch still remaining, swept from the face of the earth by the fierce followers of Muhammad, under Sayyid, the lieutenant of Omar, who crossed the Tigris, exclaiming, ‘This is the white palace of Khusrau —this is the promise of the apostle of God;’ and the greedy Saracens tore from its ceiling, a hundred feet elevated above the ground, the hundred silver lamps which had been suspended there by the Chosroes, and carpets of silk and gold from its walls and floor, till they were enriched beyond the measure of their hopes or knowledge. * Mr. Fraser relates that there still remained of this fearful sacking of the Saracens a ring which tempted SELEUCIA AND CTESIPHON 273 the cupidity of a pasha of Baghdad. He first got his men to fire at it with musket balls which shattered the roof; but this expedient failing, he sent an Arab up, who contrived to run a rope through the ring, and this being yoked to a number of buffaloes, it was at length torn down, only to be found to be—a ring of brass Sir A. H. Layard pointed out that on both sides of the arch were wings divided into floors, each containing dwelling apartments. Such, indeed, he justly remarks, is the plan of most modern Persian houses, in which a great aiwan, or open chamber for summer residence, is flanked by sleeping and other rooms, forming separate stories to the height of the hall. The exterior of the arch of the Chosroes is not only ornamented with pilasters, but also with cornices and lesser arches of brickwork, now fast falling to decay, but probably once covered with fine plaster or partly cased with stone. . The architecture is peculiar ; it belongs to both Par- thian and Sassanian times, with a mixture of Western and Eastern forms and decorations resulting from the long connection between the Persian and the Roman Empires. Byzantine architects were probably employed in the erection of many of the great edifices founded by the Arsaces and the Chosroes, and in the style of orna- ments and of the sculptured figures Occasionally found on buildings of those periods, as at Al Hahdr and in various parts of Southern Persia, may be traced the corrupt taste and feeble outline of the artists of Con- stantinople. Hamdallah Mustafi gives, in the geographical treatise WOL. II. T 274 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION entitled ‘Nozet el Kulub, a history of Ctesiphon so remote as to belong to fabulous times. He says that |Madayn was the work of Tahmurath Divband, of the Peshdudi dynasty of Persian kings, who named it Gard- abad; Jamshid completed it and called it Teisebun. It is the largest, he adds, of the seven chief cities of Irak, and was thence called Madayn. This differs from the accepted reading, that Madayn was first applied to the two cities when united into one. Its six rivals were Kadesiah, Rumiyah, Hira, Babil, Holwan, and Nahr-wan, all of which are now in ruins. Jamshid is also credited by the same historian with having built a stone bridge over the Digla, which ex- cited the admiration of Alexander, but the Succeeding Persian race of kings destroyed this useful work. Ardashir Babegan, who improved the city and made it his capital, was desirous of restoring the bridge, but without effect. He consequently formed one of boats and chains. The succeeding Khusraus retained this city as their capital, as did also the Sassanian kings, and Shapur Dhu 'l Aktaf embellished it, but Nushirwan erected the Aiwan-i-Khusrau, or great hall and arch. Abū Dawanik, the Khalifah, wished to remove the materials of this city for the use of his projected capital of Baghdad, but Sulaiman ibn Khaled, his wuzir, dissuaded him from such an act, saying that he would be reproached by mankind for the destruction of one city to aid in the foundation of another, as betraying a want of resources. The Khalif on his side taxed his minister with a sentimental weakness for the fame of the Khusraus, and SELEUCIA AND CTESIPHON 275 set to work at the destruction of the place, but he soon found that the expense attendant upon the dis- junction and removal of the materials of the city would far exceed the cost of new materials. But when he wished to desist from the undertaking his wuzir insisted that having begun with the work, he Ought to persevere, or he would be exposed to the im- putation of being less powerful than the founder of the city. But the Solomon of the Khalifat advised at the same time that the Aiwan Takht or Arch should not be touched, as it was a lasting evidence of the prophetic character of Muhammad, on the night of whose birth it was miraculously rent. Not far from the hall of Chosroes is the tomb of another Solomon, One Sulaiman Pak, or as it is vulgarly pronounced Selman Pauk, otherwise ‘Sulaiman the pure or pious, who the Turks affirm was once a Christian, but eventually became a follower of the Prophet, who appointed him his barber, which situation he filled for many years. * Hence,’ says Mignan, “all the professors of chirur- gery, phlebotomy, chiropody, et hoc genus omne, per- form a yearly pilgrimage from Baghdad to his tomb, which is surrounded by a brick wall encompassing a good court, and having commodious accommodation answering every purpose of a caravanserai. It is in fact an imām or mausoleum and a sepulchral chapel rather than a tomb—the Barber's tomb, as our men irreve- rently called it. Hamdallah Mustufi notices this tomb of Solomon as that of a Persian named Selman-i-Farsi, or Sulaiman of Farsistan. 276 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION D'Herbelot says of this Selman-i-Farsi, also called Selman al Khair, that he was a freed slave of Muham- mad's—a Persian by birth, but who had been a Christian, was a reader of holy books and a great traveller, and he is even credited with having had a hand in the com- position of the Kuran, for some say of him that he was ‘Banu al Islam, Or one of the founders of Islamism, and the Prophet pronounced him to be one of the predes- tined. - There are also in the same vicinity the ruins of a mosque, and of two imāms or sepulchral chapels, which are said to contain, One the mortal remains of Hadhaifah, the secretary of the Prophet, the other those of the unfortunate Khalif Mostasem, who was so cruelly put to death by Hulaku. This, it is to be supposed, is an example of evolution in history, and of the survival of the fittest. The Tatar, or Tartar, as it is commonly written, being, for the time being, the victor over the Khalifat 277 CELAPTER VIII. THE CITY OF THE KHALIES. IT would be difficult to point out in a definite manner the circumstances that led to the positioning of the three great cities that arose upon the Lower Tigris. Kherkh, the Opis of the Greeks, sprang up with other centres of population unquestionably at the mouth of the Adheim or Physcus. The Nahr-wan must have fol- lowed, not preceded, the population of the place. Situated as it was on the verge of rocky strata and an alluvial plain, it must have enjoyed whatever fresh air an almost inter-tropical climate could afford. There was easy access with Assyria proper and with Persia, and it was protected by a low range of hills which come all the way down from Kir-Kuk, one of the Ecbatanas or treasure cities of antiquity. Ctesiphon is spoken of in a general way as having risen in opposition to the Macedonian city of Seleucia, but it existed long before the era of Alexander, and it owed its prosperity to the Tigris on the One side and the Nahr-wan on the other ; the palace of its sovereigns lay near the Tigris, but the great mass of ruins are met with on the Nahr-wan. The Khalifs moved from Anbar, their first home, 278 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION along the canal that waters that site, to the garden of Dad, which may have been a pleasant place in its time, but does not appear to be so in the present day, and the western suburb of the city lies low. Ctesiphon appeared to me a far more inviting site than Baghdad, but this may have been in consequence of not being crowded with dwellings. Seleucia lay in the sandy plains of Babylonia, near where the chief canal that traversed that plain joined the Tigris. It stood as a kind of bulwark to Persia against any encroachments beyond that river to the west, and it succeeded in monopolising a vast Com- merce, but it had few other raisons d'étre. In the East it is a difficult matter for the mere visitor to speak or write accurately concerning the actual amount of wealth, prosperity, and luxury or comfort of the people. As every house has its rooms looking upon an inner open court, and the outside is a naked mud wall, he can know nothing save of the few to which he may gain admittance. If he judges of the rest by these few he may be led into error, and exaggerate the luxury or depreciate the general amount of comfort and cleanliness. To the mere outside looker-on, the suburb of Kherkh is a mere collection of hovels, with a house of a better class here and there, and out of which rise a few mosques with their minarehs, and the more striking monument erected over the remains of Zobaide—the favourite wife of Harān al Rāshid—and which is more beautiful in its interior and pleasing in its details, as a specimen of Saracenic architecture, than it is in its THE CITY OF THE KHALIFS 279 exterior. M. Texier made, and has I believe published, sketches of this interesting monument. Baghdad itself, approached by a bridge of boats, pre- sents an imposing appearance with its numerous domed masjids and jamis, and their sometimes tall and grace- ful minarets. But the frontage to the river is dull and uninteresting to a degree ; at the north end is an incon- gruous mass of buildings known as the Pasha's serai, and barracks with a dead wall on the river side. To the south is the British Residency—a smaller group of buildings with a garden; a dead wall along the river side, miserable-looking outside, all luxury and com- fort within. As to the bazaars, they are like those of any other great Oriental town—picturesque in detail, and still more so on paper or canvas, but with much business going on, there is that absence of energy, those habits of slothful indifference, and that disregard to details in cleanliness and in completeness, which is so purely Oriental and so totally distinct from shopkeeping or trading in Europe. The fact is, that whether founded by the Persians or by the first followers of the Prophet," Baghdad has undergone so many changes, that both in position, shape, and extent, it is scarcely possible to form an idea of the aspect it Originally presented. Even the site of the palace of Harān al Rāshid is unknown. It is sup- posed by some to have stood on the eastern side of the * The Persians, it is to be observed, claim to have preceded the Arabs in the tenure of the site of Baghdad. We learn from D'Herbelot that, founded by Zohauk, it was enlarged by Afrasiab, who first called it Baghdad, or the ‘garden of Dad, the idol whom he worshipped. 280 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Tigris, but from the fact that the Turks under Tamer- lane swam the river from that shore to reach the city, others have been led to presume that it was to be found On the opposite bank, and this is corroborated by Zobaide being buried on that side of the river. Whatever the condition of Baghdad in its palmiest days under the Khalifat, it was besieged and taken, first by Ali Baiyah, the second monarch of the Dilemi dynasty, in A.D. 945, and afterwards by Togrul Bey, the first of the Seljukian sovereigns. But these were comparatively slight calamities; for though the glory of the house of Abbas had departed, their capital re- mained rich and populous until the Mogul invasion under Zinghis Khan swept like a deluge over Asia and Overwhelmed the prosperity of every town in a torrent of human blood. In A.D. 1256 Hulaku, grandson of Zinghis, once more sacked the city, and subjected the inhabitants and its rulers to one common massacre. The ruined city re- mained in the hands of the Moguls until A.D. 1392, when it was taken from Sultan Ahmed Ben Avis, of the race of Hulaku, by Taimur the Tatar, or Taimur-leng, —our Tamerlane. The former prince, however, having Succeeded in repossessing himself of the capital, it was again attacked and reduced by the enraged Taimur, who punished the inhabitants by putting most of them to the sword. In the contest between the Turcomans of the White and the Black Sheep which distracted the Persian empire during the ninth century of the Hejira, it passed more than once from the One to the other, until A.D. THE CITY OF THE KELALIFS 281 1508, when Shah Ismael, of the Suffaveans, made himself master of the place. During upwards of a hundred years it continued to be an object of contention between the Turks and Persians, till at length, in A.D. 1637, it was finally taken by Amurath TV., of the Osmanli dynasty, and it has ever since remained as an appanage of the Ottoman empire. The eastern Baghdad, that is to say Baghdad proper, is defended by a high wall built of bricks and mud, and flanked with towers of different ages, some of which belong even to the time of the Khalifs. Not one half of the space enclosed within these walls is now occupied by habitations. There are six gates of entrance towards the land and one on each side opening to the river, besides the one called the Gate of the Talism or Talisman, the hand- somest of all, originally built by Khalif al Naser. It was by this approach that Amurath entered when he took the city, but it has been built up ever since. Within these walls are said by Kinneir and Fraser to be 200 mosques, six colleges, and twenty-four ham- mams or public baths." The enumeration of the names of these presents little interest, they are mainly shrines of holy men. The metropolitan mosque of the Khalifs, Jami al Suk al Gazeb, has been destroyed with the ex- * I find in my notes the names in Arabic, as given to me by Mr. Rassam, of sixteen hammams or baths; of fourteen different bazaars; of nineteen coffee houses and places of entertainment; of eleven caravan- serais; of seven gates; of nine water gates; of four Christian churches— Kimiset el Patriae, el Armeni, el Donna (Catholic) and el Khaldi (Sabaean); two synagogues, Towrat el Kebir and Towrat el Zair, and of twenty-one mosques. 282 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION ception of a curious but rather clumsy minar or tower. Another jami or mosque with four minarehs, called Jamah al Merjamiyah, has some remains of rich old arabesque work and its gate is fine. The Jamial Wuzir, on the banks of the Tigris near the bridge, has a grand dome and lofty minar, and the great mosque in the Al Maidan is still an imposing edifice. But, as Mr. Fraser justly remarks, there are few structures deserving of notice; and it may be further remarked as singular in so celebrated a capital, that not above twenty-four minars and about a dozen domes, none of them distin- guished by either beauty or size, are to be counted within the precincts of the western division. The college of Khalif Mostanser is now the custom house. The palace of the Pasha, never magnificent, is, like everything else, crumbling to ruin, and Ali Riza lived in the citadel, which though containing the arsenal, the mint, and public offices, is hardly in better condition. On the western side is not only the singular hexagonal edifice known as the tomb of Zobaide, but there is also another ancient structure. It is a kind of kibleh or imām-a dome fixed on four pillars, with a black stone and illegible Kufic inscription,-- and it is said to have been erected by Alp Arslan, the bravest of the Seljukian monarchs. I find it also mentioned in my notes as a takiya—the tomb of Mikail Seljuki. I find in the same memoranda a note of a column of stone, held sacred from Ali having said his prayers near it. This is in the mosque called Dair-i- Rusa or Manbayah, on the road to the Shi‘ah mosque of Khadhin or Khazimein. There is also a supposed im- THE CITY OF THE KHALIFS 283 print of the hand of Ali in the little mosque of Al Wud ad Doulet Wilani. The caravans of corpses transported from Persia to the holy places on the Western Euphrates are ferried across the Tigris at Khazimein, where they receive a blessing and pay custom. Iwitnessed the passing by of One of the caravans when out walking one day, and a frightful spectacle it presented. Many of the rudely constructed coffins had broken to pieces in the rocky defiles of the Kurdistan mountains, and I was glad to beat a hasty retreat. Upon One occasion we paid a state visit to the Pasha. The whole get-up constituted the height of the ridiculous. We proceeded through the bazaars, which constitute the chief thoroughfare from the south to the north end of the city, in procession. First a kawass, with cane and silver knob and Scarlet coat ; second, a green-silk garmented gentleman, Secretary to the Resi- dency; next the terjiman or dragoman of the Residency; then four kawasses in scarlet uniform on foot ; lastly the officers of the Expedition, protected by a file of Sepoys on either side, and (the Officers) mounted on horses gaily decorated with a profusion of Scarlet and purple satin saddle-cloths, and harness glittering with bright brass, enough to delight the eyes of a native of dirty Baghdad. The Pasha was at this moment encamped in the Maidan or plain beyond the serai. The Bey of Rawan- diz was in revolt—that is to say, had refused to pay taxes. The Pasha accordingly assembled his army and planted his guns on the Maidan to overawe the Bey by 284 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION the threat of an invasion. He might as well have at- tempted, with the means he had at his command, to have invaded the moon as to invade the mountain for- tress of Rawandiz. The Pasha received us in a capacious time-worn tent, on the floor of which water had been thrown to cool the air till it formed so many puddles. Ali was a fine old man, very fat, but his eye intelligent and ani- mated, his forehead good, his aspect benevolent, and his manner COUrteous. He was anxious we should see his preparations for war, and if we had cut a ridiculous figure in our pro- cession through the city, he certainly outbid us now, and covered us with shame. His baggy trousers did not come down to his ankles, and made him appear like a fat boy imperfectly breeched; a light and gauze-like mashallah, or cloak, was thrown over his shoulders, the train of which was upheld by bearers, whilst the in- verted cone which his figure represented was terminated by a pair of European slippers which did not tally with the other portions of his costume. One of the Pashas, a Brigadier-General, whom we also visited, was surnamed Sar-Kosh Pasha, or ‘the drunken pasha.’ He was a poor, weak, debilitated-looking man, but he had won his rank, as also his surname, by some feat of drunken valour—capturing a Russian officer, I heard. It may be truly said of Baghdad that it is not only no longer what it was, but its very magnificence is of the past, and its present is ruin and decay. The condi- tion of a Muhammadan city is nowadays the reflection of Muhammadanism itself, and in no one place in the THE CITY OF THE KHALIFS 285 East, even when bolstered up by European appliances, is there any stay to that universal decay which pervades everything except where an infinitesimal amount of civilisation is seen rising upon the ashes of a faith, which, carried out, as we have seen at length, in treachery and guile, involved in a similar ruin the minds of men, the edifices which they have constructed, and the country which they inhabit. It is not in human nature to dwell at too great length upon the past. Archaeologists and historians constitute as it were an intellectual world apart from that in which they live. The lessons they impart are invaluable, but new circumstances and new conditions of life perpetually beget new modes of action and new aims and objects of attainment. The labours of Loftus, Taylor, and others in explor- ing the mounds of ancient Khaldaea, and bringing before us the history, manners, and habits of its in- habitants, and the labours of Layard and others in dragging to light the arts and mysteries of the Assyrians of old, are of as unquestioned as they are of indisput- able value. But the human mind tends more to the future than to the past, and the question ever presenting itself is how long are these lands, with their great centres of population, power, and prosperity, to remain dormant under an utterly supine and incapable government, and when are they to be restored by railway communication or otherwise to the great families which constitute the present nations of the earth, when toiling in common in the arts of peace and industry, and of a united brother- hood P. That brotherhood is not to be found in Islamism. It despises everything that is not of itself. 2 8 7 JBOOK WIT-KURDISTAN AND ASIA MINOR. *- CHAPTER I. RURD PASHALIK OF SULAIMANIYAH. ON Monday, January 26, 1837, the last of the Expedi- tion left Baghdad for home vid Damascus. Much amuse- ment was afforded by some of the tars having to mount Camels; some slipped off Over the animals' tails, others were still more rudely tilted off when the uncouth animals rose from the kneeling posture. This party, having to cross the desert of Palmyra, met with much inconvenience from the Arabs, but being armed, it was enabled to get through in Safety. On Wednesday, February 1, I left Baghdad, having received instructions to return by way of Kurdistan in search for coal. As it was impossible to carry heavy weights on a mountain journey of this description, I had to leave the few books in my possession, as well as what collec- tions in natural history the ants had not destroyed, on board the “Euphrates’ steamer. I was accompanied by Mr. Rassam, who from his acquaintance with the country and its languages, had 288 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION acted as purser as well as interpreter to the Expedition, and did the same on the present occasion, and also upon that of my subsequent visit to Kurdistan under the auspices of the Royal Geographical Society. We had also with us Pedro, a little dark boy of Portuguese origin, who came from Goa, and had been one of the ship's company. To him was entrusted the care of the baro- meter. We had likewise a native servant and a muleteer. Starting in a north-easterly direction, we found our- selves traversing a barren plain, intersected, however, by canals of irrigation. Passing a ruinous Outwork called Kalah Sakmas, we came to a khan called Jedida, not having gone far the first day—a start in the East being indeed everything. The second day we passed the so- called tomb of Lokman, and reached another khan called Jizani, still on the level plain. The following morning we had a thunderstorm with vivid lightning, but we got on our way. Passing, four hours from the khan, a canal called Khalis, we arrived, after a journey of nine hours, at another caravanserai, known as Khan Deli Abbas. A sad accident befell us this afternoon. Pedro fell off his horse, and putting out his hand in order to check the effect of the fall upon the barometer, he broke the radius of the right arm just above the middle. There was no wood in the neighbourhood, but plenty of reeds in the canals, and I clave some of these so as to make a support, and bandaged it up to his chest. He was enabled by this arrangement to continue his journey without pain or suffering, and the arm got quite well in the usual time. The following day We reached the Hamrin hills ECURD PASHALIK OF SULAIMANIYAH 289 about four miles beyond the khan. There were three distinct ridges of red sandstone, as at Ahwaz, with some gypsum and marly beds. Beyond these we came to a more fertile plain, with beds of narcissus, flocks of sheep, some cultivation, and an Arab encampment. After nine hours' ride we arrived at the village of Kara Teppeh, or ‘Black mound.’ We had now reached the hilly regions which flank the vast plains of the Tigris on their south-east aspect, and which ultimately unite with the hilly ranges of Kurdistan. Crossing the Nahr-rin by a rickety bridge —we had crossed it lower down by a better one the previous day—we got to Kufri after six hours' journey- ing. There were herds of gazelles in the valley of the Nahr-rin. r - The hilly range on our right hand, chiefly composed of red sandstones, gypsum, and marls, stretched in an almost straight and abrupt line hence to Tüz Khurmatu, a distance of some twenty miles or more. About ten miles from Kufri a road is carried through an opening in the hills to some naphtha springs. Passing a ruin on a tell called Kuzlar Kalehsi, or ‘Girls' castle, we had to ford a rather deep stream before we reached the village of Tüz Khurmatu. We stopped a day at this village, as I wished to examine the naphtha and saline springs for which the village is celebrated. This part of the range of hills is called by the Arabs Jebel Ali, by the Turks Ali Tagh, from an imām (called Uniki Imām in Rich’s “Travels,' p. 20), to which Ali is said to have once fastened his horse. WOL. II. U 290 TEIE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION The rocks from which the saline springs with naphtha issued were saliferous red sandstone, with cyclade or freshwater limestones, earthy lignites, marls, and a variety of minerals, among others celestine in concentric balls. As these rocks are all supra-cretaceous, beds of lignite were the most that could be expected. It was a six hours' ride from Tüz Khurmatu to Taok, On February 8, through a very uninteresting country with a few herds of gazelles alone to enliven the way. Taok, ‘the village of fowls,' is watered by a goodly stream, and it contains a ruinous minar besides several sepulchral chapels in the hill sides; one in particular, on the summit of a tell, was said to belong to Zin al Abidin, ‘the best of hermits.’ - The next day we travelled nine hours to Kir-Kuk, over a plain dotted with villages and intersected by watercourses. First was Yanwija, ‘the new village; ' then, four miles beyond, Matara, “the place with water;' then Beshir, with a tell or mound of debris with perpen- dicular sides called Tamarunda, and some four miles beyond that, Ta'az Khurmatu, or ‘the new Khurmatu.’ This village had a rivulet, gardens and cultivation around it. Crossing a low ridge of rocks, we came within view and soon into a large suburb of Kir-Kuk, which with its immense castle on a rocky hills, its many domes and minarehs, and its scattered groups of houses, presented at Once a picturesque and imposing appearance, - We had letters for the governor of the place both from Ali Riza Pasha and from Colonel Taylor, and he received us at once kindly and hospitably. For a KURD PASHALIK OF SULAIMANIYAH 291 Mussulman he was unusually frank and Open, and he professed to have no regard for the letter of Riza Ali, but much for that of Colonel Taylor. The first day of our stay we went with the governor to visit the castle. It was quite a ceremonious pro- ceeding. First a reception at a large coffee house in the bazaar; then, followed by kawasses and spectators, to the castle; then a second reception at the castle itself, accompanied by pipes and coffee. The castle was, like that of Urfah, a mere mass of ruin. There was an Octagonal tower some thirty feet high, built of enamelled tiles and kiln bricks, with inscriptions dating back to the time of the Khalifat. There were also some old pieces of Ordnance, now utterly useless. The view from the walls repaid the trouble of the ascent, and was replete with scenic beauty. Two hills made themselves particularly conspicuous; One, Kara Chuk, about 800 feet high, bearing N. 60 W., and another with the sig- nificant name of Beltar. The following day I explored the seat of the cele- brated naphtha fires, known to the Arabs as the Abū Geger and to the Turks as the Kurkur Baba, both sig- nifying the same thing, ‘the father of boiling.' I found them to be situated on the summit of a low range of hills, about a couple of miles from the town. In a geological point of view these hills resembled those of the naphtha springs I had before visited. They were burning and appeared to have been so for a long time. The flame issued from openings in the soil, varying in depth, and they burnt with an intense ardour, but the light produced by them was most distinct at night. U 2 292 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION There were some twenty of these openings, but wher- ever a stick was pushed into the ground around, it was followed by a jet of flame. At the foot of the hills were some seven springs and wells giving off naphtha, to the extent it was said of some gallons per day. The workmen fired a bucketful in a hollow of the rock to get a present from the visitors. The waters themselves, although coming from a hill emitting flames, had a temperature of only 71° of Fahr., about 3° above that of the surrounding medium. We had gone to the springs in company of the governor's son, a very nice boy, and quite a cavalcade of attendants. They were rejoiced when my researches were concluded, as they wanted to have a run with the dogs after hares on the plain, and they succeeded in killing several. Unfortunately, the boy was mounted on a mare with foal, and could not join in the hunt, but I had considerately had a new horse provided for me at the naphtha springs. So kind-hearted was this governor of Kir-Kuk, that before we took our departure he told the muleteer who had charge of us as far as Sulaimaniyah that he would take off his head if he did not bring back a letter sealed with my own seal, of which he took a copy, attesting to our safe arrival at that place. An unfortunate incident occurred, however, at the moment of departure. We were assembled in a kind of maidan Or Open space near the governor's house, and the kawasses were pressing the bystanders into service to help and load the mules. There was one among them—a kind of half-witted lout—who refused to help. KURD PASHALIK OF SULAIMANIYAH 293 In endeavouring to compel him to do so with the assist- ance of a drawn sword, a scuffle ensued in which the man received a deep cut inside the arm. He went off to the governor's, but I never heard what indemnification he obtained. The kawass treated the affair very lightly when I upbraided him, but that may have been partly assumed. Kir-Kuk has been identified with the Kor-Kura or Gor-Kuk of Ptolemy; and it appears to have been in olden times a site of much importance, and, under Some undeciphered name or other, the treasure city or Ecbatana of Babylonia, as Amadiyah was of Assyria. It is remarkable that Mr. Buckingham (I quote from Fraser's ‘Assyria &c.’ p. 242) describes the castle as resembling that of Arbila (which it does) and as con- taining 5,000 inhabitants, all Moslems. This is very incompatible with what we saw—a mass of ruins, as at Urfah. - On our first day's journey from Kir-Kuk to Sulai- maniyah, a city, and the residence of a Pasha, situated within the Kurdistan mountains, we passed four diffe- rent low ridges of rock; the first gypsum and marls and sandstone, the second sandstones, the third red and brown sandstones, and the fourth limestone con- glomerate, all supra-cretaceous, and the intervening valleys, strange to say, almost totally uninhabited. In this wilderness of rocky ridges and of grassy wooded vales, so unlike the country we had been travelling through the previous week, we came on the evening of February 12 to some ruined walls which were said to belong to Khan Geshir. 294 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION There was neither khan nor human being, so we set to work collecting what fuel we could, and made a repast of what we had brought with us from Kir-Kuk. When it came on dark I ventured to remark to my friend Rassam that it was a very lonely and isolated place, and very much exposed to freebooters. Mr. Rassam agreed with me, and as we had some little luggage, such as carpets and quilts, with us, it was agreed that we should take watch turn by turns. I magnanimously selected the first watch, and at 2 A.M. woke up my fellow traveller. But he did not see it, and resigned himself to sleep. It served me right for selecting the first watch. The estimated elevation of Khan Geshir was 2,853 feet, and the thermometer stood at 7 P.M. at 35°, and at 8 A.M. 37°, and yet the coolness of the air was a relief to us, although necessitating a fire. We descended next day from our bivouac (for we slept outside of theruined khan, with our fire lit up with rhododendrons and our supper flavoured with freshly gathered watercresses) into the moorland of Ghika, with a village in its centre, and silent happy herds of gazelles browsing around. The village was called Gurgai. At the head of the plain was a long range of hills of greater height than any we had met with heretofore, and in the centre thereof, and right in front of us, was a great gap in the hills known from all times, although by different names, as one of the great passes into Kur- distan. It is now called the Derbend-i-Basian. This pass, which is well watered, had once a wall carried across it, but only the ruins remain. It seemed to be KURD PASHALIK OF SULAIMANIYAH 295 a highway without people, a pass without anybody to pass through it. On the gentle ascent of the hills that led to the pass, we encountered, however, two horsemen, well-dressed and well-armed Kurds. As they were there—not travelling but stationary, and on the look-out—they were either guards or robbers. I believe the former. The remarkable pass now called the Derbend-i- Basian leads into an expansive valley Or plain known as the Derghizin, in which are the sources of the Taok river, and of the Adheim or Physcus, with most abundant springs at the fountain head. In the same valley is the village of Tabbespi, where we passed the night at an elevation of 3,092 feet above the level of the sea. - The inhabitants of Tabbespi were Kurds, and it turned out that the two horsemen whom we had met reconnoitring outside the pass, and who had told us that a caravan had been plundered that very day at the pass (a thing I do not believe in, for we should have seen some signs of disturbance), were most civil, kind, and hospitable. We had laid in some small stores of meat and rice at Kir-Kuk, which we had boiled in an iron pot at Khan Geshir, and we produced the remnants here, but the good people said very truly they would take long to prepare, and begged we would accept a small collation in the meantime. Acceding only too gladly, after a long ride, to this request, a plentiful supply of eggs and boiled wheat was brought in, of which we made an excellent dinner and supper com- bined. 296 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION The next day we crossed two plains or valleys, one called Alai, about two miles in extent, the other called Mazaragh, seven miles in extent, and separated by a range of indurated chalk and argillaceous limestones. This change in the character of the formations was due to the neighbourhood of igneous rocks, which are here all ophiolitic (Euphotides and serpentines). The snow had just melted on these plains, from 2,500 to 3,000 feet above the level of the sea, and pro- gress was difficult. There were also innumerable holes of jerboas, crocuses were in flower, and hyacinths in bud, and so numerous that the plains must have been charming a month later. .* The town of Sulaimaniyah is situated on the latter plain, and surrounded by mountain chains. That to the east was called the Butariya, to the north the Avroman, to the west the Mazaragh Tagh, and to the south by the Kara Tagh, Sirsir and Giospeh ranges. The Persians call the plain Shahrazar, the Turks Sulaimaniyah. The mean annual temperature obtained from abundant springs was 61° Fahr., and the elevation above the level of the sea 2,895 feet. We were not admitted to present our letters to the Pasha the evening of our arrival, but as usual, the first reception was held in open diwan the following morning. There were several Persians present, and they sat on the right hand of the Pasha, Mr. Rassam and I were to his left. After the usual compliments, followed by coffee and pipes, the Pasha bade his mullah read Ali Pasha's firman. This done, he said with much emphasis, “I see you have come into this country to KURD PASHALIK OF SULAIMANIYAH 297 seek for mines. Of what use will they be if you find any ? These gentlemen, he said, waving his hand to- wards the Persians, “will claim them.’ ‘The Sultan will, I replied with a bow, “be able to defend his property.’ The reply was received with jubilation by the Turkish party, but with manifest irritation on the part of the Tajiks. The Pasha laughed over it at a subse- quent informal meeting, and the next morning he sent me a horse as a present for having, as he called it, discomfited the Farsis. I was glad, however, to get out of this city, which at this season of the year was dirty and unprepossessing. The Pasha had a battalion of regular troops as a guard, and irregular mounted Kurds and Kawasses. There was evidently, owing to these territorial feuds (which it is to be hoped have since been settled), a bad feeling between the townspeople and the country people, and when I went out into the hills I met with nothing but Scowls, nor was it much better in the streets of the town, where insolent madmen were, as in many other towns, allowed to wander about in a state of nudity. A considerable portion of the two volumes published by the well-known Resident at Baghdad, Mr. C. J. Rich, under the title of ‘Narrative of a Residence in Koordis- tan, is occupied by the details of a visit to this city in the mountains. There is also an appendix to the work by Mrs. Rich, in which a single observation sums up almost all that can be said of the place. “All my curiosity about the capital, the country, and its inhabi- tants, was converted into disgust at them all, on be- 298 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION holding the place destined for my residence (vol. i. pp. 369, 370). Mr. Rich placed the frontier of Persia in his time as at the Kizilji river, forty to fifty miles west of Sulaimaniyah, so it is difficult to imagine what claims the Tajiks had put forth at the time of my visit. Nor are they of any importance now, as they have been settled by the limitrophal commission. The first aspect of Sulaimaniyah gave to me the im- pression of the tenements of a colony of Alpine quadru- peds—jerboas Or hamsters—so low and level were the earth-clad roofs, but on penetrating into the town a few buildings of a better class were met with. There was also a bazaar, some 300 feet in length, the ruins of a small castle, and a mud and brick Serai in a very crumb- ling condition. I must say, however, that we were most kindly received and most hospitably entertained. Our quarters were in a pleasant cottage, with a garden attached to it, and I have no doubt that at a more advanced season of the year the country around must be very beautiful, although there appeared to be rather a paucity of wood. Sulaimaniyah is not, it is to be observed, an ancient site, although there are ruins of a mediaeval castle. The Origin of the city is traced in a Persian manuscript, copied by Mr. Rich when in the city. The Bebbeh family, of which one Suliman or Sulaiman Bey Ghazi, or Bebbeh Suliman, was the founder, in the year of the Hejira 1088, first settled at this spot. The history of the successive chiefs of this family is one of horrors. In A.H. 1132 one Khana Pasha conquered Sinna and built a mosque there. In RURD PASHALIK OF SULAIMANIYAH 299 A.H. 1164 Suliman Pasha succeeded to the government, having had Khana Pasha strangled in Baghdad, and in A.H. 1174 he killed Muhammad Pasha, son of Khana Pasha, in battle. In A.H. 1177 Suliman Pasha was himself assassinated by Fakih Ibrahim. Then Muham- mad Pasha and Ahmed Pasha fought for supremacy. The former was assisted by the Persians, the latter by the Zends or Nubians. Numerous battles were fought, and the two brothers were alternately the prisoners of one another, till at last Muhammad got the aid of Temir Pasha of Koi Sanjak, when what is described as a terrible engagement took place. Temir Pasha was slain, Muhammad Pasha was taken prisoner and had his eyes put out, and Ahmed Pasha himself died seventeen days afterwards. His successor, Nuwaub, was killed in fighting against one Budak Khan, and he was succeeded by Nuwaub Ibrahim Pasha, the real founder of Sulaimaniyah. This was in A.H. 1198. This Pasha was no better than his predecessors, for he seized Hassan Khan Bey and Hus- sein Bey, two princes of his own family, and sent them prisoners to Baghdad, where they were first banished to Hillah, and then strangled. Then came an extraordinary era, in which one Pasha kept succeeding to another. First Osman, then Ibrahim, then Abdurrahman, then Ibrahim again, then Abdurrahman, who stabbed the Pasha of Koi Sanjak with his own hand. All this in eighteen years' time, and so disgraceful was the state of things that the Pasha of Baghdad at last interfered and placed Rhaled Pasha on the Diwan. Abdurrahman fled to 300 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Persia, but he soon returned with a force sufficient to recover the pashalik. It was not, however, until after several reverses, and after reigning three years, that he was driven out, and Suliman, Son of Ibrahim, was placed on the throne. But the latter only reigned a year before Abdurrahman again made himself master of the pashalik, defeating alike both Persians and Turks. Abdurrahman died in A.H. 1228 (A.D. 1813), and he was succeeded by Nuwaub Mahmud Pasha, who ruled in the time of Mr. Rich. Such is the history of this Kurdish principality, as abbreviated from the account given by Mr. Rich, and it may be considered as a representative One in a mountain country where the people are brave and warlike, but quarrelsome, clannish, and ambitious, and under no one predominant and effective government, CHAPTER II. THE GREATER AND LESS.E.R Z.A.B. WE were delayed the morning of our departure from Sulaimaniyah (February 17) by the Pasha's insisting upon giving us a letter for the governor of Koi Sanjak, so that we only made a short ride to a village called Bar- mudaos; but finding this full of soldiers we went on to another called Challespie, a poor village where we obtained a sorry tenement with inhabitants more numerous than soldiers. The gigantic mass of the Pir Omar Gudrun (Mr. Rich calls the whole range east of the valley of Sulai- maniyah, Gudrun) lay to our right the whole of the next day's journey, the base of the mountain is so extensive. It has two great caverns in its southern face. One of these, called Desrüd, belongs to the Prophet, and those who are truly faithful find provisions supplied for them within its precincts. An infidel would, on the contrary, be turned into food for the wild beasts that tenant it. At the foot of the mountain was a village of same name. I found here that the westerly prolongation of the Mazaragh Tagh was known as the Abdurrahman Tagh, which does not, however, coincide with the names given to Mr. Rich. 302 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Formations of highly carburetted marls began to show themselves at this point, accompanied by thin seams of ironstone, and these formations gradually assumed so great a development as almost to lead me to expect the presence of lignites. We stopped this day at Khan-i-Miran—the ‘serpent's khan –after a ride of six and a half hours. A massive mountain called Se'rt lay N. 70 W. Abdurrahman range bore S. 35 W., and a rocky precipitous limestone group called Kam- chuka lay N. 25 W. of Khan-i-Miran. The temperature of two springs, One a running spring, the other in a basin, was 60°Fahr. (the air being 55°). This corre- sponds with what I obtained before, whereas Mr. Rich puts the temperature of Some springs he tested as 62° Fahr. At all events 61° to 62° may be supposed to be the average mean temperature of the neighbourhood. Not a bad climate, with wondrous resources for a peace- ful and industrious population. With such the hills might be covered with chestnut groves, vineyards, and olive plantations. These hills are, however, tenanted by both black and brown bears, known here as mangamar and gamesh. At Mosul they called the brown bear duba. Wild goats (chamois Or ibexes) were also met with, as well as the usual pests of Western Asia, hyaenas, wolves, foxes, and jackals. I found on my next day's journey (February 19) that the carbonaceous rocks cropped out along the base of the Se'rt mountains, and soon occupied the whole width of the valley of Kamchuka. They were, however, THE GREATER AND LESSER ZAB 303 - covered in their upper part with limestones, with beau- tiful red, and at times almost Scarlet jasperites. These formations consisted near Kamchuka of bluish-green marls, brown sandstones (often rhom- boidal) with impressions of monocotyledonous plants, ironstone marls, and sandstones and carburetted marls, and ironstones with small veins of calc spar. After all they were only the usual formations met with in naphtha districts, but with some variation, as the absence of gypsum, Salmarites, and freshwater lime- stones, and altered by contact with igneous rocks, but still I got so excited over them that when I came to a ravine or watercourse I got down from my horse and explored it as far as time would permit me. Apart from my geological researches, there was a good deal that was interesting in the longitudinal valley we were following between two ranges of mountains in a nearly northerly direction. We have seen that Mr. Rich attributes the foundation of Sulaimaniyah to one of the Bebbeh princes, who at all events gave to it its present name. But the presence of a ruinous mediaeval castle attests to the existence of a site of greater anti- quity. At the head of the valley of Khan-i-Miran are also the ruins of another castle called Kala'at Kaftan, which local tradition said was once a stronghold of Christians, and celebrated for its defence against the troops of Ali. Crossing the line of watershed where the waters ceased to flow towards the Adheim or Physcus, and began to flow northwards to the Little Zab, we came to a village called Sirdesh, with a curious walled fortification on the 304 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION hill side, to withdraw to, it would seem, in case of in- vasion, or to defend the pass as occasion might demand. But this was a mere remnant of local warfare. The valley had become more wooded, chiefly with oak. Springs and rivulets abounded, and their banks were covered with oleander, rhododendrons, and myrtle, whilst scarlet and blue anemones flowered around. Villages were to be seen on the skirts of the Se’rt mountain, some six hundred feet above the level of the valley. The Kamchuka mountain was too precipitous to admit of villages being built on its acclivities, and they occupied nooks at its base, sometimes in positions in which they appeared to be threatened with momentary destruction from overhanging masses of rock. The tombs of the departed were mostly placed by the road side, so that the passer-by might pray for them. Those of holy men were marked out by Sacred oaks, sometimes with offerings of rags, at others of jaspers and other St0rleS. Among the most beautiful of the villages was Kam- chuka itself. It stood at the bottom of a dark and narrow ravine, a perpendicular cliff rising some thou- sand feet above it. At the base of the cliff a turreted castle, now in ruins, stands upon a crag jutting upon the ravine, whilst a solitary square tower or fortalice stood upon a rocky reef beyond, and several other de- tached round towers occupied equally picturesque positions. These castellated rocks are known as Surdashi, and according to tradition the ruins, like those of Sulai- maniyah and Kala'at Kaftan, belong to a time when the THE GREATER AND LESSER ZAB 305 country was inhabited by Christians. The present in- habitants were, however, Kurds of high caste, wearing red turbans with tassels. Their houses or cottages were well built and cleanly, with pretty gardens, the fine long silky-haired goat of Kurdistan stalking along the rocky ridges within them. Kamchuka derived its strategic importance from being on the main tributary of the Little Zab river, and at the head of the longitudinal valley which leads hence to Sulaimaniyah. The river is here called Shat al Koit or Koit Chaye. It is also called Tâyiat, not Tahiti as on Kinneir's map, where it is placed far too much north and nearer to Koi Sanjak. It is a deep and formidable river at this point, and we had to be ferried across in rafts on inflated skins, whilst the horses were made to Swim across. The village at which this passage was effected after many delays and difficulties was higher up the river and was called Sertuk, but the ferry was called Dakan. The road presented a continuous ascent from hence for three miles to a village called Kalka Simmak, seven miles from Kamchuka. This was a large and flourishing village, with beautiful gardens of grapes, figs, and pomegranates, but the inhabitants, although trafficking in fish from the Zab, as the name of the place indicates, were rebellious On the subject of taxation, and the place was at the time occupied by soldiery. We were, however, kindly and hospitably ushered into the mosque, where we were much amused all the evening with the monotonous chants of the Muslim and their venerable mullah. The old man asked us why we WOL. II. X 306 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION did not join in prayer. After a time the son of the Agha of the place ushered in a train of servants, bring- ing in refreshments without any interruption to prayers. These refreshments consisted as usual of wheat boiled with sorrel, and oatmeal porridge, and we consumed the same without interrupting the other ceremonies going on at the same time. Our felicity was, however, of brief duration, for during the night a fearful storm of wind and rain came on. The dome of the time-worn mosque gave way before the blast, and we were drenched to the skin. I only hope the charitably disposed Muslim did not attribute the accident to the place having been tenanted by infidels. The temperature of an abundant spring close to the mosque, and where the sacred ablutions were performed, was only 58-5°, that of the air being 62°, and at an estimated elevation by barometer of 2,244 feet. The tribe dwelling at this place, and at this time in open rebellion against Turkish authority, were the Hamuana. A snow-clad mountain at or near the head of the Little Zab was called Kandil, and the country was said to be inhabited by the Bulbas Kurds. We were detained here all the next day by continuous rain, and I occupied the time in obtaining particulars regard- ing the Kurdish tribes of the neighbourhood. We started early on the morning of the 23rd of February, taking advantage of a break in the clouds, and followed a rugged and stony road to the village called Kala’at, but without a castle ; next Khirdala ; two miles further Sheikh Hajji (altogether seven miles THE GREATER AND LESSER ZAB 307 from Kalka Simmak); three miles further Kala'at Khan, with a circular mound of debris crowned with stones, but as at the previous village of same name, no remains of a castle strictly speaking. We ascended hence a lofty ridge of chalk, with at points gothic turrets of indurated limestones, sandstones, marls, and gypsum, and we crossed the range, which is called Kashgar, at an elevation of 3,286 feet, the temperature of the air being 43° Fahr. at 1 o'clock P.M. At the foot of the range was a village called Hajji Hasan, and it took us altogether three and a half hours (say twelve miles) to traverse the distance between the summit level of the pass and the town of Koi Sanjak, which we reached the same evening. Notwithstanding that the governor of the town placed one of his largest rooms at our disposal, it did not suffice to contain the number of visitors who flocked in during the evening. According to their account we were the first Europeans who had ever been to Koi Sanjak; and to my annoyance, for I was tired with the day's work, they sat Smoking and talking the greater part of the night. It is to be observed that in all the maps I have seen of this part of Western Asia, the Little Zab is made to join the Tayiat or Tahiti at Koi Sanjak, whilst another tributary is made to flow into the same river at Altun Kupri— the golden bridge.’ But this is altogether erroneous; the Tayiat is the Little Zab, and it flows past Kamchuka, to receive on leaving the hills only rivulets. There is no other river in this part of the country. The rivulet of Koi Sanjak X 2 308 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION flows into the Little Zab at Altun Kupri. This river as usual receives different names as it flows past different villages. Thus at Tayiat it is the Tayiat Chai, then the Serut Chaye, then the Altun Chaye at ‘ the golden bridge.’ The rivulet of Koi Sanjak is called the Koit Chai. I regret very much not having called the attention of Captain Felix Jones to this geographical fact, when I was helping him with my notes On Upper Kurdistan for a map of the limitrophal districts of Persia and Turkey drawn up by him for the use of the Foreign Office, but I forgot it at the time. The next day (February 24) we ascended a rocky range called the Hammam Muk, to some abundant springs which supply the town with water, having a temperature of 61°, the temperature of the circum- ambient air being 53°. The estimated elevation of Koi Sanjak was 1,770 feet. These springs were called Dermü. The range was of sandstone, but it contained ostracites and serpulites, besides other fossils. At the foot of the range were bituminous marls in which were freshwater shells—the first I met with in these naphtha- producing formations, although common in the accom- panying limestones. The limestones met with here contained chiefly cones. This was an uncultivated and uninhabited region, and we travelled sixteen miles before we came to a village called Susa, where a rivulet found its way through an opening in the rocky chain of hills. At a still greater distance (twenty-two miles) we came to another rocky pass, known as Derbend, and THE GREATER AND LESSER ZAB 309 having both a rivulet and a roadway. The entrance to this pass was defended by a small castle, said to have been erected by the Bey of Rawandiz in 1834. There was a castle of greater dimensions, square, but with round towers at the angles, about five miles to the north-west. We found a village, called Bomaspan, at the foot of the pass, and here we took up our quarters for the night with hospitable Kurds. A low country, with similar limestone and sand- stone ranges, lay between the Kara Tagh to the south, whilst the hills beyond the Derbend to the north-west extended from hence to the town of Arbil—the Arbela of Alexander's campaigns—and which like a hamlet of feudal times is really a congregation of dwellings gathered round a castellated hill of unusual extent and dimensions. As we had now descended to the plains, although only February 25, we found many plants and shrubs in flower, and among them the almond tree, a beautiful iris, and Syringa Persica. The star of Beth- lehem was in flower, but the asphodel still green. It took us six hours (say eighteen miles) to ride from Bomaspan to Arbil, where we passed the night to rest the horses. The next day our road lay across a level and conti- nuous plain (the estimated elevation of Arbilwas 742 feet), twelve miles to the village of Gunda-Shahir, and three miles further we came to another village, and then the ferry on the Great Zab. The village on the left bank, in- habited by Izedis, was called Kelek, or that of ‘the ferry,' that on the right bank was called Kafra. The rebel Bey of Rawandiz had actually built a castle at the first named village in order to collect tribute from all cara- 310 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION vans and travellers going from Mosul to Baghdad, to stop indeed the highway from Asia Minor to the Persian Gulf. It was high time to put an end to such preten- sions, and the castle was now converted into a peaceful caravanserai. Our passage of the river was attended by fewer difficulties than that of the Lesser Zab. The Kurds swam the horses, they themselves resting On skins, and we passed over on a raft also on skins. The Great Zab abounds in fish, and hence it is much frequented by pelicans and cormorants. It is a fine clear stream where it issues from the mountains, and where in after times I had many a luxurious bath, only interrupted by the fish striking against One's body. Sunday, February 27, we crossed the river Khazir, the Bumadus of Alexander's historians, eight miles from the ford and fifteen from Kara Gosh and Karmalissi, both villages of Syro-Khaldaean Christians, and the latter supposed to be the same as Gaugamela; and this portion of the plain of Adiabene or Assyria was cer- tainly well adapted for the movements of large bodies of cavalry, whence Darius was no doubt led to adopt it for his last great struggle against the Macedonian plalanxes. It was only two miles hence to Birtulli, or ‘the younger son, the seat of a metropolitan of the Syro- Rhaldaean Christians, and as we put up here and it was Sunday, we attended evening service. This was per- formed without the church—the men in front, the women in the rear. They shouted their hallelujahs most vociferously. There were no pictures or decora- THE GREATER AND LESSER ZAB 311 tions in the church, but the more devout among the congregation went about mouse-like, kissing various spots and corners in the Sanctuary and near the altar, crossing themselves frequently. There were two other churches in the village, but both in ruins. An old man showed me a scar on his forehead got, as he said, in their defence. Next day, after two miles' ride, we passed Kasna Teppeh, in ruins and with a mound of debris. Further on was another tell or mound of ruin, and passing this and the mounds of Nineveh we reached Mosul in three and a half hours; more expeditious progress, having made about fourteen miles. Ptolemy, it is to be observed, notices three rivers as flowing into the Tigris between Nineveh and Seleucia; the Lycus, the Caprus, and the Gorgum. The Greater Zab from its stealthy, Wolf-like character, the Lesser from its leaping propensities, and the Gorgum—if as Mr. Bich identifies it, the Taok—from one of its tributaries coming from Gorgum, Gor-Kuk or Kir-Kuk. Ammianus Marcellinus (lib. xxiii, cap. xx) says Adiabene derived its name from the rivers Diaba and Adiaba. Walesius, editor and commentator of Ammianus, remarks upon this: “I believe these rivers to be the same as are frequently called Zabas and Anzabas.’ The difference between Diaba and Adiaba, and Zabas and Anzabas, is, he goes on to say, the same as Diceta and Zaeta, Diabolus and Zabolus, Diarrytus and Zarrytus, and So it is with Diabas and Zabas. Cellarius (lib. ii. p. 656) discusses at length the 312 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION presumed Khaldaean or Hebrew origin of the word, now reduced to the monosyllable Zab. But the opinions advanced upon the point are not at all clear, and the play upon words is, as Cellarius himself observes very justly, ‘contortula, altogether twisted, forced, and un- satisfactory. If the province of Adiabene derived its name from the Zab, one would think it should be placed between the two rivers rather than above the Greater Zab, but Ptolemy distinguishes Arbelitin from Adiabene, and Strabo calls the latter district Aturia. 3 l 3 CHAPTER III. A FIRST VISIT TO MOSUL AND NINEVEHI. MR. RASSAM was a native of Mosul. He had not been there for many years, and we were received at his uncle's, a gentleman who held a responsible position under the Pasha, in most comfortable quarters. Nor did I, under the circumstances of the case, wish to press upon my good friend a hasty departure. We took our rest, although On my side, having no one to converse with, I must admit it became a little irksome before it was over. Mr. Rassam's brother, who after- wards assisted Sir Austin Henry Layard in his excava- tions at Nineveh, and earned so much distinction on his own account, was at that time a very young, handsome, and promising boy. Little did I think at this time, that it should be my fate to spend months waiting for the melting of the snows in the highest and most inaccessible part of Kurdistan, in after years, in such an abominable hole, the only resources of which (after archaeological explorations) are the mere providing for the daily com- forts of life. And these were in my time confined within very narrow limits. Meat was to be obtained, as also fowls and eggs and milk. There were also the vegetables of 314 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION the country, baydanjam, and bamiyah ; rice, maize, wheat, flour, and oatmeal were also procurable. But wine, beer, or even arrack, were non-existent. Nothing but milk in its various forms for drink, and coffee and narghali for dissipation. After a ceremonious visit to the Pasha—a matter de rigueur—Mr. Rassam conducted me over the churches of the place, Khaldaean, Syro-Khaldaean, Roman Catholic, and Jacobite. As a persecuted people the churches of all sects were built below the level of the ground, and were approached by steps and tortuous passages. This to prevent the entrance of Turkish horsemen, who often used the burial-grounds as stables. All, savethe Jacobites, acknowledging the Supremacy of the Pope, had pictures and decorations, but the Jacobites had few. The churches themselves were very small, and each boasted, in a country where printing was unknown, of the antiquity of its copy of the Holy Scriptures. One on parchment was said to date A.D. 609, and it was still legible. I had my doubts about it, but did not like to mar the pleasantness of my reception by an unwel- come scepticism. There was pathos to be found in the memorials of these remnants of an early Christianity. I was much struck with one lady, who had engraved over her son's grave his belt (a remnant of kusti worship), his little dagger, his ring, and his book. The ring is, and ever has been, an amulet or charm. We profess ourselves to be above such old time superstitions, yet we cannot wed without a mar- riage ring. I like Superstitions; they bind mankind together by little touches common to humanity, so A FIRST VISIT TO MOSUL AND NINEVEEI 315 small as to be scarcely apparent, yet wielding in the aggregate immense power. They have, however, little or nothing to do with the worship of the Deity, and they are baneful when they are in any way made to super- Sede that worship. Under such circumstances they become superstitions in the worst sense of the word; that is, superimposed upon what is due to the Almighty. The Christian who dies without the walls of Mosul is not allowed to be buried within its precincts. The Origin of this is probably half sanitary, half in contempt of the Nazarenes. Mr. Rich's medical attendant died in camp, and was buried outside the walls of the city. But the Muhammadans as a rule do not bury within the towns. There are exceptions, as every mosque, even in Constantinople, can testify. But they prefer the Campus Sanctus, petit champ des morts, as the French call it, and by a very natural anticipation of the future, prefer still more to be buried on the Asiatic side of the Hellespont. The Muhammadans too do not desecrate a grave by putting another one into it, and it not unfrequently happens that the necropolis is much larger or more extensive than the town itself. On March 2 I examined the marble quarries of Mosul, celebrated even in Baghdad. They are of gypsum, but not pure and translucent like that of Zenobia's city; the best is snowy white, others are bluish white and bluish grey. But it lies in solid beds, and not fissured like the coarse gypsum of which the so-called plaster of Paris is made. Above it are highly fossiliferous supra-cretaceous limestones—the genus Cerithia may be said to be most characteristic. 316 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION There is, however, notwithstanding the geographical remoteness of the tertiary beds of Mosul, a remarkable analogy both in the fossils and mineralogical structure with the Tritonian formations of the basins of Paris and Bordeaux, and this is still further carried out when we see cyclads or freshwater limestones representing the Meulière of Paris in the naphtha beds of the more southerly portions of the same vast supra-cretaceous deposits that include the whole of the basin of the Euphrates and Tigris below the Taurus mountains. There was at this time in Mosul a monastery and chapel that had belonged to Dominican friars, but they did not thrive, and their establishment was ruinous and uninhabited, but still respected, and nothing was allowed to be touched. Whether, since Nineveh has been restored to such popularity by late archaeo- logical researches, the Roman Catholics have re-estab- lished themselves in the place, I do not know. Most likely it is so, for the place looked as if abandoned only yesterday. The artificial flowers still stood on the altars, even candles and candlesticks were still there. There was a library of about a hundred volumes, mostly in Italian, and theological, but some medical. Attached to the library was a small phar- macy. The drugs were untouched. But most interest- ing of all were the monks' cells; so simple and so self-denying. The cell of the superior was the most superbly furnished. A wooden couch, a table, about two square yards of carpet, with a pillow, on which still rested a Bible, and above this lonely solitary place of rest was an engraved portrait of St. Dominic with a halo encircling his brow. A. FIRST VISIT TO MOSUL AND NINEWEEI 317 March 4 was devoted to a reconnaissance of the ruins of Nineveh, when I made a plan of the place, with its entrenchments and various mounds, which have since afforded such a splendid harvest of anti- quities to recent explorers. On the 5th Ivisited some hydrosulphureous springs, which occur north of Mosul, near the right bank of the river Tigris. A section of the cliffs presented no less than eleven different beds, the most powerful of which were gypseous. The springs, nine in number, were at the base of the cliff in bituminous marls, with mammil- lated limonites and hydrated peroxides, to the decom- position of which was due the existence of the hydro- sulphurets, which were deposited as sulphur by the action of the air. The temperature of the springs varied from 77° to 78°, which was above that of the mean annual temperature of the place. The north-east corner of Mosul, near these springs, but within the walls, is remarkable for being without habitations, yet higher ground than the rest of the town. On this Open space are, however, some more or less ruinous sites of interest. The most prominent of which is a colossal square tower or fortalice, forming part of the walls that front the river, but in a most ruinous condition. There are also two churches, one Khaldaean, the other Syrian, and both in fair condition. The church of St. Mary has a screen beautifully wrought out of Mosul marble. At the extreme point are the ruins of Mar Guriel, or the monastery of St. Gabriel. There is also a minar called Towela which is built or has settled out of the perpendicular. 318 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION The existing entrenchments at Nineveh, embracing the great mounds which have all, with the exception of the Nebbi Yunus—the traditional tomb of Jonah— been explored, must be considered to represent the royal and enclosed portion of the city, for the extent of these entrenchments by no means coincides with the statements of Diodorus Siculus, who gives to the city— taking the stadium at 332 ft.—a circumference of 9 miles 760 yards. The outer city extended probably along the river in the direction of Yarumjah, and on the plain towards Khorsabad. Higher up the river are limestone conglomerates that do not appear to have ever been built upon. The traces of ancient canals drawn from the Khosar rivulet are still to be seen. The allusion to a city of three days’ journey in Jonah (iii. 3, 4) is no doubt in reference to the time it would take to proclaim the fall of the city throughout its various parts. On March 7 I made an excursion some little distance to the south-west to a group of old edifices, including an arch called the Aiwan Ali Gedwin, nigh which is Al Ghelani, or ‘the church of the antelopes,' with a spring close by. Beyond a rivulet and bridge called Sehel, and in a recess in the gypsum hills was a ruined monastery dedicated to Elias. In the same neighbourhood are the ruins of Seramin Kasr, a country residence once in favour with the Pashas of Mosul, and below on the banks of the river is Shemsiyat, or ‘the village in the jungle.’ At a distance of nine miles from Mosul, on the same or right bank of the river, is the village of Bujanwi (Arabs who dwell in tents in the summer), and a little further on Kara Koi (‘the ruined A FIRST VISIT TO MOSUL AND NINEVEH 319 village'), close by which are some now abandoned sul- phur mines. These occur in the usual gypsum, bitu- minous marls, and limestones. The bed appeared to be no less than seven feet in thickness, compact and fine granular, at times crystallising in rhombic octahedrons. Wells had been sunk and galleries carried into this bed of sulphur; most were now blocked with fallen masses, but it is difficult to understand why so productive a mine has been abandoned. I had intended making a trip to Al Hadhr, and had, with Mr. Rassam's assistance, engaged some Arabs as an escort, but the Shammar were at this time in rebellion against Reshid Pasha, and had actually driven away the sheep from the very walls of the city, so my escort declined to undertake the journey. I accordingly changed my plans, and crossing the bridge of boats the same day (March 8), I proceeded along the left bank of the river to the now renowned mound of Nimrūd. About two miles below the bridge is the village of Yarumjah, built on ruins of olden times, that advanced on a point jutting into the river, and which no doubt once constituted a suburb if not a part of Nineveh proper. Three miles beyond was the Turcoman village of Shemsiyat, or ‘of the marsh, and three miles more another Kara Koi, corresponding to what had occurred on the right bank of the river. It rained heavily the whole day, so I put up for the night at a village called Uslan. The next day I passed a village with a khan, called Selami, beyond which the country lowered into an ex- 320 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION tensive plain, situated between the mouth of the Greater Zab and the Tigris. Nigh its centre was the village of Nimrūd, and on my left the great mound which gave its name to the place. Beyond traces of ruin which extended for miles around the central mound or mounds, the only structure at this time visible above the surface was a huge mass of limestone at the north-west corner of the mound, hewn into the shape of two parallelopipeds, the larger 2 ft. 7 in. On each side, the smaller 2 ft. 2 in., with a basin cut out in the centre. There had manifestly been an inscription, now illegible, on the larger block. Mr. Rich had previously found bricks like those of Babylon, and with inscriptions, at the same place. But, although each in his turn felt that an exploration of the site might furnish an abundant harvest of antiquities, it was never dreamt what colossal sculptures were con- cealed within so Small a space. Sir Henry Layard thinks that the Greeks on their retreat passed the Zab at a point lower down than the present Kelek Or ferry, and a ford at certain seasons of the year. This may be the case if there is a more fordable place lower down, but wherever they crossed it, it must have been above the junction of the Khasir, for Xenophon describes them as encamping the first day after crossing the river, and as having the second day a torrent, or ‘a valley with a torrent’ (Xapdèpa) to pass. - Bochart was the first to explain how it was that the Greeks came to call the site now known as Nimrūd Larissa. They no doubt inquired of the inhabitants what the name of the place—already at that time in A FIRST VISIT TO MOSUL AND NINEVEH 321 ruins—was, and the reply they received was La Resen, in allusion to the Resen of Gen. x. 12; and of this the Greeks made Larissa. Resen was considered as the commencement of Nimrūd's kingdom in Asshur, and hence was it also known by that name. It was also described as being situated between Nineveh and Calah, which latter must be sought for in the ruins south of the Zab ; for there can be little question but that Rehoboth Ir was the same as the ‘Ur of the Per- sians’ noticed by Ammianus Marcellinus as identical with Kalah Shirkat. Benjamin of Tudela also admitted the same identification. - Xenophon having noticed, with his usual minuteness of observation, that the plinth of the wall of the castle near Mespila (Meso-Pylae, as Nineveh was significantly called, from being the central gate of Assyria, and the place of passage over the river), and which by the dis- tance given corresponded with Yarumjah, was built with polished stone full of shells, Leunclavius and other critics have opined that the shells may have been sculptured on the walls, whereas it is a feature of the limestones of the neighbourhood that they are highly fossiliferous. Tel Keshav, a vast mound of debris, bore S. 2 E. from the mound of Nineveh, about four miles beyond the river Zab, and near the confluence of that river with the Tigris; Kara Kosh S. 35 E.; Selami N. 40 E.; course of Tigris N. 35 E. Nimrūd was seventeen miles from Yarumjah, and nineteen from the central enclosure of Nineveh. I returned to Mosul on March 10th, and found WOL. II. Y 322 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION that owing to a rapid rise of the waters the bridge had been removed, so I had to cross in a boat. The next day I ascended the minar of the Jami El Kebir, or ‘great mosque' of the city. It had two spiral staircases of 190 steps. The view from the top was alike interest- ing and comprehensive. Attached to this mosque was an old mirhab (pulpit or shrine) wrought out in Mosul marble with such refinement of detail that it appeared to me the most tasteful bit of Saracenic sculpture that I had met with in all my travels. On March 12 it rained heavily, with thunder and lightning, and this continued up to the 16th of the month. The Arabs took advantage of the storm to come down to the very walls of the city, and drive away sheep and asses. They even took away some linen that was laid out to bleach. A detachment of regular troops, who were returning harassed from the pursuit of the robbers, passed our house while the boy Pedro was standing at the door. “Oh !’ they said, “it is to your people and your clothes that we owe all our misery !' It is evident that they had not learned to appreciate tight European trousers, nor are they indeed adapted to the climate. 323 CHAPTER IV. NORTHERN ASSYRIA. AT last (and except for rain my time had not been idle) we were enabled by a slight break in the weather to make a start from Mosul on our homeward journey. But previously we had to go through the ceremony of sending word to the Pasha of our intended departure. The bridge of boats was still wanting, and no one was allowed to be ferried across the river without a teskari or permit of the governor or of his subalterns. Passing through the north gate of Nineveh, and about a mile and a half from this the Khaldaean church of St. George, we got to the large village of Tel Kaif, consisting of some three to four hundred houses of Khaldaean Christians, who, Mr. Rassam said, still used a Khaldee dialect. Tel Kaif was only nine miles from Mosul, but, as I have before observed, there is nothing in the East like a first start." There were two Arab villages in the neighbourhood; Bawani, five miles from Nineveh, and Bawaira on the banks of the river. I was struck by the head-dress of these Khaldaeans, which was at Once stately and antique. They had a church and they loved their pastor, always kissing his * Appendix No. 23. 324 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION hand at entrance or departure. They were also well to do, for I counted three hundred head of cattle brows- ing near the village. I had already found that at this season of the year Scorzonera sprouted out of the soil even in the pathways, with white shoots like celery, and I had got some cooked in Mosul. Here I found the villagers familiar with this delicious vegetable, and I feasted upon it. Starting rather late next morning, for Mr. Rassam was among his countrymen, in an hour's time we passed Tekiya, an Arab village, and then in an hour and a quarter a Turcoman village called Kilkee, the inhabi- tants of which were fond of storks, and even at this early period of the year they had come to their nests in numbers. Kilkee could boast of about a hundred houses. Another hour's ride took us to Benara, a smallvillage of about twenty houses; a further hour and a quarter to Hamsia, an Arab village of fifty huts; three quarters of an hour beyond which was Bakhak, a village of sixty or seventy houses, with an Oleander-clad rivulet at the foot of sandstone hills. We had hitherto found this part of the Assyrian plain tolerably fertile, although not so much so as the portion that lay between Nineveh and the Greater Zab, and abounding in villages at from three to four miles distant, with others to the right and left of our route. We had now got into the country of the Izedis, that strange sect who are said to propitiate the evil spirit with the sacrifice of fowls. We had passed beyond the village of Baydiya, when we arrived at 3 P.M. at the first village of this strange people, who are most nearly NORTHERN ASSYRIA 3.25 allied with tribes dwelling in the Caucasus, and whom I had in after years time to study at my leisure. The village was called Bahdinan, and it had the first of the characteristic sepulchral monuments which I had seen, but was destined afterwards to become so familiar with; a square base surmounted by circular (sometimes square) courses of stone, gradually diminishing in size, and the whole surmounted by a spire of stone, supposed by Some to be the emblem of Christianity, but, like the cypress with the Muhammadans, really the emblem of the aspi- rations of a common humanity to heaven. About a mile and a half from this first village of Izedis' we had met with was Graypa, a large Muslim village of about a hundred houses, with a minar; then Robar Taok, a village with a goodly stream of water, and lastly Delib, a second village of Izedis, where we took up our quarters after a ride of twenty-seven miles, although the inhabitants were very unwilling to receive us. The latter part of our journey had been, since we came to the first village of Izedis, carried along the foot of a low range of tertiary sandstones, limestones, and marls, with occasional valleys or openings with Small streams of water. This range followed a direction nearly S.E. to N.W., and the strata were very flexuous and contorted, but with a general dip to the South. There was only one spot in this ridge of low hills where some precipitous cliffs presented themselves in their rear, and where was situated an old Khaldaean monastery called Rabban Ormuz—not after the Persian Ormusd, but after a holy man of the Khaldaeans of that name, of great renown in modern Assyria, and from whom 326 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Ormuz Rassam, I understand, derived his name." The monastery thus situated constitutes a remarkable ob- ject, and is seen for miles from all points of the Upper Assyrian plain. g On March 20 we left Deleb in an interval of fine weather, but it soon began to rain and continued to do so all day. We started at 8.15; at 12.15 passed a Kurd village called Kawass; at 2 P.M. village of Urük; at 3 P.M. village of Asi; and at 4.30 P.M. the Kurd village of Turkasha where we stopped the night. These Kurds called themselves Slivani, and they were a very hand- some race of people, the children being especially pre- possessing; but they differed in features from the Izedis, who had narrower faces, more aquiline noses, deeper frontal sinuses, and less capacious foreheads. If we had reason to complain yesterday of the dul- ness and uniformity of the road, we were more than re- compensed on the 21st by a short ride of eleven miles through a hilly and picturesquely wooded country, our route turning to the north-west through successive gaps in successive ranges of low but rocky hills. The first range was called the Jebel Abiad, or Chea spi by the Kurds, both signifying the same thing, ‘the white mountains. The second range was called Bawari; the third Tiyari, from leading by Zakho to that part of Kurdistan which is inhabited by those mountain tribes. The vegetation of these hills and vales was mainly deci- duous Oak and shrubby evergreen Oak, but there were also pear trees and laburnum and almonds now in * As the O is aspirated, it may be Hormuz as well as Ormuz, but then we should say Harab for 'Arab. NORTHERN ASSYRIA 327 blossom, as also some grape vines. Gazelles were fre- quently met with, and this seemed to be the festive season of the land tortoises, for they assembled in groups, and kept knocking their shells together in a noisy IYla,]]]].62T. Zakho is a very ancient site, and it exists in the present day just as it was in the times of Xenophon, ‘ a palace in a village.’ Its old castle, although not as usual on a mound, still rises so loftily above the surrounding houses as to constitute not only the chief but almost the only feature of the place. Numerous storks on its battlements added to the picturesqueness of its appearance. The population of the place consisted, it was said, of about three hundred houses of Moslems, a hundred of Izedis, twelve of Khaldaeans, and five of Syrians. The Christians had two churches, one—St. Mary's—a modest structure, the other, St. George's, in ruin. Zakho is watered by a branch of the greater river of Khabur or Khazil, which flows more in the centre of the valley—a wide expanse of country, which presents a great open- ing into the interior of Kurdistan. A bridge crosses the first mentioned stream about half a mile from the town. It had three arches, the central one having a span of 40 feet, and it was 30 in height. The piers rested on masses of puddingstone or conglomerate, which at this point confined the river within two narrow channels, and which tumbling over other rocks gives birth to a succession of rapids and picturesque waterfalls of from six to eight feet in elevation. The bridge has received from this circumstance the name of 328 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Jisr Delali or ‘mad bridge, whereas it is the waters that are mad. The rivulet itself is called Moi Geli. Being a fine day I bivouacked outside of the town, and some Christians came to visit us. They were particu- larly anxious that we should examine the credentials of a young priest who had lately come among them after prosecuting his studies in Rome. As we were happily able—the said credentials being in Latin—to testify to the validity of the credentials, there was great rejoicing, and the young man was generally congratulated. I also took a bath in the turbulent but pellucid waters close by, but had to hurry out, the fish were so numerous and so combative. Some of these rivers of Rurdistan would repay the visit of an angler, for the trout are of exquisite flavour. Leaving Zakho March 23, at 9.50 A.M., our way lay across a plain some eight miles in width, the old Romaion Ager besprinkled with flowers, with Arab en- campments buried in deep shade by overhanging moun- tains, Kurdish castles On the Crags, and snow-clad peaks beyond. We arrived after a ride of about two hours at the river Khabür, which was swollen and so rapid that although only some twenty yards in width, the raft by which we crossed it was carried some way down the stream before it could fetch the opposite bank. The detention caused by the unloading and reload- ing of the mules and horses, which had to swim the river, was so great, that we did not get this day beyond Tell Kabbin, a village of Khaldaeans of about forty houses, and a church the interior of which was like * Appendices Nos. 24 and 25. NORTHERN ASSYRIA 329 a dungeon. As it was raining I was obliged to seek shelter, but while the people were fairly kind and atten- tive, the insects in these dark huts were too much so. We passed two encampments of Arabs between the river and this village, and the castle of a Kurd Bey stood on the side of the hills some three or four miles away. We started the next morning by 6.45 (it must be remembered it always took about two hours to break- fast and load, so we were up before 5 A.M.), and at about - 8 A.M., passing Tel Neharan, we finally left the plain behind, and soon reached Kalah Rubera, ancient Rahabi or Tur Rabdin–a fine old structure, with a ruin of more modern times in its centre." The ruins of a bridge that once crossed the Tigris at this point were to be seen in the valley below. Why it should not have been at Jezirah itself can only be accounted for by the fact that the stream is wider at this point and less deep and rapid. We crossed a brook near Kalah Rubera, and about three miles beyond the castle we were detained some time in fording a torrent swollen by the recent rains. The road was carried along the mountain side by a kind of terrace, below which were cliffs of greenstones or Dolerites, capping beds of Sandstone, limestone, and con- glomerates, about forty or fifty feet deep, with a very gentle and verdant slope to the river. In order that I might study these formations, for they were the first igneous rocks I had met with since entering Assyria, I left the party to follow the road whilst I rode at the base of the cliffs. Whilst so doing I came to a large cavern, with a spring, and basin of pellucid water in its * Appendix No. 26. 330 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION centre, and the place was altogether so inviting, that I prevailed upon Mr. Rassam to spend the night here, away from the discomforts of the huts of the natives. The morning of the 25th we continued our journey after the same fashion; the baggage mules keeping to the road, I riding at the foot of the cliffs. Just before reaching a khan, called Jezirah Khan, opposite to the great fortress of Jezirah ibn Omar, the Bezarta or Gesurta of the Khaldaeans and the Bezabde of the Romans, I came upon a motley collection of household goods and furniture lying indiscriminately at the foot of the cliffs. There were pots and pans, spindles, all kinds of domestic utensils, and no one to look after them. This filled me with wonder, which, however, was soon explained away. It was Our intention to have proceeded by the pass of the Tigris through Taurus to Armenia, and thence to the Sea at Trebizond, where we could have got a steamer to Constantinople, but we had not proceeded far beyond the khan when we came to a large village called Mansuriya, the inhabitants of which were in a state of great alarm, as there was a report of a general rising of the Kurds to the north- wards. I now found how it was that in their fear and apprehension they had removed their household gods to a place of safety, Over a mile from the village itself. We were not to be deterred, however, from pursuing our journey by a mere Cry of alarm, so after some con- versation we pursued our way. We had not proceeded far, however, before we met a body of Kurd horsemen, armed, handsomely attired, stalwart men, splendidcavalry NORTHERN ASSYRIA 331 indeed, in every sense of the word. They were perfectly civil, to whatever party they belonged, but they were unanimous in declaring that we could not proceed any further that way, or we should be robbed and plundered by the Kurds. We had no alternative left but to retrace our steps, and to use the rest of the day in getting Our baggage ferried over to Jezirah, making up our minds to proceed home by Diyarbekr. A few years after I had an opportunity of making up for the disappoint- ment experienced at not exploring the pass of Tigris, and I got safely through by Betlis to Erzerum. I may be allowed here to remark in connection with Northern Assyria, that when that country was divided into provinces, Arrapachitis was placed by Ptolemy near Armenia, Adiabene near to it, and above Adiabene, Calacine or Calachene. In the map attached to Cellarius, ‘Notitiae Orbis Antiqui, Calachene is made to include all Northern Assyria above Adiabene. The province is assumed in the text to derive its name from Calach, the Biblical Calah, and this city is actually placed above Saphe, now Hisn Kaifa, on the Upper Tigris. But it appears perfectly clear that Resen stood between Nineveh and Calah (Gen. x. 12), and if Resen was Larissa, now Nimrūd, So Calah must be sought for South of that site or beyond Resen. This confusion appears to have had its origin with the Alexandrian geographer, for Strabo, who speaks alike of Calachene and Adiabene as beyond the borders of Armenia (lib. xi. p. 147), also adds (lib, xvi.) 332 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION ‘Campi Nino vicini et Dolomene, et Calachene et Chazeme et Adiabene.’ It is to be gathered from this that several small provinces were associated with Nineveh. Cellarius con- nects Calachene with Calah, and Chazene with Resen. So also would Calachene comprise most probably the territory south of the Greater Zab, where the site of Calah is to be sought for, and between Aturia or Arbelitas and the Tigris. Northern Assyria would thus appear to be repre- sented by Arrapachitis, which name again is supposed to be derived from Arphaxad (Hebrew Arpachad), who with ASShur was a son of Shem (Gen. x. 22), 3 3 3 CHAPTER W. THE COUNTRY OF THE JACOBITES. A REMARKABLY lonely and barren region of hard lime- stones tilted up by igneous rocks extends from the Tigris at Jezirah ibn Omar to the site of Dara, and is prolonged to Mardin, whilst on the plain at its south- western extremity is the renowned city of Nisibis. This region, which it took us two days to traverse, is known by the name of Jebel Tur, an Old Aramean name for a mountain, which has entered into the com- position of many significant names, as Taurus, and we even find a relic of the same name in Mam Tor in our own country. It is like the Pir of the Khaldaeans, the Ar of the Assyrians and Persians, and the Put of the Hindhus (also met with in Armenia), a monosyllable that is to be met with in a hundred different forms, and almost as many different languages. This region was also included in the Mons Masius of the Romans, and Cellarius, op. cit., p. 622, places the Sinna of Ptolemy, or Syna Judæorum, which we subse- quently recovered at Koh Hissar at the foot of the Karajah Tagh, as south of the Masius. Strabo (xi. 359) describes it as Over or above Nisibis and Tigranocerta. 334 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION The first corresponds in position with the Jebel Tur, the second confounds it with Taurus proper. t There are some villages and patches of cultivation and verdure in this desolate region, and an ancient site, Hisn Kaifa, the Saphe of Ptolemy, and where according to Plutarch, in his ‘Life of Lucullus, the wife of Tigranes was buried. It has also a castle known as Kalaat Yusuf Aga, from a freebooter of that name, who was the terror of this particular district, and of which, as usual with the Orientals, he had tried to make an inde- pendent territory, till Reshid Pasha, who warred with equal success and intrepidity against a number of these quasi-independent vassals of the Porte, and laid Jezirah ibn Omar, at that time in possession of a rebellious Kurd chief, almost in ashes, also captured the person of the said Yusuf Aga, or ‘Squire Joseph, and sending him to Constantinople, brought the country into sub- jection." This infertile district abounds in wolves, and I was much struck with their audacity. They were to be seen when our party was riding along near dusk, ferreting among the rocks, generally two together, not fifty yards away, yet apparently quite unconcerned at our vicinity. What puzzled me most was what they could find to eat among the barren rocks and stones. S It was a pleasant change when, on Sunday, March 26, we left this region (not a very safe one to travel in), and entered upon the plain of Nisibis, ancient Mygdonia, 1 Tutha or Kafr Tutha, now Kafr Juza, alluded to in connection with the conquest of Mesopotamia by the Muhammadans, also lies in the northern part of this region. Mr. Taylor has identified the site with Tigranocerta. THE COUNTRY OF THE JACOBITES. 335 a name borrowed from Macedonia, and whence also Nisibis was known, among other appellations, as An- tiochia Mygdonia. Passing Tell Zerwan (we had slept at a village called Tell Sachan); Kunes, a ruined village of Jacobites with a rivulet; Ghūsh, a goodly village of the same sect ; Tell Hassan, Graymira, Tell Minareh, and Kertuit, we arrived the same evening at Nisibin, as it is now called, but Nisibis by the Romans." The fragments of ruin denoting dwelling-houses &c. extended for at least a mile or more around the central existing remains. With the exception of two columns with Corinthian capitals and three mutilated pillars in the rear, one alone with a fragment of its capital still remaining, all the choicest specimens of Roman archi- tecture have been utilised in the construction of an old Christian church, dedicated to St. James. Some of these fragments are beautifully sculptured, and are still in a good state of preservation. Clustering grapes and wreaths of vine, the tendrils creeping round the amphorae that held the precious juice sacred to Bacchus, surmounted by garlands of Imperial laurel, were here transplanted from the banquet- ing hall of Trajan and Severus to adorn the interior of an edifice sacred to St. James Or to James Baradaeus, the earliest propagandists of Christianity in the far East. It is not a little remarkable too that the churches of the neighbourhood, and especially at Mardin, which may fairly be termed the metropolis of the Jacobites, * ‘Ipsa Nisibis, sive, ut in nummis est, Nesibis' (Cell. p. 622). “Nisibin barbari, Graeci vocabant Antiocham Mygdonicam.” (Plutarch in Lucullus, p. 514.) Stephanus has ‘Nasibis,' and coins of Julia Paulla ‘Septimiae coloniae Nesibitanæ,’ 336 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION should have remained steadfast to the teachings of either the great apostle himself or to his successor. I copied an inscription which has I believe been already published, for many travellers have visited Nisibin, upon the chance that my reading may corro- borate if it does not amend, or what is more likely, not be equal in accuracy to that of others: . . /\NHTE , . HO . . . T C . HPIO NION |OYXO . . [TP6C - XTGEOY OTIOYCTIOYHA . . KEYYMAT . . OYCAOXENXEPO . . TEN HT E/\YTIOONU)N . . . . TIONTOYO Y Not far from the church and monastery of St. James are the ruins of a more modern mosque dedicated to Zin al Abidin, ‘the best of hermits; although not the first to whom that distinctive title had been given that we had met with in Our travels. A poor village of Moslems now occupied a site at the south-east corner of the ruins. The Mygdonius was but a small stream, and if, as history records, Trajan built his boats at this place with which to descend the Euphrates, they must have been very small ones." Quitting Nisibin, we passed at a distance of some six or seven miles Kaister, and two miles further Kasr Achmet, and at this point we reached the limestone hills which constitute the western extremity of the Jebel Tur. The ruins of Dara, a city celebrated in the wars of the Romans and Parthians, are situated in a secluded glen in these hills, and as the place is mentioned in * Appendix No. 28. THE COUNTRY OF THE JACOBITES 337 the ‘Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography’ as unexplored, I shall enter upon a brief description of what remains of the place. - The glen or valley in which the ruins are situated is watered by a rivulet, and the care and trouble devoted to the protection and maintenance of these waters showed that in such a place the inhabitants were dependent upon them for their existence. This rivulet, which in the month of March had a fair body of water—a goodly rivulet indeed, and one of the sources of the Mygdonius—had its origin in some wooded mountains which constitute part of the Jebel Tur, and after fertilising a small plain in the rear of Dara, still clad with gardens, it was in olden times received on entering into the precincts of the city in a reservoir protected or dammed on its lower side by masonry. The water was distributed from this into the city by four arched aqueducts. The same waters were collected together again at their issue from the city, in another and smaller reservoir, with a treble water gate. The principal entrance into the city stood a little to the west of the reservoir, and the road was carried across a rivulet by a bridge above the water gate. Outside the walls and close by the principal entrance was a massive sarcophagus. To the east were cliffs with sepulchral grottoes fronted by a wall with bastions, and beyond this, and Outside the walls, was a hill also with sepulchral grottoes and a necropolis at its foot. Beyond the bridge and in the valley of the rivulet was first a large building to the west, which we imagined to be a granary; then to the east, a small building the WOL. Il. Z 338 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION nature of which I could form no idea of ; then to the west again, above the granaries, was a large building which appeared to have been a palace; and to the east, a trifle higher up, a modern mosque with a minaret. There was a small village at the foot of a hill north- east of the supposed palace and not far off. On the hill itself above was a ruined temple, with domed vault on its eastern side, another rock-hewn temple, and a circular bastion on the hill side. On the top of the hill above the mosque was an arch with an inscription, and close by and below, on the eastern side, the water gate before mentioned at the entrance of the rivulet into the city, between limestone rocks, and defended by two bastions. The walls were strengthened by four bastions or fortalices on the eastern side below the water gate, as many bastions on the south side, and two bastions west of the principal entrance. There was also a modern tower at the south-east corner near the necropolis. Excepting the circular bastion mentioned as being on the side of the hill with temples, there were walls but no bastions along the South-west front till the principal entrance was reached, and from hence the walls and bastions extended along the south and south-east sides up to the entrance water gate, but not beyond. Hence the whole of the north side seems to have been unpro- tected. r There were, however, traces of a wall north of the entrance water gate, and a little above were the remains of a stone dam, and of a reservoir above it. Above this dam and reservoir, and on a hill at the THE COUNTRY OF THE JACOBITES 339 north-east extremity of the city, were the ruins of the acropolis, as also of reservoirs, which appear to have had a natural supply of water. The modern village of Dara is situated upon this hill, and its southern acclivities are covered with the ruins of houses. From the acropolis or castle to the cisterns was a dis- tance of 540 feet. The cisterns were three in number, in part cut in Solid rock, in part masonry plastered and arched over, 114 feet long, 11 wide, and 30 deep. To mosque 730 feet; from mosque to palace 240 feet; to granary (?) 258 feet; to bridge 208 feet; to water gate 206 feet; first outer gate 36 feet; second outer gate 36 feet. ," The so-called granary had a vaulted entrance 32 feet long, with three flights of stairs leading into a vast chamber 15 feet 9 inches in width and 80 feet long, with recesses, and the roof very lofty. This supposed granary may have been a hall of reception, diwan or divan, of the Parthian monarchs, but I never met with such approached by staircases. To the west of the precincts of the town was a low hill, which had three sarcophagi on the top, and beyond this cliffs with an ancient quarry and sepulchral grottoes, and a necropolis in the same neighbourhood. These necropolises, especially the One to the east, were truly superb, containing, as the latter did, many hun- dred tombs variously ornamented. One was divided into two compartments, each containing receptacles for four bodies. At the entrance were mutilated sculptures apparently of Ormusd, with the characteristic wings and kusti, a cypress, a bird, and minor decorations. Z 2 340 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Another of nearly similar character, only that the arch was nearly below the top line, had an altar in the centre and a pyraeum or fire altar on each side. There were two scrolls, probably kusti, one above, the other below the arch. There were mutilated inscrip- tions on both monuments. On the first I deciphered TITOKNAHE OK OTTONEO ; on the other, simply IMONHOI. Dara—or Daras, as it is written by Procopius– played an important part in the wars of the Lower Empire and of the Sassanian dynasty. According to the historian of the Persian Wars, it was raised from a village to a city by the Emperor Anastasius, who gave to it his own name and called it Anastasiopolis. We have, however, the authority of Stephanus that it existed as a stronghold long anterior to this, and was said to have been founded by Arsaces. It was in fact Persian before it became Roman, and was also con- quered from the Romans by the Persians. Procopius, however, gives a full account of the way in which Dara was fortified by the Romans, and which, Gibbon has remarked, may be considered as represent- ing the military architecture of the age. Procopius also gives an account of a marvellous fountain of water, whose Source on a neighbouring height was in such a position that the supply could not be cut off by an enemy, while at the same time it was distributed through the town to the inhabitants by various channels, no one knowing whither it went on reaching the outer walls (“Bell. Goth., iv. 7). It is difficult, even after an exploration of the place, THE COUNTRY OF THE JACOBITES 341 cº) to explain this statement satisfactorily. If the sources being on a height were in such a position as not to be in the power of an enemy to cut off the supply, then they would appear to correspond to the reservoirs, wells or cisterns, noticed above and near the acropolis, but there were no indications of the supply from these wells having been distributed over the town, whilst the evidences of such a supply having been afforded by the rivulet below, by reservoirs and water gates, are abun- dant. But then if this rivulet was supplied from a source on a neighbouring height, it could not be said that it was not in the power of an enemy to cut it off. These Dara limestones were exceedingly fossiliferous. Among the chief fossils were large Ostracites and great cones; also large turreted univalves, and numerous bivalves but of Ordinary size. It was a six hours' ride from Dara to Mardin, the Quito of Mesopotamia, but as there is a steep ascent up to the walled city, the distance would not probably be more than eighteen miles. There were few villages, although the country at the foot of the hills is rich and fertile. At the foot of the latter was Gur Harin, with a mound of debris; then a Jacobite village called Goldi, and still further on a village of Moslems with a tumble-down mosque and minaret, called Khozar. As bearings to distant and very remarkable points in Northern Mesopotamia, I may mention here that the volcanic cone of Kaukab bore from Dara S. 18 E.; from Mardin S. 2 W.; the Sinjar hills from Dara, nearly due south and from Mardin N, 70 W. From Mardin the Sinjar hills extended from SE. to S. 10 E. and the 342 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Abdul Aziz hills from S. 15 W. to S. 55 W. These were points from which I had previously taken bearings from |Urfah. We spent the morning after our arrival at Mardin (March 29) with the Persian Princes—Riza Kuli Mirza, Nejaff Kuli Mirza, and Taimur Mirza. The latter, to attest his well known prowess as a sportsman, as also to show his familiarity with European manners, for they were on their way from England to Baghdad, met us in the balcony caressing his dogs. This visit over, and it was much prolonged, as I had many pleasant reminiscences of their country— Shiraz and Kauzerun—to talk over, we rode out to the celebrated Jacobite monastery Deir-i-Saffran, or the ‘Yellow monastery, so called from the predominant colour of the marls and limestones. This is a very picturesque and remarkable site, as is the case with so many old monasteries. First, in a deep and rocky dell to the east of Mardin, from which it is separated by a rocky pass, is the village of Kala’at Marrah, inhabited by Jacobites, and surrounded by gardens and vineyards. I have little doubt that the monks of Deir-i-Saffran were fully aware of the comfort to be derived from the fermented juice of the grape, which their master had not forbidden, as well as monks elsewhere, before their more jaded tastes had taken to the concoction of Chartreuse and Dom. Ours is an age of ‘spiritual' monks, but not in the mediaeval or the philosophical sense. But I have really no right to criticise the Jacobite monks of Deir-i-Saffran, for they neither offered us wine nor spirits upon the occasion of THE COUNTRY OF THE JACOBITES , 343 our visit. They knew better than to waste such good things. Kala’at Marrah is so named from a ruinous castle, which occupied the summit of a lofty and precipitous hill to the south, about a mile from the village. This so-called castle, which is situated at a point where there is an opening in the hills to the plain of ASrab, is a spacious building, erected apparently in the earliest times of Christianity, and it is as well adapted for defence as it is for moral and intellectual seclusion. One would imagine, however, from its name, ‘Woman's castle,’ that it had seldom had recourse to the former. The rocky and secluded glen of Deir-i-Saffran contains no less than three separate monasteries with churches attached; one dedicated to St. James—Deir-i- Yakub—another to Mary, and a third to Zezail. Some of these buildings were more or less decorated, after the style of the Syro-Greek churches, with deeply carved friezes and uncouth representations of animals, crosses amid foliage, and tiaras or patriarchal mitressur- mounting scrolls, but without legends. The Jacobites are also more partial to pictures than happy in the selection of such. The monastery called Deir-i-Yakub, or of St. James, occupies a remarkable position on the face of a perpendicular precipice, and nigh the summit of the hill. Not far from this monastery, and nearly similarly situated, is the Deir-i-Sayyidi, or the monastery of the Holy Lady. It has greater claims to picturesqueness than the former. The monastery is in part hewn out of the rock, and numerous grottoes are connected 344 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION with it, open to day. The water ever dropping from the roofs is received in tanks or reservoirs excavated in the floors. The church attached to this monastery is reached by two apartments hewn out of the friable rock, and a gallery or passage cut out of the face of the cliff. . • , - Certainly, what struck me as most interesting in this strange and secluded place were the numerous caves or grottoes which abounded in the vicinity of both monasteries. They may have been some of them sepulchral, but there was no evidence of such. They seemed more like cells for ascetic monks. In most of them the dripping waters were collected in those ex- quisitely pellucid basins so celebrated in Helio-Arkite worship, and here generally fringed with mosses and marchantiae. The gardens of the monks were also prettily distributed on terraces on the sides of the cliffs, and were at this time of the year blooming with flower- ing almond trees. { To the north-east lay another valley, with a monastery called Deir-i-Kerikos which we did not visit, and near it a fertile valley with a Jacobite village called Benabi. The whole of the Jebel Tur, or Mount Masius, appears to have been once in the possession of these sectarians, and the patriarch gave me a list of the principal villages having churches, now however mostly in ruin. . . The monks of Deir-i-Yakub, which is the principal monastery, preserve a calendar which dates anterior to the times of Abū-l-faraj, better known as Abulpharagius, and who was a patriarch at the monastery. This THE COUNTRY OF THE JACOBITES 345 calendar is divided into three columns. The first is devoted to theology and ecclesiastical affairs, the second column to history, and the third to the progress of literature and philosophy. As a specimen of the work I copied, with Mr. Rassam's assistance, a list of the kings of Nineveh. (1) Ninus, contemporary of Abraham ; (2) Damaus; (3) Belaus, contemporary with Jacob ; (4) Manklus, epoch of the Egyptian bondage ; (5) Skatris; (6) Amontis, epoch of Moses and of Ramsis (Rameses); (7) Alapris; (8) Sempirichus; (9) Susarmus, epoch of Habeh Malik in Israel; (10) Metrus; (11) Totanis, contemporary of Nahir in Israel; (12) Totanus, contemporary of the Roman Demopon (Domitian P).’ And yet Abū-l-faraj may have had this record under his eyes! No doubt, like all good patriarchs, he did not wish to disturb the legendary history of the worthy monks who had preceded him. It would be amusing to peruse the modern history of the progress of literature and philosophy in this recondite manuscript. The fact, however, of Jacobite monks keeping up a record of the kind is interesting. How much are we indebted to the monasteries of the middle ages for records of the history of bygone times | The limestones of Deir-i-Saffran were fissile and friable, and of a straw-yellow colour, and apparently non-fossiliferous. But I was shown at Mardin large Ostracites and other shells, as also the teeth of a shark, said to have been obtained from the summit of hills to the eastwards. I also observed one bed that was full of miliolites, like an Oolitic Or pisolitic rock, and another near Mardin that was almost entirely formed of broken 346 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION and comminuted bivalve shells. Near the east gate of Mardin the rocks abounded in botryoidal haematite or limonite, and ironstone in veins. The castle and town of Mardin are built upon the same yellow limestone, with fissile and argillaceous beds beneath ; the whole repose on compact and often granular limestone with Ostracites. There are in Mardin itself other sects of Christians besides Jacobites, and the Khaldaean Romanists and Armenians have also their own churches. The town was by barometric observation about 3,800 feet above the sea, and the castle some 400 feet higher. It is not, however, its mere elevation that imparts interest to this place, as its position on the side of hills which terminate abruptly on the plains of Northern Mesopotamia, giving to the inhabitants or the visitor a prospect as peculiar as it is extensive." * Appendix No. 29. 347 CELAPTER WI. THE COPPER, MINES OF ARGHANA. MR. RASSAM had a kind of roving commission from Mr. Alexander, one of the party who were so ill-treated by the Khazail Arabs, to purchase old coins, and I was not a little amused that, although none were to be obtained at Mardin, two or three Christians accompanied us for a short distance on the morning of our departure, and we had no sooner got down into a wooded and rocky glen than a halt was made, and little bags full of coins were produced. They actually had not dared to show them in the town. Some one might have seen and reported tales of secreted wealth, which might ultimately have reached the authorities. They were chiefly coins of the Macedonian era, and Mr. Rassam selected a few of the best. The bargaining, however, took up so much time that we only got over some fifteen miles the first day (March 31), to Sheikh Khan, where we had to put up in a kind of cavern, built into a broken-down caravanserai of most venerable aspect. The country we had traversed was more broken, and was diversified by fruit trees, poplars, willows, and ilex, also some almond trees in flower. Saturday, April 1, passed, after a ride of six or seven 348 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION miles, the village of Havagowa, and three miles beyond this, Khan Kajurin. A little beyond was a village called Koh Tuz or “salt-hill,’ and on the summit of an adjacent hill the ruins of a castle, of which all that I could learn was that it was called Kala’at Deir-zowar. Beyond this we came to another khan, also called Kajuri or Kajurin, then Khan Ak-Punar, or ‘white spring,’ with a village where we intended to rest, but being occupied by a Pasha and his followers on their way to Mardin, we had to go out of our way to a village at the foot of a tell or mound of debris, known as Towspen Teppeh. - The next day (April 2), we crossed a rough country of volcanic rocks (Dolerites and Spilites), with a stony tableland to Diyarbekr, Some sixteen or seventeen miles. We passed on our way a river with a bridge and mill called Charski, another village called Kajuri on the Opposite bank, and a large and tolerably well-built village to the north, called Kabi Koi. We adjourned, on arriving at Diyarbekr, to the house of a Christian merchant known to Mr. Rassam, and the next day waited upon Hafiz Pasha, at that time governor of the province. Hafiz was a man of the world—a Circassian I believe by birth, and brought up in Constantinople—so he had none of the formalities of the Turks of the Old School, as at Baghdad, Sulaimaniyah, and other places. He received us simply and without ostentation, although there were others present at the time. Look- ing at my firman, the fact that I was or rather had been seeking for mines, supplied subject for conversa- THE COPPER, MINES OF ARGHANA. 349. tion. Before entering the city, the road had taken us down to the river, and I could not fail to notice that the sands on the bank of the river were darkened by the presence of large quantities of iserine or magnetic iron ore in minute crystals. Mentioning this, the Pasha at once sent for some of the sand. ‘Yes,’ he observed, ‘there is plenty of iron, but how separate it from the sand P’ Whereupon I took a horseshoe magnet I happened to have in my waistcoat pocket, and at Once, and to the surprise of all present, attracted all the iron from the sand, and exhibited it thus adhering to the magnet. Hafiz Pasha was so interested that he at once ordered horses, and we had to ride through the town and bazaars down to the river side, to see how much iserine there really was. On our return to the serai he insisted on our stop- ping to dinner, and as a mark of particular favour, he tore the wing off a fowl out of the pilaf, and handed it to me himself. - ** He complained bitterly of the heat of the place; the town he said stood high and was fairly exposed to the wind, yet it was hotter, he said, than other places further south. I explained to him that it was owing to the volcanic rocks of which the town was built retain- ing the Sun's heat. - He also talked a great deal about an expedition he was preparing to enter upon against the Kurds of the Sinjar hills, and asked me many questions, but not being a military man my advice was of little use. He told me afterwards at Nizib that he had been stung by a scorpion on this expedition, and had suffered greatly. 350 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION The Arabs and Kurds he also said were so cunning, that they would rob the tents of the soldiery whilst they were asleep. - I dined with the Pasha next day also, privately. There were only myself and Mr. Rassam, and he urged me very strongly to remain with him and take charge of the great and well-known copper mines of Arghana Maden. I explained to him, however, that I was in the employment of my Own Government, and could not therefore accede to his request, which otherwise would have been very advantageous to me. I was, how- ever, labouring under a very great mistake, for on my return to England I found that Government did not re- cognise my existence or my labours in any form what- SOéWeT. Diyarbekr, although a large and commercial city, and well situated on a bluff volcanic rock over the Tigris, had not a prepossessing appearance in the interior, and the walls of black basalt added to its sombre appearance. Nor was there any pretension to architectural perfection in its bazaars, serai, mosques, or churches. The chief of the latter were Mar Bethune, Khaldaean; Kirkur Javerik, Armenian; Sub Gregorius, Armenian ; Mar-O-Madra, Syro-Greek; Sub Sirkis, Armenian ; Surg Khal, Syro-Greek. The two principal gates were Bab Mardin and Bab Rüm. I obtained some interesting bearings from the minaret of the Jami Kirkus Nunli. Culminating point of the Karajah Tagh S. 65 W.; snow group N. 30 E.; and three Snow peaks, One N. 14 E., second N. 2. E., third N. 5 W., besides several other culminating points, THE COPPER MINES OF ARGHANA 351 I made the elevation of Diyarbekr 2,583 feet above the Sé8,. I also obtained, with Mr. Rassam's assistance, the following items from an old Khaldaean MS. preserved in the church of St. Bethune. Baalpeor, ‘the man of shame; ' Baaltishazzar, ‘the image of Bel.” Bel is Jupiter, so called because he is beautiful; Mosul, ‘Attur ; Athuria, ‘mighty people.’ I also procured some curious references from a work of One Jacobus Tirini Antwerpiani, and from Baluli's Dictionary, in which Calah was identified with El Hathr, Rehoboth with Arbil, and Larissa with Reshaina. The history of Diyarbekr is a long and chequered one. Ptolemy appears to have known the place as Dorbeta, but, as Cellarius points Out, it was better known as the ‘noble city’ of Amida. There is no doubt from the Assyrian remains found at Arghana, and on the Tigris above that place, that its existence dates from the earliest historical times. On my second journey, after an examination of Se’rt (from Kert, also written Gerd and Kerta, and even Karta as in Carthage, and equivalent to polis, ‘a city'), and a careful study of the movements of Lucullus on the One side and of Tigranes on the other, I came to the conclusion that the city known after the latter as TigranOcerta was not Se'rt but Diyar- bekr. Mr. Taylor, however, believes the oft-disputed site of Tigranocerta to be represented by ruins at |Kafr juz, near the Jacobite town of Madiyat in the Masius. Its Muhammadan name is simply that of a Diyar or province distinct from other Diyars in Meso- potamia, as Diyarbekr. 352 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION It was not till April 5 that I could get my ex- cellent friend Hafiz Pasha to write out my firman for further progress. He did not like my leaving at all, and little did either of us think at that time that we should meet again in the battle-field of Nizib. The preliminaries were at length got through, a firman was made Out, an Officer appointed to accompany us to Arghana Maden, post horses were to be impressed (not paid for—Turkish fashion), and a horse given to us as a present for the Pasha of Siwas. It is one of the curses of the country that anyone travelling on official business, down to the kawasses and bashi-bazuks, especially when acting as tax-gatherers, are lodged and boarded at the expense of the villagers. Hence it is that they are often unwilling to receive travellers who are willing to pay for their accommodation, for they are unaccustomed to fair treatment. The fact that we, though Christians, carried arms, had rather a deterrent effect than otherwise, as they deemed us to be officials; but on the other hand it delighted the Christian villagers, who were proud to see their co-religionists independent and armed like Mussulmans, nor would there have been any safety without. The Pashas cannot disarm the Arabs or Kurds, but they often forbid their entrance into cities armed. Ali Riza Pasha took it into his head at one time to send his bashi-bazuks, or “men without a bashi, or commanding officer,’ about their business. I was unfortunately travelling at the time, and a set of more disconsolate rascals and vagabonds I seldom met with. Although dismissed with ignominy, they still insisted THE COPPER, MINES OF ARGHANA. 353 upon their rights with the poor villagers, for they kept their horses and arms in Order to obtain employment elsewhere. The bold stroke of Ali Riza was heard of, however, through the country, and I was conversing with some eunuchs one day that I was seeking admis- sion to a Serai at Constantinople, when hearing that I had been to Baghdad, they inquired if it was true that the Pasha had dismissed his bashi-bazuks. On the occasion of the battle at Nizib they held aloof on the hill side nearly a mile from the seat of combat. We did not get away till 3 o'clock in the after- noon, yet managed to get Over Seven hours' travel, arriving two hours after dark at a khan of Murad Sultan's, commonly known as Sherbet Khan, or the khan where sherbet was Once to be obtained. Our way lay still mainly across rude volcanic rocks, and there were traces of a Roman causeway at intervals all the way. Five hours from Diyarbekr we came to a river, about forty feet in width, and crossed by a noble bridge of three arches. The next day's journey (April 6) took us to Arghana, some twenty-four miles, performed with stoppages in seven hours. About a couple of miles beyond the khan the black volcanic rocks came to an end, and were succeeded by more or less granular limestones forming hills, of which we had three ranges to pass over before we reached Arghana. These lime- stones were, however, succeeded before reaching that point by sandstones, breccia, and marls. Arghana castle (Artagera of Strabo and Artigigarta of Ptolemy) stands upon a peak in a picturesque valley WOL. II. A. A 354 TIIHE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION opening upon the Tigris with a rivulet in its centre. From the top of the castle Ziaret Tagh, so called from having a sepulchral chapel on its summit, bore N. 70'W., being a prolongation of the peak range. Mihrab Tagh, with patches of snow, N. 30 W., culminating point of Ali Tagh, N. 3 W., Bosma Tagh, with lofty summit covered with snow, W., Sakūs Tagh, with snow, N. 35E, Hussain Tagh, distant and snow-clad, NE. ; all these constitute part of the Ali Tagh or ancient Niphates ; Kala'at Tagh, E. On the latter, composed of red marls and limestones. was a sepulchral chapel called Dul-Kaphar, claimed by the Christians, but in possession of the Muslims. At the southern extremity of the same hill was an Armenian monastery dedicated to Mary. There is a sculpture over the doorway, and the interior was richly decorated with tiles and the usual barba- resque paintings and pictures. Altogether Arghana, without a town, is still from its natural features and many scattered monuments, with a history dating back to Assyrian times, a most picturesque and interesting site. It was but a short ride of five hours, or some fifteen miles, from hence up the Arghana Sū to the mines. The direct distance is probably not more than six miles. A small river below the said Arghana Sü became a mere brook before reaching the mines, and I saw in its bottom some powerful beds of copper, three to four feet in thickness, probably not worked from fear of water getting into the shafts, for the beds inclined at an angle of about 40° to the eastwards. The little town attached to the mines lay some dis- THE COPPER MINES OF ARGHANA. 355 tance up the hill side, south of the rivulet. It was said to contain a population of some two thousand souls, chiefly Armenians and Syro-Greeks. Each has its own church, and the Muslims had also a small mosque with a tumble-down wooden minaret. The director of the mines received us with cordiality. I did not come to supersede him. He had heard all about us and was fully prepared to do the honours of the place. There came on a fearful storm the even- ing of our arrival. It hailed heavily, with incessant thunder and lightning. A caravan was passing along the valley of the Arghana Sū, and seen in the deluge of waters, and lit up now and then by the vivid flashes of lightning, it presented one of those fearful yet pictu- resque scenes that are only to be met with in mountain countries. Luckily, it cleared up in the morning, and I was enabled to explore the mines in a cursory manner. There were eleven shafts or galleries carried into the side of the hill east of the village. They dipped at various angles from 45 to 65°. These galleries, with their rapid inclination, were supported by woodwork, and here and there were steps of the same material, except where the rock was hard. Some of the principal shafts extended as far as eight or nine hundred feet into the mountain, and they had side shafts or galleries, carried apparently as the beds of copper presented themselves, and sometimes establishing communication between two different mains. Four of the principal of these were known as Bostan, Gushma, Tiklana, and Besasta. A. A 2 356 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION There were numerous furnaces (the director said 200), and the metal was said to be roasted seven times to get rid of the sulphur, previously to undergoing fusion. Only nine of these furnaces had bellows. The great drawback is that the wood and charcoal used in the furnaces has to be brought all the way from Tokat ; a long transport which must take away con- siderably from the profit. I cannot help thinking that lignites might be met with in the mountains with care- ful search. I was constantly meeting with carbonaceous marls, and they occur even at Arghana, but I was not lucky enough to find workable beds of lignite coal. As there are no true coal measures to be met with south of Taurus, it is vain to expect anything but such com- bustibles. The wages of the miners were 100 paras, or 2% piastres, or about 6d. a day, and as they have to look after the furnaces, the days are often (by rotation) of twenty- four hours. Each furnace takes fifty baskets, each con- taining seventy-five maunds of ore. The mines were said to produce 150,000 maunds of copper ore. A maund is equal to 6 okas, and an Oka is equal to about 2% lbs. avoirdupois, so that the produce is estimated at 2,250,000 lbs. There is no faith to be put in such figures, but one thing is certain, that with proper adits and a more careful and scientific following up of the beds of ore, whatever amount is now obtained might be almost doubled. As yet they are not troubled with water so as to require the use of steam pumps. I arrived at Arghana Maden on April 9, and re- mained there until the 12th of the month. On the THE COPPER MINES OF ARGEIANA 357 10th I made an excursion into the mountains in search of lignite, but although I found much carbonaceous stea- schist in contact with dykes of diallage rock (the ophiolitic series comprising Euphotides, serpentines, and diallages had superseded the basaltic rocks of the plain), I found little to make me hopeful of success. On the 11th I made an ascent of Mihrab Tagh, or “pulpit hill' as we should call it, the director of the mines volunteering to accompany me. I found, however, little to reward the fatigue of the ascent, The forma- tions were most varied ; limestones with ironstones and spilites (last remnants of the Doleritic rocks), and stea- schists carbonaceous Or ironshot, in contact with dial- lage rocks. Imade the elevation of Arghana 3,781 feet, of Arghana Maden 4,078, but my barometer was not in perfect order. But on the 7th and 8th I took hourly Observations to get a mean. 358 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION CHAPTER WII. A BEAUTEO US BUT NEGLECTED COUNTRY. THE early portion of Our journey on April 12 was rendered uninteresting by the want of wood. After four hours' progress we came to a khan called Oja, with a cultivated valley and the village of Alenda beyond. Crossing a low range of hills, we came upon a fine lake about ten miles in length by four in width, with two or three islands, upon one of which was an Armenian monas- tery. The lake is called Gurjik Goli (ancient Lake Colchis), and only wants wood to be picturesque, for it is situated amid bold scenery. One snow-clad mountain in particular, to the west of the lake, called Azara, and anciently Minervae Mons, was remarkable for its eleva- tion and massive isolation. We crossed this day a spur of Azara Tagh, and passed from the watershed of the Tigris to that of the Euphrates. The pass was at an elevation of about 5,053 feet above the level of the sea. The lake was at an elevation of 4,453 feet, and the pass about 600 feet above it. This lake has no outlet, and the sources of the Tigris appear to be situated more in the group of hills at the head of the plain of Alenda, where the head A BEAUTEOUS BUT NEGLECTED COUNTRY 359 waters are seen flowing from west to east, and fertilising the plain. Mr. Taylor, late consul at Diyarbekr, has since dis- covered what he believes to be the true source of the Tigris, or of its eastern branch, at a place called Zibeneh, and in a cave near Eggil (ancient Inghilene), as also memorial tablets of the Assyrian kings, the character of which has been explained by Sir Henry Rawlinson (Proc. of R.G.S., vol. ix. No. 11). The Azara Tagh extends in a north-easterly direc- tion towards the Murad Sū, or easterly branch of the Euphrates, its prolongation joining the Ali Tagh, the ancient Niphates, and numerous rivulets flow from its acclivities to the east and south-east, constituting the remotest sources of the Tigris, but it would be diffi- cult to say, without a careful topographical Survey, which among them is the most remote. On our descent from the spur of the Azara Tagh, we came upon a new Country, Constituting part of ancient Sophene, a nearly level and fertile plain of great extent, watered by a tributary to the Murad Sü, and now known as the Kharput Dawassi, from the town of that name. This great plain is bounded to the north by the Kush Tagh, and to the south by the Dawa Boini; it is dotted with villages, chiefly of industrious Armenians, but also of a Christian sect who called themselves Assuri (as if they claimed to be descendants of the Assyrians). They speak Armenian and Turkish, but belong to the Jacobite persuasion. The villages in the Kharput Dawassi are said in Oriental hyperbole to be 200 in number. They are, 360 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION however, very numerous, and are mostly surrounded by gardens, orchards, and vineyards. Here (a rare thing in Western Asia) we saw bullock carts in common use. We passed the night at one of these villages, called Kunk, and the next day had but a short ride to Kharput, the chief town of the district, although the seat of the Turkish government is at a village called Mazara, about a mile and a half from some barracks recently built upon the plain, below Kharput itself. Kharput stands in a most picturesque position upon the side of a conical hill rising out of the plain. It stretched from nigh the summit of the hill down into a narrow ravine which lay between it and another hill. On the west side of this ravine were the remains of the old castle of Arsomasata, the portals of which, with a covered way and passages, were still perfect, but the walls were very ruinous and dilapidated. At the foot of the castle is a suburb called Serik. The town is chiefly inhabited by Armenians, who have great repute as workers in copper, iron, and silver. The name of this ancient Armenian city and strong- hold is variously written. Polybius calls it Armosata; Pliny also calls it Armosata, and places it near the Eu- phrates, with Carcathiocerta on the Tigris. Polybius says it is half way between the Tigris and Euphrates. Ptolemy calls it Arsomosata. Artageras or Artagigarte lay, according to the same authority, between Armosata and Tigranocerta. Carcathiocerta was, according to Pliny, in Sophene, but near the Tigris—a point, however, upon which Cellarius differs, as he argues that Sophene did not extend to the latter river." * Appendix No. 30. A BEAUTEOUS BUT NEGLECTED COUNTRY 36]. Cedrenus (“Hist. Comp., ii. p. 686) notices this ancient stronghold under the name of Karpote. It was called by the Syrians Khurtbist (D’Anville writes it Charbist; D'Herbelot, Khartabist; and Asseman, Harebaret). There are reminiscences attached to the place which belong to the time of the Crusades. The two chiefs, Baldwin de Bourg, Count of Edessa, and Jocelyn de Courtnay, having been made prisoners by Sikman ibn Artuk, Jocelyn was imprisoned at Hisn Kaifa on the Tigris, and Baldwin at Mosul. After being liberated, they were again made prisoners with Waleran, a kinsman of Jocelyn's, and all three were incarcerated at Kharput, whence they were set at liberty by a valiant band of Armenians from Behesni. Balak, grandson of Artuk, having recaptured the castle, he destroyed, according to Matthew of Edessa, who is corroborated by Abū-l-fada, all his prisoners, con- sisting of sixty-five men and eighty ‘beautiful ladies, by throwing them over the battlements into the plain below. The castle of Kharput has thus a melancholy interest attached to it, even in the eyes of Europeans; and when we consider that these regions were the great battlefields between the Romans and Persians during the early centuries of the Christian era, that it was across these hilly districts that the frontiers of the two kingdoms ran, and that there were constant sieges of forts along its whole extent, which have been only partially recorded by the historians of the Lower Empire, its walls would, if they could speak, relate probably many another sad and dismal story. We descended from a low ridge north-west of 362 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION the plain of Kharput Dawasi to the valley of Kul- waneh, watered by a tributary to the Murad Sü, with several villages and gardens, and bounded by a range called Arkut. From this we passed over other hills to a very pretty village called Khutal, situated in a ravine with a brook, and where we passed the night. I found the elevation of our house on the hillside at Kharput to be 5,032 feet, whilst that of Khutal was only 4,086 feet; yet I obtained bearings of Azara Tagh S. 40 E. and of Ali Tagh N. 65 E. There was also a mountain range to the north-west called Azi Kur, the culminating point of which bore N. 15 W. The following day (April 15) our way lay along a ravine with a mountain stream in its centre, with lofty mountains on both sides, those to the right hand tower- ing up some thousand feet above the ravine. The country opened a little, but very little, before we reached Kapan Maden or Maden Gumush, the celebrated silver mines on the banks of the Euphrates, below the junction of its eastern and northern branches. I devoted the whole of the next day to the explora- tion of these mines. I found the base of the hill to be composed of a white crystalline felspathic rock, above which are gneiss and chlorite slate, into which the first-named rock protrudes at places, denoting an igneous Origin. The Second metamorphic rocks pass into mica Schists, and these are capped at the top of the mountain by Saccharoidal limestones. The veins of argentiferous galena are met with at the junction of the chlorite slates and mica schists. They become unproductive when they meet with lime- A BEAUTEOUS BUT NEGLECTED COUNTRY 363 stones. Steatitic clays and carbonaceous Schists are also met with in the galleries, which render their work- ing every dangerous—the more so as they are very inefficiently protected. The veins are accompanied by veinstones, and a variety of minerals of a very interest- ing description. One mine, and it has been pursued to the greatest extent, contains sulphuret of silver and anti- mony which is much richer in the precious metal than the galena. The latter only gives two and a half okas of silver to a maund of galena, and the mines are said to yield annually only 400 okas of silver out of 13,000 maunds of lead. A peculiar formation of reddish-brown metal with a horny texture is met with at the junction of the lime- stones. It has not been worked, but it might be so pro- fitably, for it appeared to be horn silver (chloride of silver), with an admixture of iron and other minerals, but still likely to be remunerative. It occurs also in dark-coloured masses, such as are met with above the native silver in some mines in Peru. We had, after being ferried over the Euphrates, a short but pleasant ride to Berastik, for there was much delay at the ferry. We reached thence the village of |Kurtik in a valley watered by a tributary to the Euphrates. In this miserable hamlet the chimneys were made by piling sticks in the middle of the TOOIſl. The next day we had to ascend a lofty range of hills, the crest 6,357 feet above the level of the sea. The Summit was in part Snow-clad, and there was ice on the pools. I observed here a pretty species of mustella 364 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION among the debris of the mountain, but could not succeed in obtaining a specimen. I shall spare the reader geological details regard- ing the very difficult country we were now entering upon, being part of Asia Minor, and I have given Sections with details in my geological researches in this and the adjoining countries. t It took us an hour and a half’s toil to descend from the last mentioned mountain of Berastik to the village of Karsi. We had to cross a mountain torrent in this valley, so rapid in its course that it carried one of the horses off its feet, but it was quit with a wetting. From thence we had only another ridge, not so lofty or so stony, to pass Over to reach the open and wooded valley of Divriki, the Cimiatene of old. The river, in its ‘thal- weg” a tributary to the Euphrates, was at the upper part of the valley only about forty feet wide and two deep. It took us altogether six hours' ride to reach the town of Divriki from Berastik mountain. Divriki is a tolerably large town, and is celebrated for its iron- works. The houses are mainly gathered together around the ruins of an ancient castle, the walls and towers of which were still extant. But a great number of houses were scattered over the valley, each having its garden with fruit trees now in blossom (April 21), and gave to the whole place a pleasant and inviting appearance, the Only drawback being that it lies low, and from the quantity of Snow and water is malarious and unhealthy. As a rude generalisation, it appeared in this land of rocks and mountains intersected by deep valleys, that the Snow lay pretty continuously up to A BEAUTEOUS BUT NEGLECTED COUNTRY 365 April at an elevation of 6,000 feet, in May at 6,500 feet, and in June at 7,000 feet of elevation. The town is chiefly peopled by Armenians, who do the industrial part, and Turks who look on. The ruling race have, however, several mosques, one of which was a rather handsome Saracenic structure, with a beautiful gateway. The Christians had also their churches, and according to the mutesellim or governor, there were altogether Over a thousand houses. I stopped a day at this place to explore the mines and neighbourhood. The iron most used in the furnaces was a compact dark- coloured oligist of specular iron ore, which occurred in masses of various size, and also in beds. But what surprised me most were the numbers of great boulders of ironstone scattered over the valley. I had observed them indeed the previous evening on our way to the town, and some of them were over a ton in weight, and looked like great meteorites. I was extolling the advantages and resources of the place in conversation with the mutesellim, when all he did was to complain of its poverty. I ventured to point out that its resources were not properly estimated, and as there was plenty of wood, manufactures might be established at the place; but I think his complaints of poverty were a mere cover to his perquisites. The mountain chain we had to cross on leaving Divriki was called the Dumbu Tagh. A river much more considerable than that of the upper valley of Divriki flowed through this mountain chain, and after four hours' ride we had to descend, and cross this river by a stone bridge. 366 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION As I was knocking away at the rock formations on the road with my geological hammer, I came to a sienitic formation which yielded what I at first thought to be decomposed mica, but soon discovered to be specks of gold in sitſ. I have often regretted that the necessity of keeping up with the baggage horses and the rest of the party prevented a more careful examina- tion, and I should also have much liked to have examined the sands of the river below this sienitic for- mation. The whole district is rich in minerals, and having put up at a village called Siliski, about three miles above the bridge, the inhabitants of which blasted iron in their huts, I was enabled to go out and explore, and I detected small veins of sulphuret of silver in a curious rock of pisolitic chalcedony. There was abun- dance of specular iron Ore. I also found plenty of iserine in the sands of the river, but no gold. I am not sure if some of this iserine was not titanic, as both minerals are met with on the Iser in Bohemia, whence they derive their name. We had to encounter a rather formidable country beyond Siliski, composed mainly of Ophiolitic rocks and limestones, with powerful beds of gypsum. The moun- tain torrents, swollen at this time of the year by melting snows, fell by rude cascades into yawning chasms, or disappeared at times beneath the rocks to reappear again below. We had several times to pick our way as best we could over these natural arches. After a ride of Some ten miles we came to a new watershed (I made the dividing crest 4,957 feet), the waters now flowing to the river of Siwas—the Upper A BEAUTEOUS BUT NEGLECTED COUNTRY 367 Halys. Passing the Kurd village of Singasi, which was walled in, we came to another Kurd village called Yar- bassan. We had a letter from the governor of Divriki, who had further, as this country had a bad repute, kindly sent a kawass with us, to the head of the village. It was coming on to rain, so Mr. Rassam and myself took refuge beneath an outbuilding whilst the kawass pro- cured lodgings for us. We had not been in shelter many minutes when the polite landlord of a neighbour- ing hut came to peremptorily bid us take ourselves off. At the same moment we became aware of loud and vociferous wrangling with the kawass and our mule- teers. Hastening to their assistance, we saw swords drawn, and our janissary in conflict with the people. A quick display of pistols brought about a temporary lull. No one had been hurt, and after a time peace was established and a lodging allowed to us. It took a long time, however, to pacify the kawass, who had been mani- festly ill-treated. I suspect these Kurds were really at variance with the mutesellim of Divriki, whose officials sponged upon their small resources, and we should have been better off if we had been by ourselves. They either would not, or what is more likely, could not, read either our firman or the mutesellim's letter. We left this village of rude and uncultivated Kurds on a very unpropitious day. It was raining heavily, but even this was preferable to passing a day with people who, if they did not rob us, would have insulted us whenever the occasion presented itself. We had before us the ascent of the Kara Bel—the ancient Paryadres—a lofty wooded range which ex- 368 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION tended far away in a north-easterly and south-westerly direction. At first the hills presented only coppices of ilex or dwarf evergreen Oak, juniper and Sabine; but above these, firs and pines soon began to spread all over the summit of the range, above the Snow line in April, and constituting forests of vast extent. The Kara Bel range is one indeed of great magnificence. Our ascent of this splendid mountain range was, however, calculated to damp the ardour of the most enthusiastic lover of scenery. It was effected in a storm of rain and wind, accompanied by thunder and lightning. Everyone was wrapped—Oriental fashion— in cloaks with hoods, and as the so-called highway only allowed of single file, there was no conversation to enliven the long ascent, nor, if there had been, could it have been heard in the din of the roaring torrents that came pouring down from the melting Snows above, super- added to the storm. At the crest of the mountains the barometer stood at 24,210, which, corrected for tempera- ture (49°Fahr.), gave an approximate elevation of 6,397 feet. The culminating points of the range did not attain over a thousand feet above the minimum of the crest. The Paryadres cannot therefore be called an Alpine range of mountains, so much as a noble forest-clad range of con- siderable elevation and vast extent, and its recesses must present many a pleasant place of refuge in the hot summer months. The descent of the range was comparatively easy, and after passing Over Some minor ranges with inter- vening valleys we arrived, after a journey of ten hours (say thirty miles), at the Armenian village of Kutni, A BEAUTEOUS BUT NEGLECTED COUNTRY 369 where a good fire, for wood was plentiful (but the re- past not equally so), comforted us after our day's fatigue and exposure. The next day we travelled over a lower country, but of similar formation, nine hours, or Some twenty-seven miles, to Siwas. The Only novelty was that there were several lakes in hollows, but whether temporary inun- dations or permanent lakes I could not determine. The pretty mustella before alluded to abounded by the road side. Siwas is a characteristic specimen of the capital of a Turkish province. It is a motley collection of huts, only diversified by the domes and minarets of numerous mosques, with no public buildings of any interest—not even the Serai, and the bazaars have no architectural pretensions. - - The castle belonging to ancient Sebastopolis still remains, but in utter ruin. When I say Sebastopolis, it is because Ptolemy has it so ; and Pliny distinguishes Sebastia from Sebastopolis. The Antonine Itinerary has Sebastopolim, and Socrates, in lib. ii. “Hist. Eccles..,' cap. xliii., speaks of Eustathius as Bishop of Sebastea in Armenia. It is really in Pontus." The city is said to contain 5,000 houses of Moslems and 1,000 of Armenians. I should imagine the first, at all events, to be an exaggeration. I witnessed an amusing scene whilst on a visit to the Pasha the day after our arrival. It happened to be a day for invest- ing local mutesellims with gowns of honour. * Siwas or Sivas is a corruption of Sebaste, as is also Suez on the canal of that name. VOL. II. B B 370 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION These mutesellims or local governors presented a motley appearance in gowns and turbans of different colours. They would have been quite different persons seated on their own divans, and kept in countenance by the usual acolytes. The ceremony of distributing the cloaks was just about to commence, when it was inter- rupted by the entrance of an old fool, who no doubt was looked upon as holy by virtue of his folly. ‘Baraba | Baraba | you are welcome, he said to the mutesellims who were all standing, and shaking a stick with bells attached to it at them. The antiquarian reader will remember that this was a very old practice. The variously coloured garments were, however, at last distributed, and each mutesellim kissed the hem of the Pasha's garment, retiring with their faces still towards him, a proceeding which was very nearly involving a catastrophe in the accidental overthrow of an aged and white-bearded governor of some local town. 371 CELAPTER VIII. FAREWELL TO THE ORIENT. ON leaving Siwas (April 27) we passed some interest- ing deposits of travertino disposed in ledges on a rivulet with grottoes in the same neighbourhood. Thence we crossed an upland of gypsum to the village of Bebledi some fourteen miles from the city. This, on a supposed high road, was a rather long interval without khan or caravanserai. Crossing a low range of hills we came to a more fertile valley, with a rivulet flowing south- west, and a village with fruit trees, called Karin, where we passed the night. Sea Swallows (the first I had seen since quitting Rahabah) of an ash-grey colour were dis- porting themselves over these waters. A prominent mountain to the north-west was called Yuldüz Tagh or ‘Star mountain, and as it had still many hundred feet of snow, it must attain a considerable elevation, cer- tainly not less than 7,000 feet. I found the temperature of a spring in One of the caverns on the route to be 59, which would express a low mean annual temperature, and in Such the harvest, from what we heard, did not come in till the end of July and the beginning of August. I made Siwas 4,762 feet above the level of the sea, and Karim 4,697 feet. But the open plain of Siwas B B 2 37.2 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION must be very hot in summer—like the upland of Angora—an extreme climate, hot in summer, propor- tionately cold in winter. The following day it took us four hours to attain to the crest of a range of mountains called the Chamlu Bel or Fir Mountains, ancient Sandisses, of which the Yuldüz Tagh constitutes the culminating point. I made the pass to be 6,867 feet in elevation. This mountain chain, with patches of Snow On the north-western sides, was well wooded with fine trees, and an undergrowth of cedar, juniper, and rhododendrons. At the north-western side of the range we came on our descent to a region of Saccharoidal limestones or marble rocks, which assumed most picturesque shapes, and accompanied us as far as the village of Bolas. A rivulet passed through these rocks by a magnificent archway, through which a coach and four might have been easily driven, and a precipice of solid marble rose directly above, some hundred feet in elevation. Innu- merable pigeons found a home in the rocky cavern below. This region appeared to be known to the Inatives as the Dela Kahir, or mountain with holes, and there were four poor villages within the district. We had still another range to cross before reach- ing Tokat, called the Kusanlish or Gorgu Tagh, and we were glad after a long ride to obtain a refuge in this walled city, in which the Armenian population must quite equal that of the Moslems. At the top of a ravine which led down to the valley of Tokat were the ruins of an old castle called Garias Kalassi. The valley of Tokat is larger and more extensive FAREWELL TO THE ORIENT 373 to the north-east of the town itself, but that appearance may be in part attributed to the great isolated mass of rock upon which town and castle are grouped. The hills being now covered with trees, and the valley occupied by houses, gardens, and vineyards, with a fine stream in the centre, presented a very different ap- pearance to the countries we had lately been traversing, and acquired, if possible, additional beauty in our eyes from the contrast. Tokat, the modern name of the city, is evidently an abbreviation of its old name Eutochia or Eudoxiara (Ptolemy writes it Eudixata), and like all the great castles of Asia Minor it has had a chequered history. I was not a little surprised on strolling round the foot of the still lofty and well preserved walls, to find some of those great circular stones, if they can be so called, for they were two or three feet in diameter, which must have been hurled against the walls by balistae or engines of a like description." The Armenians of Tokat manufacture a very fair red wine, or at least we thought it to be so, after being months without tasting either wine, beer, or spirits of any description, and at all events it was not adulterated. We left Tokat on May 3, and for an hour or more fancied ourselves to be in another country, travelling along a good road, amid gardens and plantations equal in beauty and verdure to anything to be met with in Europe. The only difference—and a great one it was— was, that there were nojoyous peasantry, no Smiling coun- tenances, to gladden the scene; the same ever Scowling, * Appendix No. 31. 374. THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION discontented look of a people trod down by tyrannous exactions; and above all, no fair peasant girls. The women in the East are treated as if they were a part of humanity, but certainly not a part of the living nature around them. Quitting the beautiful valley of Tokat, we had to ascend a steep mountain range, but clad with oak and pine, and which led to a still more diversified country, with beech, alder, and Sycamore, and numerous wild pear and apple trees. At the end of six hours' travel we arrived at Sarpin, a village of charcoal burners for the mines of Arghana, and near here I visited, at the request of the Pasha of Siwas, who had sent a kawass with us as a guide to the place, a supposed mine situated in a ravine and near a village called Kara-tabin, but found nothing beyond translucent mica uniformly disseminated, and which, discoloured and decomposed, had given origin to the idea of a mine of precious metals. There were also garnets and cubical pyrites in the same formation, which occupied the greater part of the district known as that of Gaban. On May 4 we travelled six hours across a rocky but wooded country to Turkhal. Many flowers en- livened the woods, most of which, as primroses, butter- cups, and Coltsfoot, constituted pleasant reminiscences of home. - Turkhal is remarkable for a castellated rock of lime- stone lying on mica schist, which does not like that of Tokat almost block up the valley, but rises like a pinnacle in its centre. The castle is very ruinous, and the little town at its foot poor and dirty. The Tokat FAREWELL TO THE ORIENT 375 river flows past at its foot. This old castle appears to represent the site of Gaziura or Gazióura. On the Iris, South of Amasia. Following the river for some distance we came to a ravine, in part artificially widened, with a guard-house, and some implement of torture like our stocks outside, as an insignia of Office. Passing this, and crossing an- other, we came to a fertile valley with several villages, at one of which, called Asin Burghu, we put up for the night, having, with change of horses at Turkhal, ridden thirteen hours. The country in the valley of the Iris kept improving as we travelled the next day toward Amasia. There were villages with tiled cottages, gardens, orchards, and those mulberry plantations which give Origin to the celebrity of the place as a manufactory of silk. But Amasia itself stands in a rocky ravine, where the bed of the river, turning to the north-east, is narrowed, whilst bold limestone rocks, castellated on their summit, and with vast sepulchral grottoes On their precipitous face, front the town, which itself Occupies a lower position on the banks of the river, and on its southern side, but beyond a rocky point, along which an aqueduct is carried attributed by the natives to Rustam, their favourite hero of romance. Mr. Hamilton has, in his “Travels in Asia Minor, described the ancient tombs of the kings of Pontus that present themselves on the face of the precipice, so it is needless to enter into details here. With a descent of some thousand feet, we came now to a spot where roses were in bloom and cherries ripe. The mutesellim assigned us a 376 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION house next to his own, where we had a balcony over- looking a river, and we were in clover in this strangely situated but most interesting place." - A long but not steep ascent from the valley of the Iris led us to the great plain, or rather upland of Marzivan, ancient Rhazemon, with a town of same name, inhabited chiefly by Armenians who work in copper. It took us six hours (eight by caravan) to reach the town, which was prettily embosomed in walnut trees. Every day's journey in Asia Minor, when it is not carried in an easterly or westerly direction, but either directly north or to the north-west or north-east, and vice versä, is one of ascents and descents, and according to rule we descended on May 7, by rocky ridges, past the large village of Hajji Koi, to a well-known caravanserai called Menzil Kushiki. I heard of mines of argentiferous galena in these mountains, said to produce 144 okas of silver annually. We came to the same khan at a later period, after the battle of Nizib, when we fell in with a part of the disbanded troops of Izzet Pasha of Angora, who gave us much trouble, disputing with us the possession of the only little room in the menzil or post-house. - ; Our way hence to Osmanjik, on the Halys, lay with some exceptions on a descent by a ravine and valley, bounded by picturesque rocks. The road was in one place carried along the face of a precipice, and was paved in places to give it additional security. There was plenty of water, and some mills, but few cottages. Two guard-houses protected a wild region * Appendix No. 32. FAREWELL TO THE ORIENT 377 admirably adapted for Onslaughts On passing Caravans. Cliffs and caverns as well as sparkling rills diversified the scene, to which additional beauty was imparted by forest trees, some of which had fallen from the cliffs above down into the very centre of the valley. At length after several hours' struggle along this secluded but picturesque ravine, we came to a more open country, with gardens, poplar trees tenanted by storks, and red and yellow roses, and beyond these the town of Osmanjik, with its old and ruinous castle and better preserved bridge, the highway over the river Halys. The castle, or rather what remained of it, stood upon a pinnacle of limestone, and there were other pinnacles to the west which the storks had ap- propriated to themselves. The mutesellim was not only civil but hospitable, and as he insisted upon our dining with him, I was nearly upset by unwarily taking a table- spoonful of innocuous-looking sour milk, but which proved to be full of garlick." Crossing the Halys by its handsome bridge, the Kush Tagh, ancient Olgasis, is passed through by one of the most remarkable ravines in Asia Minor, not re- markable for its lofty or precipitous character, but on the contrary for its level, capital road, with perpendicu- lar cliffs on each side. It opens in its central part into a kind of punchbowl admitting space for a caravan- Serai, mosque, a few cottages, and even a small bazaar. As this has been the line of the ancient road from west to east from time immemorial, it is probable that the traveller is as much indebted to art as to * Appendix No. 33. 378 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION nature for this wonderful passage through the moun- tains. The village in its centre is called Hajji Hamsa. It was fourteen miles from Osmanjik, and as we had started late, and there was some delay in procuring post horses, we had to spend the night here. The next day (May 10) our road carried us along a wide valley with a tributary to the Halys in its centre, deep ravines at its side, but numerous villages, with some rice fields, and at the head of this valley we came to Tusiyah, ancient Dacia—a town of some three or four thousand houses, attributed, like its neighbour Pompeiopolis, to Caesar's great rival." We had a pleasanter and longer ride of some thirty miles the next day to the town of Kutch Hissar. Although it had rained heavily the previous day, the hills were still in parts snow-clad, and we had ourselves to cross a ridge on which were still patches of Snow, but the valley, if rocky, was wooded. There were several villages and much cultivation on the way, and here and there a guard-house built of logs, and looking like birds' nests in the forest. |Kutch Hissar contained scarcely a hundred houses, chiefly Armenians', who were engaged in the manufac- ture of Angora wool. The raw material, we were told, cost ten piastres for two and a half pounds, and the manufactured material brought in from Il to 3!, per piece of sixteen yards, according to quality and work- manship. From Kutch Hissar to Tchar Kash (anc. Antonio- polis) was a thirteen hours' ride the ensuing day. The * Appendix No. 34. FAIREWELL TO THE ORIENT 379 country was getting more populated, and we passed on our way, first Urmarla, a village of fifty houses with a minaret, secondly Bujurra, a village of twenty wood houses with menzil or post station, and another Small village adjacent to it. Passing thence, another small village called Chiraski, where—a rare thing in the East—sour milk was proffered to us, we came to a site known as Kara-wiran or ‘the Black ruin” (Anadynata) where we had to change horses, but Owing to some trivial misunderstanding, the head of the village afterwards took them from us. We got on, however, to Karagilis— another posting station, and thence to Tchar Kash or Tcher Kesh. Before arriving at the latter little town we passed some columns with Ionic capitals—probably the remains of an ancient guard-house. A similar ruin was met with at a pass about three miles west of the town, and Roman milestones were also occasionally met with, as well as traces of a causeway." Between Kutch Hissar and Tchar Kash we crossed the watershed of the tributaries to the Halys and those of the Parthenius, and the next day we passed a marsh with a lake dotted with water-fowl, and well known to traders in leeches, which are obtained here in large quantities, and conveyed hence up the Danube for the markets of Central Europe. We were detained two hours at a posting station called Hammam Ali, getting change of horses.” Passing hence Bayandah, now a village of about fifty houses, we reached the town of Karadagh or Keredeh (anc. Caris or Caria) a town of some five hundred houses, where we obtained good * Appendix No. 35. * Appendix No. 36. 380 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION accommodation in the Menzil Khan, after a long day's ride. - ! We were detained the next morning (May 14) by heavy rain, and did not get off till noon, but got as far as Boli, ancient Hadrianopolis—with its many remains of olden times—situated in a fine open and well wooded, well cultivated plain. Here to our annoyance we found that owing to an outbreak of plague in some villages in the interior, a quarantine, Superintended by a French or Italian medicus, had been established, and we were detained the whole of the next day before we could get a permit to proceed on Our journey. Starting at length, we reached the beautiful little plain of Tuzcha, ancient Duseprum with village and post house, and the next day Khandak, a post station with a few huts amid wooded hills, and whence we descended upon the great marsh of the Sangarius, now known as the Sakkariyah, which although provided with a bridge and broken-down wooden causeway, was most difficult to pass, and waggons with buffaloes up to their middles in mud seemed to be unable to extricate themselves. Our post horses also frequently sank up to their bellies. A good turn sometimes brings its reward with it. Seeing that the tenants of a guard- house in the marsh were suffering badly with malaria, and being near to Constantinople, where I could get a fresh supply, I left a number of doses of quinine, with directions to take it with their coffee. Coming back across the same quagmire a year or two afterwards, the men recognised me, and they were profuse in their gratitude. FAREWELL TO THE ORIENT 3.81 We reached Sabanjah (Sophon) with its beauteous lake the same day (May 18), and the next day, after a pleasant ride, Ismid (ancient Nicomedia), and thence we got in a single day's ride to Scutari, whence we crossed to Constantinople, the end of our journey for the time being, on the 20th of the month. Crossing the Bosphorus with its ugly Seraglio, on one of probably the finest positions on the earth's surface, the domes and minarets, the gilded palaces, the red-tiled villas above the Arsenal, and the crowded city or rather cities beyond, all looking down upon the Golden Horn and its shipping below, I could not help thinking of Gibbon's encomium, that Byzantium was by nature formed to be the capital of Europe. But what a hollow farce is it in the present day ? An effete system, upheld solely by the rivalry of nations, each anxious that another should not hold the glorious inheritance, open to all Or any I had now traversed the greater portion of the Sultan's dominions in Asia, and I had seen nothing but indolence, poverty, and exaction—ignorance, fanaticism, and rapacity. As civilisation has travelled westwards, is, I asked myself, this country, so gifted by nature and so neg- lected by man, likely to be ever resuscitated P Great Britain lost its last chance in not securing the Euphrates valley as a highway to India, and the chance of restoring the ancient Empires of the world to some degree of prosperity and happiness. One of the next phases will be Anglo-India and Russia fighting for supremacy at the mouth of the river, which Russia will probably reach by the uplands of Persia. The sway of 382 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION Muhammadanism seems to be a mere step in the retrograde descent to the Savage state, whilst the far West presents the aspect of an evolution (no doubt so arranged by Providence), tending daily to a higher de- gree of civilisation, industrial, economical, and religious. ATPPENDIX. TABLE OF SITES ON THE RIVER E UPHRATES. FROM SAMOSATA To BABYLON. SYRIA Miles MESOPOTAMIA Samaisat. º Samosata, capital of Com- tº: mageme, Shot Mischot of 5 Talmud. E. Urema. 3. Urimorum Episcopw8. § Gok Sū. J. Simja, Cinga, or Cimgilla 22 Narsis. I'lwvºws. Amiana. Arudis. | Rum-Kalah. 24 Zewgma of Osroeme. Zabothra. Kapersama. Capersame. Urum or Gurum. 13 & Urema, 3 Tell Balkis 2} Ba'al Kis (Queen of Sheba). Balthim. Beth Baltim. 6% ...” Bir. Birijik. Birtha Bireh. Biraſm. Biremtha. Baris. Apamvaa, Zeugma. Port William. Jerabulus. Ewropus. 13} El Kayara. Gurluk. (Abraham's Pass.) River Sajur. Sarisat. 7 Cecilia. Ceciliana. Nesjm Kalah. 15 El Jisr. Thilaticom/wm. 384 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION TABLE OF SITES ON THE RIVER EUPHRATEs (continued). SYRIA Miles MESOPOTAMLA Mambej. Bambuch. Bambuke. Bambycé. Magog. Kargamºus. Raºrchemish. Hierapolis. Kara Bambuch. Iron Gates. Iron Gates. Sheikh Arudi. Fragiza. Erachiha. Balis. 30 Belesis. Barbalis8w8. Tower of Balaam. Paradise of the Persiams. Abū Bara or Abū Hararah 22 Kalah Jaber. |Hills. Giabar. Jabir. Ziabar. Dawser. Dawsara. Dawama. Dabama. Dabamas. Deir Mahariz. Sela Mödbara. Mizard Turk. Mežanº, Zwrwk. Turk's Burial Place. Wadi Sahel. Ethdeim. Suriyah. 19 Swra. Swºre. Ura. Thipsach. Twrmeda. Thapsacus. Amphipopolis. Rasasah. 2 Bridge of Lead. Pass of Harugla. Thapsacus. Al Hammam. FIeraclea. Hadjar Rassasi. Aemodotia, 8 Ford of the Beda win. 7% Rakkah. Nicéphorium. Callinicus. Chalme. Dakia. ARABLA MESOPOTAMIA IBalik Sū. The Palmyrean Bilecha. Basilius Fluvius. Solitudes. Royal River. Plain of Siffin. Forest of Amran. Campus Barbaricus. Resapha. Sergiopolis. Zurbuk. Muhaila. Al Kebir Munaka. 364 Abū Sayyid. Bushir or Abū Shehr Hills. APPENDIX 385 TABLE OF SITES ON THE RIVER EUPHRATEs (continued). ARABIA Miles MESOPOTAMIA Zelebe. Zilba. 28 Zemobia. Castle of Riba. Deir Farinum. Sur al Hamar. Thillada—Mirrhada. Temple of Anahid. Tabus. Ain Abuna. Abū Juma. Shifat. Naphtha Springs. Deir. Deir Abuna. 37 - 22 River Khabur. Habor. Abom'ras. Rhaboras. Arawes. Rarkisiya. Rarkisha. Körkö. I(archemish, or Carchemish (Abū Serai). Kirkisiyon. Khan'chemish of Midrash (Neub. 354). Cercwsºwmv. Circesium. Zaitun. Olive Grove. Zaita. Twºmwlºws Gordiami. Tomb of Gordian. Dºwra, 3 Dura, Nica/monºis. Nicamoris Urbs. Mayarthin. 7 Rahabah el Hamra (the red). Rehoboth ha Nahar (by the river). - Salahiyah. 21 Saladin's Castle. Rahabah—Malik, ben Tauk. (LOSs of ‘Tigris.”) 36 Musa Canal. Masca. Ahava. 7 Irzah. Wurdi. Ezra. Corsote. El Raim. 6% Rayim. Agamma. Sarasis. 50 Rarabilah, “The Sieves.” 9 Rawa. Al Gulman. Al Karim. Kurain. Habuliyah (Castle). WOL. II. C C THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION TABLE OF SITEs on THE RIVER EUPHRATEs (continued). ARABLA Anah. Amatho. Amahid. Amaitis. Addaea. Phraates Gaza. Pacoria. Phatusae. Hema, 2 Kings xviii. 34. Anathw8. Anatham. Bethautha. Beth Awma. Bethawna. Tilbes. Tilwtha. Thilutha. Teridata. Treasu Akra, of Tholeban Is Hisºn Musala, Al Aghadir. Sheibiya (castle). Bajan (rocks). Al Aghadir Jera or Ac Jebel Habib el Najar Sarifah Is Tel Sertralij. Haditha, Nehardea. Nahar Al Uzz. Miles land a ry of T ke of R 7mah. 9 1 and Kura haicha land a Or Ha. 28 (River Naard 6 I MESOPOTAMLA | nd Bridge. Phraates Gaza. eridates. Olabºws. ab. Thelebanke. Amah, Telbes. w Wadi Sur. (Saocoras 3) Muharah Hills. Island. la (Ak Kaya Kaleh). Rullibah Hills. nd Castle. Abū Khabūr Castle. disa Island. ). 8. Dar (Dwelling). Uzannesopoli Baia.Smalc Eischina Hills. Dowaliyah Castle. takara. Dakin'a. Wadi Hauran. Kadjudah Castle. Al Jubbah Pomebeditha. Golab, Cap Imām Amis. Na. Al Kuraf (castle). Safa Madruk, lis. ha. B Island 11% Palºmb ital of was Isl riah r Island and Castle. ZZamesopolis. araxmalcha. and Castle. editha. Beditha. the Exiles. Tower of El Taim. and. Tower of Maliyah. Ocks. El RaSr. Hajar al Dawaliyah. Diakira. APPENDIX TABLE OF SITES ON THE RIVER EUPHRATES (continued). ARABIA Sheikh Hafa Hills. Ełit. Bitumen Fountains. Atopolis. Chilmad. Nafatah. Napacha. Naphtha District. Nachaba. Sawab Castle. Al Muhalli. (Twin Castles) Megia. Is. Ralah Ramadi. Charmamde. Rasºibal Hwbañra. Masjid Sandabiya. Besachana. Temple of Atargatis. Throne of Trajan. On hill OVer Lake Jazrum. Ozogan dama Zaragardia. Sura Canal and Town. Sura of Rab. Perath of Sura. Sura Sura (Idrisi). Nahr Sares. Maarsares. Chebar. Chobar. Gobya. Gobaris. Pallacopas of Arriam and Appiam. (Western Euphrates.) Nahr Sura. Miles MESOPOTAMIA 31 2 2 Al Asayah Lake of Pebbles. Agama. Akra de Agama. Nahr Agama. Naraga. Akrakanon. Acra.cam. Sidd Nimrūd. Khali Nimrūd. Median Wall. BABYLONIA Termination of Median Wall on Euphrates. Pulai or Pylae (gates) of Xenophon. Gates of Babylonia. Gates of Paradise. Massices. Macepracta. Sifarah. Sipwr. Tsipar sha Jamas. Tsipar “ of the sun.” Sephar. Sepharvaim. Parvaim. Sipparenovum vel Hip- parenorwm Civitas. C C 2 388 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION TABLE OF SITES ON THE RIVER EUPHRATES (continued). A RABIA Miles BABYLON LA Hindiyah Canal. Penrath of Borsip. Nahr all Börs. Reybella River (Ockley) Pallacopas. (Canal of Borsippa.) Cheban (of Rabbi Petachia). : 13 Hipparenum. Harpamya, at Kutha (Bewsher), at Mussayib (Rawlinson). Saklawiya, Canal. Nahar Malcha. Nahr Malka. Naam”valcha. Naº'yaga. Nahardaa. (Royal Canal.) Abar. Amban of the Khalifs. Firuz Shapw'. Peris-Abora. Schabor of Talmud, on Nahr Malcha. Arab Castle of Felujah. Abū Gharrib, or Ghuraib Canal. Nahr Serser (Abū-l-fada). Nah?' Isa, or Alesa. Isa, Ibn Abdullah Ibn Abbas. Ruthwamiyah Zimberaniya. Nahr Sarsar or Serser. (Canal and town.) Wall of Hub es Suk. Mahmudiyah Canal. Nahr Malikah. Nahr Malcha Saba. (Second Royal Canal.) Abū Dibbis. Al Kithr. Rhºwta-v. Kubah, Imām. FCutha. Kwth. Cwth, (2 Kings xvii. 24). ‘Largest of canals’ (Herodotus). Kham Haswah. Kunaxa (Bewsher). Cumaa’a, 8 Mounds of Muhammad. Mussayib. Town and Bridge. Moeb. Moseyb (Bewsher). APPENDIX 380 TABLE OF SITES ON THE RIVER EUPHRATES (comtinued). AIRABIA Miles BABYLON: A |Hebil Yama of Rabbi Papa. S Mahawil. 6 Nahr Nil. Nilus. Babylonian Nile. Canal of Babylon. 4 Mounds of Babylon. Babel. Temple of Belws. Nahr Nil. Mujaliba. Place of Captivity. IQasr. Palace. Amran ibn Ali. Hanging Gardens. Ibrahim el Rhalil. Al Haimar am Kalahah. Hillah. Town and Bridge. 4 Suburb of Hillah. Birs Nimrūd. (7 miles west). Birs. Borsippa. Bursif. Beresith. Borsiph. Barsita. TABLE OF SITES ON THE TIGRIS. WEST TIGRIS EASTERN TIG RIS A 7'ghſtºn( Sū Zibémeh Sū Azara Tagh (Mt. of Minerva). Zibeneh Sū (Sophene.) Dhu’l Karnayn. Two-hormed. Rurjik Kuli (Lake Colchis). Subterranean river. Cave and Castle. Madan Kapur (Copper mines). 3 m. below sources (Taylor, R.G.S., vol. xxxv. p. 42). Arghana (Artagera or Rar. Khar. Kerk. Artagigerta). (Carcathiocerta.) (Assyr. Sculptures.) Ralah Tagh. Monast. of Virgin. Ammanah Castle. Tul Kaphal. (Carcathiocerta of Taylor.) TIGRIS Eggil Agyl or Augyl (Inghilene). (Anchialus). Jubeyr or Jubair Castle. THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION TABLE OF SITEs on THE TIGRIs (comtinued). Rurkh with Assyr. sculptures. (Tukshan). (Carcathiocerta of Rawlinson.) Zeywa or Zawa. |Hish Kaifa. (Ciphar.) (Saphe.) Midiyat or Modiat. Mediath. Kafar Juz. Reffr Joze (Taylor). Tigranocerta (Rawlinson). Tutha (Al Wakedi). Jezirah ibn Omar (Zabdita). (Zozarta.) (Xurta.) (Bezabde.) (Bizabda.) (Deba.) Tell Afar. (Tell Al S'hair.) (Thella'ssar.) Eski Mosul. (Balad) Idrisi. (Balada.) Christian Episcopate. WEST TIGRIS TIGRIS IASTERN TIGRIS Arghama Sū Debemeh Sū Diyarbekr. Tell Allu. (Amida.) Butal Teppeh. Purdad. Batman Sü (Nymphius). Miyafarikin (Martyropolis). (Justinianopolis.) Arzen Sü. (Arzan.) Arzan. Emporium. Arzanenorum. (Asaerd.) (Mobadra) Radwan. Redwan. Se’ert Sa'art. Tigranocerta of D'Anville and Kinneir. Thil. Til (Taylor). Til Tillo plain of Mush (Taylor). Redwan. Rudwan Castle. (Centrites.) Buhtan Chai. Chelek or Kulak (ford). Finduk. Konakti. (Fynyk, Layard.) (Phoenica.) (Assyr. Sculptures.) Mar Yuhannah. Mansuriyah. IFenik. Rabdium. (Tur Abdin.) (Rahabi.) Tur Rabdin (Jiham Numa). Tell Kubbin. (Romaion Ager). Jebel Judi. JHazir. Pirishabur. IKhabur. Zakho. Jibal Abiyad. Cha Spi. Salub (ruins) Hatara (Halah of Grant.). APPENDIX 391 TABLE OF SITES ON THE TIGRIs (continued). MFSOPOTAMIA TIGRIS ASSYRIA Tell Ajus. Badus. Tell Escof (Ascuf 2) Batmaia. At. Maidat. Rabban Ormuz. Tell Kaif. R. Al Kosh. Mosul. uvuniik. - Musul. §. *u. } Nineveh. Rasr or Al Seramum. Yarumjah. Jubailah. Tell Araij. Hammam Ali (Bitumen Fountain). Tell-ū-Sakik. (Tisasphalta of Ammianus.) Wady al Kassab (reed valley). Senn—Nahr Senn. Nimrūd. Ashur. Athur. (Caenae or Scenae). (Lynch.) Calah or Halah (Raw.) (Semidij.) Al Kayarah (Bitumen Fountains). Ralah Shirkat or Toprak Kalahsi (Earth Castle). Resen (Rawl.) Ur of the Persians (Amm.) (Rehoboth Ir) Bel-aliss springs, Lay., 579. Wadi Jehannem or of “hell.’ Mahú, Lay., 579 (on W. side). Hamrin (On east). Tikrit. Ishaki canal. Ashik. Rarmaineh old Khan, Lay, 579. Islabilat. Larissa of Xenophon. (Resen) Eord of Greater Zab." Rashaf and Abū Shitha. (Election of Xenophon.) Gla or Kalah. (Calah.) Tell Kunus (vill. of Parysatis). Zab al Sughair. Little Zab. Hamrin ‘ Red Hills.’ Tell Kubr. Imām Dura. (Dura.) Nahr Hafu. Rantarah al Rassasi (Lead Bridge.) Nahr-wan or Nahar-wan. Blski Bagdad. (Opis.) (Kherkh.) Samawa or Sarmanra. Sammawa, tower, dome, and minarehs. Lay., 578. Al Kayim (Opis of Ches.) 392 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION ASSYRIA TABLE OF SITEs on THE TIGRIs (continued). . BABYLONIA Nahr Dijail. (Little Tigris.) Wall of Media. Farriyah. Sidd al Nimrūd. Dujail (of the Khalifat). Bridge of Harba. Shat Aidha. Anc. bed of Tigris. Shiriyat al Baidha, Ross. (Sittacé of Ches. and Ross.) Radhaimain or Kathimain. Imām Musa al Kathem and el Taki. Akka Küf, Hur, or Khor (Accad.) (Duraba.) Shat al Masudi. Shat al Alik. Sur and Barud ruins. (Seleucia.) Abū Hitti Canal. |Haddara. Bridge. Shat al Hai. (Pasitigris.) Imām Garbi. Al Kamtarah (Bridge). Sarut Castle. . Zuwaiya and Humanya ruins. Kadisiya. Ratur, Nahr al Resas. Nahr-wan. Opis (Lynch). Antiochia. Adheim, Adhaim. Azim river. Rhalis can. from Diyalah 2 Muadhim. Baghdad. Western suburb, Sitta.ce of Jones and Rawlinson. Diyalah. Deir 33 m. S.E. of Diyalah. (Sittacé on a canal, Collingwood, Bew., 168.) Takht Khusrau, Sulaiman Pak. Ctesiphon. Hadaetha. Al Bostan. Al Madayn. Cont. of Nahr Malka, 2 Tell Hubbus 114 m. S. of Ctesiphon, Bew., 181. Tell Dthubba (hyaena) at W. point of Hubles Sukhr. Tajut and Zuwaiya ruins. Canal. Niche of Chosroes (Ches.) Mumla or Mumlihah. Bridge. IKut al Amarah. APPENDIX 3 9 3 TABLE OF SITES ON THE TIGRIs (continued). RTIALDAEA TIGRIS SUSIANA Ibn Flavele Mound. Sidd al Khüd (canal). Tomb of Ezra. Abu Khal Kal (Tomb). Marsh. Al Maksum (Tomb). Rornah. Lake of Susiana. (Apamaea of Mesene.) Junction of Tigris and Euphrates to constitute the Shat al Arab. No. 1. ISLAND OF MELIBOEA. THE Orontes, like the Pyramus, only in a much lesser degree, is constantly gaining on the sea. Hence the ancients, with their customary poetical turn of mind, used to figure the gradual gain of land made by the river towards converting the island into mainland into the loves of Orontes and the Nymph Meliboea. The myth occurs in Oppianus (‘Cyneget., ii. 115). Cellarius is inclined to think that Virgil refers to the same spot, and not to a Thessalian Meliboea, in the lines— Victori chlamydem auratam, quann plurima circum |Purpura Maeandro duplici Meliboea cucurrit. The geographer remarks that there was no purple dye in Thessaly. “Meliboea purpura a nomine insulae, in quâ, tangitur, est dicta.” No. 2. MOUNT ST. SIMON OR ST. SIMEON. THE ruins of Mount Simon had been explored before our time by Burckhardt, Pococke, and others. The principal church must have been a very magnificent building, erected in the form of a Greek cross, and the remains of the pillar—the supposed seat of penitence of St. Simon Stylites—are to be seen 394 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION hewn out of the solid rock under the middle of an octagon dome. The mausoleum of Sheikh Barakat, on the summit of the hill, adjoins a building of great antiquity, which from several pillars still standing appears to have had a portico all round it and to have been adorned with pilasters on the outside. Pococke thinks it may have been a temple of Bacchus. The ruins also exist of a convent close by, built of large hewn stones, which was over a quarter of a mile in extent. Mount St. Simon, or St. Simeon, so called from the tomb of the well-known Syrian ascetic, but also denominated Bin Kilisah, or the Thousand Churches, from the extensive remains of ecclesiasti- cal structures on its summit, separates the gardens of Suwaidiyah from the Orontes at the point where that river issues from that magnificent gorge the scenery of which, beautiful as it is, has been somewhat exaggerated by Irby and Mangles when they describe it as equal to anything in Switzerland. It is remarkable that the memory of Simeon Sisanetes, the son of a Syrian herdsman and the founder of the sect of the Stylites, who continued for seven hundred years to imitate his penance, and were hence desig- nated “Sancti Columnares,’ is as much venerated by the Muham- madans as by the Christians of the country; and the Mekka Itinerary contains especial injunctions to pilgrims on their arrival at Antioch to pay their respects to the remains of Hazrat Simum, the holy or beloved Simon. |Pococke describes the ruins on Mount St. Simon as those of a very noble convent, which he says was encompassed with a wall built of large hewn stones, about ninety paces in front and two hundred and thirty in length. The church seems to have been a Greek cross, though the building without is square, and there were probably two chapels, a sacristy, and chapter-house, to make it a square. The middle part was an octagon, four sides of it being open to the church; and as well as he could judge there were four altars in the other four sides. In the middle of the octagon was the lower part of St. Simon's pillar, cut out of the rock, with two steps to the pedestal, exactly on the model and of the same dimensions as that in the hills of Sheikh Barakat. There are also ruins of churches and hermitages on the side of the hill which the traveller identified with the Trapezus of Strabo. APPENDIX 395 The narrow pass before alluded to, precipitous on the St. Simon side, rugged but wooded on the other, separates the first named mountain from the rocky and forest-clad offsets of Mount Casius. Several villages are met with on the northern slopes of this mountain, one at an elevation of 2,419 feet by aneroid. The Christian population of these villages are reported to have exhibited a remarkable aptitude in receiving the in- structions of the missionaries who have lately been among them. NO. 3. DAPEINE. ‘THE vigorous youth,’ says Gibbon, ‘pursued like Apollo the object of his desires, and the blushing maid was warned by the fate of Daphne to shun the folly of unseasonable coyness. The soldier and the philosopher wisely avoided the temptation of this sensual paradise, where pleasure, assuming the charac- ter of religion, imperceptibly dissolved the firmness of manly virtue.” The delights and luxuries of Daphne have been extolled by pagan writers, condemned by edicts of Praefects and Consuls, and ridiculed and possibly exaggerated by an opposing faith. That the spot really invited by its pleasantness to a voluptuous- ness which was quite inconsistent with that Republican severity which forbade the use of garments of silk, we can readily believe. Daphnicis m0ribus became a proverb. Cassius dismissed or punished every soldier who was seen there, and Marcus An- toninus equally condemned the habits of the place. The Roman Praefect, in his proclamation affixed to the walls of Antioch, said: —‘Si quis cinctus inveniretur apud Daphnem, discinctus rediret,” a phrase to which perhaps too much meaning has been attached. It is well known that the Romans tied up their robes with a girdle as do the Easterns in the present day, more especially when they were actively employed, whence the phrase, ‘accingere se ad opus.' But when they were inactive, they suffered them to flow loosely; hence ‘discinctus’ and ‘dissolutus’ came to 396 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION signify an effeminate and negligent person, as in the present day it is a disreputable thing for an Eastern to appear without his girdle. Daphne was a luxuriant grove in a fine climate, ‘pleasant, agreeable, and jocund; ‘its murmuring waters,’ ‘temperate sky, and soft-breathing breezes, to use the words of the writers of the middle ages, led to habits of repose and indolent indul- gence, but there appear to be few grounds for asserting more. The long processions of youths and virgins were clothed in white robes, the symbol of their innocence, the chaste and ennobled laurel was never profaned by contact with vice, and the humble myrtle which testified to maternal respect, Cingens materna tempora myrto," which adorned the brows of bloodless victors, and was the symbol of authority with the virtuous magistrates of Athens, would have been equally out of place; and lastly, the whole beauty and ingenuity of this fable of the loves of Apollo and Daphne, of Apollo crowned with laurel as the god of poetry, yet as charioteer of the sun avoided by the shade-seeking Daphne, ‘who perished when his warm embrace drove aside the curls of her hair, is destroyed by admitting those visions of impropriety with which the satire of the middle ages filled the groves and polluted the fountains of Daphne of Antioch. The Emperor Hadrian read his fate on a leaf dipped in the Castalian fountain, and he was led from this to endeavour to obstruct the sources from whence came such dangerous know- ledge. The aquatic Oracle was, however, dumb to the apostate and credulous Julian, and its silence afforded a theme for ridicule of which the fathers of the Church did not fail to avail them- selves. ‘The Castalian fountain is now silent,” said Clement of Alexandria, and Gregorius Nazianzen taxed the fountain with not having been able to prophesy its own silence. The fountain of Daphne has been identified in the Vulgate, and by Hieronymus and Bochart, with the Ain or spring par éminence of Moses (Numb. xxxiv. 11), but as this depends upon the connection of Sephana with Apamaea, it seems more | Georg. i. 28. APPENDIX 397 likely that the true sources of the Orontes are the springs in question. A writer in the ‘Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography' complains that “no detailed account of the remains has been given.’ This is not to be wondered at, for little or nothing exists in the neighbourhood in the present day to be described. Already in the time of Julian, the Emperor complains with that naïveté which Gibbon declares to constitute genuine humour (‘Misopogon, pp. 361, 362), ‘that instead of heca- tombs of fat oxen sacrificed by the tribes of a wealthy city to their tutelar deity, he found Only a single goose, provided at the expense of a priest, the pale and Solitary inhabitant of this decayed temple! Even the church of St. Babylas, which had succeeded to the temple of Apollo, had been demolished, and there only remained to the last pagan Emperor the care to deliver his oppressed deity from the odious presence of dead and living Christians.’ The same night that witnessed the removal of the remains of St. Babylas to within the walls of Antioch witnessed the burning of the temple, and ‘the walls of the edifice were left a naked and awful monument of ruin.’ The anger of Julian had been aroused, the Christians were expelled from the grove of Daphne and their church was de- molished. But Antioch was a nobler temple and mausoleum than Julian had destroyed, and thus the groves of Daphne ap- pear to have gradually become deserted from that time. Con- stantine erected a statue of Helena within the ancient sanctuary, but this failed to re-awaken interest in the site, and its last cypress trees were cut down to roof the great church at Antioch. “At the foot of the hills there is a deep ravine, embosomed in the midst of a grove, from the bottom of which a subterranean river issues with a rushing noise. It flows at first from the live rock as a considerable stream, then boils and foams over fallen masses, which appear once to have still more obstructed its way, and casts its spray upon dark laurel and myrtle shrubs which overhang the rocky cleft.’ (‘Ainsworth's Magazine, vol. v. p. 51.) Poujalat says (‘Corr. d’Orient, viii. 38): “A cöté de la plus profonde fontaine de Beit el moie on remarque des débris 398 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION massifs appartenant à un édifice des àges reculés: si j'étais antiquaire et savant, je pourrais peut-être prouver que ces restes sont ceux du Temple d’Apollon.’ ‘The ravine turns at right angles,’ says Captain Allen, ‘from one higher up in the moun- tains, while below us it widened to a pretty little valley at the gap in the ridge where it turns. A great fall of stones, or landslip, seems to have blocked up the passage at Some remote period. Among these confused masses of rock, water gushes out in many streams and falls, turning several flour mills. They unite below to form two beautiful cascades, rivalling those of Tivoli, with the additional merit of having been entirely made by nature.’ This is all that travellers have been able to see, from Bococke and Richter to ourselves and Captain William Allen's time. There seems to have been a little convent (Duwair) at or near the site to within comparatively recent times, and the curious may still find many traces of olden times by a more careful exploration of the neighbouring groves. The remains of the aqueduct which used to convey the waters of Daphne to Antioch are still to be seen. At one spot the arches cross a ravine at a considerable elevation and are deeply covered with travertino. Beyond this again is a secluded rocky valley, where is the fountain of Zoiba. This is a favourite spot with the modern Antiocheans, and the waters flow from a spout in the usual mass of masonry with a pointed arch in front, cha- racteristic of a fountain, and fall from thence into a marble basin, with a platform before it, overshadowed by a gigantic plane tree. Beyond this the creak of the great Persian water-wheel strikes discordantly upon the ear, the western walls of Antioch are seen clambering up the lofty hill side, and a mansion and barracks erected by Ibrahim Pasha chiefly out of the materials of the old walls, lead the Way to what remains of that which was once one of the first cities in the world—the withered ‘Queen of the East.” Captain Allen bivouacked at this point. ‘We had, he says, “picturesque objects in front; the river with immense water-wheels, the old Roman bridge, the modern miserable city with its ruined walls; the ancient battlements pursuing the outline of the rugged mountain in the rear of APPENDIX 399 the city, in utter disregard of crag or ravine ; in the distance a part of the Amanus range, with a fine conical mountain claim- ing pre-eminence.’ Daphne is said to have owed its origin to Seleucus Nicator, and as in the case of Antioch itself, so he associated the religious suburb ‘Amoenum illud et ambitiosum Antiochae suburbanum (Amm. Marc. xix. 12, 19) with mythological traditions which were intended to glorify the family. The fame of Apollo was associated with that of himself. The fable of the river Peneus was appropriated, and the tree was even shown into which the nymph Daphne was transformed, although laurels are rare in the same neighbourhood in the present day. The fountain of Beit al Moï in the same manner received the name of the Castalian spring, and the chief honours of the new sanctuary were borrowed from Delphi. “In the midst of a rich grove of bay-trees and cypresses,’ says Procopius (“Bell. Persic.’ 11, 14), “with baths, gardens, and colonnades on every side, Seleucus built the temple of Apollo and Diana.’ The statue of the god was colossal; its material was partly marble and partly wood; the artist was Bryaxis, the Athenian, whose works were long celebrated at Rhodes and elsewhere. Gibbon describes the deity as represented in a bending attitude, with golden cup in his hand, pouring out a libation to the earth; as if he supplicated the venerable mother to give to his arms the cold and beauteous Daphne; but Libanius, in his ‘ Monod. de Daphnaeo templo, iii. 384, states that the god was represented with a harp as if in the act of singing. Antiochus Epiphanes associated the worship of Jupiter with that of Apollo in the Sanctuary of Daphne. This monarch erected there in honour of that divinity (with whom he was singularly fond of identifying himself), a colossal statue of ivory and gold resembling that of Phidias at Olympia. A sanctuary was also established at the same place with privileges of asylum, and games were afterwards instituted in honour of Jupiter. Hence Daphne became famous throughout the heathen world, and remained for centuries a place of pilgrimage and the scene of almost perpetual festivities. 400 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION No. 4. SELEUCLA PIERIA. THE ruins of the city and port of Seleucia Pieria are at the foot of the limestone rocks which close up the bay to the north, and which rise up at this point abruptly from the low level plain below, and advance in rude promontories into the Sea on the other; and the site of this Once strong, populous, and well- frequented port is now marked by the filled-up basin or dock, the crumbling gates and ramparts, tumble-down buildings and houses, numerous sarcophagi, and equally interesting Sepulchral grottoes, and the remarkable water-way cut through the mountain. The town was manifestly divided into two parts. One was on the plain, watered by a rivulet which has its sources in the hilly range to the east, and is bounded to the north by the rocks which Polybius designated as Coryphaeum, Strabo as Pieria, and Pliny, by mistake, as Mount Casius. The other portion lay in a valley to the north-eastward, having a higher level than the port, from which it is separated by a narrow rocky gap, the valley expanding, full of ruins, beyond in the bosom of the hills. Above rose a mountain upon which the acropolis was situated. It was this portion of the town which was approached according to some from the sea side by the artificial road in steps (k\up- akaoTiju) distributed into frequent and continuous slopes (cut- tings? §yk\ſuaat) and curves (tunnels?—a caudºpaat)' (Article, Seleucia Pieria, ‘Dict. of Greek and Roman Geography.") On the side towards the sea lay the factory (Tà éptopsºa) and suburb, on the level ground, strongly fortified. The hollow valley, in which the remainder of the town was situated, was called kitos, and was likewise strongly fortified, and adorned with temples and buildings. The writer in the Dictionary is, however, probably not only in error when he makes this excava- tion an artificial road, but he is certainly so when he says that the hill on which the city stood appears to be the “low moun- tain called Bin Kilisah, or the Thousand Churches.’ The moun- b AIPPENDIX 401 tain in question, otherwise called Mount St. Simeon, is at the gap of the Orontes, some miles' distance from Seleucia Pieria. On the side of the city opposite to the harbour are the ruins of two temples, and of an amphitheatre partly cut out of the rock, as is so frequently the case ; and here also commence the numerous sepulchral excavations which extend nearly two miles along the face and up the ravines of the mountain, and in front of which many hundreds of sarcophagi (some of which Mr. Barker had opened) are scattered. ‘ One portion of the exca- vations, called the Tomb of the Kings, has a façade entrance, and suites of apartments with columns, and staircases leading to a set of chambers above. In some of the grottoes were traces of fresco paintings, the colours of which were preserved till lately; in general, however, they are ordinary excavations, devoid of architectural Ornaments, and many appear to have been used as dwellings. But the most remarkable feature in the ruins of Seleucia is the great cut or hollow way before noticed, and which is alto- gether 3,074 feet in length, and attains in places an elevation of 120 feet, averaging a width of 22 feet. It is divided into portions, the greater part being an open hollow way, interrupted, however, by two tunnelled portions or covered ways, the one 102 and the other 293 feet long. The cut is also crossed in its eastern part by an aqueduct supported by a single arch, and its western extremity by another arch, bearing a mutilated inscrip- tion of the time of the Caesars. A recess with sepulchral grottoes occurs in another portion, and in one part a narrow staircase leads down to within about 14 feet of the base, and which General Chesney thinks was the ordinary level of the waters. For it is the opinion of General Chesney and of Captain Allen, and we believe also of Sir John M'Neil, that this great excavation was a channel for water. The natural gap or opening which led from the lower to the upper town they suppose was artificially dammed up, and the waters were led away through the mountain to the mouth of the harbour by this remarkable engineering work to keep the mouth open. Originally founded, it is supposed, by Seleucus Nicator, who according to Strabo gathered together at this place the WOL. II. D D 402 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION descendants of Triptolemus, who had been sent by the Argives in search of Io, and despairing of success had established themselves on the plains of the Orontes, Seleucia, which took the name of its founder, was captured by Ptolemy Euergetes, and held by an Egyptian garrison until the time of Antiochus the Great. This monarch, at the instigation of Apollophanes, a Seleucian, having sent his fleet under Diognetus against the place, encamped himself with his army near the hippodrome, five stadia from the city. Having in vain attempted to obtain possession of the place by bribery, Antiochus divided his army into three parts, of which one under Zeuxis made the assault near the gate of Antioch, a second under Hermogenes near the temple of the Dioscuri, the third under Ardys and Diog- metus by the arsenal and suburb, which was first carried, whereupon the garrison capitulated (cir. B.C. 220). Seleucia then became one of the cities of the Macedonian Tetrapolis, the others being Antioch, Apamaea, and Laodicaea, which were called sister cities, being all founded by Seleucus Nicator, and called by the names respectively of himself, his father, his wife, and his mother-in-law; that bearing his father's name being the largest, that bearing his own the strongest. The auguries attending its foundation are mentioned by John Malalas (“Chronographia, lib. viii. p. 254). It was the port of Antioch, and there it was that St. Paul and Barnabas embarked for Cyprus on their first mission to Asia Minor (Acts xiii. 4.) It became a free city under the Romans. Pliny calls it ‘Seleucia libera Pieria.” The modern village of Suwaidiyah or Suadia, as Seleucia is orientalised, or, as it is more commonly called, Zeitunli, “the place of olives, embosomed in luxuriant groves of mulberry, Olive, grape-vine, pomegranate, and apricot trees, occupies the range of the lower hills, and the houses being scattered amid gardens extend almost the whole way from the hills above Seleucia Pieria to the hill of St. Simeon. Captain Allen estimates the number of houses as from five to six hundred, all tiled. The population is a mixed one, of Christians, Ansairi, and Turks. The Christians greatly predominate. The land is possessed by the Turks, but there is a slovenly character about APPENDIX 403 the farms and gardens, and the Turk in his own land is not so well off as the Christian on that for which he pays rent. The Christian portion of the population is well disposed and indus- trious, and the Ansairi make very good servants and labourers. The law does not, or did not, permit foreigners to buy land, but it is easily managed through a rayah or Christian subject of the Porte, who completes the purchase in his own name, and then makes it over by legal conveyance, duly executed before the cadi, to the foreigner, who is never disturbed. The Turk will not, or cannot, change the law, but knowing its inconvenience, he admits this infraction of it under certain forms. The late Mr. Consul Barker, who resided here so many years, devoted his time to the introduction of foreign fruits, vegetables, and flowers, moré especially with the object of preparing choice eastern fruit-trees for the English climate by acclimatising them at Suadia. He introduced the Sweet-kernel peach into this country, where it now thrives well. At Suadia it flourishes with the guava, the loquat of China, and many other exotic fruits. In his gardens, for he had two or three at different elevations, there was truly an embarras de richesses from the excessive fertility of the soil. The common China rose, which he intro- duced, has become a rank weed, and has completely overpowered the sweet-scented native from which the attar of roses is obtained. The Barkers made an attempt to establish a silk factory, and introduced English machinery for the purpose of winding the excellent but badly got up silk of the country, which would, with encouragment, be produced to a great amount. The estab- lishment commenced well, the first year's profits being about forty per cent., when some unfortunate disputes among the pro- prietors caused the works to be suspended. The late Dr. W. Holt Yates also erected a handsome house in the same neighbourhood, near the Orontes, and during the time that he resided there, his efforts and those of his amiable wife have done much to improve both the intellectual, moral, and religious condition of the poor Christians around them. If the Bay of Antioch becomes the terminus on the Mediterranean of a great Indo-European Railway, it would be very difficult, with its magnificent situation, its healthy climate and its fertile soil, to D D 2 404 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION foretell its future. It might become the site of one of the most prosperous and populous cities on the Mediterranean, for it would become the great entrepot and emporium of goods coming from Australia, China, the East Indies, Persia, Babylonia, Mesopotamia, and Syria. • , NO. 5. 1MOUNT CASIUS. SACRIFICES to the Thunderer were offered on the summit of Mount Casius from the most remote antiquity, and these were said to have originated with the descendants of Triptolemus. These sacrifices were kept up by the Macedonians and the Romans—the latter dedicating them to Jupiter Casius. Julian the Apostate, discomfited at Daphne, cheered himself with a hecatomb on Mount Casius, and Pliny relates that Jupiter, yielding to prayers addressed to him on Mount Casius, sent the birds called Seleucidae (roseate thrushes) to destroy the scourge of the country—the locusts. Bochart (‘Phaleg, p. 333) derives Casius from a Hebrew root signifying boundary. A more likely origin may, however, be found in the Syriac and Khaldaean kas, “shining,’ in refer- ence to the bald Summit of the mountain, whence its actual Arabic name Jebel Akra, “ Mount Bald.’ Tin and lead, accord- ing to Mela and Pliny, were called by the Greeks kasiteros, from their lustre. - Tin (in Numb. xxxi. 22) is read kastira by Jonathan, and in Arabic kasdir. Hence also the British Cassiterides. Not the least interesting tradition connected with the mountain, and which the Emperors Hadrian and Julian alike made the ascent solely to witness, is described at length by Aristotle (‘Meteor., i. 16) and by Pliny (v. 18). It is to the effect that at the fourth watch, or at the second crow of the cock, as Ammianus puts it, day and night are, by the walk round of a few paces, seen at the same time. The Emperor Hadrian, who passed a night upon the mountain to verify this very simple but not the less striking scene, was pre- APPENDIX 405 vented gratifying his curiosity by a furious storm (Spartian, “Hadrian, 14). This great mass of rock, which rises so abruptly from the sea, is, with the exception of some sandstones and marls with crystalline gypsum at its north-eastern foot, and of igneous rocks that crop out at its western foot, entirely composed of indurated supra-cretaceous limestone. The greater portion of the mountain is clothed with a variety of trees and shrubs, and these are succeeded by oaks and these again by gloomy pine-forest, which, at an elevation of 3,500 feet, are themselves succeeded by more open glades of birch and occasional wild pear, apple, quince, and medlar trees. Vegetation is both luxuriant and beautiful at the same altitude, and in the month of April patches of gaudy Scarlet peonies were seen alternating with other patches of yellow asphodel not far from the line of snow, where violets and pansies blossomed. beneath dark green fennel. No. 6. THE SYRIAN CROCODILE. THE connection thus established between crocodiles and so small a river in Cilicia in olden times may appear strange, but Spanheim, in his remarks on the life of Isidorus by Damascius, justly suggests that the term 200xos or Suchus may also be referred to the monitor lizard known by the name of Waran, still so common on the Euphrates, and which in the time of the Crusades appears to have been met with in the lakes of Raiseriya and of Marash as well as in Cilicia, as in olden times. The crusaders knew a Crocodilon river and lacus, but they applied the name variously to the Kersus, and to the rivers and lakes South of Kaiseriya and east of Marash. Colonel Hamilton Smith remarks that it is not improbable that the same laxity in the application of proper names which is traceable in the Oriental languages, and in the Greek, where the original meaning of kpokööst)\os in the Ionic is lizard, as even in modern tongues, has allowed the word to be vaguely employed 406 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION to denote saurians. Herodotus says that the Egyptians called crocodiles Xdual'at, which, according to Sir J. G. Wilkinson, is a corruption of Misah, or Emsooh, as he spells it. The Arabic retains Temsah, and as the designation of moi or 'ma al Temsah, ‘water of crocodiles, is still given to certain of the lakes before alluded to, it is possible that the monitor or other large Saurian still exists in those waters or on their banks. A similar mame, it is to be observed, Temsche or Temesche, was anciently applied on the Danube and the Scheldt to the sturgeon. Kimsak is the Turkish, Kimbuta, the Ceylonese, but the Lemg of the Malays, still venerated by them, is of the gavial subdivision of the genus. It is the horned crocodile, or Makair of Buddha lore, it figures in the Zodiac of the utmost East, and there becomes confounded with the dragon—an emblem assumed by all the nations of Mongolic origin. During the Roman sway in Egypt, crocodiles had not disappeared in the Lower Nile, for Seneca and others allude to a great battle fought by them and a shoal of dolphins in the Heracleotic branch of the Delta. During the decline of the state even the hippopotamus reappeared about Pelusium, and was shot at in the seventeenth century (Radzivil). - The exploit of Dieudonné de Bozon, knight of St. John, who when a young man slew the dragon of Rhodes, must be re- garded as a combat with a crocodile, which had probably been carried northward by the regular current of the eastern Mediter- ranean, as may have been the case with the crocodiles of the Kersus or Crocodilon river in Cilicia (supposing the name to have applied to real crocodiles and not to monitors or other large saurians), for so the picture said to be still extant in the harim of a Turkish inhabitant represents the Hawam, Rebir, or great beast—a picture necessarily painted anterior to the expulsion of the Knights in 1480, as de Bozon died Grand Master of the Order at Rhodes in 1853, and the spoils of the animal long re- mained hung up in a church. There is not, Colonel Hamilton Smith argues, any reason to doubt the fact, though most of the recorded circumstances may be fabulous. Other paintings by the same artist, said to have been Sebastian de Firenze, pupil of Cimabue, show that he did not represent Grand Masters later APPENDIX $ 407 than Gio de Lartin, who was elected in 1437 and died 1454. All the ancient Greek and the later Mediterranean dragons, as those of Naples, Arles, Tarascon, &c., where they are not alle- gorical, are supposed to be in the same manner derived from crocodiles which at one time were evidently met with occasion- ally in all parts of the Mediterranean, and therefore possibly in Cilicia as well as elsewhere. They have indeed been asserted to have been seen in our own times in a river of Palestine ; but the instance was a solitary one, and has not been authenticated by subsequent observers. No. 7. THE TELLS OR MOUNDS OF NORTH SYRIA. To the north of Aleppo is the fine level tract which, with an elevation of about 1,100 feet at its southern, and nearly 1,300 feet at its northern extremity, stretches almost uninterruptedly from the city to the hills, enclosing Kilis and Aintab in one direction, and from AZas nearly to the Euphrates on the other. This extensive tract is almost everywhere fertile, and is hence thickly covered with villages and hamlets, consisting of houses either of stone or mud, and, wood being scarce, they are usually covered with clay-built cupolas or flat roofs. In the vicinity of each of these villages there is generally one of those conical mounds that rise out of the plain to a height of from 30 to 150 feet or more. They have been aptly compared by the late Major-General Estcourt to giant molehills, and Major-General Chesney justly remarks that they are among the most remark- able features of this part of Asia. These mounds, whether in groups or isolated, are almost invariably situated in arable soil or in such portions of the country as seem to have been cultivated from time immemorial, and that they are of considerable antiquity is attested by the fact that many of them occupy the sites of towns or citadels renowned in history. - - They were designated by the Greeks, both of the Hellenic and of the Low Empire, as X6pata, and Strabo describes Tyana 4.08 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION and Zela as built on such mounds, raised originally by Semi- ramis. Herodotus (ii. 137) uses the same word when describing Sabacon, king of the Ethiopians, as obliging the convict Egyptians to heap up mounds against their cities. Diodorus Siculus (i. 36 and ii. 14) uses the same word. ‘For thou hast made of a city a heap, Isaiah xxv. 2, is in the Greek version rendered by sis Xópua. Xenophon speaking of the mounds of Babylonia uses the more expressive and elegant designation of yńNobos, mound or hill of earth. Such a mound is called Tur by the Syrians, Tell by the Arabs, Teppeh by the Turks, and U’yuk by the Turcomans. Most of these mounds appear to be mere heaps of ruin or rubbish as far as can be judged of externally. Few of the Syrian mounds appear, like the Babylonian, to have been raised of solid masses of brickwork, or to have been distinct platforms or terraces of sun-dried or kiln-burnt bricks rising one above another. At times, however, the existence of jutting rocks or crags has been taken advantage of to facilitate the piling up of materials for the purpose of raising a mound on which to build an acropolis as at AZas, or apparently to erect a temple as at Tell Balkis. At other times huge boulder stones and smaller pebbles of basaltic and other rocks have been used for the same purposes, as at Jindah Aba, as also to support the base and slope, giving to the tell a Keltic aspect, as at Ak Diyarin. Lastly, some of the smaller mounds in the valleys of rivers appear to be mere hills of denudation, or at all events to have had a primary nucleus of river detritus. How it is that these relics of probably the oldest civilised community of Syria, should have been allowed to remain through changing dominations and successive races of men, is a matter of interesting speculation. Much must be attributed to climate, which has preserved the same mounds in Assyria, Babylonia, Mesopotamia, and elsewhere. Still more has been owing to the same sites having been made the strongholds of successive dominations, Macedonian, Roman, Parthian, Saracenic, and even Crusading. But most of all does their preservation appear to be owing to feelings of respect for that which is long gone by, entertained by even the most abject populations, and which APPENDIX 409 leads the Syrian peasant to erect his mud hut at the foot or on the summit of temple or citadel of ancient time. Owing to these feelings, and also to the circumstances in which these mounds are met with, on fertile soils, by the river side, at the sources of rivulets, or in some luxuriant and sheltered corner, there are few tells in North Syria that are not in the neighbour- hood of a village. The first mound that attracts attention on this great plain on reaching it from the valley of the Afrin, or from the westward, is the remarkable tell of Azas or Azaz. It is 250 yards in cir- cumference at its base and 90 at the top, having an altitude of 120 feet. Although we cannot trace its history back to the times of the Assyrian or Persian empires, or even to the time of the Seleucids, still there is every reason to believe that the place was not without its importance in those more remote periods, and as remains of the Macedonian conquerors have been found superimposed upon the relics of olden times in the mounds of Babylon, so there is every reason to believe that an exploration of the mound of Azas would furnish some relics illustrative of the different epochs of its eventful history, going back possibly to the times of the Assyrian empire. It is evident indeed from the tradition handed down by the geographer of Amasia, that the mounds of Tyana and Zela were raised originally by Semi- ramis, that these Komata were looked upon generally by antiquity as having had their origin in times coeval with the Babylonian and Assyrian empires. At the time of the conquest of Syria by the Saracens, Azas is described as a place of importance, under Theodorus, a governor appointed by Heraclius. It was taken next after Aleppo and before Antioch, and that by a series of misdeeds characteristic of the immorality and irreligion of the epoch. First Yukina, the renegade governor of Aleppo, tried to seize the place by a feint, but being discovered, was himself made prisoner; then Leon, son of Theodorus, being enamoured of Yukina's daughter, connived at the designs of the prisoner traitor; and lastly, another son named Luke, for reasons which Al Wakedi (Ockley's authority in the matter) does not make at all clear, carried on a murderous plot against his own father on his own 410 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION account. ‘Hopeful youths!” says Ockley, “who had prevented each other in a masterly piece of villainy; the one murdering his father, the other in setting at liberty his most mortal enemies and betraying all his friends !’ Even the captain of the Saracens, one Malik (king or chief) Alashtar, a lieutenant of Abū Obaidah's, was filled with horror upon hearing of such an atrocity, but the cowardly parricide having declared that he did it out of love to them (the Saracens), their Prophet, and their religion, Malik, with the usuallaxity of a neckless propagandism, gave the youth his blessing, saying, ‘When God will have a thing done, he prepares the causes of it.’ The strength of Azas at that time may be judged of by the fact that in the castle alone, when the Saracens took it, there were one thousand young men, Greeks, two hundred and forty- five old men and monks, one thousand young women and girls, and one hundred and eighty old women. We have before seen that under the name of Arsace, Artasia, and sometimes Arthusia, Azas was still a place of importance in the time of the Crusades. The Christian inhabitants of the place it is said rose on the approach of Robert Earl of Flanders against the Mussulmans, and slaying the greater part of them, they received the crusaders into the fortress. Albert of Aix relates, however, a quite different story as to how Artasia fell into the power of the crusaders. According to this chronicler, the Amir of the city of Hazart, or Hezas as he spells the name of the place, was first induced to enter into amicable relations with the Crusaders by the persuasions of one of his principal officers who had married the widow of a knight named Foulque, killed by the Turks on the banks of the Euphrates. The Emir was at that time at war with the Sultan of Aleppo, and Godefroy de Bouillon having marched to his assistance, the army of the Sultan was beaten in several en- counters and forced to abandon the territory of Hezas. It is to be observed that Albert of Aix stands alone in this version of the event, the correctness of which Michaud and other modern historians of the Crusades doubt very much. Defended by the Crusaders, the castle of Arsace also resisted several attacks made upon it at various times by the Sultan of APPENDIX 411 Aleppo; and it was one of the strongholds which held out last against the victorious troops of the Kurd Salah-u-din, our Saladin. In after times, it in a similar manner opposed, but unsuccessfully, the devastating progress of Taímur the Tartar, who after its capture bestowed much care in restoring its forti- fications. Although it is impossible to discover the ancient names of all these different mounds, to most of which or to the villages at their base the natives have attached some modern appellation, still many occur of which notice is made in Roman or mediaeval times, showing that in all probability they were never totally abandoned from early Persian or Assyrian days. Some of the names are indeed only corruptions of their antique designations, as Minniah for Minniza or Minica, a site which is met with in the Antonine Itinerary on the road from Cyrrhus to Beroea, and on that from Doliche to Serianem. The name of Mennaeus was also borne by some of the kings of Chalcidene. Another instance occurs in Jerablus for Europus on the Euphrates, where a heap of mounds and fragments of ruin still mark the site of a Macedonian town of Some magnitude, and where a broken slab of marble, with sculptures in relief, was found by the old traveller Maundrell. There is also much reason to believe that Tell Zumbah is a corruption for Singa upon the river of same name. Pliny calls the place Cingilla, and describes it as the frontier town of Commagena. There was also a bridge at the same place, the ruins of which still exist, and which was called Pons Singa or Cingae. Tell Ma'ni appears in a similar manner to represent Chaonia, written in the Antonine Itinerary Hanumea, by others Haminea and Anunea, and which was half-way between Doliche and Cyrrhus. Doliche, Dolichen, and Dolica, as it is variously written, celebrated for its thermal and medicinal springs, was a place of some importance, the site of a Christian episcopacy, and accord- ing to the Theodosian Tables, XLI. M.P. from Samosat. So there can be little doubt that it is the same place which was designated by the Macedonians Antiochea ad Taurum, and which preserves in its present name Aintab, or ‘warm spring, the same expression of its characteristic peculiarity. 412 T[HE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Tell Bashir, which still preserves the same name, is mentioned as a stronghold of the crusaders. The importance of this station at that epoch is attested by the circumstance that Salah- u-din at his death having left no directions respecting the Order of succession, his extensive conquests were divided among his sons and emirs. Tell Bashir or Tell Bacher was possessed by one Emir, and Sahyün, probably Sourawn, by another. With an oval base of about 300 feet in length by 200 feet in breadth, the remarkable mound called Tell Khalid rises in the shape of a truncated cone to a height of nearly 174 feet, and on its summit are some trifling remains of the castle, which was an object of contest during the wars of Salah-u-din and the sub- sequent invasion of Taímur (‘Hist, des Huns,’ tom. ii. p. 232). Tell Balkis or Ba'al Kiz, ‘daughter of the lord or master,’ is another remarkable mound having the ruins of a temple on its summit, and situated in a pleasant and fertile recess on the banks of the Euphrates, hemmed in on all sides by rocky hills. The name, corrupted by the mediaeval writers to Turbessus, reminds us of the Oriental designation for the Queen of Sheba. Josselin or Jocelyn de Courtenay, second Count of Edessa, of the same name, being a weak and pusillanimous prince, is related to have quitted the city of Edessa to take up his abode in this pleasant place, and which is described by Kemaleddin, an Arabian historian, and by William of Tyre, as being that which it still is by nature, ‘a delicious retreat on the banks of the Euphrates.’ The consequence of which indulgence was the loss of Edessa, which fell before the Kurdish allies of Zanqui, Emir of Mosul. The mound of olden times that belongs to Nizib, always appa- rently from its position a place of some importance, is at some distance—about a geographical mile—from the modern"village. Tell Sauran, we have seen, appears to represent Sahyūn, one of the independent Emirates that arose on the breaking up of the short-lived empire of Salah-u-din. We have also, nearer to Aleppo and in the Syrian district of Hailan or Ailan, “the Powerful, the mounds of Maharit, “the two brothers,’ and beyond these to the northwards, Ak Diyarin, one of the largest and most remarkable mounds of North Syria, APPENDIX 413 being surrounded at its base by a circle of gigantic boulders of basalt. The boulders manifestly play the part of the menhirs or peulvans of the Kelts, and they are grouped here in the next most simple form of Keltic monument—the true cromlech—only with a mound in the centre. Selden, in his work “De Dís Syris, tells us that the trilith or lichaven was known to the Syrians. ‘Tapides fani Merkolis,” he says, ‘sic dispositierant ut unus hinc, alter illinc, tertius super utrumque collocaretur.' Monuments of the more simple forms adopted by the Kelts have also been met with in Persia, in |Palestine, and in Galatia. At Jindah Aba is a mound into the composition of which it is quite evident that boulders of basaltic rock and common rolled pebbles and stones have been made to enter. It is manifest that these mounds are most deserving of archaeological exploration. It is not that works of art or historical monuments of the same remote antiquity that have been dug up out of the mounds of Assyria or Khaldaea, and which have been said to refer to the 22nd century before Christ, ascending almost to the earliest known Egyptian period, are to be expected to be met with here. But there is every reason to believe that monuments and relics of one kind or another would be found belonging to Syria of old, very probably some evidences of those idolatrous practices which were engrafted upon more simple Assyrian forms, and which excited the ire of the Greeks and Romans. To these no doubt would also be added relics indicative of the subsequent domination of the Macedonians and Romans, and it is not likely that, except in a few instances which have been previously alluded to, and in those which are still the sites of castellated buildings, as at Aintab, that these mounds have been much used in more modern times, either for places of strength or refuge—for strongholds of robbers as in the instance of Jindaris—or for purposes of worship on high places. The marshes of Murad Pasha have driven the inhabi- tants to build their cottages on the mound of Gül Bashi; but it is rare to find modern villages on the tells themselves, while on the other hand the subordination of the village to the tell, the naming the tell rather than the village—a constant practice—and 414 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION the preservation of the remains themselves, sometimes even by artificial walls or ramparts of cyclopean stones, attests to the respect in which these huge monuments of olden times have ever been regarded by the natives. NO, 8. ABRAHAM's FATHERLAND. IT is not our province to discuss whether the outspreading, which is the entire subject of Genesis ch. x., and the scattering narrated in ch. xi. 1–9, refer to the same event. It suffices that the latter is included in the former description, and contains a statement of the manner in which the separation was effected. This is the general opinion, but there are not wanting those who dissent from it, and who argue that an unbiassed reading of the text appears most plainly to mark the distinctness, in time and character, of the two narratives. The first was universal, regulated, Orderly, quiet, and progressive : the second, local, embracing only a part of mankind, sudden, turbulent, and attended with marks of divine displeasure. - Be this as it may, we learn from the sacred record that as ‘they journeyed from the east they found a plain in the land of Shinar, and they dwelt there. They then burnt bricks, and using slime (bitumen) for mortar, they built a city and a tower, which was afterwards called Babel, ‘because the Lord did there confound the language of all the earth, and from thence did the Lord scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth.’ (Gen. xi. 9). We have before noticed the land of Shinar, and Babel has also been noticed as, with other places, the beginning of the kingdom of Nimrod, before he went forth to Asshur. It would appear from this, as also from the genealogy of Shem, entered upon immediately afterwards, as if the dispensation of a confu- sion of languages and a general scattering abroad was more particularly directed to that family of whom Noah had said; ‘Blessed be the Lord God of Shem, and which is here enu- merated in the line of Arphaxad, Salah, Eber, and Peleg. It was, APPENDIX 415 according to Gen. x. 25, in the time of the latter that the earth was divided, and he had for immediate descendant Reu, besides other sons and daughters. It is manifestly in keeping with the beginning of the chapter, that what is looked to is the direct descent of Abram, who although the youngest son is named first. ‘And Reu lived two and thirty years and begat Serug.” (Gen. xi. 20). SERUG.—A group of patriarchal names are gathered together in a very remarkable manner in One of the most fertile and populous portions of Mesopotamia, that which was known in Biblical times by the name of Padan-Aram, and afterwards as Osrhoene and Edessa. We have described in the text how a surveying party, consisting of Captain Lynch, I.N., Captain Eden, R.N., and the writer, explored this region in the year 1836, and met with a wide plain, dotted with ruins, at a distance of about 34 miles W. a little N. from Haran, 25 miles W. a little S. from Urfah, and 22 miles E. a little S. from Bir, and which district was known to the natives as that of Serug. There were villages, camps, and tells or mounds of ruin, the latter in some instances crowned by modern walls or Ziyarets—Sepulchral tombs or chapels—as also other ruins Scattered over the plain, but the most remarkable remains met with were two colossal unfinished lions, evidently of Assyrian Origin, and Sculptured on slabs of basalt some twelve feet in length, at a spot called from this circumstance Arslan Tagh or ‘the Hill of Tions.” Serug constitutes a little district of itself in a well-watered plain, surrounded on all sides by low hills, midway between Urfah and Haran and the Zeugma of Mambej or Hierapolis, and it was on the highway of the Assyrians, Greeks, Romans, and others, proceeding from Mesopotamia into Syria and Palestine, or ad- vancing from the latter to assail Mesopotamia. Thus it was that Trajan captured the place on his way to Nisibis, and that Julian came thither after crossing the Euphrates at the Zeugma of Hierapolis. It was then known as Batnae, a name conferred upon it by the Macedonians. That Batnae is the same as Serug is shown by the fact that the Syrian Christians called the 416 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION city Batna Sarugi or Batni in Sarugo (Assemanni, ‘Bibl. Orient, i. p. 285). Afterwards the name of Batnae seems to have given way to that of Sarug, and its later history is fully given in Assemann under that title, which it still preserves. Ritter, in his Erdkunde, xi. p. 282, erroneously identified the ruins at Char-Malik, half way from Bir to Urfah, and described by Lord Pollington, with Sarug. Mr. Walpole identified the same place with Anthemusia. But Anthemusia was in reality a district having a capital of Same name, and, as Ammianus tells us (xiv. 3, § 3) that Batna was a municipal town in the district of Anthem usia, we may suppose that the capital was at Arslan Tagh. Isidorus of Charax places Anthemusia between Edessa and the Euphrates, 4 Schoeni (24 geo, miles) from Edessa. This would precisely tally with the position of Arslan Tagh. The name of Batnae is said to be of Syriac origin, and to be found in the Arabic. It means a place in a valley where waters meet. (Milman, note on Gibbon’s ‘Decline and Fall, iv. 144; St. Martin, ‘note on Le Beau, iii. 56). The plain is in fact well watered, except at the dry seasons of the year, by rivulets which descend from the hills to the west. One of these flows past a village called Ras Ain or ‘head spring, and close by is another with a mill. The neighbourhood of Arslan Tagh is watered by the Margi stream, that of Sarug by the Abū Murdan. All these streams, with the exception of the last mentioned, unite on the plain itself, to form the Ras al Ain al Arab, which flows into the Balik Sū, the ancient Bilecha or Basilius, and the river of Haran. s - The name of this region in Assyrian times does not appear to have been yet deciphered, yet, if Mambej represents Carchemis, the Assyrians must have held it, and the Zeugma on the Euphrates, as a means of upholding communication. The exis- tence of Assyrian sculptures indeed sufficiently attests the fact. In later times many opulent traders resided at Batnae, and a large fair was held on the plain, which was attended by merchants from India and China. In the Antonine Itinerary Thilaticomum was 15 M.P. from Bathas (Batnae) and 10 M.P. from Hierapolis. Thilaticomum was therefore on the right, or left bank of the river Euphrates, where are now the ruins of APPENDIX 417 Kalah al Nesjm, or ‘the Castle of the Stars, and more fragmen- tary remains on the other side. ‘And Serug lived thirty years, and begat Nahor’ (Gen. xi. 22). NAHOR.—We find that the patriarchal city called Haran in Gen. xi. 31, 32; xii. 4–5, as also elsewhere, and in 2 Kings xix. 12, is called Nahor in Gen. xxiv. 10. We may therefore presume that Nahor was settled there before Haran, and that the place first bore his name. This is supposing that the Second Nahor was not meant, in which case the city may have been indifferently named Nahor or Haran. ‘And Nahor lived nine and twenty years, and begat Terah' (Gen. xi. 24). ‘And Terah lived seventy years, and begat Abram, Nahor, and Haran’ (Gen. xi. 26). ‘And Haran died before his father Terah, in the land of his nativity, in Ur of the Chaldees’ (Gen. xi. 28). UR OF THE CHALDEES.—We have before commented upon the difficult question as to the original Ur of the Chaldees having been in Babylonian Khaldaea, and its being succeeded by another place of the same name in Northern Mesopotamia. The affixing of patriarchal names to localities was charac- teristic of the earliest migrations, but here we have an excep- tion to the rule, inasmuch as while Serug, Nahor, and Haran are names connected with particular sites, the chief home of the patriarchs is spoken of by the peculiar designation of ‘Ur of the Chaldees.’ Local tradition has ever consecrated Urfah as the home of the father of Isaac, and the Birkat al Ibrahim al Khalil, or “spring of Abraham the beloved, is still supposed to contain the descendants of the fish loved by the Patriarch. There are also other local traditions connected with the Patriarch. Ur in the progress of corruption became Urhoi and Urfah, and with change of masters, Callirrhoë, and Edessa. Oriental writers, as Ahmed ibn Yusuf and Abū Muhammad Mustafah, identify Ur with Urfah, and they conduct the patriarch Abraham in his migration to the land of Canaan, from Haran to Berza, either Beroë, the modern Aleppo, or Bir on the Euphrates; but local tradition points to a spot a little lower down than Bir, known WOL. II. E E 4.18 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION as Kiyara by the Arabs, and Kur-liyu by the Turks, where there is a whirlpool or eddy in the water, as the place where Abraham lost some of his stock in crossing the river. Much confusion has arisen from some, as more especially Bochart (lib. i. ‘Phaleg,' cap. x.), Hugo Grotius (in Gen. xi. 31), Cellarius (iii. xv.), and others, confounding the Ur (or city) of the Persians, noticed by Ammianus Marcellinus (lib. xxv. cap. 26; Wales, cap. viii.), with Ur of the Chaldees. But this Ur (now Kalah Shirkat) was on the Tigris, in the same desert as Hatra was situated; and Jovian proceeded thence by Tisalphata, “the place of bitumen’ (now Ali Hammam) to Nisibin. This Ur or Ir had no reference either to Ur in Babylonia or Ur in Mesopo- tamia, Save analogy of name. M. Dubois de Montpereux, who identifies Eden with Media, the Haïasdan of the Armenians and the Hadanache or country of Zoroaster or Zardusht, supposes the prophet of the Persians to have been born at Urmiyah, or Ourmiah as he spells it, on the shores of Lake Urmiyah or Ourmiah. The legislator called the region the pure Iran or Uran, compared it to Paradise, and said it was the first spot created on earth. ‘There also is to be met with the antique country of Arphaxad, and of the Hebrews, and their patriarch Abraham was born like Zoroaster at Ur, on the shores of Lake Ourmiah in Chaldaea.’—‘Voyage autour la Caucase', vol. iv. p. 341 et seq. ‘And Terah took Abram his son, and Lot the son of Haran his son's Son, and Sarai his daughter in law, his son Abram's wife; and they went forth with them from Ur of the Chaldees, to go into the land of Canaan; and they came unto Haran and dwelt there. ‘And the days of Terah were two hundred and five years: and Terah died in Haran.’ HARAN.—It has been remarked of Haran (Charran of the Sep- tuagint, and of the New Testament) that there are no grounds for supposing the place to have been so called from Haran, the father of Lot, except the identity of names. But surely this is some- thing, since we find the patriarchal name of Nahor given to the same place (Gen. xxiv. 10), and we have the patriarchal name of Serug in the same neighbourhood. The elder branch of the APPENDIX 419 family continued to reside here after Abraham had left, upon the decease of his father Terah, which led to the interesting journeys thither described in the patriarchal history—first, that of Abraham's servant to obtain a wife for Isaac (Gen. xxiv.), and next, that of Jacob when he fled to evade the wrath of Esau (Gen. xxviii. 10). The spot where Isaac went forth to meet Rebekah was at a well called Bir (Beer in the vulgate) -lahai-roi, which is between Kadesh and Bered (Gen. xvi. 14), “for he dwelt in the south country.’ When Jacob went out from Bir-sheba to- ward Haran, the home of his ancestors, he is described as going on his journey, after tarrying at Beth-el, till he ‘came into the land of the people of the east. Such an expression would scarcely have been used if Haran was, as has been lately argued, in Aram Dammesek. When Jacob is described as leaving the country with his wives and herds, he is said (Gen. xxxi. 18) to have carried away “the cattle of his getting, which he had gotten in Padan-aram. If Haran was in Aram Dammesek, that region would thus be made to comprise Padan-aram as well as Aram Naharaim. Further, when Jacob fled, he is described as passing over ‘the river, an expression only used in the instance of the ‘great river par excellence, the Perath or the Euphrates; after which he set his face towards Mount Gilead. That Laban should have overtaken Jacob at Mount Gilead after seven days’ pursuit, journeying from Padan-aram, would argue a rate of travelling of at least forty miles per diem. But this rate of speed on the part of an irate parent is more readily understood than to suppose that the patriarch took seven days to overtake Jacob and his daughters, starting from Aram Dammesek to beyond Hermon, a distance of about fifty miles, and therefore arguing a pursuit at the rate of only some seven or eight miles per diem. Jacob, it is also to be observed, when overtaken and reproached by Laban was on his way, in the words of Scripture, to his father's house. His father's house was in the south country, a word usually applied to the districts south of Jerusalem (see Stanley's ‘Sinai, p. 159). If Haran had been in Aram Dammesek, Jacob would, to have gone to Gilead, have been fleeing away to the westward instead of to the South, towards his father's house. When Jacob came to Shalem, a city of Shechem, which is in the land of Canaan, he is also described E E 2 420 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION as coming from Padan-aram (Gen. xxxiii. 18). If therefore the proofs of Padan-aram being either Mesopotamia or a dis- trict of Mesopotamia are of any value, so also must Haran or Charran have been in Mesopotamia. The Holy Writ, by specify- ing the number of days which it took Laban to overtake Jacob, when travelling from Haran in Mesopotamia to Mount Gilead in Syria, seems to have considered the rapidity of the journey to have been worthy of being consigned in Jewish history. There is no deficiency of wells around Haran. Most have square stones over them, with a circular hole to draw water and stone troughs for cattle to drink from. The Hon. Frederick Walpole, when here, selected, as the officers of the Euphrates Expedition did before him, one of the most prominent and most frequented, as the well to which Rebekah may have come with her pitcher. - ‘As we sat, he relates (‘The Ansayrii,’ &c. vol. i.), ‘camels came and knelt by the well; and then the veiled girls came out in long file, each with her pitcher on her shoulder; as in Holy Writ it says, “Rebekah came with her pitcher on her shoulder.” And they one by one let down their pitchers; the bearded men knelt to indulge in the draught they asked for. At such a well could any ask in vain P. The Bible says, “She hasted and let down her pitcher upon her hand.” With each family is a rope: this is attached to the handles of the pitchers, and the drawer, generally, as now, a woman or maiden, lets down the pitcher, the rope held by her hand, or resting on her hand. And here we sat and saw this very scene.’ There are other wells in Mesopotamia, and in Syria also. Dr. and Mrs. Beke, having found a well at Haran in Dammesek, took the same liberty as the Hon. Frederick Walpole did at Haran in Naharaim, and identified it with the well from which Rebekah drew water for the servant whom Abraham sent forth to seek a wife for his son, who should not be “of the daughters of the Canaanites’ among whom he dwelt, but of his own country and kindred.’ This is a remarkable statement if Ur of the Chaldees was at Orchoe in Babylonian Khaldaea and not at Urfah. Mr. Walpole says the Arabs uniformly call the latter place Ur to the present day. The most amusing thing concerning Dr. Beke's APPENDIX 421 well is that having assigned to it the tradition of Rebekah, the dwellers around gladly adopted it, and point out to modern travellers the well of Rebekah, just as the monks do the wine pitchers at Kana and the manger of the Saviour at Bethlehem. Haran or Charran was known to the Greeks as Käppat (Dion Cass. xxxvii. 5, xl. 25; Strabo, xvi. p. 747; Ptol. v. 18, § 12), and to the Romans as Carrhae and Carrae. It is most celebrated as the scene of the overthrow of Crassus by the Parthians under Suraena. “Carrae, clade Crassi nobiles,’ says Pliny (v. 24); and Lucanus (lib. i. 104) says: - miserando funere Crassus Assyrias Latio maculavit Sanguine Carras. Ammianus states that Julian secretly invested Procopius with the purple at the same place, in case the same fate should befall him. That the Carras of the Greeks and Romans was the same as Haran, is shown by the latter place being written Charran in the New Testament, and by the spelling of the name in Josephus and Zonaras, as also by its pre- serving the name of Haran to the present day. The Sep- tuagint has also Kapata ?) #v Batáum, evidencing the con- nection between Haran and Batmas. The details of the cam- paigns of Crassus and Julian leave indeed no doubt as to the positioning of Carrhae, which the Theodosian Tables place at 26 M.P. from Edessa. If then Carrhae was the same place as Haran, of which there seems to be little doubt, the site of Carrhae being found, so is also that of Haran, and this can not only be done historically and geographically, but at the site itself extensive ruins are found, still known by the name of Haran. What is there to be said, when compared with such cumulative evidence, in favour of Haran in Dammesek being the Haran of Holy Writ P. It may have been an Haran of subsequent—and even of Biblical times—but it was not the Haran whither Terah took Abram his son, where Terah died, where Abraham's kindred dwelt after the prophet's departure for Canaan, whither Abraham deputed his servant to seek for a wife for his son Isaac, from his own country and from among his own kindred, whither, Isaac in his turn bade Jacob also seek 422 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION a wife, and whence Jacob fled with Leah and Rachel to Isaac ‘ his father in the land of Canaan.' - Bochart says, “Tharam, Abrahae patrem . . . migravisse Charan . . . Graeci et Romani scriptores Carrhas vocant ’ (‘Phaleg, ii. 14). Salmasius also says, “Carras urbem adpellant, quam Ebraei Haran sive Charran' (‘Exercit. Plin.’ p. 848); and Cellarius adds, “Secundum nos ergo, Eusebium et Hieronymum, non est dubium, quin Carrae Romanorum fuerint Haran patriar- charum ” (“Not. Orb. Antiq. pp. 617,618). It would be difficult to find a greater mass of cumulative evidence on any one point of Biblical geography. General Chesney (‘Exp. to the Euph.’ vol. i. p. 115) says ‘the ruins of Haran (properly Charan) are about twenty miles S.E. by S. from Orfah, and consist of a bath, a castle, the remains of a temple or church ; and near them is the well of Rebeka.’ No. 9. CHALCIDENE. THE river Koweſk, after being nearly drained of its waters by the fields and gardens of Aleppo, is reinforced by the waters of the Ain al Embaraky, or the ‘Blessed Fountain, where Malek al Daher, son of Salah-u-din, was received by the grandees on his succession to the throne, and still more particularly by those of the Ain Rijib Rasha, which is six or seven miles below the town. It follows thence a tortuous course by Khan Taman through a hilly district to Kinisrin, ancient Chalcis. This is now a con- fused heap of ruins; nothing like a house is seen standing, but there are plenty of squared stones and foundations. The remains of the city walls are visible; they were about ten feet (Pococke) or nine feet (Drummond) thick, and about a mile in circumference, having Square towers at equal distances. At the south-east side of the city is a raised ground, on which there are foundations of a castle which was about half a mile in circumference, and on the north-east side, without the walls, there are foundations of an oblong building on an advanced ground which Pococke thought might have been a temple. There is a high hill to the west of the city, on which stood APPENDIX 423 the fortress which was the great defence of all this country. It was surrounded by a double wall, and on the top of it there are three or four very large cisterns like arched vaults, cut down in the rock, with a hole in the top to draw up the water, and steps down to them on one side; there is likewise a mosque on a mount which is the highest part of the hill, where Pococke detected some fragments of Greek Christian inscriptions, and at the east end of the mosque the foundations of a semicircular wall which convinced him that it had been a church. This is by no means surprising when we consider that all this country was Christianised previous to the conquests of the Saracens. At the foot of this hill to the north, Pococke also found cut over the door of a grotto a spread eagle in relief, which that traveller thought might be a work of the Romans, probably during the government of the Flavian family, who might have been bene- factors to the city, as the name of it was changed in compliment to some of them, probably Trajan; for there is a medal of this city, with Trajan's head on it, and this reverse, p A XAAKIAEON. From the top of this hill Pococke saw the minaret of the mosque in the castle of Aleppo, and Drummond describes the view from the same eminence as being very grand and compre- hensive, extending over a champaign country to a prodigious distance all round; but he adds, “not one fiftieth part cultivated.’ Even this, however, is not bad for what is commonly considered to be a part of the great desert—a thing that would have little or no existence were it not for the predatory dispositions of the Arabs, which, unrestrained by a feeble government, render sojourn or even travel insecure. In the time of the Romans and of the Palmyreans, there was no great Syrian desert. The four districts of Apamene, Chalcidene, Chalybonites, and Palmyrene, extend- ing from the Orontes to the Euphrates, were dotted with towns. Between Apamaea and Chalcis was Lysias, now Kafir al Barah, and Macra, now Marrah. The vast extent of ruins at Reiha, and the flourishing village of Edlip, celebrated for its olives, and of Armanas, ancient Maronias, equally celebrated for its glass manufactures, all tell of the past and present capabilities of these deserted regions. Then again in Chalcidene we had, besides Chalcis, Lysias, Macra, Maronias, and other sites, at or 424 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION near Mount Belus; Androna, Seriana, Thoma or Tolmidessa, Asaph or Asaphidama, in the plains. In Chalybonites we had, besides Chalybon, Acoraba or Acoraca, Goaria or Coara, Der- rhima, Spelunca, Barbarissus, and Athis. And in Palmyrene, besides Palmyra, Resapha, Oriza, Adada, Cholle, Putea, Adacha, Danaba, Aneria, Casama, Odmana, Ateia, and in Palmyrene Euphratensis, Alalis, Sura, Alamata, and Zenobia. Pliny, speaking of Chalcis in the desert, says: ‘Et Chalcidem, cog- nominatam ad Belum ; unde regio Chalcidene, fertilissima Syriae.’ There seems little doubt of Mount Belus being the range of hills that separates the Orontes from Chalcidene. Seleucus (Jisr Sughair) was called ad Belum. Ptolemy son of Mennaeus is described by Strabo as holding, besides Heliopolis (Baalbek), the plain of Marsyas, the mountain region of Ituraea, and the city Ralkis in Ituraea. Cellarius (p. 364) discusses the question in favour of the two Chalces being one and the same, and it certainly is remarkable that Strabo says of Kalkis or Chalcis (lib. xvi. p. 519), that it was in the mountains near Macra; 6a7sp &xpóToxts Toi, Mapaiſov, ara, et munimentum campi Marsyae. In the ‘Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography, however, Chalcis, the chief city of Chalcidice, and Chalcis ad Belum are treated as separate places, chiefly on the grounds of the state- ment made by Josephus (comp. ‘Antiq.’ xiv. 3, § 2; Reland, ‘Palaest., p. 315), and Dr. Robinson has recovered the site of Chalcis in Ituraea, which was bestowed by Claudius on Herod, a brother of the elder Herod Agrippa, and which became the seat of a dynasty, with Madjel Anjar. Beyond Kinisrin, the river Koweſk sweeps eastward along the foot of a range of hills called by Pococke Sheikh Aite, till, one hour from the village of Sphiri, it enters the marshes and lake of El Melak, which receives a second river coming from the above-mentioned village, besides other fresh streams. Although but a small place, Sphiri is described by Dr. Helfer as remark- able for its prosperity, and the pleasing contrast it affords when compared with other Arab villages. The houses are well built of sun-dried bricks, and contain several clean apartments looking into an interior Court. The inhabitants have become settled APPENDIX 425 cultivators, and enjoy the advantages of an improved system of husbandry, with better farming implements than they formerly had. These and the practice of irrigation have been introduced by the Sheikh, who is thus enabled to obtain a succession of crops; and he has made a good road and planted trees on each side in order to afford an agreeable shade. The salt lake called El Melak is described upon the same authority as exceeding in its circumference in winter-time probably fifty miles, and at that season its waters are merely bitter; but during the dry season the extent of water being reduced to less than thirty miles in circumference, the solution becomes more concentrated, and sufficient salt crystallises on the borders to supply the wants of a considerable part of Syria. General Chesney describes the lake as being supplied by the waters of the celebrated Nahr el Dahab or Golden River. Dr. Russell, in his ‘Natural History of Aleppo ’ (p. 55), describes it as an extensive plain, generally known by the name of the Valley of Salt or Subket el Jibool (or Jibül), eighteen miles distant from Aleppo to the south-east. This lake he describes as mainly supplied by the waters of the Nahr el Dahab, which is reckoned by Eben Shuhny as one of the wonders of the world, and near it is the village Jibool, close by which is a small hill worth visiting on account of the prospect from the top. General Chesney says that 6 miles south-westward of Aleppo is the village of Nerab; about 16 miles further is that of Maloula; and again, about 17 miles, also in a south-easterly direction, are the ruins of Ashuak Mashuk (Asaph, or Asaphi- dama P), which contain a church, and constitute the remains of a considerable town situated at a little distance from a second Salt lake, in which a river no less remarkable than the Koweik terminates. This stream has its source at a place called Dahab, near the foot of the hills to the southward of Mambej (Hiera- polis); from thence the Nahr el Dahab, or Golden River, identified by Colonel Chesney with the Daradax of Xenophon, flows Southwards, passing by Taïdif, and near the fountain of El Bab; after which its course tends a little way westward of Abū Jaber. It now inclines S.S.W., and after flowing 426 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION about 46 miles in this direction, or nearly parallel to the Rowek, its waters are lost in those of Lake Jibul (more pro- perly Sabakhah, i.e. brackish), a little beyond the village of that name. Both the village and the lake are situated in the Valley of Salt ; and the latter, having received three short streams near its western extremity, extends from thence east- ward for about twelve miles, with a breadth varying from about three to five. - The salt lake is alluded to in history as the ‘Salt Walley,’ where David conquered Hadadezer, king of Zobah, when he went to recover his border on the Euphrates, Pococke, leaving Mambej or Hierapolis, took a circuitous road by Shihiet in a north-westerly direction, and then in a south-westerly, to the river Samgour, and by Jelbegly (Tell Begly P) to Aadeneh. The next day he came to a fine fertile plain in which was Bashe (apparently the head of the waters) and a village called Bab, situated under a hill, the west end of which is called Sheikh Majar, and under that part of the hill a large village called Sur is situated, which is three hours from Aleppo. Pococke was informed that there was a very ancient synagogue at Bab, called Sheikh Isaiah, to which there was a great resort at a certain time of the year, a few Jews only living there; about a league to the east of this hill there is a village called Derah (the valley). Thence he went south-west by the rivulet Mazouty and near a village called Bezouah, and in less than an hour more came to a most pleasant village called Tedif (Taidifoſ General Chesney, vol. i. p. 415), which is computed to be 20 miles to the east of Aleppo. At the time of Pococke's visit, the country about is described as having been improved with a young plantation of mulberry trees, which was made under the direction of a French merchant who had an interest in the lands, ‘and as being very much like the country between Chantilly and Paris. There is a synagogue there which is held in great veneration, and if I mistake not,’ he adds, “they have some ancient manuscript in it, on the account of which it is much frequented by the Jews. In the hill near this town there are many sepulchres and curious aqueducts cut in the rock ; they have some tradition that one of the minor prophets lived here. APPENDIX 427 }-y General Chesney thinks that somewhere on the banks of the river flowing into Lake Sabanjah, possibly near the ruins at the fountain of El Bab or Taïdif, there may have been the extensive hunting-grounds enclosing the palace of the satrap Belesis, which was destroyed by Cyrus during his halt after the march from the river Chalcis. There are difficulties in this view of the question which will be found discussed at length in the Com- mentary on the ‘Anabasis’ of Xenophon attached to the Rev. J. S. Watson's translation, published by Henry G. Bohn (1854). The probabilities of the case certainly point to this identity of El Bab and the sources of the river Dardes or Daradax, as advocated of old by Rennell, who calls it the ‘Fountain of Fay.” But strong doubts exist as to its being also the residence of Belesis, at that time the governor of Syria, and whose name still attaches itself to Balis. The ruins appear, however, to indicate a site of as much magnitude as those at Balis, which we have before identified with the seat of the palace and hunting-grounds of the Persian satrap. From hence Pococke proceeded in one hour to Beenj, and an hour more by a stream called Ain Dahab (the golden spring) and came to the deserts, ‘and after travelling about a league we arrived at Shirbey, where we were very civilly received by the Sheikh, and had a grand supper served; for this Sheikh usually goes with the Europeans to the Valley of Salt, but not without a proper gratification.” El Amri is described by Dr. Helfer as a ridge of basaltic rocks upheaved amid chalk, or, as is more likely, supra-Cretaceous limestones, and it is broken by numerous precipi- tous valleys, in which blocks of stone are scattered on all sides. At a short distance to the south-westward Dr. Helfer met with considerable remains, to which the Arabs gave the name of Belad Rhan Azra. “The walls and towers of this city of old were nearly nine miles in circumference; and in addition to the remains of houses constructed with basalt, there were several ruined baths with two temples. There were also the remains of a * Pococke also notices the village called Geboue, built on an eminence in the same vicinity. There are two roads, he says, hence to Aleppo; one to the north and the other to the South, which he followed by Trihanë, Elhass, Gibly, and Nerop (Nerab). 428 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION castellated building situated on a tell in the south-west quarter of the town. Being twelve hours distant S.S.E. from Aleppo, Colonel Leake is of opinion that Belad Khan Azra may be the ancient Androna ; and it is probable that the ruins mentioned by the Arabs to Dr. Helfer, which are six hours further on towards Palmyra, are those of Seriane. The cities of Chalcidene, Thoma, Asaph or Ataphor Asaphidana, and Androna would appear to have been grouped more, or less together on the tributaries to the salt lake. The first being possibly now represented by Taïdif, the second by Ashuk Mashuk, the third by Belad Khan Azra, if this site does not represent Bathnas, 21 M.P. from Hierapolis. Wherever, however, the sites of the old towns of Chalcidene may be ultimately determined to be, the great point to be kept in view is the former populousness and productiveness, and the existing fertility of tracts of country often too hastily set down as desert. Nothing is wanting but the security to be afforded by an energetic and competent government to draw the same regions once more within the common bonds of industry and well-being. At all events, it must not be imagined that the railroad has to be carried from Aleppo to the Euphrates through a mere wilderness. - Besides the permanent villages and cultivation met wherever there is water, a few Arab tribes still lead a nomad or wander- ing pastoral life in this region, pitching their tents now on the great hawis or meadows on the banks of the Euphrates, at other seasons in the higher pastures around ancient Hierapolis or in the neighbourhood of the great salt lake and its tributaries. These tribes are chiefly the Henadi, the Beni Sayyid or Said, and portions of the Fahal, Weldack, Effawali, and Arieza. The Millis and some few of the Kurdish tribes are also nomadic in the same region, but most of them are located in permanent villages and are allowed to retain the patriarchal government, the Boyah Beg, or chief of the district, being answerable to the government for the taxes. The majority of the Turcomans are nomadic, but the chief tribes, as the Reihaulis, the Jerid, and the Richwans, do not quit the plains of Syria. Whilst Achmet Beg continues to reside in a tent on the plain of Umk, Muhammad APPENDIX 429 Beg has established his headquarters in the town of Kilis, and his tribe have become agricultural labourers in the villages around. No. 10, HALAH. THE name Halah is essentially Biblical. It is noticed in Holy Writ as one of the cities to which the captives of Jerusalem were removed by Tiglath-pileser (2 Kings xvii. 6; xviii. 11; 1 Chron. v. 26). The name, it has been said, differs from Calah as much as Habor differs from Chebar. This is true, inasmuch as the Chebar of Scripture (the Gobya of the Talmuds) was never known by the epithet of Habor or Khaboras, but the Habor or Khaboras was known by the name of Chaboras as written by Ptolemy, as well as Aboras, and Al Chabür by Abū-l-fada, as well as Al Khabür. Hence has arisen the miscon- ception entertained by many as to the identity of the Chaboras with the Chebar. Then, again, there is no greater difference between Chabor and Halah (Calah or Chalah), than there is between Habor and Chebar, only that the latter has never been called Habor. Or as between Halah or Calah of the captivity and Calah of Gen. x. 11—the Calach of the inscriptions, and now Gla or Kalah, immediately south of Resen or Nimrūd. Although the name of Halah is bound up with that of the river of Habor and its confluent the river of Gozan, or of Gausanitis, described by Cellarius (lib. iii. p. 603) as being between the Chaboras and the Saocoras, and therefore corresponding either to the Huali, Hermus or river of Eleia, or to that part of the Khabür which flows between the extinct volcanoes of Kaukab (‘the Star') and Arban, still it has not been recognised as represented by any known site on the I habūr or its tributaries. The Only possible approximation would be supposing Halah or Calah to be repeated in the modern Kalah or ‘Castle, is to be found in the existence of a castle on the Khabür known as Aborensium Castellum by 430 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Simocatta (lib. iv. c. x.), but called Chabora by Ptolemy, and which may either be represented by the Assyrian city of Arban or Arbonai, or by Karkisha, both having had castles in their time, that of Chabora being described as being at or near the mouth of the river. Sextus Rufus speaks of the castle of Cir- cessum, as he writes it, as does also Zozimus (lib. iii, cap. xii.), but as the castle of Circesium, and Ammianus as the castle of Cercusium (lib. xxiii. Cap. xi). --- A site with an approximative name is met with on the left bank of the river Khabür, and nearly opposite to Abū Serai, or “ the father of palaces,’ representing Karshisha, and which, if the site of Halah or Calah, may indicate that the place selected for the captive Israelites was not so much Carchemish itself as a suburb of that city. Benjamin of Tudela, who calls Rakka Dakia, alone identifies the same site with the ‘Calneh of Scripture, by which it is to be presumed he meant Halah or Calah, not Chalne, a primeval city in the land of Shinar. This approximation meets with a coincidence in the name of Rakka having been at one time Callinicus or Callinocopolis, which it might be conjectured was derived from its old appella- tion of Calah or Halah. r & - Unfortunately for such a hypothesis, there is a difference of opinion as to the origin of this name. According to the chronicles of Alexander (“Chron. Alexandri, p. 405), it was derived from Seleucus Callinicus, who repaired the city. Ac- cording to Libanius in his Epistle to Aristaenetus, it was derived from Callinicus the Sophist, who according to Suidas lived in the time of Gallienus. But may not this very diversity of opinion as to how its Roman name came to it, prove it was of more remote and forgotten origin P - It is not, however, to be denied that there exist many strong proofs in favour of Holwan at Sar Puli Zohab being the Halah of the captivity, of at least the Samaritan Jews. The place was known as such by the Nestorians, as also by the Christian Arabs. The Kalhurs are said to have descended from the J ews, as also the Ali Ilahis. Amaria, where the false Messias, David Elroi, appeared, was APPENDIX - 431 in the district of Holwan. Isidorus of Charax says Chalonitis (which is supposed to have extended from Ctesiphon to the foot of the Zagros) was so called from Chala. Shalmaneser, in fact, carried the tribes in captivity to various places, and as some of these were strongholds—Kalahs, as they would be called in the present day—it is not surprising that we should meet with different Halahs, Calahs, or Chalnehs. No. 11. CARCHEMISH. BOCHART (lib. iv. ‘Geogr. 8, cap. xxi.) says: Learned people (‘multi existimant,’ adds Cellarius) think that Cercusium is the same as Carcemis, a city on the Euphrates (which Hierapolis is not). Grotius also entertained the same opinion. Benjamin of Tudela also said, ‘Karkisia, which is Kharkh’mish; ? and A. Asher, his commentator, adds in a note, ‘Modern Orientalists of celebrity, including Rosenmüller and Gesenius, agree with our author's identification of Karkisia (Cercusium, Circusium, Cir- cesium) with Karkh'misch.’ In connection with the name of Araxes, given by Xenophon alone to the Khabür, it is interesting to note that in the trans- lation of the Inscriptions of Nebuchadrezzar by the Rev. C. Ball, occurs a passage in which either the Euphrates or the Baby- lonian Nil is called by the same name. ‘The embankments of the Araxes with bitumen and kiln- brick’ (‘ Proceedings of the Society of Biblical Archaeology,’ vol. x. part 7, p. 362). No. 12. DURA. ZOZIMUS says (lib. iii. cap. 14), “We came to a place called Zaita, which means a place of olive trees. We could perceive the tumulus of the Emperor Gordian long before arriving there.” But in another place he describes Julian as arriving at Zautha, and thence reaching Dura, where they were shown the sepulchre of Gordian. 4.32 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION Eutropius (lib. ix. cap. ii.) describes the sepulchre of Gordian as being 20 M.P. from the castle of Circesium ; but Walesius says it was only sixty stadia from that site, and he is confirmed in this statement by Zozimus. Dura is described as a city of Nicanor built by the Macedonians, and also known to the Greeks by the name of Europus. It was deserted in the time of Julian. No. 13. BETHAUNA. PTOLEMY has only one site between Zaita and the confluence of the Sahocoras, which he designates as Bethautha, or, as it is written in the Palatine Codex, Bethauna. Ammianus says, “After Dura, a deserted city, comes Anathan, a stronghold sur- rounded by the Euphrates, that is to say on an island.’ There can therefore be little doubt but the two names apply to the same place, and the allusion to its being situated above the confluence of the Saocoras lends countenance to the supposition that the existing channel known as the Naha Sura, and which I crossed on an old stone bridge, was really the mouth of that mysterious stream. No. 14. SAOCORAS. CELLARIUS (lib. iii. p. 609) remarks, as we have before seen, that Ptolemy makes no mention of any sites from Zaita to the confluence of the Saocoras with the exception of Bethautha, or Bethauna, as it is written in the Palatine Code. The identity of Bethautha is not satisfactorily determined, although, as elsewhere shown, there are many reasons to suppose that Beth- auna, as it is otherwise written, is a misspelling for Beth or Beth- ana (home or village of Anah). Zaita was at all events situated below the confluence of the Khabür with the Euphrates, yet does the same able critic identify at page 610 the Saocoras with the Araxes of Xenophon, and there are in reality many reasons APPENDIX - 433 for believing the identity thus established to be the correct one notwithstanding the confusion and perplexity wrought by Ptolemy's statements. How little these are to be depended upon in connection with the Saocoras is shown by another state- ment of the Alexandrian geographer to the effect that Rescipha is placed by him at the confluence of the Saocoras with the Euphrates. Now Rescipha, or Resepha, afterwards Sergiopolis, was the last stage on the road from Palmyra to Thapsacus, and this would identify the Saocoras with the Bilecha or Balik Sū Another argument in favour of Ptolemy's Saocoras being the same as the Khabür may be derived from the sites described as following in succession : Agamna (el Kayim), Eudrapa (not known), Addaea (Anah), Pacoria (Anatho), Teridata (Tilbes), Naarda (Haddisa), and Sipphara (Sifarah). “Fontes habet prope Nisibin et totam prope Mesopotamiam dividit,” says Cellarius, and such terms apply to no other known river than the Khabür. It might indeed be assumed, that as for some inexplicable reason Xenophon called the ancient Habor and Chabor Araxes, so for some equally inexplicable reason, Ptolemy called it the Saocoras, were it not that he himself also makes mention of the Kaboras or Chaboras as flowing into the Euphrates at Cercu- Sll III] . No. 15. FIERY FURNACE. BENJAMIN of Tudela makes mention in connection with the palace of Nebuchadnezzar (or as some have it Nebuchadrezzar), of the ‘fiery furnace' into which were thrown Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah. “It is a valley,’ he adds, “well known to every one.’ The tradition was probably associated with the Mujaliba or place of captives. No. 16. NEHARDEA. BENJAMIN of Tudela places Shafjahib, ‘where there is a syna- gogue which the Israelites erected with earth and stones WOL. II. E F 434 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION brought from Jerusalem,” above Sura, a place he says called in the Talmud Matha-Mecasia (but that name refers to a suburh of Sura), and a day and a half from El Jubar or Pombeditha. But his commentator, A. Asher, observes that Rabbi Petachia more correctly places it at N'hardea or Nehardea, which it must be borne in mind was the name of a district comprising alike Nehardea (Haddisa), Pombeditha, Juba, and Sura, still so called, as well as of a town and synagogue. These were all celebrated seats of the Gaonim or heads of Academies—seats, in fact, of the most celebrated universities of the Jews of the captivity. Neubauer, in his ‘Géographie du Talmud, p. 389, places Nehardea, as he writes it—the most ancient synagogue—upon the Nahr Malcha. The identification of name is unquestionable, but there were Nahar dars, dwellings on the river, under various idioms, as Nehardea, Nehardaa, Be’ Nouharda (Asseman. ‘Bibl. Orient., ii. 249,459), Naharra (Peuting. Tables), Naard (Ptolemy), and even Narraga (Pliny) on the Euphrates, the Nahr Malcha and the Sura canals. Nor do the distances given from Sura and Pombeditha support this view of the case; but if, as one writer describes, the city extended over three miles of territory, it could not have been on an island like Haddisa. But Nehardea was a district as well as a town. “Juba, which is Pumbeditha in Nehardea,” says Benjamin of Tudela. The town of N'hardea, as A. Asher writes it, “was situated on the Euphrates,’ adds his commentator, quoting Josephus (“Arch.” xviii. 11), and above Sura, according to Aruch or Rab. Had Nehardea been on the Nahr Malcha, it would have stood 26 miles by river below Sura. - No. 17. ARCHAEOLOGY OF KEIALDAEA. THE ruins of Sinkara, situated 15 miles south-east of Warka, stand on the extreme verge of the broad desert ridge which intervenes between the inundations of the Euphrates in the west and the marshes of the Shat al Kahr on the east. In ordinary seasons the waters of the Kahr extend close up to the eastern base of the ruins. These consist of a low circular plat- APPENDIX 435 form, about 4% miles in circumference, rising gradually from the level of the plain to a central mound, the highest point of which is seventy feet. Adjoining this principal pile on the north-west is a low extensive ruin, apparently consisting of a series of brick walls and pavements. At a distance of 400 paces on the north- east of the great ruin is a high mound of large half-baked red bricks, at the base of which is traceable the outline of an ancient square enclosure, and small chambers between thick walls. The south-east edge of the whole platform is occupied by an undu- lating ruin of considerable extent, composed of mud bricks, and known to the Arabs by the name of ‘Gemel’ or the camel, from the peculiar lump which rises from its centre. The surface of the rest of the ruins is covered with pave- ments, varying from 30 to 40 feet Square, elevated a few feet above the general debris, and constructed of Small rough bricks; on the north-east these pavements are of very frequent occur- I'éIOC6. Mr. Loftus says that it was evident from a first inspection of these ruins that they all belonged to one period, and that no later races of different origin have built upon the edifices erected by the ancient people. There are no coins, no glass, no glazed pottery, as at Warka, but a uniform dull brown hue pervades everything about the place; the fine dust, the bricks, the pottery, are of the same Sombre colour; the only relief being presented in the north-east mounds, whose deep red bricks afford a pleasing contrast to the general dingy aspect of the place. Mr. Loftus commenced his explorations at the principal ruin. The edifice crowning its summit was found to be included within an oval space circumscribed by a wall, built of Square bricks, firmly set with bitumen, and having a thirteen-line inscription of Nebuchadnezzar upon the under side of each. The whole mound seems to have been terraced as usual, with the angles facing the cardinal points. Near the centre of the mound two tombs were found, the one above the other, nearly every brick of which bore a dedication of a Temple to the Sun by Urukh, the common founder of Warka and Niffar. Three barrel cylinders were found, as also some bricks, one edge of which was minutely inscribed with precisely the same F F 2 436 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION record as that upon the barrel cylinders; thus, says Mr. Loftus, beyond doubt fixing the date of the upper part of the mound above the tombs as early as the time of Nebuchadnezzar, about 600 B.C. This is confirmed by Sir Henry Rawlinson's decipherment of the inscriptions. He states that they commemorate the re- building of the temple of Pharra by that monarch, in the city of Larnak. A description of the same work occurs on Bellino’s cylinder from Babylon, published by Grotefend. Nebuchad- nezzar is represented as digging into the foundations of the old temple of the Sun, which had fallen to ruins, for the purpose of obtaining the ancient idol, with the intention of placing it in his new edifice. Having excavated for a considerable time, he was obliged to give up a fruitless search, and to finish his building without it." The same authority elsewhere states that ‘throughout the Babylonian monuments—that is, in the bricks found at Niffar, at Sinkara, and at Warka, as well as on the tablets of Nebuchad- nezzar—the city in question is named Sikkara, or Sinkareh.” He further conjectures that the Lanchara of Berosus, which was the capital of the original Khaldaean dynasty, is a mistake by some copyist for Sanchara (29th Annual Report of the Royal Asiatic Society for 1852). Sinkara is likewise supposed to be the Sarsa of other inscriptions, as stated in the ‘Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society, p. 47. Mr. Loftus thinks that in this name we probably have preserved that of Shinar, the land whence the Biblical migration took place. It appears curious that Sir Henry Rawlinson should trans- late ‘Sin as the ‘moon' (see Loftus, p. 168). The temple at Sinkara, we are told, was dedicated by Urukh to the ‘Sun.” Like the Ra or Sun of the Egyptians, Sin is also a prefix and an adjunct in the names of certain kings, as Sin-shada, Rim-sin, and Zur-sin of the first Khaldaean dynasty. Sinkara appears to have been the Baalbek, Heliopolis, Hierapolis, or Apollino- polis of Khaldaea. * A king named Purna-puriyas was also a builder at Sinkara. Mr. Loftus picked up a brick with a legend of sixteen lines bearing that name. He is supposed to have reigned about 1650 B.C. APPENDIX - 437 El Heimar (Al Hamra), or the red mound, was found to be wholly composed of half-baked red bricks, with layers of reeds intervening. A patch of building at its eastern corner afforded a legend of Nebonit, the last king of Babylon. This monarch, like his predecessor Nebuchadnezzar, appears to have repaired a more ancient structure, for at the northern corner of the same ruin there was uncovered a fragment of brick masonry, with a legend of the king Khammurabi, who is supposed to have flourished about 1560 B.C. With the subsequent rise, Mr. Loftus tells us, of the Persian empire after the fall of Babylon, Sinkara declined in importance, the latest record obtained from its mounds being a small clay tablet inscribed with the name of Cambyses. From that period Warka, the great rival of Sinkara, assumed a higher rank at least as a place of sepulture, and engrossed the whole considera– tion which it had previously shared in conjunction with Sinkara. It appears to have been the only city throughout that region which survived the great convulsion attending the taking of Babylon. With the extinction of the native rulers, Mu-kayir, Sinkara, Abu Shheyreyn (Abu Sharein), Til Sifr, Medina, and numerous other sites in Khaldaea were deserted, and have re- mained so to this day. Warka alone maintained its position 500 years longer as the capital of the district, and witnessed the enfeebled dominion of the Persian pass into the hands of the Grecian conqueror, and from him in turn to the barbarous Parthian, when he, too, succumbed under the changeable character of the times. Beyond the few buildings explored, the remainder of the area at Sinkara appears to have been one vast cemetery; wher- ever an excavation was made, vaults and graves invariably occurred, and the innumerable cuneiform records contained in them substantiate their undoubted antiquity. The usual relics —jars, vases, cylinders, rings, beads—besides many of a rarer character, were obtained from these sepulchres of the dead. Among the more remarkable relics were a variety of clay tablets with inscriptions. There were a variety of these, from simple clay cakes to tablets enveloped in clay cases, and Mr. Loftus believes that documents on parchment, papyrus, or leather. 4.38 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION were also attached to certain triangular lumps of clay, which had holes at two of the corners. It was among these clay tablets that the confirmation was discovered, by Sir Henry Rawlinson, of the statement made by Berosus that the Baby- lonians made use of a sexagesimal notation—the unit of which was termed a ‘SOssius'—as well as a decimal notation. The record in question was a table of squares. The upper chambers of the Sinkara tombs also yielded a few curious tablets of baked clay, which are not only interesting as exhibiting the state of the arts, but as illustrating the costume, occupation, and worship of the Khaldaeans. The sculptures in the palaces of Nineveh, Mr. Loftus remarks, were historical monuments erected by the kings of Assyria to perpetuate their own exploits and greatness; but the people are only shown as subservient to the will of their monarch. In the little tablets from Sinkara is depicted the everyday life of the people, modelled by themselves, without any royal influence to produce the best works of the best artists. Rude as they are, these designs prove that the Khaldaeans, if they had possessed stone for the purpose, could have executed Sculptures equal, if not superior, to those of the Assyrians; and that the palaces and temples of the Khal- daean kings were undoubtedly as highly ornamented as either those of Egypt or Assyria—not, perhaps, with bas-relief, but with figures portrayed upon the walls in coloured plaster. Several large mounds are visible from Sinkara across the Shat al Kahr, among which Ablah, Elassam, and Tell Sifr are the most important. Excavations were carried on at the last, and at a more distant mound called Medina, under Mr. Loftus's direction. With the exception of a conical mound at Tell Sifr, the whole surface of the platform, which was of much less extent than Sinkara, had been completely burrowed by the Arabs in the Search for copper. The name of the place is derived from the number of articles in that metal found in the vaults, for the dead were buried here in oblong brick graves, for the most part Vaulted and painted red inside. A very curious and quite unique collection of these copper articles were obtained here by Mr. Loftus. Among them were large chaldrons, vases, small dishes which Mr. Loftus supposes APPENDIX 439 to have been dice-boxes, hammers, chisels, adzes, and hatchets; a large assortment of knives and daggers of various sizes and shapes, all unfinished; massive and smaller rings, besides numer- ous other objects. The conclusion arrived at from an inspection of these imple- ments and articles was that they were the stock in trade of a coppersmith, whose forge was close at hand; but the explanation of their connection with the public edifice near which they were discovered, Mr. Loftus admits, is by no means clear. The actual date of these copper objects is to be inferred from numerous enveloped clay tablets which were found close to them. Sir Henry Rawlinson pronounced these to be the documents of private persons in the time of the Khaldaean kings Khammurabi and Shamshu-huna (whose name he then met with for the first time), about 1500 B.C., which nearly corresponds with the date of the departure of the Israelites from Egypt. The mounds at Medina were of considerable extent, running in a line from south-west to north-east. Nothing, however, was found to show that the place had been more than a small ceme- tery. It abounded in brick vaults, similar to those at Sinkara. Mr. Loftus describes it as a dismal place, with an unbounded view of marsh towards the south-east, and a desert bearing an abundant crop of ancient remains in every other direction. The water reached to the base of this mound—a perfect Dead Sea, without reeds or other evidence of vegetation appearing on its salt-incrusted shore. * > The ruins now called Hammam, or the Bath, and believed by Sir Henry Rawlinson to represent the Gulaba of cuneiforminscrip- tions, are situated near the Shat al Kahr, about halfway between the origin of that canal near Diwaniya and its termination in the Euphrates. Mr. Loftus describes the ruins as measuring about a mile in diameter, and consisting of low undulations around a grand central tower. Owing to the falling away of the brickwork at its sides and base, and to the projection of its upper parts, this building has in the distance the appearance of a gigantic mushroom. Its total height is about fifty feet, of which twenty are a conical mound supporting a mass of unbaked brickwork. 440 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION “It is difficult, Mr. Loftus remarks, ‘to conceive the purpose of this and similar edifices throughout Babylonia, unless we assume them to have been platforms for the erection of temples, such as may be seen in a better state of preservation at Birs Nimrūd and Mu-kaiyar. That the ruin at Hammam was a portion of a temple devoted to the worship of a Khaldaean divinity is, moreover, inferred from the statue which lay about two hundred yards from the north-west corner of the ruin; this bore all the characteristics of a sacred idol. Unfortunately it had suffered much from ill-usage, being not only broken, but otherwise maliciously defaced. This statue represents a male being, of the natural size and correct proportions, cut out of finely grained black granite, and executed with remarkable skill. The torso was broken at the waist, where the hands were clasped in front, as if holding a garment thrown loosely over the left shoulder. The right shoulder was bare, with a defaced inscription in Babylonian characters cut upon it. The head was gone, and is believed to have been in the possession of Captain Lynch, C.B. Statues of Babylo- nian workmanship being extremely rare, Mr. Loftus had them carefully packed and removed to this country, where they now are in the vaults of the British Museum. In this year 1854 Mr. Loftus obtained a similar but smaller statue from the neighbouring mound of Yokha, which was likewise sent to England. Tell Ede is one of a singular class of mounds met with in Rhaldaea. Mr. Loftus describes it as being a huge artificial mass of solid sand 90 feet high, the circumference at its base measur- ing 2,500 feet. At the same base are long ridge-like ranges of small mounds covered with the usual relics—such as frag- ments of bricks, pottery, and glass; but they are still unexa- mined by the spade, and await the investigation of some future archaeologist. Mr. Loftus ascertained that similar conical mounds occur in various parts of Khaldaea, invariably sur- rounded by or connected with lesser mounds undoubtedly artificial. They appear to have been citadels or temples of the same period as the adjacent ruins, and were probably erected by a township which could not afford to construct their high APPENDIX 441 place of worship of the usual sun-dried bricks, still less to erect on its summit an edifice of kiln-bricks. Mr. Loftus excavated some smaller conical mounds of the same character near Warka, but they exhibited no change in their nature; and Mr. Taylor excavated deeply into a similar conical mound, called Umwa- weis, with no better results. A high wind arising during the night completely carried away its summit, so light were the particles when loosened. Upon the subject of these conical mounds of sand it is to be observed that at Warka they are both without as well as within the walls, and that the Arabs have a remarkable and not impossible tradition associated with them, which is that they were raised by a besieging army. Mr. Loftus is inclined, however, to believe in their sepulchral character—to look upon them, in fact, as huge tumuli or barrows; and he thinks that the bones of the warrior kings, in whose memory they were erected, may eventually be discovered deeply buried in the centre, below the level of the desert. . Mr. Fraser, in his description of this central tract of Khaldaea, says that to the north and east of Warka are other clusters of mounds, the largest of which was called Yokha, of considerable size, and in the centre of a wide tract of debris. To the north- west of this is a lofty pyramidal mass called Tell Ede, surrounded by the relics of old habitations. Tell Ede is the Tell Esd of General Chesney's map, on which are also marked Tell Tendhiyah and Safani as N.E. of Sinkara. - The circularly disposed ruins of Sinkara must have extended over a space of three miles and a half, but seven or eight miles to the north-east of the pyramid of Tell Ede are ruins of a city which must have attained still greater magnitude. The central portion of these latter ruins (the extent of which is marked by walls that can be traced by irregular heaps and fragments, converging at right angles to one another) form a quadrangle of at least five or six miles each way. At the north-east corner of this quadrangle stands a structure like a great tower, built of Sun-burnt bricks, with layers of reeds between each tier, and which rises to a height of at least fifty feet above the plain. The country around this enclosed space is everywhere covered with 442 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION debris and low mounds, while long ridges of ruins stretch away to an almost boundless distance beyond. The Arab name for this site is, according to Fraser, Guttubah (Gulaba P). General Chesney's map has one great central Khaldaean group—Yokah, Jajitha, Tell Maraghdah, Abu Khanzir (“Father Boar’), Abu-l Udha, Abu Ehunnet, Mizisitha, Edndhahr, Nemalah, and Sem-sub-li, besides a great number more to which names are not given. To the north-east are the mounds of Afrin, Kubeidan, Maghallat, and others without designations, leading by Al Khadr (‘the Ever- green ), and Ahwaniyeh, and the Tell with glazed coffin on its summit before alluded to, to the Tigris. The number of name- less mounds, however, far exceeds those of which the names are in use among the Arabs, and which are of no possible advantage except as giving some little guide by which to distinguish between the one and the other. To the west of Al Khadr, there are upwards of ten great mounds of ruins grouped over an area of some six miles in diameter, of eighteen to twenty in circumference. - A large portion of this district is low, and, to a great extent, periodically overflowed, so that the remains are less conspicuous; but Mr. Fraser describes the mounds as again becoming frequent about thirty miles northward of the Guttubah. Among the most remarkable are those of Iskuriyah, not far from the Tigris, and Zibliyah, south-west of the former, nearly halfway between the two rivers. In giving these names we adhere to the orthography of the authority we are for the time being quoting from. No two travellers—Mr. Fraser, General Chesney, Captain Lynch, or Messrs. Layard, Loftus, or Taylor—spell the names of the same mounds identically, and it is not for us to determine which is in the right. - Iskuriyah, Mr. Fraser tells us, is a name applied by the Arabs to a huge group, of which the highest may rise to twenty-five or thirty feet above the plain, and are covered with immense quantities of scoriae and slag-like stones resembling the refuse of a brick furnace. The Arabs have a tradition regarding this multitude of slabs that this was the country of Lot (Loot), and that Heaven in Its Wrath showered them down on the wicked inhabitants. APPENDIX 443 o Zibliyah presents a lofty structure consisting of a tower or bastion-shaped building, about eighty feet in height. The exterior of it was formed of sun-dried brick like other similar structures, pierced with holes, and like them the interior presents kiln-bricks. Two or three miles from Zibliyah are four pyra- midal mounds, rising abruptly to a height of forty or fifty feet, and said to be built, but probably only cased, with sun-dried brick. The traces of a very large canal, and of two or three Smaller ones crossing from north to South in this neighbourhood, showed that the district when inhabited was duly irrigated and cultivated. ‘The south of Mesopotamia,” says Mr. Layard, ‘abounds in extensive and important ruins of which little is known. The country around them is inhabited by Arabs of the tribes of Rubbiyah and Al Maidan (Al Māāān, commonly pronounced Al Maidan, “the stationary or sedentary’ Arabs).’ Mr. Fraser says that the buffaloes are kept by a peculiar race of Arabs known by the name of Madan. (But the term is applied to Arabs of any race who are of sedentary pastoral habits, and is used as one of reproach by the Bedawin, who look upon such as of an inferior caste, notorious for their idleness, and scarcely more intelligent or human than the buffaloes which they tend.) ‘One or two travellers have passed these remains of ancient civilisation when journeying through the Jezireh, or have received descriptions of them from natives of the country. Mr. Loftus was the first to explore the most important.” Such, then, is the character of Khaldaea of old—lofty artificial mounds rising in silence and isolation out of the plain; groups or clusters of mounds dispersed upon a surface itself irregular, and raised in gentle undulations or sunk in alternate hollows; and irregular heaps and fragments of ruin grouped around some central pile, a compact tower, or a terraced platform onceprobably bearing a temple or altar. We have traces, in the same group of mounds, of buildings that may have been devoted to religious, astronomical, monumental, palatial, and Sepulchral purposes. Some of these mounds at Sinkara are, as we have seen, dis- posed in a circle; others, as at Guttubah, are disposed in a great 444 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION quadrangle; some are isolated amidst more surrounding debris, and others rise up like pillars or pyramids in the desert. Some of these mounds are distinguished, again—as the Iskuriyah—by a vast accumulation of slag-like stones; others, as at Niffar, by being divided into parts and intersected by a canal, from which old Khaldaean boats smeared with bitumen have been dug up ; others again, as the Zibliyah and Akka-kuf, consist of a solid mass of sun-dried bricks with layers of reeds. Most of them, however, are alike characterised by the vast accumula- tions of the dead in glazed earthen coffins. Some of these are enshrined in the heart of a great massive pile, round or above which countless numbers seem to have been since brought, or exposed on the top of some lone pile, like the Dakmas of the fire-worshippers. This great country of shepherds, manufacturers, merchants, and navigators, the home of men of Science and philosophers, and famed in remote antiquity for their peaceful virtues, still contains all the elements of prosperity and riches if it were in the hands of an industrious race of people. The soil is exceedingly fertile, being generally meadow land adapted for grazing, with a rich substratum ready for the plough. Water is abundant, and the climate, as of old, incomparable. It would form an admirable district for colonisation, and in such a country and under such a heaven, with Ordinary industry, well-regulated and systematic irrigation, and efficient protection, Khaldaea might soon be made to become, if not what it was once, at least not what it now is—a land of ruins, peopled by semi-savages. No. 18. RUINS AT MU-ECAYIR. THESE remarkable ruins have been recently fully explored by Mr. Taylor, and that gentleman describes them as being very extensive. The circumference of these ruins round the top of the most defined mounds was alone 2,946 yards, their length 1,056 yards, and their greatest breadth 825 yards. The principal building was a two-storied structure, of a APPENDIX 445 parallelogram shape, the longest sides being to the east and west. In his first attempts at excavation Mr. Taylor found the ruins to be apparently one solid mass o sun-dried brick. Per- sévering, however, he was rewarded by the discovery of cylinders at each of the corners of the building, of passages amid masses of alternate thick layers of kiln-burnt and sun-dried bricks, and a paved space between the first and second story, the latter of which he considers to be more modern than the former. The bricks on the two have for the most part a different inscription. Mr. Taylor considers also, from clay lamps and fragments of fine chased pottery which he found on the top, that the whole was surmounted by a chamber or structure of some sort. Excavating another mound forty-five yards off, Mr. Taylor discovered a house or building of large inscribed burnt bricks of a very irregular plan. Within this he also found black stones with inscriptions, as also of enamel or gypsum, upon which characters had been stamped. The most central mound of all, which Mr. Taylor calls the “Tomb mound,’ was found to be full of coffins, which were em- bedded in the sun-dried bricks of which the mound was com- posed. They were at a depth of about eight feet from the surface. Long strips of masonry were also found going about four feet into the ground, which Mr. Taylor suggests may have formerly been used to separate the private burying-grounds of different families. The remains of the dead were found generally disposed under baked clay covers and in arched brick vaults. There were no such things as coffins properly so called. The forms of these covers varied, and appear to have been highly ornamental. Within were found copper bowls, cylinders, and pieces of meteoric stone; pieces of bamboo truncheon, different jars and utensils for food and water, and even the remains of date-stones were found in a shallow dish ' The head of the skeleton rested on a sun-dried brick. An inscribed cylinder of meteoric stone was often attached to the arm or wrist. It is obvious therefore, if the decipherment of Cuneatic writing had ob- tained the perfection that is desirable, that we could obtain the names of most of these Khaldaean princes or priests. Among 446 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION other curious relics found in these tombs were articles of copper —among others a fish-hook, spear, and arrow-heads; the jaw of a boar; a saw-fish's snout ; fish and chicken bones; gold and agate beads, rings, bracelets, and shells. In one mound was found the figure of a priest in copper. Mr. Taylor carried on his explorations to other mounds, but he says he found nothing but deep bricked graves, one close to another, and filled entirely with the fragments of jars and vases. The whole of the southern mounds, he also says, were full of graves. All over these mounds inscribed cones of baked clay were also found, but the inscriptions much obliterated. This vast ruin is surrounded by broken ground and hillocks covered with the debris of Small vaults and coffins, and about 500 yards N.W. of the mounds is the bed of a canal, but ex- tremely indistinct in consequence of the inroads and ravages of the marsh. This last discovery is of the more importance as Mr. Fraser had not been able to detect the remains of a canal in the same vicinity. Altogether these most important excavations tend to show, as in other instances, that these gigantic mounds served for a variety of purposes; that there were in them vast solid terraces, which apparently supported a superstructure, probably of an astro- nomico-religious character ; that habitable buildings, as we might expect from the descriptions left to us of the Assyrian temples by the Father of History, were attached to the temple; and that, as in the very words of Arrian, they were also made the place of sepulture of their kings, as of their princes and magnates, as well as of their families, and also probably of their holy men and high priests, wise men, prophets, and sooth- sayers. Hence has it occurred here, as elsewhere, that others have sought to be buried in such favoured ground. Mr. Taylor says that in several instances he found two or even three large skulls, which must have belonged to grown-up men, under the same cover. These remains, he remarks, must have been previ- ously interred in some other cemetery, and then disinterred and finally deposited there—“perhaps,’ he further and justly adds in a foot-note, ‘from the fact of its being holy ground, as at Meshed and Kerbela at this day.’ That is indeed the whole APPENDIX 447 gist of the thing, and with the knowledge of the diverse nature of these mounds goes a great way towards clearing up the differ- ences which have presented themselves in the views entertained by such distinguished explorers as Sir Henry Rawlinson and Mr. Layard of the nature and origin of those great monuments of olden time. Mr. Taylor carried on some further important researches at two other ruins of Khaldaean cities, situated below Suk al Shuyuk, and apparently on the Southern prolongation of the ‘Western Euphrates.’ The first of these were the ruins called Tell al Lahm, which consist of two mounds of some height joined to each other by a chain of lower ones, with other smaller mounds and ridges around and joining them. These ruins are three hours south of Suk al Shuyuk, and are about half a mile in circumference. Mr. Taylor exhumed, as usual, numerous coffins from these mounds. These presented differences not met with elsewhere, except afterwards at Mu-kayir. The said coffins were composed simply of two great jars, sometimes fitting into one another, and placed in contact over the dead body at their open ends, and then connected by a thick band of bitumen. The second were at the ruins of Abū Shahrein, described as appearing like a ruined fort surrounded by high walls, with a keep or tower at One end, situated on an eminence, in the centre nearly of the dry bed of an inland sea. These ruins are not encumbered with the masses of rubbish usually surrounding similar places. They will be found minutely described in the fifteenth volume of the ‘Transactions of the Royal Asiatic Society, pp. 405 et seq. |Mr. Taylor found here relics which attested to the highly ornamental nature and rich embellishment of the temple or sacred room at the top of the pyramid. In other parts of the building he discovered hatchets, hammers, nails, and cutting instruments made of baked clay, stone chisels and nails, flint knives, an instrument like a sickle, and an instrument apparently for inscribing tablets, giving us a further insight into the in- terior and domestic habits of the Khaldaeans than that obtained from the baked clay tablets. 448 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION These mounds were also literally covered with conical pieces of baked clay, about a quarter of an inch to half an inch in diameter at the bottom, and gradually tapering to a point; others had a rounded base, like a big nail, and the point curved round. In nearly all the trenches were also found marble and limestone cones, from four to ten inches long. Some of them had their bases painted black, and a rim round the edge filled with copper. Mr. Taylor, who believes these conical terra-cottas to be priapi, found them at Mu-kayir with inscriptions round the base. But what is most curious is that, as we have before seen, Mr. Loftus discovered at Warka a building the whole of whose external walls were ornamented with a mosaic formed of these cones. They were laid horizontally, bedded in cement, with their bases outwards, and arranged in great variety of geometric patterns, forming not only a beautiful but a most durable mode of deco- ration. - Mr. Taylor remarks that, from the number of fragments dis- covered at various places, it seems to have been One of the most usual decorations employed in Lower Babylonia. A drawing, full size, of one of the cones, with an elevation of a wall deco- rated with them, was given by the Assyrian Excavation Associ- ation in their first report. Among the remains of Abū Shahrein, which bore evidence of having been deserted some considerable time previously to their ruin, were also found blocks and pieces of marble, rough and polished, of different colours of the most beautiful hues; frag- ments of bowls, vases, and coffins, in crystal, marble, and ala- baster; gilt-headed nails, curious bricks and tiles of original shape and composition. The bricks were in many cases in- scribed with what Mr. Taylor calls the usual Abū Shahrein inscription. The great mound of Mu-kayir, we have seen, has long since been considered identical with the Ur in Khaldaea, if not with the original ‘Ur of the Khaldees.’ Sir Henry Rawlinson has upon different occasions expressed his belief that the great ruins of Warka represented at once Ur in Khaldaea and the Ur of the Khaldees, deriving his opinion APPENDIX t 449 from the fact that it was known to the Talmudists and early Arabs as the birthplace of Abraham, and that it is even named Ur by the early Arab geographers (“Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, vol. xii. p. 481 ; and Twenty-ninth Annual Report, p. 16). But it appears that this great authority has since changed his opinion, and now advocates the old-established identification of Ur and Mu-kayir (‘ Proceedings of Royal Geographical Society,' vol. i. p. 47). We learn from Mr. Loftus that, from his examination of the numerous brick and cylinder inscriptions obtained at Mu-kayir, Sir Henry Rawlinson regards that ruin as one of the earliest, if not the very earliest, of the sites colonised by an Ethiopic or Scythic invasion. These records, it appears, bear the names of a series of kings, from Urukh, B.C. 2230, to Nabonidus, B.C. 540. Among others is that of Kudur-mapula, or Chedorlaomer. The temple was dedicated to Sin, or ‘the moon, which element was preserved by the Greeks in the name Mesene, applied by them to the sur- rounding region; and also in that of Camarina, derived from the Arabic word kamar, ‘the moon,' assigned by Eupolemus to either Mu-kayir or Warka. The most important identification, however, is that of Mu-kayir with the Biblical Ur of the Chaldees, or at all events with the ‘Ur of Khaldaea, which Sir Henry Rawlinson supposes to be complete from his having read the name Hur upon the cylinders. In support of this proposed identification he states that one particular parish of this place was called Ibra, from which he supposes Abraham to have set out on his journey to Canaan, and whence originated the word Hebrew. This appellation is usually supposed to be derived from Heber, the alleged an- cestor of Abraham; or from a Hebrew verb which signifies to pass over, in consequence of the patriarch having crossed the Euphrates, which he would not have had to do if he started from Ur in Khaldaea. As far as legends and traditions are concerned, they are more numerous and complete in reference to Urfah in Mesopotamia WOL. II. G. G. 450 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION being the second site of the same name, where Abraham, after setting out on his journey from the first Ur, departed for Canaan. The Arabian historians Ahmed ibn Yusuf and Abu Muhammad Mustafah confirm the tradition of the identity of Ur with Roha, the modern Urfah. It was called Urhoi by the Syrians, and Chaldaeopolis by the Greeks. Eusebius says, “Ur oppidum regni Chaldaeorum,’ and “In urbe Camarina, seu Uria, quae Graecisdicta Chaldaeopolis.’ The Birket el Ibrahim el Khalil, ‘the pond of Abraham the beloved, is still supposed to contain the descend- ants of the fish beloved by the patriarch, or more probably wor- shipped in connection with Noah. Abraham at his first call (Acts vii. 2-4) went only to Charran, or Haran, in Mesopotamia, and few identifications are less dis- puted than that of Charran or Haran with the site so called in the present day, and renowned under the name of Carrhae in the wars of the Romans and Parthians. Close by is also the great plain of Serug—the Batnae of the Middle Ages—the name of which reminds us of another of the patriarchs of the family of Shem, and a place evidently in favour with the Assyrians, for a colossal lion, similar to those disinterred at Nineveh, only hewn in basalt, lies in the plain. As far back as the time of Benjamin of Tudela the site of the house of “our father Abraham ” was vene- rated at Haran. In the amplitude of the sacred text it is said (Gen. xii. 9) that the patriarch ‘journeyed, going on still towards the south,’ which would hardly have been the case if he had started from Ur in Khaldaea for the land of Canaan. With regard to ‘the pass of the river, the Arabs still point out the locality on the way from Haran to Aram Zobah, now Aleppo, and which tradition says derived its name of Haleb al Shahba from Abraham's pied cow being milked there. The tradition may be a silly one, but it derives interest from its geographical con- secutiveness. To return to our subject, the cylinder inscriptions of Mu-kayir, Mr. Loftus informs us in his able summary, are in- valuable documents in confirming the authenticity and truth of Scripture. They not only inform us that Nabonidus, last king of Babylon, repaired the Great Temple of the Moon at Hur, but they also explain who Belshazzar was, concerning whom the early APPENDIX * 451 Bible critics have in vain endeavoured to reconcile conflicting statements. In the Book of Daniel he is alluded to as the king of the Khaldees when Babylon was taken by the united armies of the Medes and Persians. The account of Berosus does not, however, agree with that of Scripture. It states that Nabonidus, after being utterly routed in the open plains by Cyrus, shut himself up in the city of Borsippa, but was soon obliged to surrender his person to the conqueror. From Daniel, therefore, we are led to conclude that Belshazzar was the last Khaldaean monarch, while Nabonidus is represented in the same capacity by Berosus. Herodotus only adds to the difficulty by calling Belshazzar and his father Labynetus, which name is apparently a corruption of Nabonidus. Sir Henry Rawlinson's reading of the Mu-kayir cylinders entirely reconciles these discrepancies. The records distinctly state that Bel-shar-ezer (Belshazzar) was the eldest son of Nabonidus, and that he was admitted to a share of the govern- ment. When Cyrus took Nabonidus, Belshazzar was regent or governor of Babylon, and to all intents and purposes king of the Khaldees. Amongst other discoveries made by Mr. Taylor at Mu-kayir was that of a house or Oratory, in a small mound covered with clay and scoria, near the eastern angle of the great temple, erected on a mound or foundation of sun-dried bricks. The ground-plan of the edifice was that of a cross. The exterior was ornamented with perpendicular stepped recesses, thickly coated with bitumen. This building, as Mr. Loftus remarks, has settled the im– portant architectural question whether the Babylonians were acquainted with the arch. Two regularly constructed semi- circular arches, running through the entire thickness of the walls, are in admirable preservation, the bricks being wedge-shaped to form the voussoirs. Mr. Churchill subsequently discovered at the same place, and about 200 yards from the north-east side of the great temple, three large blocks of black granite. One bore a fragment of inscription; another had a plain upper surface, with G G 2 452 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION a moulding, eight inches in depth, rounded off at the angles, passing along the top of each side; two opposite surfaces bore in high relief an ornament resembling the capital letter A reversed, and supporting the moulding: of the other two sides, one was plain and the other broken. These granitic masses are supposed to have belonged to an altar, and, like the fragments of the statue at Hammam, to have formed part of the shrine of the deity which stood upon the principal building. No. 19. UR AND ORCHOE. SIR HENRY RAWLINSON was, as we have before seen, at first in- clined to advocate the identity of the great ruins at Warka with the Ur of the Chaldees, deriving his opinion from the fact that the place was known to the Talmudists and early Arabs as the birthplace of Abraham (‘Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society,' vol. xii. p. 481). But this great authority changed his mind, and has since adopted the old-established identification of Ur and Mu- kayir (“Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society, vol. i. p. 47). A similar misapprehension has occurred with regard to Orchoe (a mere variant of Ur), some identifying it with Warka, others with Mu-kayir. But it is sufficient that Ptolemy places the Orcheni in Desert Arabia, to show that the place was on the right bank, or west of the Euphrates. When Pliny says (lib. vi. cap. 27), “Euphraten præclusere Orcheni et accolae agros rigantes; nec nisi Pasitigri defertur in mare, he alludes to the Palla- copas or Western Euphrates under that name, for at one time not only was the Shat al Haï known as the Pasitigris, but also that part of Euphrates which lay below the junction of the Shat al Haï. - - The identity of Orchoe with Ur of the Chaldees was, we gather from Cellarius (lib. iii. p. 643), a matter of discussion in olden times. None but those who have laboured at the com- APPENDIX 453 parative geography of the East can enter into the difficulties with which the determination of sites is frequently attended. NO. 20. LIST OF KHALDAEAN OR CHALDAEAN KINGS. A CHRONOLOGICAL list of Khaldaean kings, borrowed from Mr. Vaux’s ‘Nineveh and Persepolis’ (fourth edition), and to which are added the more recent discoveries and a list of localities whence the cuneiform records of the various kings were derived by Mr. Loftus, is subjoined as a fitting termination to the details that have been given of recent archaeological researches in Khaldaea. This list has, however, met with several corrections and emenda- tions since at the hands of the learned contributors to the ‘Trans- actions of the Society of Biblical Archaeology. FIRST KHALDAEAN EMPIRE. ..., | Names of Kings | Cuneº. where | Pºe 2234 Urukh Búwāriyya at Warka; Great Mound, Niffar ; Do. Sinkara; Mu-kayir Ilgi * - e. Niffar ; Warka ; Sin- Birth of B.C. kara ; Mu-kayir Abraham, 2130 Shinti Shilkhak 1950 | Kudur-Mapula ... Mu-kayir (perhaps Chedor- laomer) 1860 ismi-Dagan ... Mu-kayir Ibil-Amu-Duma ... Mu-kayir Gurguna ... Mu-kayir Naramsin 1700 | Purna-Puriyas ... Sinkara Durri-Galzu Akker-Kúf ; Mu-kayir The Exodus, 1625 khammu-rabi Red Mound at Sinkara ; Mu-kayir ; Gherăra near Bāghdād; on Tablets from Tell Sifr 454 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION FIRST KHALDAEAN EMPIRE-continued. B.C. * ~ *-- * Cuneiform Records, where Dates of Corresponding about Names of Kings discovered Events in the Bible 1600 | Shamsu-Iluna ... On Tablets from Tell Sifr ë te tº tº Death of Moses, 1585 Sin-shada ... Upper terrace of the Bú- || First Servitude, 1558 wāriyya, and Wuswas gateway, at Warka 1500 | Rim-Sin ... ... OnTablet from Mu-kayir Zur-sin ... ... Abū-Shehreyn Merodach-Gina ... N. of the Búwāriyya at Warka, 1400 | . * de 1300 | . Between 1400 B.C. and 625 B.C. we know little of the Khaldaean monarchy, but in B.C. 1110 a Khaldaean king named Merodach-adam-akhi defeated the Assyrians, and carried off their gods as trophies to Babylon. The lower plains of the Tigris and Euphrates seem to have been governed by independent kings except at such times as the Assyrians were able to hold them in subjection. In the time of the Assyrian queen Sammuramit (Semiramis), wife of Phulukh III., about 760 B.C., the Assyrian dominion over Khaldaea was for a short period established; and ultimately Sennacherib, in 702 B.C., defeated Merodach- baladan, king of Babylon, and placed his own son Esarhaddon on the throne. In 625 B.C. Nineveh fell before the united armies of the Medes and Babylonians, from which time was established the— * SEGOND KHALDAEAN (OR BABYLONIAN) EMPIRE. Cuneiform Records, where Dates of Corresponding discovered Events in the Bible B.C. T º about Names of Kings 625 | Nabopollasar ... On Tablets from Warka || 605 | Nabo-kuduri-uzur | Babylon ; Birs Nimrūd; B.C. (Nebuchadnezzar) Bághdād ; Sinkara ; Jehoiachin, 599 Cylinders in Europe 562 | Evil-merodach ... Zedekiah, 588 560 | Nergal-shar-ezur | Babylon ; Cylinder from 554 (Neriglissar) Babylon at Trinity College, Cambridge 538 (Nabonidus Mu-kayir ; Red Mound, and Sinkara ; on Tablets from Warka, 538 | \Del-shar-ezer (Belshazzar) Taking of Babylon by Cyrus APPENDIX. 5 PERSIAN EMPIRE. a;* Names of Kings Cuneiform Records, where discovered 538 Cyaxares - 536 Cyrus ... e tº ... Mārghāb; on Tablets from Warka 525 | Cambyses ... ... Sinkara 522 | Smerdis the Magian 521 | Darius I. de Persepolis; Bisātūn; Hamadān; on Tablets - (Hystaspes) from Warka, 485 Xerxes I. (Ahasuerus | Persepolis; Susa ; Hamadān; Vân ; on of Scripture) Tablets from Warka ; Vase at Paris 472 | Artaxerxes I. (Longimanus) 425 | Xerxes II. 424 | Darius II. (Nothus) 404 || Artaxerxes II, Susa ; Vase at Venice (Mnemon) 362 | Artaxerxes III. Persepolis (Ochus) 338 Arses 336 | Darius III. (Codomanus) GREEK EMPIRE IN KHALDAEA. B.C. Names of Kings Cuneiform Records, where discovered 330 Alexander the Great 311 | Seleucus Nicator 280 Antiochus Soter On Tablets from Warka 261 | Antiochus Theos 246 | Seleucus Callinicus 226 | Seleucus Ceraunus t 223 Antiochus the Great... On Tablets from Warka 187 | Seleucus Philopator 175 | Antiochus Epiphanes 164 || Antiochus Eupator &c. &c. No cuneiform inscriptions have been discovered of later date than An the Great. NO. 21. TOMB OF EZR.A. tiochus RABBI PETACHIA relates of the tomb of Ezra, ‘They said that in the days of old the grave of Ezra the scribe was ruinous. * Travels of Rabbi Petachia, by Dr. A. Benisch, p. 37. Once 456 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION a shepherd came who saw a mound and slept on it. Some one then appeared to him in a dream, saying to him, “Tell the Sultan I am Ezra the scribe. Let him take me up through the instrumentality of Jews, and place me in such and such a spot ; if not, all his people will die.” However, he did not attend to the matter, and so many people died. Now Jews were called upon, who buried him with honour. The grave was of marble stone, and upon the marble was a tablet upon which was engraven. “I am Ezra the scribe.” Charisi (chap. xxv. p. 53) relates the same tradition, but at greater length. See Notes to Benisch’s “Travels of the Rabbi Petachia, p. 91. NO. 22. SULAMANIYAH. MR. RICH does not appear to have been more struck with the appearance of Sulaimaniyah than we were. ‘The ordinary houses,’ he says, “are mere mud hovels, which make the place look like a large Arab village; they are perfectly exposed, but the people do not seem to regard this, the women going about with the men and performing their domestic labours without any veil. s ‘This miserable-looking town, however, contains six Khans, five mosques, and a very fine bath, with 2,000 Muhammadan, 180 Jewish, 9 Khaldaean, and 5 Armenian houses. The popula- tion of Sulaimaniyah is estimated by the best judges among the Rurds as 10,000 souls, including the officers of government and retainers of the princes residing here. The ordinary citizens are of the peasant race.” It is necessary to understand this last remark to explain that the peasantry in Kurdistan are distinguished from tribes or clansmen, who seldom cultivate the soil. The clannish Kurds call themselves ‘sipah, whence our “sepoy, or military Kurds, in contradistinction to the peasant Kurds, who are called ‘Guran Rayahs, or serfs, as also Kumylis, or villagers. It is surprising how little timber there is in this part of Kurdistan, contrasting therein very much with what is pre- APIPENDIX 457 sented to us only some thirty or forty miles to the north. Only the ‘tchanir, or Oriental plane, is cut between this place and Sinna, and it is floated down the rivers to Baghdad. Some mulberry and nut trees are also cut, but only out of orchards. It is different in Northern Kurdistan, and hence most wood is sent down by the two Zabs and from the river Tigris. There are some Afghans in Shahrizur, as Sulaimaniyah is also called, as also some families of Afshars (Nadir Shah's tribe) —all political refugees. Snow lies in Sulaimaniyah, in winter, for from two to six weeks, and the cold is said to be very severe. It is correspondingly hot in summer. Barley is reaped by June 1 ; mulberries ripen about the same time, when cucumbers also first come in ; but wheat is not cut till the middle or end of June. Gall-nuts, honey, manna, kudraft hoºvassi (‘divine sweet- meat'), and other mountain products are exported to Kir-kuk. NO. 23. TOMB OF NAEIUM. THE tradition of Nahum the prophet being buried at Tell Kaif or El Kosh is upheld at the site, as also in a church in Mosul. Colonel Sheil describes the tomb of Nahum Peignember (‘the prophet Nahum ) as being in the synagogue, ‘a large building quite as substantial as the church’ (‘Journal of the Royal Geo- graphical Society, viii. 93). Benjamin of Tudela also makes mention of the same tradition as associated with ‘Nahum the Elkoshite,’ but he describes the tomb of Nahum the Elkoshite (who rests in peace) in another place as at Aïn japhata, in the region of the western Euphrates. The Rabbi Petachia also places the tomb of Nahum the Elkoshite four parasangs from that of Ezekiel. No. 24. ROMAION AGER. THIS great plain, watered by the Khabür, was known in the Middle Ages as the Romaion Ager. It is bounded to the south 458 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION by the Jebel Abiyad, or ‘White Mountain, and to the north by the Jebel Judi, where a mosque records the Muhammadan tradition that the ark rested here, and not at Ararat. Dr. Grant, an American missionary, in his anxiety to identify the Khaldaeans of the mountains with the lost tribes, made of this Khabūr the Habor of the captivity, but we have before shown this was the Khaboras of the Romans. No. 25. JEBEL JUDI. BENJAMIN of Tudela actually calls the Jebel Judi Mount Ararat, and he relates that Omar Ben al Khatab, the same who gave his name to Jezirah ibn Omar, removed the ark of Noah from the mountain and made a mosque of it. There still exists a mosque on the flanks of the mountain, and Benjamin says there also existed a synagogue of Ezra in the vicinity, which was visited by the Jews on the day of solemnisation of the destruction of the temple at Jerusalem. It is probably due to this that the Muhammadans call the mountain Jebel Judi, or ‘of the Jews.’ NO. 26. RAHABI. THIS old castle, within which was a structure of more modern times, and known as Rahabi, appears to correspond to the Rabdium of the Byzantines, and the Tur Rabdin of the Jihan Numa, which was in the neighbourhood of the Romaion Ager, or great plain north of Zakho. The two rivers which water this plain, the Khabür and the Khazil, if the latter is not a derivative from the former—a point I was not able to determine—unite, before entering the Tigris, to constitute the Piri Khabür, or Piri Shapur, as I also heard it called. APPENDIX 459 NO. 27. JEZIRAH IBN OMA.R. THIS castle, or rather fortified town, is situated at the foot of the mountains, and below the point, as Xenophon graphically described it, where the craggy mountains of the Karduchians hang over the river. It has, from the peculiarity of its position, been at all times a strategical point of importance to each suc- cessive dominant power. The Beit Zabda of the Khaldaeans and Syrians, the Romans euphemised its name into Bezabde. The Khalif Omar is said to have given to it its present name, Jezirah ibn Omar. The pos- session of the place has even up to the most recent times, as those of Reshid Pasha, been a bone of contention between the Kurds and the Osmanlis. NO. 28. NISIBIS. NISIBIS is first mentioned in history under the name of Antiochaea (Polyb. v. 51) in the march of Antiochus against the satrap Modon. In the later wars between the Romans and the Parthians it was constantly being taken and retaken. Thus it was wrested by Lucullus from the brother of Tigranes, after a long siege which lasted the whole summer (Dion Cassius, xxxv. 6, 7); but, according to Plutarch, towards the close of the autumn without much resistance from the enemy. Again it was taken by the Romans under Trajan, and the Senate decreed the title of Parthicus to the Emperor in consequence of the capture. If, as has been suggested, Trajan built his boats here by which to descend to the Euphrates by the Mygdonius and Habor, they must have been small boats, for the river is not large at Nisibis. There was, however, wood in the hills beyond Dara, which there probably was not on the |Habor. Nisibis appears to have been subsequently besieged by the 460 THE EU PHRATES EXPEDITION Osroeni (the people of Urfah or Edessa) and other tribes who had revolted, but who were subdued by Septimus Severus. Nisibis became on this occasion the headquarters of Severus (Dion, lxxv. 2, 3). From this period it remained, with Bezabde on the Tigris, and Atra in Mesopotamia, an advanced outpost of the Romans, till it was surrendered to the Persians by the treaty concluded by Jovian after the death of Julian (Zosim. iii. 33; Amm. Marc. xxv. 9). Rabbi Petachia describes Nisibis as being at an early period one of the centres of Jewish learning out of Palestine. And he adds, in connection with the traditions of Ezra associated with the place by Benjamin of Tudela, several other congregations, besides that of Nisibis, ascribed the origin of their synagogues to Ezra, who, tradition says, founded them on his return from Babylon to Jerusalem. NO. 29. MARDIN. MARDIN, as the Marde of Ptolemy situated near the Tigris, would appear not only to have been a city of the Mardi, but in the district of Mardene. The Mardi were unquestionably a people of Persia. “Mardi, latrones etiam ipsi, Persas accolunt,” says Arrian (‘Ind.’ cap. xl.); but it is evident from the details of the wars of the Romans and the Parthians that the Mardi were also encountered and had strongholds west of the Tigris. No. 30. CARCATHIOCERTA, CARCATHIOCERTA has been identified by Sir Henry Rawlinson with a site called Kurkh or Tukshan, on the Tigris below Diyarbekr, but by Mr. Taylor with a site called Kar Khar or Kert, above Arghana. There are Assyrian sculptures at both sites. APPENDIX 461 No. 31. AMASIA. STRABO, who was a native of Amasia, although Tarsus was his adopted home, has left a graphic description of his birthplace. ‘Our city, he says, ‘lies in a deep and extensive gorge, through which the river Iris flows; and it is wonderfully constructed, both by art and by nature being adapted to serve the purpose both of a city and of a fort. ‘For there is a lofty rock, steep on all sides, and descending abruptly to the river; this rock has its wall in one direction on the brink of the river, at that part where the city is connected with it; and in the other direction the wall runs up the hill on each side of the heights; and the heights are two, naturally connected with one another and very strongly fortified by towerS. “Within this enclosure are the palace and the tombs of the kings; but the heights have a very narrow neck, the ascent to which is an altitude of five or six stadia on each side as one goes up from the bank of the river and the suburbs; and from the neck to the heights there remains another ascent of a sta- dium, steep and capable of resisting any attack. ‘The rock also contains within it water-cisterns, which an enemy cannot get possession of, there being two galleries cut— one leading to the river, and the other to the neck. There are bridges over the river, one from the suburb to the neighbouring country, for at the point where this bridge is the mountain which lies above the rock terminates.’ Hamilton explored the acropolis and the tombs, and he explains (“Residence in Asia Minor,’ &c., vol. i. p. 366) the five or six stadia to mean the length of the road by which alone the summit can be reached, and which is circuitous. The same traveller, however, erroneously follows Cramer in giving the version ‘the summits have on each side a very narrow neck of land, for the words ‘on each side refer to the ascent to the ‘neck, as Groskurd and Long understand it. 462 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION |Bamilton found two Hellenic towers, of beautiful construc- tion, on the heights, which he considered to be the copwdal of Strabo. But the greater part of the walls now standing are Byzantine or Turkish. Indeed, we learn from Procopius (‘’De Edif. iii. 7) that Justinian repaired them. * |Hamilton also explored a passage cut in the rock, down which he descended about 300 feet to a small pool of clear cold water. The other gallery, he says, was not excavated in the rock, but was built of masonry above ground, yet equally well concealed. The tombs are five in number, three to the west and two to the east. Considerable remains of the old Greek walls, which Strabo describes as forming the peribolus or enclosure of the royal tombs, still exist, as also a square tower built in the best Hellenic style. Hamilton also found the front wall of what he calls an old morgue (or receptacle for the dead) to be built of ancient cornices, friezes, and architraves, as also fragments of Greek inscriptions, deep cut in large letters. NO. 32. OSMANJIK, THE castle at Osmanjik is said to have been built (but probably only repaired) by Bayazid, in order to keep in check a rebellious vassal at Kastamuni; and the same Sultan is credited with having built the noble bridge of thirteen arches which crosses the Halys. But the gap of Hajji Hamsa must have made this the pass of the Halys from the most remote times, and no doubt, if only a ferry, it would still have been fortified. No. 33. TUSIYAH. THE hills to the south of the Divrik Chai are, we have observed, known as the Kush Tagh, or the ‘Bird Mountains; those to the north, as the Al Kuz, corresponding to the ancient Olgassys, APPENDIX 463 Near the town of Tusiyah, or Tosia, is a lofty mound of debris representing the site of the castle in which Diogenes Romanus took refuge when liberated by Sultan Hasan during the pre- valence of the faction of Michael. At that time the place was called Dosia. It first fell into the hands of the Seljukiyan Turks in the time of Manuel Comnenus, when it was placed under the rule of the Princes of Kastamuni, and it passed under the sway of the Osmanlis in the time of Muhammad I. NO. 34. ANADYNATA. BEYOND Kutch Hissar, or ‘Bird's Castle, the country rises up to a volcanic region, which divides the head waters of the Divrik Chai from those of the Bayandah River, and in which districts are the towns of Kara-Wiran, “the black ruin, and of Raraula, ‘the blacker,’ appropriately so named from being con- structed in part of basaltic rocks. The long valley we had been ascending from Hajji Hamsa, and which is altogether some seventy miles in extent, was not unknown to the old geographers, who called the river Doros, and the district Cimiatene. Karaula has been identified with Anady.nata of the tables. But Kara-Wiran is the larger site, with the ruins of an old castle still extant. No. 35. TOKAT. IT is not certain what ancient place Tokat represents. Strabo described the Iris as flowing through Commana Pontica and the fertile plain Daximonitis, and then turning to the north at Daxiura (Turkhal). In the book on the Alexandrine war (c. xxv.) a lofty range of hills covered with forests is said to extend from Pontic Commana to Armenia Minor. This description would correspond to the position of Tokat, but Hamilton discovered remains of an ancient town and bridge 464 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION on the Iris higher up than Tokat, and which, being called Gu- menek (Kumamak), have been adopted as representing Commana. Tokat may represent Talaura, a mountain fortress in Pontus to which Mithridates withdrew with his most precious treasures, which were afterwards found there by Lucullus (Dion Cassius, xxxv. 14; Appian, “Mithrid.’ p. 115). Its modern name is, however, derived from the Empress Eudocia, during whose widowhood, and the minority of her Sons, Commana fell into the hands of the Turks, against whom Diogenes Romanus sent an army under Ruselius, and subse- quently other generals. It is found on many old maps marked as Eudoxiaria and Eutochia. Tokat, the abbreviation of the latter name, was a place favoured by the Turks, for we find one of its chiefs, called Ahmed Allah-ed-Din, styling himself Sultan in the time of Bayazid. In the year 1471 Yusuf Bey, a general of Uzun Hasan, Prince of Kaisariyah, invaded the district of Tokat, but he was defeated by Mustafah, a Seljukian general. Tokat ultimately fell into the hands of the Osmanlis in the time of Selim I. NO. 36. HAMMAM ALI. THERE were ruins at Hammam Ali of a fort and Serai which were not long ago held by One Hajji Achmet Oghlu, a partisan of Shapwan Oghlu, who attempted to re-establish Turcoman supremacy in these parts. NO. 37. THE RENDERING OF ORIENTAL WORDS INTO ROMAN LETTERS. THIS is a subject of such exceeding difficulty that it not only appears that perfection can never be attained, but that the same writer should not be excused if he is found guilty of lapses in even his own versions. In translating from the Arabic, for example, certain commas APPENDIX 465 or points are used to assist in distinguishing vowels in the Original manuscript; yet are these often wanting in manuscripts, while the convertibility of vowels in Oriental languages is well known. - The Arabs have in reality only three vowels, a, i, u ; but these with the commas have a use equivalent to our e's and w's, and even more so as ee and oo. The vowel I is unknown in the English Sound given to it. To produce such, another vowel must be affixed, as in Aïn, a spring, plural Ayān. Ei is soft, as in Seihun ; ia as in the English i." Then, again, in a we have the aspirate or its absence. All know that the Emperor Adrian's name is generally written Hadrian; but if we adopt the aspirate as equivalent to h in one case, we should adopt it in all, and ‘Arab would become Harab, and ‘Arabic Harabic Adrianople is adopted, yet in other cases we have Hadrianopolis. Contempt is entertained by many for what is termed the cockney use, or rather misuse, of the h, when such abuses are really founded in nature. When a person wishes to emphasise a vowel, he adds involuntarily an aspirate to it. It is the inspiration given by the lungs to a simple vowel. To drop the h when it is wanted is often an act of nervousness. To say, as I have done in the course of my work, that almost every traveller and writer renders the name of a place differently, must not be understood as impugning in any way their desire for accuracy. In the first place, a sharp ear is essential to catch the words and put them in our Orthography; and in the second place, the Turks and Arabs, and all Oriental countries, differ among themselves in the pronunciation of words. Thus the simple expression for water, moi, in Syria, is ma or mah in Egypt. If we find in our own counties a different pronuncia- tion, how are we to expect the people of Antioch, of Baghdad, and of Cairo to pronounce in precisely the same manner P Or if we obtain the name of a place from a peasant, how can we ex- pect that it should be precisely the same that would be obtained from a mollah P * In the Hebrew we have only vowel points, and these, as in the Arabic manuscripts, are sometimes wanting. WOL. II. H. H. 466 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION If the difficulties are great in rendering Oriental words into English letters, it is still more so in regard to adapting other European versions. One example will suffice. The word wadi is now generally accepted as signifying a place where there is water. The Greeks rendered it by the classical oasis.’ The Trench have it ‘ouady.' It is a simple question as to whether ow or w best represents the Oriental sound to English ears. Sir William Jones was one of the first to attempt to lay down certain rules for the rendering of Oriental words into the English language, and these rules, if adhered to, would simplify the question greatly. They have, with modifications, been adopted by the Royal Geographical Society, but it is impossible that all travellers should either be acquainted with them or adopt them, although some progress has been made. Some will still call the prophet Mahomet, Mahommed, or Muhammad, as best pleases them. Then, again, the long e's and long wis, un- known in our own language, can Scarcely be got over by é i ö (i. The Anglo-Indians cannot help reverting to the double ee's for a long i, the double 00's for a long 0, and double us for a long ii. The French, whose orthography in Oriental words has had a vast influence in maps and books of travel, have materially impeded the progress of a correct English rendering of Oriental words: for example, their ou is soft, as in St. Cloud; but an Englishman would render the word as if it were a cloud; and so where the French rendering of Oriental words is used the errors brought about are most grievous. Sometimes the more simple the word, the more various the rendering. Thus the Turkish for a village may be represented by Koi, Keuy, or Kuiy. I have met with even more renderings, and they would all be justified by the pronunciation heard on the spot. Gul, a lake, or that which is ‘blue,' has to have two dots, Gül, to approximate to the vary- ing pronunciation Guel, Güül, &c. It is often written Gol, or Göl. - As the Arabs themselves use words in different acceptations— as “wady' for a spring in a desert, a rivulet, a valley with a watercourse, or even a river, as in the instance of the Wadi el Kebir, or ‘Great Valley, now the Guadalquivir; so the Orientals also vary in the pronunciation of words according to national or provincial dialects. APPENDIX 467 It would appear at times as if the pronunciation became broader the more we proceed eastwards. Thus the Khān of the Turks becomes Khāān with the Persians, and ultimately Hông or Kong in China (as far as pronunciation goes). So the refined Pasha of the Turks becomes Pāshā in the provinces, and even Bashaw in Africa. The instances that might be given of erroneous and even grotesque renderings of Oriental words are innumerable, indeed unending, but my object in this note is not to dilate upon these, but if possible to modify hasty criticisms upon different render- ings. When a traveller has no dictionary at hand (and no exist- ing dictionary contains the names of all places on the earth's surface), he must rely upon his ear; and hence the reader must not be annoyed if travellers sometimes spell names differently, nor irritated even if the same traveller sometimes himself pens the same name in a different Orthography. He has what he heard on the spot in his ear and mild, and he forgets the rules by which he should formulate ee into i and 00-into (i. - Much and more might be said in regard to consonants, where we have, for example, two k's and kh's. The guttural pronun- ciations are most difficult of rendering. For example, out of regard for rules I have rendered gheuzel or gueuzel, ‘pretty, by küsil; but there is no getting over the fact that the former approximate most closely to the general pronunciation. It resembles the French gueule, ‘throat; ' and hence I have left Gueuzluk Kalah (Girl's Castle), the necropolis of Tarsus, as M. Langlois writes it. All that can be asked for is forbearance in harsh criticism. It must be admitted that the adoption of certain rules is in most cases as advantageous in giving facilities to the writer as it would be to the comprehension of the reader if he understood the rules. It would, above all, ensure uniformity. But it is very questionable if a person reproducing the sound as given by rule would be understood by a native." 1 Hence it is that the Anglo-Indians adhere to the two ee's and two oo's in preference to Sir William Jones's long i and long (i. 2 E[ \{ 468 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION It is not only in the Orient that names of places have varied at different epochs, but the same thing occurred in Europe, especially in the Middle Ages; and a mediaeval dictionary, after the plan of the ‘Dictionarium. Historicum, Geographicum, Poeticum, authore Carolo Stephano,' is a great desideratum. IN ID E X. ABA ABADAN, (Hubadan), (Miyam Radan), (Mesene), (Appha- dama), ii. 187 Abar, (Ambar), (Perisabor), (Firuz Shaphur), ii. 3 Abdui, (Dasht Ber), ii. 138 Abdul Assiz Tagh, i. 157, 339 Abgar, (Abgarus), i. 200 Abgar Shat, (Nisibis), i. 200 Ableh, (Aphle), (Ampe), ii. 89 Aboras, (Aborras), (Habor), (Khabūr), i. 341 Aborensium Castellum, (Kar- kisha), i. 336 Abraham’s Fatherland, i. 203 Abraham's . Pass, (Gurluk), i. 223 Abū Bara (hills), i. 268 Abū Dibbin, (“Father of Dibs'), (Aniana), i. 192 Abū Geger, (“Father of Flames'), (Kir-Kūk), (Aracca), ii. 291 Abū Gharaib, (“Father of Pop- lars’), (Gharab), i. 274 Abū Ghuraib, (Nahr Isa), ii. 14 Abū Khabur, i. 337 Abū Sayyid, i. 304 Abū Serai, (“Father of Palaces '), (Karkisha), i. 336 Abū Shehr, (Abū Shahir), (“Father of Cities '), (Bushire), ii. 113 Abulah, (Apologos), (A Paradise of the Persians), ii. 101, 104 Abul Us, (Olabus), (Tilbes), i. 114 Accad, (Akka Kūf), (Duraba), i. 447 Achiakala, (Ak Kaya Kalah, “white stone castle'), (Jera or Kura), i. 434 AíN Achmet Bey's Camp, i. 38 Acropolis of Cyrrhestica, (Jin- dariz), i. 30 Adamodana, (Tum Kalahsi), i. 173 Adana, i. 127 Addasa, (Anah), i. 413 Adheim, (Athem), (Dokalah), ii. 36 Adiaba, (Anzabas), (Greater Zab river), ii. 311 Adiabene, ii. 310 AEmoparas, (Kara Sū), i. 109 Affaij Marshes, ii. 187 Affrin river, (Arceuthus), i. 31 Agae, (Ayas), i. 18 Agamma, (Al Kayim), i. 401 Ager Aleium, (Plain of Alèia), i. 125 Ager Eliensis, (Pastures of Nahab), (Gozan), (Gausanitis), i. 338 Ager Romaion, (Plain of Zakho), ii. 328, (App. No. 24) Aginis, (Ahwaz), ii. 226 Ahava river, (Musah), (Masca), i. 889 Ahwaz, the Sugar Plantations of, ii. 219 Ahwaz, (Aginis), ii. 226 Aïanha, (Amiana), i. 192 Ai Anjur, (An Oriental Atlas), i. 262 Aidah, (mound), ii. 58 Aidel Bazaar, (Urema), i. 194 Ailan, (district of Aleppo), i. 91 Aïn Abuna, (Naphtha Springs), i. 332 Aïn Al Jebel, i. 338, 341 Ain Halan, i. 431 Aïn Simmak, (Fish Spring), i.431 (Physeus), 470 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION AíN Aintab, (Thermal Springs), (Doliche), (Dolichen), (Dolica), (Antiochaea ad Taurum), i. 99 Ain Zarbah, (Amazarba), i. 176 Aiopolis, (Hit), i. 434 Aiwan Ali Gedwin, ii. 318 Aiwan i Khusrau, (Arch of Khos- roes), ii. 274 Akbara, ii. 36 Ak Dújarin, (App. No. 7) Akiyarim Island, ii. 169 Akka Kūf, (Accad), (Duraba), ii. 227 Akr, (Akar), (Akra), (Akka), (Al Ajida and Gharbi), ii. 3 Akra de Agama, (Akka), (Nahr Agama), (Akra of Thelebanke), (Acracanum), (Aracan), (Akra- kanon), ii. 8 Al Aghadir, i. 422 Al Asayah, (Lake of Pebbles), i. 444 Al Asayah, (Warka), (Erech), ii. 53 Al Ashar, (Cartiron Mt.), i. 376 Alama, i. 298 Al Bostan, (The Garden of Chos- roes), ii. 275 Alejan Plain, the, i. 125 Alenda, (Plain of), ii. 358 Aleppo, (Beroea), (Haleb), i. 270, 347, (App. No. 18) Alexandretta, (Iskendrüm), (Alex- andria ad Issum), i. 12 Al Ghelani, (Church of the Ante- lopes), ii. 818 Al Guman, (castle). i. 405 Al Hadhr, (Atra), (Hatra), i. 270, 316 Al Heimar, (Ankalalah), ii. 16 Al Húd, (Khūd), (Sidd al Hūd), ii. 238 Ali Hammam, (Tisasphalta), (App. No. 8) Ali Illahis, i. 381 Aliobar, (Olabus), (Tilbes), i. 414 Ali Tagh, (Niphates), ii. 354 Al Jabar, (Jibbah), (Pomebeditha), i. 435 Al Kantarah, (Bridge), ii. 237 Al Kayim, (Agamma), i 401. Al Kebir Munaka, i. 303 Al Khud, (Sidd al Khud), (Shat al Hūd), ii. 288 AND All'ithr, (Kutah), (Cush or Kutha), ii. 14 Al Kosh, (Tel Kaif), (Tomb of Nahum, the Alkoshite), ii. 323, (App. No. 23) Al Madayn, (Twin Cities), (Seleucia and Ctesiphon), ii. 268 Al Nahrain, (Nahr Ain), i. 341 Al Shasiybat, (Place on Piles), ii. 187 Altars of Alexander, (Bomitae), (Sakal Tutan), (Jonas's Pillars), i. 16, 116 Altün Kupri, (Golden Bridge), ii. 307 Alim Tash, (Golden Stone), i. 187 Al UZZ, (Uzanesopolis), (Izameso- polis), i. 433, 434 - Al Wurdi, (Irzah), (Ezra), (Cor- sote), i. 388 Amah, (The Blind), (an umnavi- gable channel), ii. 173 Amanian Gates, (Amamides Pylae), (Taimur Kapu), i. 94 - Amanus, (Mount), i. 21 Amasia, (Amasiyah), ii. 375, (App. No. 35) Ameiva, or Monitor Lizard, i. 265 Amelia depôt, i. 5 Amida, (Diyarbekr), ii. 351 Ampe, (Ampelone), (Apamaea), (Jamba), (Ampelous), (Kornah), ii. 89, 180 Amphipopolis, (Thapsacus), i. 280 Amran ibn Ali, ii. 15 - Amran, Forest of, the, i. 296 Anabad, i. 182 Anadymata, (Kara wiran), (An- drapa), (App. No. 35) Anah and Anatho, i. 401 Amah, (Amahid, Amaitis), i. 414 Amaitis, Anahid, Temples of, ii. 54 Anak, pl. Anakim, (Scythians), i. 245 Anastasiópolis, (Dara), ii. 340 Anatho, (Anatha), i. 410 Anazarba, i. 174 Anbar, (Firuz Shapur), (Schabor of the Talmud), (Perisabor), ii. 3, 35 Anchialus, (Inghilene), (Eggil), ii. 359 - Ancyra, (Angora), i. 314 Andricus, (river), (Kersus), i. 12 INIDEX - 4 7 1. AND Androma, (Balad Khan Azra), i. 59 Aniana, (Alanha), (Dibbin), i. 192 Anizah or Amiza, Arabs, i. 267 Annacha Kalahsi, (Bodendron), i. 121 Ansajujah Hills, (Jebel Susa), i. 422 Ansarians, the, i. 33, 43 Anthemusia, i. 250, (App. 416) Antigonaea, i. 72 Antioch, (Antakiyah), (Antiochaea ad Orontem), (Epidaphnes), (Riblah), i. 69 Antioch, (maritime), Mallus, i. 131 Antioch, (Lake and Plain of), i. 29 Antiochaea ad Cydnum, (Tarsus), i. 131 Antiochaea ad Euphratem, (Bir), i. 214 - Antiochaea of Mesopotamia, (Ur- fah), i. 201 Antiochaea of Mesene, (Muhamm- rah), ii. 182 Antiochaea of Mygdonia, (Nisibis), ii. 335 Antiochaea ad Orontem, (Antioch), i. 129 Antiochaea ad Sarum, (Adana), i. 131 Antiochaea ad Taurum, (Aintab), i. 102 Antoniopolis, (Tcharkash), ii. 378 Anton Kalahsi, i. 172 Apamaea ad Belum, (Kalah al - Mudyk), i. 63 Apamaea of Commagena, i. 191, 196 Apamaea of Mesopotamia, (Bir) i. 214 Apamaea of Mesene (Kornah), ii. 89 Apamene, (Coele-Syria), i. 63 Aphle, (Apologos), (Ableh), (Abu- lah), ii. 90, 101 Apologos, (Abulah), ii. 90, 101, 103 Apphadana, (Abadan), (Hubadam), (Mesene), ii. 187 Ar, or Arx, (a citadel), i. 33 Araban, (Arban), i. 842 Araban, Owahsi, i. 186 Arabian Story, an, i. 317 AIRS Arabistän, (territory of Shuster and Dizful), ii. 222 Aracca, (Areca), (Kir-Kūk) ii. 53 Aram Naharaim, (Mesopotamia), i. 208 Aram Paddan, (Gozan), (Osroene), i. 340 Aram Zobah, (Chalcidene), (App. Nos. 9 and 18) Araxes, (Euphrates or Nilus), (App. No. 11) Araxes, (Khabur river), i. 341 Araya, (Arban), i. 354 Arba, (Narba), (Narban), (Nahr- wan), ii. 253 Arban, (Arayat), (Arbonai), (Ara- ban), (City of Habor), i. 342, 367 Arbelites, (Arbelitin), ii. 312 Arbil, (Erbil), (Arbela), ii. 309 Arbonai of Judith, (Arban), i. 342 Arceuthus (Afrin river), i. 31 Archæology of Khaldaea, ii. 52, (App. No. 17) Arch of Bairamlü, (Taurus), i. 145 Arch of Chosroes, (Takht-i-Khus- rau), ii. 271 Arethusa, i. 51 Arghana (the copper mines of), ii. 347 Arghana, (Artagera), (Artagigarta) ii. 353 Arghana Maden, (Copper Mines), ii. 354 Arghana Sū, ii. 354 Arimaspes, (Scythians), i. 245 Arlabiyeh, (Zilba), i. 323 Arlas, (port of Tarsus), i. 135 Armalchar, (Nahr Malcha), (Sak- lawiyah), ii. 3 Armansura, (Arbayin), (Maronias), i. 64 Armenians, (the strongholds of), i. 135 Arrapachitis, (Northern Assyria), ii. 331 Arsace, (Artasia), (Azass), i. 33 Arslam Tagh, (Hill of Lions), (Serug), (App. No. 8), (An- themusia), i. 207 Arsomasata, (Armosata), (Khar- put), ii. 860 (Arthusia), 472 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION ARS Arsis, (Rhosus), (RhoSopolis), i. 10 Arulis, i. 191 Arx of Cyrrhestica, (Gindarus), i. 30 Asayah, (Asaiyah), (Mound of Pebbles), (Wurka), (Erech), ii. 43 Asayah, (Asaiyah), (Lake of Pebbles), i. 441 - Ashterabad, (Muhammrah), ii. 182 Assassins, (Hashishin), i. 35 Asshur, (Resen), (Nimrūd), ii. 321 Assyria, (Land of Asshur), ii. 321 Astarte, (Ishtar), (Ashtoreth), (Atargatis), (Derceto), i. 241 Atargatis Fanum, (Besachana), (Masjid Sandabiyah), i. 444 Atargatis Fanum, (Hierapolis), i. 241 Atra, (Hatra), (Al Hadhr), i. 270 Aturia, ii. 312 - Avroman, (Mountains), ii. 296 Axium, (Belus), (Marsyas), i. 57 Axio-Kersus, i. 15 Ayas, (Agae), i. 18 Azara Tagh, (Mount of Minerva), ii. 358 - Azas, (Azass), (Azaz), (Hazart), (Hezas), (Arsace), (Artas'a), (Arthusia), i. 90, 348 Azass al Arab, i. 92 BA’AL, Bel, Belus, i. 40 Ba'albek, (Emesa), i. 241 Ba'altin, (Ba'althin), (Balkis), i. 189 Bab Baulus, (Gate of St. Paul's), i. 71 Babel, Bab-el, (Golden Gate), ii. 15 Babel, mound of, (Temple of Belus), ii. 10, 15 Bab Hadid, (Iron Gate), i. 71 Bab Jinain, (Gate of the Gardens), i. 71 Babylon, ii. 13 Babylonia, cities of, ii. 22 Babylonia, the marshes of, (Paludes Babyloniae), ii. 40 Babylonia, Plain of, the, ii. 1 Babylonian Nile, (Nilus), (Nil), ii. 13 BEI Baghdad, (Bagh, a garden ; Dad, an idol), ii. 5 Baghdadiyah, i. 137 - Bahdinam, (Village of Izedis), ii. 32.5 Bahmishir, (Bahmen Ardeshir), ii. 170 - Bahr-i-Nedjeff, ii. 186 Baiae, (Bayas), i. 16 Dakras Kalahsi, (Pagras), (Pan- grios), i. 22 Baktiyari Kurds and Mountains, ii. 214 - Bakuba, ii. 253 Balaam, (Bileam), Tower of, i. 261 Dalad, (Balada), (Eski Mosul), i. 342 Balis, (Barbarissus), i. 261 - 'Dambyce, (Bambuke), (Bam- buch), (Hierapolis), i. 236 Barax Malcha, (Baismalcha), (Haditha), i. 434 Barbaricus Campus, (Plain of Siffin), i. 296 Darsita, (Borsippa), ii. 23, 25 Baruch, (Tomb of), (Barūd), ii. 267 . Basileia, (Temple of Anahid), i. 332 Basilica of Ham or Cronus, i. 8 Basilius Fluvius, (Balik Sū), (Belius), (Bilecha), i. 204 Bassora, (dim. of Basra), (Basrah), (Bussora), ii. 92 Basul Kalahsi, (Heraclea of Cyrrhestica), i. 31 Bathnas of Syria, (App. No. 10) Bathne, (Batmas), (Batne), (Batma Sarugi), (Serug), i. 206 Battlefield, the, of Imma, i. 23 Battlefield, the, of Siffin, i. 296 Bay of Antioch, i. 4 Bayandah, (Bayadir), (Potamia), ii. 379 - Bayas, (Baiae), i. 17 Baylan, (Gate of Syria), (Pic- tanus), (Erana), i. 20 Baylan Bostamdeh, i. 21 IBeaver of the Khabur, i. 337 Beditha, (Pomebeditha), (Jibbah), i. 435 - JBeit al Moi, (Daphne), i. 19 Beit Saluk, (I&herkh), ii. 33, 251 INDEX 4 7 3 BEI, Bel, (Baal), (Belus), ii. 25 Belad Khan Azra, (Androna), (Bathnas), i. 230, (App. No. 9) Belesis, Paradise of, (Ba'alitz of Phtora), i. 260 Belesis, Paradise of, (Balis), i. 258 Belius, (Bilecha), (Balik Sui), i. 204 Bellerophon, i. 126 Belus, Temple of, (at Babylon), ii. 15; (at Borsippa), ii. 25 Belus, Mount, i. 63 Bendemir, (Bund-i-Amir), ii. 146 Beni Fakal Arabs, i. 257 Beni Hiyakim Arabs, ii. 63 Beni Lam Arabs, ii. 238 Beraea (Berea), (Beroea), (Aleppo), i. 270 Berastik, (Mt.), ii. 364 Besachana, (Fanum Atargatis), (Throne of Trajan), (Masjid Sandabiyah), i. 444 Bethauma, (Bethautha), (Amah), i. 373, (App. No. 13) Bezabde, (Deba), (Jezirah ibn Omar), (Besarta), ii. 330 Dilecha, (Balik Su), i. 204 Bin Kilissa, (Thousand Churches), i. 6 Bir, (Birijik), (Bireh), (Biram), (Birtha), (Birentha), (Bersima), (Apamaea), (Antiochaea ad Eu- phrateln), (Zeugma of Mesopo- tamia), i. 214 Birat, (Bir), i. 169 Birket el Ibrahim el Khalil, (Abra- ham's Pond), i. 198 Dirs, (Borsippa), ii. 25 Birs Nimrūd, (Bursif), (Borsippa), (Beresith), (Barsita), ii. 22 Birthplace of St. Paul, the, i. 137 Birtulli, (Khaldaean Episcopacy) ii. 310 Bitumen Fountains: Deir Abuna, i. 132; Is or Hit, i. 340 Bodendron, (Podandus), i. 152 Boli, (Hadrianopolis), ii. 380 Bomaspan, ii. 309 Bomitae, (Altars of Alexander), (Sakal Tutan), (Jonas's Pillars), i. 16, 116 Borsippa, (Birs Nimrūd), (Bursif), (Barsita), ii. 22 Borsippean Khaldaeans, ii. 55 CAL Bosanti, (Butrenti), i. 152 Bostamluk, i. 148 Bostan Takhti, ii. 161 Boundaries, the, of Persia and Parthia, i. 410 Break-down, the, ii. 191 Bridge at Baghdad, ii. 196, 279; at Bir, i. 214; at Hillah (Baby- lon), ii. 19; at Jezirah ibn Omar, ii. 329; at Kalah Nesjm, i. 229; at Kara Bambuch, i. 250; at Mosul, (Meso-Pylae), ii. 322; at Mussayib, ii. 14; at Osmanjik, ii. 377; of Semiramis (Mum- liab), ii. 261 ; at Serut, ii. 235; at Samosat, i. 195; at Thapsa- cus, i. 276 Eulbas Kurds, ii. 306 Bulghar Tagh, (Taurus), i. 147 Bumadus, (Khazir), ii. 310 Bund or Bend (a dam), ii. 141, 225 Bund-i-Amir, (Bendemir), ii. 146 Bund-i-Kir, (Bitumen])am), ii.222 Burj, (a tower), (al Arab), i. 363 Burj al Tair, (Bird's Tower), i. 355 Burj, (Burjah, pl. Burjayit), ii. 89 Bursif, (Borsippa), ii. 22 - Bürüzüm, (Brasjūn), (Borasgun), (Berasdjan), ii. 121 IBushir Hills, i. 304 Bushire, (Abū Shehr), (Abū Sha- hir), (Father of Cities), ii. 113 Bussora or Bosairah, (Bassora), diminutive of Busra or Basra, ii. 92 Butremti, (Bosanti), i. 152 CAESAREA Amazarba, i. 183 Caesarea, Germanicia, (Marash), i. 183 Caesarea Mazaca, i. 183 Calacine, (Calachene), (Territory of Calah), (mounds south of Great Zab), ii. 331 Calah, Calach, (Gen. x. 11), (Glä or Kalah), ii. 321 Calah, (Halah), (? Rakka), (Kar- kisha), (Holwan), (Kalah), i. 840, (App. No. 12) Callicome, i. 230 Callinicus, (Callinocopolis), (Rak- ka), i. 281, 292 - 474 THE EUPFHRATES EXPEDITION CAL Callirhoe, (Urfah), i. 198 Calme, Chalme, (Dakia), (Rakka), i. 284 Calneh, Chalmeh, (Niffar), (App. No. 17) Campus Aléius, i. 125 Campus Barbaricus, (Palmyrean Solitudes), (Plain of Siffin), i. 296 Canal of Semiramis, i. 332 Canarmella, (Bayas), i. 16, 116 Cappadox, (Gok Sū), i. 191 Caprus, (Lesser Zab), ii. 311 Carcathiocerta, (Kar-Khar), (Kert), ii. 360, (App. No. 30) Carchermish, (Khar-Khemish of Talmud), (Kirki), (Kirkesium), (Circesium), (Cercusium), (Kar- isha), (Karkisiya), (Abū Serai), i. 343 Carchemish, (Kargamus), (Bam- byce), (Hierapolis), i. 236, (App. No. 11) Carrhae, (Carrãe), (Carras), (Cha- ran), (Haram), i. 204 Casiotis, i. 51 Casius, Mount, i. 8 Castabala, (Kara-Kaya), i. 92, 115 cº, of Aborenses, (Aboreon), i. Castle of Lethe, i. 312 Castle, the, of the Stars, (Kalah Nesjm), i. 226 cºhe (Coche), (Kochos), ii. Cave of Desrüd, ii. 301 Caye of the Seven Sleepers, i. 145 Cave, the, of Shapur, ii. 159 Cecilia, (Ceciliana), (Sarisat), i. Celts or Kelts, i. 245 Cergusium, (Karkisha), (Circe. sium), (Kerkusium), i. 344, 345 Cha’ab Arabs, (Ka'ab), the, ii. 205 Chaboras, (Khaboras), (Aborras), º, (Araxes), Khabur), i. Chala in Chalomitis, (Sar Puli Zohab), (Holwan), (Kalah), i. 340 Chala, (Calach), (Halah), (Kalah), (Karkisha), i. 340 COE Chalcidene, (App. No. 9) Chalcis, (Chalcis ad Belum), (Kin- misrin), i. 57, 59 Chaldaea, (Khaldaea), (Irak), ii. 52 Chalep, (Haleb), (Aleppo), i. 270, 347 Chalomitis, (App. No. 9) Chalus, (Koweik river), i. 92 Chalybon, (App. No. 9) Chamlü Bel, (Fir Mounts), (San- disses), ii. 372 - Chaonia, (Tell Ma'ni), (Hanumea), (App. No. 7) Characene, ii. 182 Charax, (Charax Spasinus), (Pel- laum), (Antiochaea of Mesene) (Kherkilſusan), ii. 182; Ashtera- bad, (Muhammrah), ii. 180 Charmande, (Kalah Ramadi), i. 446 ; ii. 1 Charran, (Charan), (Haran), i. 204, 209 Chebar, (Chobar), (Gobya), (Go- baris), (Nahr Chobar), (Nahr Gobari), (Flumen Sares), (Nahr Sura), (Nahr Kufa), (Palla- copas), (Western Euphrates), i. 344; ii. 2 - Chehel Minar, (Hall of Forty Columns), ii. 150 Chemosh, (Sun or Fire), (Car- Chemosh), i. 237 Choaspes, (Kherkah river), i. 312; ii. 180 Chūkür Ovah, i. 115 Church of St. Paul, i. 144 Church of St. James, (James Baradaeus), ii. 335 Cilicia, i. 112 Cilicia Campestris, i. 125 Ciliza, (Kilis), i. 106 Cimiatene, (Divriki), ii. 364 Cinga, (Singa), (Gok Sū), i. 191 Cingilla (Ceciliana), i. 225 Circesium, (Karkisha), (Cercu- sium), (Abū Serai), i. 336 City, the, of the Khalifs, ii. 277 Claudius, (Kakteh Sū), i. 194 Coche, (Cauchae), (Cochen), (Vicum Seleuciae), (? Ctesiphon), ii. 32 Coele-Syria, (Upper Valley of Orontes river), i. 50 - INDEX - 475 COM Comana Pontica, (Gumenek), (App. No. 31) Conquest, the, of Mesopotamia by the Arabs, i. 346 Constantina, (Constantia), i. 295 Constantinople, (Byzantium), li. 381 Copper Mines, the, of Arghana, ii. 347 Cordiana, (Island), i. 135 Corsote, (Wurdi), (Al Erzi), i. 338 Country, a beauteous but neg- lected, ii. 358 Country, the, of the Jacobites, ii. 333 - Crocodile, the Syrian, i. 15, 265, (App. No. 6) - Crocodilon Flumen, (Kersus), i. 12 - Crocodilon Lacus, i. 185 Crocodilon Mons, (Amanus), i. 12 Ctesiphon, (Coche), (Gardabad), (Teisabun), ii. 267 - Cunaxa, (Khunasah), (Khan Haswa), ii. 14 Cush, (Kutha), (Kutah), ii. 14 Cybate, (Wasit), ii. 82, 260 Cydnus river, i. 108, 134 Cyrus river, (Kur Ab), ii. 155 Cyrrhestica, i. 30 Cyrrhus, (Cyrus), i. 106, 108 DAHAB, (Dhahab), Golden River, (? Daradax), i. 259, (App. No. 9) Daisan, (Scirtos river), i. 198 Dakia, (Rakka), i. 284 Dakira, (Dacira), (Diacira), (Cia- ceri), (Cicora), (Thi d' Akira), (Dawaliya), i. 434 Dalaki, (Naphtha Fountains), ii. 130 Damascus, i. 382; ii. 105 Daphne, (Beit al Moi), i. 7, (App. No. 3 Dar Aslam, (House of Peace), ii. 35 Dara, (Daras), ii. 336 Dardes, (Daradax), i. 259, (App. No. 9) Dashistan, (Gurmisir), (Syrtibole), ii. 121 Dasht Arjun, ii. 141 IDIW Dastagerd, (Kherk), (Eski Bagh- dad), ii. 33, 251 Dauana, (Dauser), (Dausara), (Dabama), (Kalah Jaber), i. 270 Dawaliya, (Diakira), i. 434 Dawasir, (Water Country), ii. 114 Day, a, and might on the banks of the Euphrates, i. 419 Deba, (Bezabde), (Jezirah ibn Omar), ii. 330 Decia, (Missis), i. 120 Deir, (monastery near Bassora), ii. 113 Deir Abuna, (Naphtha Springs), i. 333, 334 Deir Mahariz, (Turks’ Burial- place), i. 269 Deir-i-Saffran, (Yellow Monastery of Jacobites), ii. 842 Deir al Sikr, (Tibni), i. 326, 331 Deir-i-Sayyidi, (Monastery of the Lady), ii. 343 Deir-i-Yakub, (Monastery of St. James), ii. 343 Dela Kayir, (Mt. with Holes), ii. 372 Deli Chaye, (Pinarus), i. 91 Demir Kapu (Iron Gate), (Ama- nus), i. 118 Derbend, (a pass), Erwend, (Per- sian), (Orodes and Orontes), i. 381; ii. 308 Derbend-i-Basian, (Pass of Sulai. maniyah), ii. 294 Derghizin, ii. 295 Dervish, (Durwish), Ali, i. 86 Descent, the, of the river, i. 215 - Diaba (Diabas), (Zabatus), (Zabas), (river Zab), ii. 311 Diakira, (Dakira), (Dawaliya), i. 434 I)ibbin, (Aniana), (Abū Dibbin), i. 192 - Digla, (Digba), (Didugua), (Dijal), (Digua), (river Tigris), ii. 264 Dijal, (Little Tigris), ii. 36 Diosphage, i. 339 Direkli Tash, (monolith), i. 136 Diridotis, (Teredon), (Old Basra), ii. 102 Divriki, (Cimiatene), ii. 364 Diwaniyah, ii. 29 476 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION DIY Diyalah, (Diala), (Gyndes) (Nahr- wan), ii. 252 Diyar, (a province or residence), ii. 351 Diyarbekr, (Diarbekr), (Diyar- Bekir), (Dwelling of Bekir), (Amida), i. 351; ii. 348 Diyar-Mudhar, (Padan Aram), (Osrhoene), i. 351 Diyar-Rabbia, (Gozan), (Gausani- tis), i. 351 Dizful, ii. 222 I)ocia, (Tusiyah), ii. 378 Doliche, (Dolicha), (Aintab), i. 102 Dorak, (Fellahiha), (Ka'abam), (Gaban), (Cha’aban), ii. 185, 205 Dorakstan, territory of Cha’ab or Ra'ab Arabs, (Ka'aban), ii. 205 Dorbeta, (Diyarbekr), ii. 351 Dumbu Tagh, ii. 365 Dün Kalah, i. 182 I)ümük Tash, (Tomb of Sardanapa- lus), i. 139 Dura, (Nicanorum Urbs), (Tumu- lus Gordiani), i. 373, 389, (App. No. 12) Dura of Nebuchadnezzar, (?Imām. Dur), (? Mukhattat), ii. 36 Dürdūn Tagh, (Dumbugh Tagh), (Taurus), i. 179 Duseprum, (Duz-cha), ii. 380 IEASTERN TIGRIs or Nahr-wan, ii. 35, 248 IEcbatana, (Treasury of Babylonia), (Kirkuk), ii. 54 Edessa, (Osroene), (Callirhoe), (Ur), (Antiochaea of Osroene), (Urfah), i. 201 Edessa, principality of, the, i. 190 Edlip, i. 68 Biggil, (Inghilene), ii. 359 Elaeusa, (island), i. 135 IElam, (Elymais), ii. 172 Bl Bara, (Christian ruins), i. 59 Eleia, (Hileia), (Hauli), i. 338, 345 Eleuthro-Cilicia, i. 168 FIR Elymais, ii. 172 Emesa, (Ba'albek), i. 51, 314 Emgoli Tagh, (Sheikh Barakat), (Mount St. Simon), i. 25, 26, 31 IEmgoli Sū, (river), i. 25 Emk, (Umk), (Emma), (Imma), i. 22 Entrance into Hamath, i. 6 Epiphanaea, i. 51, 115 Eragiza, (Erachiha), (Sheikh Arudi), i. 256 Erbil, (Arbil), (Arbela), ii. 309 Erech, (Irkah), (Warka), (Uruch), (Arach), (Arderika), (Al Asa- yah), ii. 53 Blski Baghdad, (Old Baghdad), (Dastagerd), (Kerkh), (Beit Saluk), (Beit Germa) (Beklam), (Opis), ii. 33, 251 Eski Mosul, (Old Mosul), (Balad), (Balada), (Tables in App.) Eulaeus, (Ulai), (Karlin river), ii. 180 Euphrates, (Frat), (Perath), ii. 1 Euphratic IBeaver, i. 337; Momi- tors, i. 264; Tern, i. 378; Turtle, i. 265 X Europus and Ceciliana, i. 213 Europus, (Jerabulus), i. 221 Eutochia, (Eudoxiara), (Tokat), ii. 372 Excursion in Coele-Syria, i. 50 Ezekiel, Tomb of, (I'cheskal of the Jews), (Khazkil), (Keffil), ii. 250 Eziongeber, ii. 102 Ezra, (Tomb of), ii. 249 JFANG, i. 181 JFarewell to the Orient, ii. 371 Felalil (ruins at bridge), ii. 235 Fellahiya, (Dorak), ii. 205, 208 210 § IFelujah, ii. 5 Fenik, (Fynyk), (Phoenica), (Tables in App.) . Fiery Furnace, the, ii. 26, (App. No. 16) Fight, the, of the Sacred Grove, ii. 61 Fire Altars, (Pyraea), ii. 154 INDEX 477 FIR Fire Worshippers, (Parsis), (Par- sees), Firüz Shaphur, (Perisabora), ii. 3 Fish, (Sacred), i. 199, 243 Flavias, (Flaviopolis), (Sis), i. 168 Fluvius Regius, (Bilecha), i. 204 Fluvius Regius, (Nahr-Malcha), ii. 3, 6. Fons Scobore, i. 339 Forest of Amran, the, i. 296 Forests of the Tigris, ii. 237 Fountain of Zoiba, (Daphne), i. 19 GABAN, (Cha’aban), (Kabban), (Dorakstan), i. 173 Gangamela, (Gaugamela), (The Camel's House), (Karmalissi), ii. 310 Gardabad, (Ctesiphon), ii. 274 Garden of Eden, i. 263, 446 Gate of Amanus, i. 93, 117 Gate of Babylon, (Pylae Babylo- niae), (Entrance into Paradise), i. 446 Gate of Cilicia, (Sakal Tutan), i. 14 Gate of the Gardens, i. 71 Gate, the, of St. Paul, i. 71 Gate, the, of Syria, (Baylan), i. 25 Gate, the, of the Talism, ii. 281 Gate, the, of Taurus, (Kulak Boghaz), i. 147 Gates of Cilicia, the, i. 112 Gates of Cilicia and Syria, i. 14, 112 Gates, the, of Paradise, i. 440 Gauzanitis, (Gozan), (Pastures of Nahab), i. 340, 341 Gaza Parthorum, (Tilbes), i. 414 Gaza. Phraates, (Pacoria), (Pha- tusæ), (Anatho), i. 414 Gaziura, (Gazioura), (Turkhal), ii. 374 • Gennaba, (Gumnava), ii. 120 Gephyra, (Pontisfer), (Jisr Hadid), i. 25 Gerbedissus, (Kara Weyli), i. 106 Gerbillus, (a new species), i. 274 Gergen Kalahsi, (Juliopolis), i. 196 (Thilutha), HAD Germanicia, (Marash), i. 183 Gharab, (poplar tree), i. 274 Giabar, (Ziabar), (Kalah Jaber), i. 270 Gindarus, (Jindariz), i. 30, 86 Gobya, (Gouba), (Vologesia), (Kufa), ii. 29, 35 Godefroy de Bouillon's Castle, i. 13 Gog and Magog, i. 244, 245 Gok Sü, (Singa), (Marsyas), i. 194 Golab, (Capital of the Exiles), (Pomebeditha), i. 435 Gopher or bitumen coracles, (Kayir), i. 440; ii. 196 Gordian's Tomb, (Zaita), i. 370 Gorgum, (Gorgus), Kir-Kuk), ii. 311 Gorgus, (Taok Chai), ii. 311 Gozan, river of, (Gausanitis), i. 340, 3.11 Graine, (Koweit), ii. 168 Graiyim, (canal), ii. 53 Grotto Churches of St. Paul and St. James, i. 76; of Nymphaeum, i. 7, 38; of the Seven Sleepers, i. 145 - Guedisir, (Ardishir), (Seleucia), ii. 268 Gueuzluk Kalah, of Tarsus), i. 141 Gulf of Issus, the, i. 10 Gumush Maden, (Silver Mines), ii. 362 Gurjik Góli, (Lake Colchis), ii. 358 Gurluk, (Pass of Abraham), i. 223 Gurmisir, (Dashistan), ii. 121 Guttubah, (Chuduca), ii. 58 Gyndes, (Nahr-wan), ii. 262 (Necropolis HABOR, the river of, i. 331, 340 Habor, town of, i. 340, 342 Haddisa, (Haditha), (Haditha al Nur), (or the Luminous), (Nehar- dea), (Nahar-Diyah), i. 431 Hadramaut, ii. 102 Hadriana, (Mopsuestia), (Missis), i. 120 Hadrianopolis, (Boli), ii. 380 IIadshirl, i. 184 478 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION EIAF Haffar Canal, (Muhammrah), ii. 173 - Hai, (Shat al), (Pasitigris), ii. 52 Hajji Hamsa, ii. 378 Halah, (Calah), (Kalah), (Chala), (Hatarah), (Karkisha), i. 340 Halah, (Holwan), i. 340, (App. No. 11) IHaleb, (Aleppo), i. 270, 347, (App. No. 18) Hallilah, ii. 119 e Halys, (Kizil Irmak), (salt river), ii. 337 IHamath, (Hamath Zobah), i. 51 Hammam Ali (Tellu Sekir), (Tis- asphalta), (App. No. 86), ii. 379 Hammam, (Gulaba), (App. No. 17 Hºmº Muk, ii. 308 Hamrin, (Red Hills), ii. 231, 254, 289 Harim or Harem, (lady's apart- ments), ii. 72, 156 Harran, (Haran), (Carrhae), i. 204 Barugli, (Heraclea), (Zenodotium), (Arakla), i. 276 Harun all Rāshid, (Harlin ar Rāshid), (Summer retreat of), i. 284 . Hassawi, (river), i. 338 Hauli, (Huali), (Eleia), (Hermus), i. 338 Hawaji Jubbah, (Pomebeditha), i. 437 Hawash, i. 53 Hawaz, (Ahwaz), (dim, of Huz, a body of people), (Aginis), ii. 226 IIawisah, (Hawaizah), (dim. of Hauzah), ii. 180, 239 Hazor of Kedar, (Al Hadhr), i. 270, 316 Hedyphon, (Jerrahi river), ii. 185 Iſeraclea of Cyrrhestica, (Basul Ralahsi), i. 31 Hejira, (Hegira), i. 367; ii. 280 Herem, (Hir-Im), (Imma), i. 27 Eſermus, (Huali river), i. 338, 345 Hiddekel, (Dikel), (Diglah), (Tigris), ii. 264 Hierapolis, (Magog), (Bambyce), (Carchemish), (Mambej), (Bam- buch), i. 246 IRE Hieratis, ... (Heratemis), (Khor Rayir), ii. 120 Highway, the, to Susa, ii. 257 Hijaz, (Hejaz), (Hedjaz), i. 311 Hileia, (Eleia), (Hauli river), i. 338 - - Hillah, (Babylon), ii. 13 - Hindiyah Canal, (Perath of Bor- Sippa), (Nahr al Birs), ii. 2, 14 Hipparenum,(Hipparenorum Civi- tas), (Harpanja), ii. 3 Hira, (Vologesia), (Kufa), ii. 33, Hir-Im, (Herem), (Imma), i. 25 Hisn Keifa, (Saphe), i. 356; ii. 331, 334 Hisn Musalamah, (Anatho), i. 412 Hiß, (IS), (Aiopolis), (Is-i-Dakira), (Bitumen Fountains), i. 440 Hizan, (Hisn Kaifa), (Ciphas), (Saphe), i. 351 Holwan, (Chala), (Calah), (Kalah), (Halah of Samaritans), i. 340 Hor (Marshes), ii. 259 Huali, (Eleia or Hileia river), i. 338, 345 Hub es Suk, ii. 14 Hubadan (Khupapan), (Appha- dana), (Abadan), ii. 188 Tº Hubuliyah, (castle), i. 405 IBN ALI DAUD, (Pagras), i. 22 Ibn Hasan, (suburb of Pome- beditha), i. 437 Ibn Hubairah, (Kalah Ramadi), ii. 2, 36 Ibrahim Khalil, ii. 16 Imām. Dur, on Euphrates, i. 390 Imām Dur, (? Dura of Nebuchad- nezzar), ii. 36, 250 Imām Gharbi, (Western Imām), ii. 237 Imām Sharki, (Eastern Imām), ii. 237 Imma, (Emk), (Umk), (Hir-Im), i. 27; Battlefield of, i. 23 Incidents of the Transport, i. 65 Indiyan river, (Oroates), ii. 115, 185 Inghilene, (Eggil), ii. 359 Irak, (Khaldaea), ii. 52 Irenopolis, (Dar Islam), ii. 35 INDEX 479 IRI Iris, (Yeshil Irmak), river), ii. 375 Irkah, (Warka), (Erech), ii. 53 Iron Bridge, (Gephyra), (Pontis- fer), (Jisr Hadid), i. 25, 349 Iron Gate, the, (Bab Hadid), i. 25 Iron Gate, (Demir (Amanus), i. 118 - Iron Gaies, the, of the Euphrates, (Kara Bambuch), i. 248 Irzah, (Ezra), (Corsote), i. 887, 58 Is, (Hit), (Bitumen Fountains), i. 440 Isa, (Abū Ghurraib), ii. 37 Ishtar, (Anahid), (Atargatis), (Ashtoreth), (App. No. 17) (Green Rapu), Iskanderia, (Khan), (Tomb of Alexander), ii. 9 Iskandrün, (Alexandretta), i. 12 Iskuriyah, (Mound of Slag), ii. 59 Ismalia, (Ismaini), (Ismaeli), ii. 172 Ismid, (Nicomedia), ii. 881 Issus, (Yuzler), i. 113; battle of, i. 13, 114; Gulf of, i. 8 Istakhar, (castle), ii. 148 Izedis, (Yezidees), ii. 324 Izzanesopolis, (Uzzanesopolis), (Al Uzz Island), i. 433 JABIYAH, (pl. Jiyayib), (navigable channels), ii. 89 Jacobite Monasteries, Saffran), ii. 842 Jacobites, the country of the, ii. 333 - Jacob's Spring, i. 12 Jaíhún, (Jihūn), (Pyramus), i. 138 Jajah, (Jahjakjah), river, i. 337 Jarri Zaid, (Nahr Saleh), ii. 90 Jawur (Gaiour) Tagh, (Mount of Infidels), i. 21 Jawur (Giãour) Koi, i. 171 Jayithah, (Mound), ii. 57 Jazrūm Lake, i. 444; ii. 1 Jebel Abiyad, (Chea Spi), (White Mountain), ii, 326 Jebel Ali, ii. 259 Jebel Habib el Najar, i. 422 (Deir-i- KAL Jebel El Kra'ad, (Ansarian Moun- tains), (Al Akrad), i. 44 Jebel em Nür, (Mt. of Light), i. 95. Jebel Judi, (Muhammadan Moun- tain of the Ark), (App, No. 25) Jebel Simam, (? Teredon), ii. 90 Jebel Tur, (Masius Mons), i. 337 ii. 333 Jera, (Kura), (Castle), i. 422 Jerabulus, (Europus), i. 221 Jerrahi river, (Hedyphon), ii. 185 Jezayir, (Jezirah), Khaldaean Lake), ii. 88 Jezirah, (Mesopotamia), i. 351 Jezirah ibn Omar, (Zabdita), (Besarta), (Zozarta), (Xurta), (Deba), (Bezabde), ii. 330 Jibbah, (Jubbah), (Pomebeditha), (App. No. 27), i. 435 Jindariz, (Gindarus), i. 30 Jisr, (Bridge on Tigris), (Al Kantarah), ii. 237 Jisr Hadid, (Iron Bridge), (Pontis- fer), (Gephyra), i. 25 Jisr Soghair, (Little Bridge), i. 50 J * Pillars, (Sakal Tütan), i. Jubbah, (Jibbah), (Al Jabar), (Pomebeditha), .435 Judi, (Jebel), (Mount of the Ark), (App. No. 25) Juliopolis, (Gergen Kalahsi), i. 196 Jünüb (south district), ii. 113 Justinopolis, (Justinianopolis), (Anazarba), i. 140 KA'ABA, i. 243; ii. 155 Ka'aban, (Dorak), (Gabban), ii. 205 Kadesia, (Kadisiya), (Kadesh), ii. 35, 53 Kadiyah, (Castle), i. 435 Kaffir Bey, i. 190 Kaffirbina, (Khan), i. 123 Kafr Juza, (Kafr Tutha), (Tigrano- certa), i. 356 Kafr, (Hisn Keifa), i. 356 Kaim, (Kayim), (Agamma), i. 401 Kaim, (Kayim), (? Opis), ii. 252 Kalaba, (Jalab Sū), i. 203 Kalah Gergen, (Juliopolis), i. 196 Kalah Girah, ii. 53 Kalah Jaber, (Giabar), i. 268 480 THE EUPEIRATES EXPEDITION RAL Ralah Miran, (Shah Miran ICalahsi), i. 119 Ralah al Mudyk, (Apamaea), i. 53 Ralah al Nesjm, (of the Stars), i. 229 Ralah Ramadi, (Charmande), i. 446; ii. 1 Kalah Rubera, (Rahabi), ii. 329 Kalah Shirkat, (Shirgat), (Toprak Ralahsi), (Ur of the Persians), (Rehoboth Tr), i. 370; ii. 321 Ralah, (Kala’at), Kaftan, ii. 303 Ralah Marrah, (Woman's Castle), ii. 343 Ralah Yusuf Aga, ii. 334 Ralinicos, (Callinicus), (Rakka), i. 292 Ralka. Simmak, ii. 305 I(alneh, (? Halah), i. 844 Ramchuka, ii. 302 Kantarah, (Samosata), i. 194 Kantarah Rassasi, (Leaden Bridge on Tigris), (Katur), ii. 36,251 Kantarah Rassasi, (Leader, Bridge), (Resasah), (Thapsacus), i. 276 Kantarah, (Al), ii. 237 Kapan Maden, (Silver Mines), ii. 362 Rara Baba, (Black Chieftains), i. 110 Kara Bambuch, (Iron Gates), i. 249 Rara Bel, (Paryadres), ii. 367 Karabilah, (The Sieves), i. 404 Raradagh, (Keredeh), (Caris), (Caria), ii. 379 Rara Gosh, ii. 310 Rarajah Tagh, (Masius), i. 337; ii. 333 Rarak, (Kharaj), (Island), ii, 115 Rara Kapū, (Amanian Gates), i. 118 |Kara, Sis, i. 192 Rara Sū, (Aenoparas), i. 36, 109 Karatash, (Mallus), (Megarsus), i. 19 Rara Teppeh, (Black Mound), ii. 289 Raraula, (App. No. 35) Karawiran, (Anadymata), (An- drapa), (Neo Claudiopolis), ii. 379 REIA Karin, (Al Kuraim), (tower), i. 405 Rarkisha, (Karkisiya), (Carche- mis), (Circusium), i. 336 Rarmalissi, (Gangamela), ii. 310 Rars, i. 178 Rarlin river, (Ulai), (Eulaeus), ii. 172 Rartin al Amah, (Blind Karūn), ii. 173 Rashgar Hills, ii. 307 Kasr (Castellated Palace) of, Babylon, ii. 15 Kasru-l-Motowekkil-el Jaferi, (Motassem’s Palace), ii. 250 Ratur, (Nahr-wan), ii. 36,250 Raukab, (The Star), i. 339 Kayir, (Bitumen), (Gopher boats), (Tiradas), (Kufas), (Kir of the Persians), i. 440 Kāzerüm, (Kauseroon), ii. 135 Referbina Khan, i. 123 Relek Izedi, (Ferry of the Izedis), ii. 309 Kerbillah, (Kir-billah), ii. 34 Kersus, (Crocodile River), i. 15 Kert, (Seert), (a city or stronghold), ii. 351 Kert, (Kar-Rhar), (Carthathio- certa), ii. 368, (App. No. 36) Kerzin river, i. 93 Khabora, (Karkisha), (Khabūr), i. 343 Khabur, (river). (Habor), (Kha- boras), (Chaboras), (Aborras) (Araxes), i. 337 Rhabür river, (Kurdistan), (Kha- Zil), (river of Zakho), i. 340; ii. 327 Rhadr, (Evergreen), (Khidr), (Khudr), Iliyas, (Resting-places of Elias or Elijah), i.435; ii. 62 Rhaist, (Komar Tacht), (Pass), ii. 132 Khaldaea, (Khaldaea), (Chaldaea), (Irak), ii. 52; Archæology of (App. No. 17); List of Kings, (App. No. 21) Rhaldaean Lake, (Jezarjir), ii. 88 Rhalifs, the City of the, ii. 277 Khalis, (river), (Khazir), (Buma- dus), ii. 310 Rhalu Nimrūd, (Median Wall), i. 446 INDEX 481 KHA. I(han Deli Abbas, ii. 288 Rham Geshir, ii. 293 Khan Iskanderiya, ii. 9 Rhan-i-Miran, (Serpent's Khan), ii. 302 Khan-i-Zemund, ii. 143 Rhandak, ii. 380 Rhanuka, i. 319 Rhanzir, (Ras al), (Boar's Head), i. 10 Kharaj, (Island), Karak), ii. 115 Khar Khemish of Talmud, (Car- chemish), (Karkisha), i. 236, 343 Rharput, (Khurtbit), (Kurtbist), (Khartabist), (Karpote), (Arsa- mosata), ii. 360 Rharput Dawassi, (Plain of Khar- put), ii. 359 Rhazail Arabs, (Beni Rechab), (Rechabites), ii. 42 Rhazimein, (Shi‘ah Mosque), ii. 282 Rhazir, (Kumar Sū), (Gomar Sū), (Burmadus), ii. 310 Rherkah river, (Choasspe), ii. 180, 239 Kherkh, (Beit Saluk), (Beit Ger- ma), (Bajerma), (Dastagerd), (Opis), (Eski Baghdad), ii. 33, 251 Rherkhi Musan, (Muhammrah), ii. 182 Khor Abulah (Apologos), ii. 101 Rhor Kayir, (Hieralis), (Herate. mis), ii. 120 Rhor Musa, (Mesene), ii. 183 Rhorsabad, ii. 318 Rhud, (Shat al Hud), ii. 238 Rhupapan (Hubadan), (Abadan), ii. 188 Khush Aub, (Khush Ab), (Battle of), ii. 122 Rhusistan, (Susiana), ii. 172 Kiakira, (Ciaciri), (Cicora), (Da- kira), (Dawaliya), i. 434 Rilis, (Ciliza), i. 90, 105 Rinisrin, (Chalcis), i. 57, 347, (App. No. 9) Kir-bella, (Tombs of Husain and |Hassan), ii. 34 * *:::: (Kirkesium), (Karkisha), i. Rir-Kük, (Gorgum), (Arraca), (Areca), (Kor Kura), (Gor-Kūk), VOL. II. KUT (Ecbatama of Babylonia), ii. 53, 290, 311 Kirmanshah, ii. 242 2° - Kiyara, (Kurliyu), (Gurluk), (Pass of Abraham), (App. No. 8) Rlimakes, (Ladders), (Passes of the Persian Apennines), ii. 133 Koche, (Kochos), (Al Kursh), ii. 32 Kohissar, (Sinna), (Syna Judaeo- rum), (Sinnaca), i. 209 Roi Sanjak, ii. 307 Komata, (tells or mounds), i. 30 Rorgo Island, ii. 169 Kornah, (Kurmah), Mesene), ii. 89 Kotlil-i-Dochter, (Girl's Pass), ii. 137 Rottil-i-Kumarij, (Salt Mines), ii. 132 Rottil-i-Mullû, ii. 131 Kotīl-i-Pir-i-Zún, (Old Woman's Pass), ii. 141 Roweik river, (Chalus), i. 91 Koweit, (Graine), ii. 168 Kufa, (Gobya), (Vologesia), (Bé Ripi), ii. 29, 35 Kufa, (Gopher), (Kayir), (bitumen boats or coracles), ii. 196 Rufri, ii. 289 Kuhnaswah, (Khan Haswa), (?Cu- naxa), ii. 14 Rulak Boghaz, (Gate of Taurus), i. 148 Kulak Kalahsi, (Goulag), i. 121 |Kulibah Hills, i. 422 Rumarij, (Salt Mines), ii. 133 Kur Ab, (River of Cyrus), ii. 155 Kurd Pashalik of Sulaimaniyah, the, ii. 287 Kurjik Góli, (Lake Colchis), ii. 358 Rurk Kulak, (Tardequiaea), i. 118 Rurkur Baba, (Father of Flames), ii. 291 Kurtlu, (Place of Wolves), i. 21 Kushla Kalahsi, ii. 35 Rush Tagh, (Bird Mts.), (Olgassis), ii. 377 Rusti, the, (Fillet of the Fire- worshippers), ii. 165 Rut, (Muntifik Arabs), ii. 88 Kut Amarah, (Kut al Amarah), ii. (Apamaea 82 Kutah, (Kutha), (Cutha), ii. 14, 88 | 1 482 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION KUT Kut, Hai, ii. 82 Kutch Hissar, (Ram's Castle), ii. 378 Kutha, (Al Kithr), (Kutah), (Cuth or Cush), ii. 14, 38 Ruzil or Ghuzel Burj, (Pretty Tower), i. 42 LAKE of Antioch, i. 30; Asayah, (of pebbles), i. 44; of Colchis, (Gurjik Góli), ii. 358; of Croco- diles, i. 185; of Jazrūn, (Perath of Sura), ii. 1; of Khaldaea, ii. 88; Khatuniyah, i. 338; el Me- lak, (App. No. 9); of Susiana, ii. 180; Taka, i. 42 Lampron, (Nemrun Kalahsi), i. 150 Larissa, i. 52 Larissa, (Resen), (Nimrūd), ii. 320 Latakiya, (Laodica’a), i. 7 Ledmiyah, i. 842 Legend of the Seven Sleepers, i. 145 Leontopolis, (Rakka), i. 295 Lemlum, (town of), ii. 42 Lemlun, (marshes), (Paludes Ba- byloniae), ii. 43 Lethe, (Castle of), i. 312 Lions, (Assyrian), at Haran, i. 204; at Serug, i. 207; on the Karūn, ii. 233 Lizards, (Great), i. 265 Locusts and Locustrades, i. 285 Loss, the, of the ‘Tigris,’ i. 387 Lycus, (Greater Zab river), ii. 311 Lysias, (Kaffir el Bara), (App. No. 9) MAARSARES, Canal), ii. 1. Macepracta, (Massices), (division of waters on entering Babylonia), i. 446 º Macra, (Marah), i. 58 Madayn, (Twin Cities), (Seleucia and Ctesiphon), ii. 35, 268 Maden Arghana, (Copper Mines), ii. 354 Maden Gumush, (Silver Mimes), ii. 263 Madrük, (Castle), i. 438 (Maarses), (Sura MEG Magog, (Mambej), (Syrian name for Hierapolis), i. 235, 236 Mahadi, (the Guide), ii. 35 Mahamūr, ii. 175 Mahmudiya Canal, (Nahr Mali- kah), (Nahr Malcha Saba), ii. 14 Maidan, (open space or Square), ii. 282, 283 Maksin, (Makisin), i. 341, 354 Mallus, (Mallos), (Karatash), i. 133 Malta, i. 3 Mamistra, (Missis), i. 123 Manaz, (Basilica), i. 148 Mandaites, (Mandayi Ayah), (Sa- baºans), ii. 233 Mansuriya, ii. 330 Maogamalcha, (Nahr Malka), ii. 3 Marah, (Macra), i. 47 Marash, (Maresia), (Germanicia), i. 183 Mardin, (Marde), ii. 341, (App. NO. 30 Marses, (Maarsares), (Baarsares), (Nahr Sura), (Perath of Sura), ii. 1 Marshes, the, of Babylonia, (Pa- ludes Babyloniae), ii. 40 Marsyas, (river and plain), i. 50 Marsyas, (Gok Sū), i. 194 Marzivam, (Rhazemon), ii. 376 Mas, (Mesas), (Mesameos), (Mu- hammrah), ii. 168 Masca, (Musa Canal), (Ahava), i. 387 Masius Mons, (Karajah Tagh), (Jebel Tur), (Mardene), ii. 333 Masjid Ali, (Tomb of Ali), ii. 34 Masjid Sandabiyah, (Temple of Atargatis), (Throne of Trajan), (Besachana), (Akra), i. 444, 445 Massices, (Macepracta), (Matha Meshaya), i. 446; ii. 1 Matakh, (station at Amanian Gates), i. 117 Mayarthin, (Rehoboth an Nahar), i. 369 Mazuragh, (mountain and plain), ii. 296 . Medaniyah, i. 437 Median Wall, (Sidd Nimrūd), (Khali Nimrūd), (Pylae), i. 446 Megarsus, (Kara Tash) i. 133 INDEX 483 MIEL Melangema, Oghlu's Mansion, i. 161 Meliboea, (island of Orontes), i. 5, (App. No. 1) Menzil Khan, (Kushiki), ii. 376 Merdasht, (Plain of Persepolis), ii. 147 Merketz-Kalahsi, (Neghertz), i. 14 Merketz Sū, (Andricus), (Kersus), (Crocodile River), i. 12 Mersinah, (Port of Tarsus), i. 135 Mesambria, (Rû-al-Shahir), ii. 120 Mesanaeos, (Muhammrah), ii. 183 Mesene, the territory of, ii. 180 Mesene, (Mesana), (Misan), (Mu- san), ii. 180 Mespila, (Meso-Pylae), (Nineveh), ii. 321 Meteorites at Ba'albek and at Mekka, i. 242 Mihrab Tagh, (Pulpit Mount), ii. 357 Mijdel or Mijdal, (Majdal), i. 352, 367 Minawi, (Minawiyah), (Miniyah), (Abulah), (Oboleh), (Aphle), (Apologos), ii. 94 Minervae Cyrrhestica. Fanum, i. 31 Minervae Mons, (Azara Tagh), ii. 358 Minerva's Owl, i. 24 Miniyah, (Minawi), ii. 104 Minmiah, (Miniza), (Mimmica), (App. No. 7) Misan, (Mesene), ii. 182, 188 Missis, (Mopsuestia), (Mopsu- crene), i. 119 Misr el Kahira, (Cairo), i. 380 Mizari Türk, (Mizari Zürük), (Turks' Burial-place), i. 268 Mizarluk, (Mezarluk), (Necro- polis), i. 148 Monitor Lizards, (Ameiva), i. 265 Monkeys, (Simiae), in Khaldaea, ii. 55 Mons Singarus, (Sinjar), i. 338 Mopsuestia, (Mopsi Hestia), (Mopsucrene), (Missis), i. 119 Moseus, (Musa), (Mesene), ii. 184 (Nigrinum), NA’A Mosul and Nineveh, a first visit to, ii. 313 Mounds of Babylon, ii. 15 Mounds of Khaldaea, ii. 62 Mounds of Syria, i. 30, (App. No. 7) Mount Amanus, i. 21 Mount Belus, i. 50 Mount Casius, i. 7 Mount Crocodile, i. 15 Mount Masius, ii. 333 Mount Rhosus, i. 11 Mount St. Simon on Orontes, i. 6 Mount in Cyrrhestica, (Sheikh Barakat), (Trapezus), i. 31 Mucan, (Mesene), ii. 183 Muhaila, (Whirlpool), (Muham- madiya), i. 302 Muhammad al., (Imām), ii. 14 Muhammad, (Mounds of), ii. 14 Muhammrah, (‘A Bone of Con- tention'), ii. 168 Muhammrah, (Charax), (Charax Spasinus), (Antiochaea of Mesene), (Ashterabad), (Kherki Musan), (Mahersi), (Pasinus), (Pellaeus), ii. 168 Muhaila, (Mahmudiyah), i. 302 Muhawil Canal, ii. 14 Mujaliba, (Place of Captivity), (Mukallib), ii. 15 - Mu-kayir, (Mugayir), (Place of Bitumen), (Ur), (Urchoe), (Orchoe), (Umgeiyer), ii. 64, 80, (App. No. 19) Mukhattat, (? Dura of Nebuchad- mezzar), ii. 36 Mumlah, (Mumlihah), (bridge), ii. 261 Muntifik Arabs, the, ii. 71 Murad Pasha, (bridge and cause- way), i. 82 Murgadeh, (Majuliya), i. 342 Musa, (Musan), (Mugan), (Misam), (Mesene), ii. 180 Musah Canal, (Masca), i. 387 Mussayib, (Moseyb), ii. 14 Mygdonia, ii. 334 Mygdonius river, ii. 336 Myriandrus, i. 13 NA'ARDA, (Nahardca), Nehardaïa, i. 432 484 THE EUPIITATES EXPEDITION NA’A Na'arda, (Narraga), (Nahr Mal- chad, ii. 4 Nafatah, (Napacha), (Nachaba), (Nachata), (Region of Naphtha), i. 443 Nahardea, (Nehardea), Nahar- diyah), Haddisa Island), i. 432 Nahor, (Haran), i. 166 Nahr Abulah, ii. 101 Nahr al Birs, (Hindiyah), ii. 23 Nahr Ardashir, (Seleucia), ii. 268 Nahr Balik, (Bilecha), i. 204 Nahr Chebar, (Chobar), (Gobya), (Gobaris), (Nahr Sura), i. 844; ii. 2 Nahr al Dahab, (The Golden River), (App. No. 9) Nahr Dijail, (Little Tigris), ii. 36 Nahr al Kebir, i. 43 Nahr-i-Abulah, (Apologos), ii. 104 Nahr Kutiyah, ii. 14 Nahr Malcha, (Ar Malchar), (Sa- klawiya), ii. 3, 6 Nahr Malcha Saba, (Narmalches), ii. 14 Nahr Obillah, (Obolleh), (Abu- lah), (Apologos), ii. 101, 104 Nahr Rin, (Nareen), ii. 289 Nahr Saleh, (Saada), (Jarri Zaid), ii. 20, 90, 202 Nahr Sares, (Nahr Sura), (Nilus), ii. 17 Nahr Sir, (Wadi Sir), (Nahr Ardashir), (Guedisir), (Seleucia), ii. 268 Nahr Sura,(Ma'arsares),(Maarses), (Perath of Sura), (Chebar), ii. 1 Nahr-Wan, (Eastern Tigris), ii. 36, 11, 248 Nahr-Wan, (city of), (Arba), (Narba), (Narban), ii. 253 Nakchi Rejib, ii. 156 Nakib-i-Rustam, ii. 155 Narba, (Narban), (Nahr-Wan), ii. 253 Narraga, (Nahr Malcha), ii. 3 Narsis, (Nerses), i. 193 Nazarenes, (Nüsairi), (Ansarians), i. 38 Nebbi, or Nabbi, Yumus (Tomb of Jonas), ii. 318 Nedjef (town of), ii. 186 Nedjef, (Lake of), (Bahr-i-Nedjef), (Rumiyah), ii. 29, 186 OPI Nehardea, (Nahar), (river), (Diyah), (region), (Haditha), i. 432, (App. No. 15) Nemrūn, (Nimrod's Castle), (Lampron), i. 149 Neo Claudiopolis, (Nicephorium), (City of Victory), (Constantia), (Rakka), i. 280,292 Nicephorium (Nikephorium), i. 295 Nicomedia, (Ismid), ii. 381 Nicopolis, i. 93 Niffar, (Nipur), (Calneh), (App. No. 17 Nigrinum, (Marketz Kalahsi), i. 14 Nil, (Nahr Nil), (Nilus), (Baby- lonian Nile), ii. 18 Nimrod, (Castle of), (Nemrūn), (Lampron), i. 150 Nimrūd, (Asshur), (Athur), (La- rissa), (Resen), ii. 320 Nimrūd Tagh, i. 197 Nineveh and Mosul, (A first visit to) ii. 313 Nineveh, (Ninus), (Meso-Pylae), ii. 313 Ninus, (Nineveh), ii. 313 Niphates, (Ali Tagh), ii. 354 Nipur, (App, No. 17) Nisibis, (Nisibin), ii. 334 (App. No. 29) Northern Assyria, (Arrapachitis), ii. 323 Nusairi, (Nusairiyah), (Ansarians), i. 44 Nushayit Wasut, (Wasut), (Cy- bate), ii. 82. Nymphaeum cum Specu, (Grotto on Orontes), i. OLABUS, (Aliobar), (Gaza Partho- rum), (Tilbes Island), i. 414 Old Baghdad, (Eski Baghdad), (Kherkh), (Dastagerd), (Opis), ii. 33 Old Bassora, (Basra), (Zobair), (? Teredon), ii. 101 Olgassis Mts., (Kush Tagh), (Ol- gassus), (Olyssas), ii. 377 Ophir, (Sofala), ii. 102 Opis, (Eski Baghdad), ii. 28, 236, 251 INDEX 485 ORC Orchoe, (Urchoe), (Osroene), (Os- rhoene), (Edessa), (Urfah), i. 196 Orchoe, (Ur of the Khaldaeans), Urchoe, (Mu-kayir), ii. 54 Orchoenian Khaldaeans, ii. 55 Oreiba, ii. 220 Orient, Farewell to the, ii. 871 Ormusd, (Hormuz), (Hormusd), ii. 339 Ormuz, (Khaldaean monastery), ii. 325 Oroates, (Arosis), (Ruates), (Indi- yan), ii. 115 Orontes river, (Erwend), (Orodes), (Orodos), (Asi), i. 5, 25 Osmanjik, (Little Osman), ii. 377, (App. No. 33) Osroëme, (Osrhoene), (Chosroene), Urfah, (Paddam Aram), i. 196 Ozair, (Tomb of Ezra), ii. 249 Ozogardana, (Zaragardia), (Throne of Trajam), i. 445 BACORIA, (Phatusae), (Phraates Gaza), (Anatho), i. 413, 414 Padan Aram, (Osroëne), Osrhoene), i. 196 Pagras Kalahsi, (Pagras), (Pan- grios), i. 22 Palace, the, of Harlin al Rāshid, (Rakka), i. 284 Pallacopas, (Western Euphrates), ii. 2, 38 Palm groves, the, of the Euphra- tes, ii. 84 Palmyra, (Tadmor), i. 311 Palmyrean Solitudes, (Palmyremae Solitudines), (Campus Barbari- cus), (Plain of Siffin), i. 296 IPaludes Babyloniae, (Babylonian Marshes), (Lemlun Marshes), ii. 40 Pangrios, (Pagras Kalahsi), i. 22 Paradise, (origin of the word), i. 263 IParadise, a, of the Persians, ii. 104 Paradise, a, of Belesis, i. 256 Paradise, (Gates of), i. 440 Tardzerpart, (Bersbart), i. 173 Barthenius, (river), ii. 379 Paryadres, (Kara Bel), ii. 367 Pasines, (Spasinus Charax), (Mu- hammrah), ii. 168 Pasitigris, (Shat al Hai), ii. 52 PON Pass of Baylan, (Syrian Gates), i. 21 Pass, the, of the Pyramus, i. 178 Pass of St. Simon, i. 6 Passes, the, of the Persian Apen- mines, ii. 125 Passus Portellae, (Gates of Syria and Ciliciae), i. 14 Patriarchate of Abraham, (App. No. 14) Pellieum, (Muhammrah), ii. 182 Perath, (Frat), (Euphrates), ii. 1, 37 Perath of Borsippa, (Nahr al Birs), (Hindiyan Canal), (Kelah of the Talmud), ii. 14 Perath of Shapur, (Peratz Scha- bor), (Pheroz Sapor), (Firüz Shapur), (Perisabora), (Anbar), ii. 3 Perath of Sura, (Chebar), (Chobar), (Gobya), (Maarsares), (Nahr Sares), (Western Euphrates), ii. 1. Perisabora, (Pirishabur), (Perath of Shapur), ii. 3 Perisabora, (Pirishabur), on Kha- bur of Zakho, (App. No. 25) Perre, (Pelvereh), i. 185 Persepolis, a Visit to, ii. 145 Persepolis, (Pasagarda), (Persa- gadun Urbs), (Persarum Cas- tra), (Takht-i-Jamshid), ii. 148 Persian Paradise at Abulah, ii. 104; at Balis, i. 256 Phatusae, (Anatho), i. 412 Phraates Gaza (Royal Treasury of Phraates at Anatho), i. 414 Phumsah, (Sura), (Turmeda), (Thapsacus), i. 273 -- Physcus, (Adhem), (Adheim), (Ka- tur), (Nahr-wan), ii. 36 Pictamus, (Baylan), i. 21 Pinara, (Erana), i. 21 Pinarus, (Deli Chai), (? Bayas Sū), i. 16 Pindemissus, (Sis), i. 16 Pir-i-Omar Gudrum, ii. 301 - Plain of Siffin (Palmyrean Soli- tudes), i. 296 Plain, the, of Babylonia, ii. 1 Podandus, (Bodendron), i. 152 Poms Singae, (Cinga), (Gok Su), i. 194 486 THE EUPIIIRATES EXPEDITION POM Pomebeditha, (Beditha), (Golab), Jibbah or Jubbah Island), i. 435 Pontisfer, (Iron Bridge), (Jisr Hadid), (Gephyra), i. 20 Porpoises on the Bahmishir, ii. 234 Porsica, (Yailash), i. 152 Port William, i. 93 Posidium, (Ras Posit), i. 155 Potamia, (Bayadir), (Bayandah), ii. 379 Pratum Palliorum, i. 176 Principality of the captive Jews, the, i. 431 Principality of Edessa, 190 Prison of Nebuchadnezzar, ii. 26 Pºthora, i. 200 Pylae, (Pulai of Xenophon), (Gates of Babylonia), (Gates of Para- dise), i. 446 Pyraea, (Fire Altars), ii. 154, 165 Pyramus, (Jaihun Sü), i. 19 Pyramus, the Pass of the, i. 178 RABBAN ORMUZ, (monastery of Rhaldaeans), ii. 325 Rabdium, (Tur Rabdin), (Kalah Rubera), (Tur Abdin), (Rahabi), ii. 329, (App. No. 26) Rafika, (the Retreat), i. 283 Rahabah al Hamra, (the Red), (Rehoboth Hannahar), (An Na- har, on the river), i. 374 Rahabah al Malik, (Saladin's Castle), i. 370, 374 Rahabah on the Tigris, (Rehoboth Ir), (Ur of the Persians), i. 374 Rahabi, (Tur Rabdin), (Rabdium), ii. 329, (App. No. 24) Iłai Anlu Turcomans, i. 32 Iłakka, (Callinicus), (Nicepho- rium), (Harlin al Rāshid's sum- mer retreat), i. 284, 289 Ras al Ain, (Head Spring), (Res- saina), (Resaena), i. 352, 388 Ras el Khanzir, (Boar's Head), i. 10 Rawah, i. 405 Rawandiz, (Rawadaei), (Erwend), (Orodes), (Orontes), ii. 283 Regnus Fluvius, (Bilecha), (Balek Sū), i. 204 IRUT - Regnus Fluvius, (Nahr Malcha. Saklawiya), ii. 3 Regnus Fluvius, (Nahr Malcha Saba), ii. 14 Rehoboth Hannahar, (An Nahar, on the river), (Rahabah al Hamra), i. 369, 373 Rehoboth Ir, (Ur of the Persians), (Kalah Shirkat), i. 370; ii. 321 Remains of early Christianity, i. 58 Resaina, (Ras al Ain), i. 352, 388 Resapha, (Rezeph), (Rescipha), (Sergiopolis), i. 293 Resasah, (Rasasah), (Leaden Bridge), at the Katur, ii. 251 ; at Thapsacus, i. 274 Resen, (Larissa), (Nimrūd), ii. 321 Rhazemon, (Marzivan), ii. 376 Rheiha, (Christian ruins), i. 59 Resh Glutha, (Prince of the Cap- tivity), i. 432 Rhosus, (Mt.), (Jebel Kaisaryah), i. 11 Rhosus, (Rhosopolis), (Arslis), i. 10 Riba, Castle of, i. 310 Rivers, the, and cities of Babylo- nia, ii. 22 Road of Semiramis, ii. 29 Roha, (Urfah), i. 356 Romaion Ager, (Plain of Zakho), ii. 328, (App. No. 24) Roman arch, i. 115 Royal Mountain, (Persepolis), li. 148 Toyal River, (Bilecha), i. 204 Royal River, (Nahr Malcha), ii. 3 Royal River, (Nahr Malcha Saba), ii. 14 Royal River, (Nahr Malik), ii. 14 Rubari, (Kalah), (Rahahi), (Tur Rabdin), ii., (App. No. 26) Ruins of an early Christianity, i. 48 Ruins at Mu-kayir, (App. No. 18) Rumiyah, (Bahr-i-Nedjef), ii. 29 Rum Kalah, (Zeugma), (Zabothra), (Kapersana), (Capersane), (Co- lengebar of Knolles), i. 188, 190 Rushire, (Rū al Shahir), (City at the Cape), ii. 119 Ruthwaniyah, (Zimberaniya), (Ca- mal), ii. 14 INDEX - 487 SAB SABA, ii. 102 Sabaeans of Haran, i. 208 Sabaeans or Mandaites, the, (Sabi), (Tsabians), (Khaldaeans), (Sa- biomna), ii. 238 Sabanjah, (Sophon), ii. 881 Said, (abbreviation of Sayyid or Sayid), ii. 201 Saihun river, (Sarus), i. 133 Sajur river, i. 91 Sakal-Tūtam, (“Beard-catcher’), (Jonas's pillars), (Bomitae of Alexander), (Gates of Cilicia and Syria), i. 14 Sakiyeh, (Sakiniyah), i. 367 Sakkariyah, (Sangarius river), ii. 380 Saklawiyah Canal, (Nahr Malcha), ii. 3 Saladin's Castle, (Salahiyah), (Rahaba al Malik), i. 376 Salt Lake and Valley), (App. No. 9) Samargah and Samida, ii. 180 Sammara, (Sur-man-rah), (Sir- man-rah), ii. 36, 252 Samosata, (Somaisat), capital of Commagena, i. 195 Sand-grouse, ii. 8 Sandisses, (Chamlü Bel), ii. 372 Sangarius river, (Sakkariyah), ii. 380 Saocoras, (? Wadi Sur), i. 339, 436, (App. No. 16) Saphe, (Hisn Kaifa), i. 356; ii. 331 Sardanapalus, Tomb of, i. 139 Sarpin, (a reputed mine), ii. 374 Sar]?uli Zohab, (Holwan), (Halah), i. 340 Sarifah Castle, i. 422 Sarisat, (Cecilia), (Ceciliana), i. 224 Sarsah, (Sarsak), ii. 36 Sarus river, (Saihūn), (Simarus), (Saron), i. 128, 134 Sawida, (Sawilea), (Shahdadi), (Sikkat al Abbas), i. 342, 353 Sayyid, (Sayid), (Lord), ii. 240 Scirtos river, (Daisan), i. 198 Scutari, (Uskudar), ii. 381 Scythopolis, (city of the Scy- thians), i. 244 Sea Voyage, the, i. 1 Sebaste, (Sebastapolis), (Siwas), ll. SHE Seh Gumbedan, (Three Domes), ii. 147 Sela Midbara, (Deir Mahariz), i. 269 Seleucia and Ctesiphon, ii. 267 Seleucia, (Seleucus ad Belum), (Kalah Mudyk), i. 50 Seleucia of Mesopotamia, (Bir), i. 214 Seleucia Pieria, (Suwaidiyah), i. 7, (App. No. 41) Seleucia on the Tigris, ii. 6, 267 Senana, i. 59 Senn, (Nahr Senn), (Cenae), Tables in App. Sephar, (Sipar), (Sephanaim), (Sifarah), ii. 2 Sephyra, (Gephyra), i. 116 Seramiim Kasr, ii. 318 Sergiopolis, (Resapha), i. 296 Se’ert, (Kert), (a stronghold), ii. 351 Serút, (Bridge on Tigris), ii. 235 Seven Sleepers, Legend of, i. 145 Shafjahit, (Shaf-Wijathib), (Nehar- dea), i. 433 Shahdadi, (Sawida), (Sakkab), Sikat al Abbas), i. 342 Shah Miram Kalahsi, (Thil), (Thila), i. 119 Shahrazar, (Sulaimaniyah), ii. 296 Shah Rik (Castle), ii. 148 Shammar Arabs, i. 267 Shapur, (Sapor), town of, ii. 167 Shapur, Cave of, the ; Shapur, River of, ii. 130 Shapur, Sculptures at, ii. 164 Shat al Amarah, ii. 264 Shat al Arab, (estuary of the Euphrates and Tigris), ii. 84, 92 Shat al Hai, (Pasitigris), ii. 52, 259 Shat al Hud, (Khud), (Sidd al Hud), ii. 238 Shat al Koit, (Little Zab), ii. 305 Shatra, Marshes, ii. 187 Sheibiyah Castle, i. 422 Sheikh Khan, ii. 347 Sheikh Barakat, (Mt. St. Simon), (Trapezus), i. 31 Sheikh Khan ; Shemal, (north. district of Bassora), ii. 113 Shemshan, i. 342 Sheriffa tribe, ii. 215 Sheriffs, (Muhammadan), ii. 240 (Scenae), 488 THE EUPPIRATES EXPEDITION SHI Shinar, (Senaar), (Campus Babylo- niae), (App. No. 8) Shiraz, ii. 145 Shuster, ii. 222 Sidd Nimrūd, (Wall of Media), (Khalū Nimrūd), i. 446 Sidd al Húd, ii. 238 Sifarah, (Sipur), (Sephar), (Si- phara), (Sepharvaim), (Siparen- orum Civitas), (Hipparenorum Civitas), ii. 3 Siffin, Plain of, i. 296 Sikat al Abbas, (Sawida), i. 341 Siliski, (Iron Mines), ii. 366 Silver Mines, (Gumush Maden), ii. 362 Sinam, (Jebel), ii. 90, 202 Simarus, (Saihum), i. 134 Sindbad the Sailor, ii. 106 Sindebad Nameh, ii. 107 Singa, (Cinga river), (Gok Sū), i. 194 Singara, (Sinjar), i. 888 Sinkara, Mound of, ii. 57, 259 Sinna, (Syna Judæorum), (Sin- naca), (Tela), (Koh-hissar), (Wiran Shehr), (Nicephorium of Taylor), i. 209, 337; ii. 333 Sipar, (Sifarah), (Sephar), (Sephar- , vain), (Hipparenum), ii. 2 Sir, Mound of, (Seleucia), ii. 267; (Wadi Sir), ii. 268 Sirdesh, ii. 303 Sirhur, (Sirhir), (Cold Climate), ii. 121, 130 Sir-man-rah, (Surmenra), (Sam- mara), ii. 36 Sis, Monastery and Castle at, (Pindemissus), i. 165, 167 Sittacé, (? Sheriat el Beitha), (? western suburb of Baghdad), ii. 28 Sittacéne, (district of Baghdad), ii. 28 Siwas, (Sivas), (Sebaste), (Sebas- tapolis), ii. 369 Someisat, (Samosata), i. 195 Sophene, (Sophanene), ii. 359 Sophon, (Sabanjah), ii. Sources of the Tigris, (Zibeneh), ii. 359 St. George, Church of (at Kar- kisha), i. 367 St. Paul, Church of, i. 115 TAD St. Paul, the birthplace of, i. 109 St. Simon, (Monasteries), i. 2 St. Simon (Mount on Orontes), i. 6 St. Simon (Mount in Cyrrhestica), (Sheikh Barakat), (Trapezus), 1. 31 Strongholds, the, of the Ar- menians, i. 133 Sugar Plantations of Ahwaz, the, ii. 219 Suk al Shuyuk, (The Sheikh's Market-place), ii. 73 Sulaimaniyah, (Sulaimaniya),(Su- laimania), ii. 287, (App. No. 23) Sulphur Mine, ii. 319 Summer Retreat of Queen Zeno- bia, the, i. 306 Summer Retreat of Harlin al Rāshid, i. 284 Sur, (Sir), Seleucia, ii. 267 Sur al Humar, (Trench of Semi- ramis), i. 332 Sura, (Sura of Rab), (Sura of the Captivity), ii. 446 Sura, (Canal), (Nahr Sura), (Pe- rath of Sura), (Chebar), (Cho- bar), (Gobya), (Nahr Sares), (Maarsares), (Marses), (Western Euphrates), ii. 1 Sura, (Suriyah), (Thapsacus), i. 283 Surdashi, ii. 304 Susa, (Susan), (Shushan, the Palace), (Tomb of Daniel), ii. 224 Susa, the, Highway to, ii. 257 Susian Lake, (Samida and Samar- gah), ii. 180 Susiana, (Khuzistan), ii. 172 Suwaidiyah, (Seleucia Pieria), i. (Turmeda), Syrtibole, (Dashistan), ii. 121 TAB INDIYAN, (Oroates), ii. 115 Tabús, i. 332 Tabbespi, ii. 295 Table of sites on the river Eu- phrates, (App.) Table of sites on the Tigris, (App.) º Tadmor, (Palmyra), i. 276, 311 INDEX 489 TAJ Tajib, (Persians), ii. 127 Takht, (Tacht), (Throne), iPalkis, (Queen of Sheba), i. 189,445; ii. 271 Takht-i-Bostan, ii. 161 Takht-i-Jamshid, (Throne of Dejoces), (Persepolis), i. 445; ii. 155 Takht-i-Kaisar, i. 312, 446 Takht-i-Khosrau, (Taki Kesra), (Ctesiphon); i. 445; ii. 270 Takht-i-Kūr, (of Cyrus), ii. 156 Takht-i-Sulaiman, (Murghab), i. 445 Takht-i-Taus, (of the Peacock), ii. 156 Takovars, (Armenian kings), i. 134 Taok (village of fowls), ii. 290 Taok Sū, (Gorgus), ii. 290 Taoke, (Oke), ii. 120 Tarbas, i. 135 Tardequiea, (Kurk Kulak), i. 118 Tarsus, (Tarshish), i. 126, 138 Taurus, (Bulghar Tagh), i. 115 Taurus, foot of the, i. 97 Taurus, (The Gate of), i. 147 Tayiat, (Tahiti), (Lesser Zab), ii. 305 Tchar-Kash, (Tcherkesh), (An- toniopolis), ii. 378, (App. No. 35) Teger, (Tegerra), (Tir), (Tigra), (river Tigris), ii. 264 Teisebun, (Ctesiphon), ii. 274 Tell Afar, (Thelassar), (Ellasar), (Tell el Chair), (Tell el Arab), i. 342, 353 Tell Aidah, ii. 57 Tell Amu, (Noah), (Oamnes), (Nif. far), (App. No. 17) Tell Balkis, (Ba'alkis), (Balthin), i. 180 Tell Bashir, (Bacher of Saladin), i. 28 (App. No. 7) Tell Eed, (Ede), (Mound of Sand), (App. No. 17) Tell Kabbin, (Kaif), (Kosh), Tomb of Nahum the Al Koshite, (App. No. 23) Tell El Lahm, Ma’mi, (Chaonia), (Anumea), (App. No. 7) Tell Mazin, i. 353 Tell Sertalij, i. 422 WOL. II. THI Tell Siphr, (Mound of Copper), ii. 57 Tells or Mounds of North Syria, (App. No. 7) Temir Kapu, Demir Kapu, (Iron Gate), (Gate of Amanus), i. 118 Temple of Anahid, (Anah), i. 414. Temple of Amaitis, (Kir Kuk), ii. 54 Temple of Atargatis, (Hierapolis), i. 241 Temple of Besachana, (Masjid Sandabiyah), i. 444, 445 Temple of Belus, (Babel), ii. 15 Temple of Borsippa, ii. 24, 25 Temple of Cronus or Ham, i. 7 Temple of Minerva of Cyrrhestica, i. 31 Temple of the Moon, (Sinkara), (App. No. 17) Temple of Nebo, (Borsippa), ii. 22 Temple of the Sum, (Baalbek), i. 241 Temple of the Sun, (Hierapolis), i. 246 Temple of the Sum, (Erech), ii. 53, App. No. 17 Tenk-i-Allah Akbar, ii. 146 Tenk-i-Turkhan, ii. 134 Teredom, (Diridotis) (Old Basra), (Jebel Simam), ii. 102 Teridates, Treasury of Teridata, (Thilutha), (Tilbes), i. 413 Term of Euphrates, i. 378 Terra cottas of Tarsus, i. 141 Tetrapolis of Antioch, i. 72 Thamaniyeh, (Themenir), (Thanu- niormega), i. 354 Thapsacus, (The fatal Pass of), (Sura), (Turmeda), (Thipsach), (Suriyah), i. 274 Tharthar river, i. 388 Thelassar, (Tell Afar), i. 342, 353 Theopolis, (Antioch), i. 62 Thil, Thila, (Shah Miran Ka- lahsi), i. 119 Thilaticonum, (Kalah Nesjm), i. 230 Thillada-Mirrada, (Sur allºſumar), i. 332 Thillutha, (Gaza or royal trea- sury of the Parthians), (Tilbes), i. 412 K K 490 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION THO Thoma, (Taidiff), (App. No. 9) Three days lost in Taurus, i. 124 Throne of Trajan, i. 445 Thrones, (see Takht) Tibanani, i. 168 Tigranocerta, (Kafr Juz), (Kafr Tutha), i. 356; ii. 334, 351 Tigris river, (Digla), (Teger), (Hiddekel), ii. 264 Tilbes, (Thilutha), i. 412 Tipsah, (Thipsach, (Thapsacus), i. 274 Tisasphalta, (Place of Bitumen), (Hammam Ali), (Tables in App. No. 8) Toheibah, (Babylonian mound), ii. 10 * Tokat, (Eudocia), (Eudoxia), (Eu- doxiara), (Eutochia), ii. 372, (App. No. 36) Tomb of Alexander, ii. 9 Tomb of Ali, (Masjid Ali), (Imām. Ali), ii. 34 Tomb of Baba Tadjur, (Holy Place of Ali Ilahis), i. 381 Tomb of Baruch at Seleucia, ii. 268 Tomb of Cyrus, (Masjid-i-Madreh Sulaiman), (Murgab), ii. 156. Tomb of Daniel, ii. 224 Tomb of Elias or Elijah, (Khadr Iliyas), i. 435 Tomb of Ezekiel, (Keffil), (Kiffil), (Khazil), (J’cheskel), ii. 250, 270 Tomb of Ezra, (Ozair), (Azair), (Zamzumah), ii. 249 Tomb of Gordian, (Zaita), (Dura) i. 370, (App. No. 22) Tomb of Hussain and Hasan, (Kir-balla), (Kerbelleh), ii. 34 Tomb of Jonas, (Nebbi Yünüs), ii. 318 Tomb of Khalif Mostassem, (Ctesi- phon), ii. 27 Tomb of Lokman, ii. 288 Tomb of Metrodorus Scepsius at Saphe, (Hisn Kaifa), ii. 334 Tomb of Nahum, (the Al Koshite), (App. No. 23) Tomb of Sardanapalus, (Dunuk Tash), i. 139 Tomb of Selman i Fars, (Mu- hammad's barber), ii. 275 UMA Tomb of Zobaida, (Baghdad), ii. 181, 278 To Spasinus, (Charax), (Muhamm- rah), ii. 181,278 Torna, (Tornadatus), (Katur), ii. 251 Towaibah, (Toheibah), ii. 10 Tower of the Two Sisters or of St. George, i. 74 Transport, the, i. 1 Transport, the end of, i. 82 Trapezus, (Mt. St. Simon), i. 32 Treasury of Phraates, (Gaza Phraates), (Pacoria), (Phatusæ), (Amatho), i. 410 Treasury of Tiridates, (Gaza Par- thorum), (Teridata), (Thilutha), (Tilbes), i. 412 Trench of Semiramis, i. 332 Trionyx Euphratica, (Euphratic Turtle), i. 265 Tripoli, i. 349 Tum Kalahsi, (Adamodana), i. 173 Tunnel between Zilba and Riba, i. 310 Tur, (Jebel), (Masius Moms), ii. 333 Turcoman tribes, i. 39, 40 Turkhal, (Gaziura), (Gazioura), ii. 374 Turks' Burial-place, (Deir Maha- riz), i. 269 Turmeda, (Sura), (Thapsacus), i. 274 Turtle, the, of the Euphrates, i. 265 Tusiyah, (Tosiyeh), (Docia), ii. 378, (App. No. 34) Tutha, (Kafr Tutha), (Village of Mulberries), (Kafr Juza), (Tigra- nocerta), i. 356 ; ii. 334 Tuzcha, (Duzcha), (Duseprum), ii. 380 Tuz Kūrmati, (Naphtha Wells), ii. 289 Tyana, i. 314 Typhon river, (Orontes), i. 20 Tyre, (Sūr), i. 350 ULAI (Eulaeus)(Karānriver), ii. 172 Um al Buk, (Mother of Mosqui- toes), ii. 199 Um al Themin, (Mother of Rice), 11. INDEX 491 DMA Um al Tobul, (Mother of Drum- mers), ii. 258 Umgelyer, (Mu-kayir), ii. 54 Um Jemal (Mother of Camels), ii. 248 Umk, (Emk), Plain of, (Emma), (Imma), i. 22 Unicorn, the, ii. 152 Ur, Fire Temple, i. 210 TJr Chaldaeorum, (Khaldaeorum), (Mu-kayir), (Mugayir), (Place of Bitumen), (Orchoe), (Urchoe), ii. 54, (App. No. 18) Ur Chaldaeorum, (Khaldaeorum), (Ura), (Euria), (Urhoi of the Syrians), (Orchoe), (Orchoene), (Edessa), (Urfah), i. 201 Urema (Urimorum Episcopus), (Aidel Bazaar), i. 194 Urfah, (Ur of the Khaldees), (Edessa), (Osroëme), i. 197 Urlinjah river, i. 157 Uzz, (Al Uzz), (Uzamesopolis), (Izamesopolis), i. 433, 434 WANGA, (baronial residence of the Armenians), i. 173 Visit, a first, to Mosul and Nineveh, ii. 313 Visit, a, to Persepolis, ii. 145 Vologesia, (Wolgesia), (Vologeso- certa), (Vologesopolis), (Volo- gessia), (Volocesia), (Gobya), (Kufa), ii. 33 WADI, (Wady), Hauran, i. 435 Wadi Sir (Guedesir), (Seleucia), ii. 268 Wadi Sur, (? Saocoras), i. 339, 421 Wall of Media, (Sidd Nimrūd), (Khalū Nimrūd), (Wall of Semi- ramis), (Hubles Sukh), i. 446 Warka, (Erech), ii. 53 Wasūt, (Cybate), (Waasaut), (Wa- Seth), (eipscopacy of Waseta), (Naseth) Benjamin of Tudela), ii. 82, 260 Wels, ii. 221 Western Euphrates, (Perath or Frat of Sura), (Chebar), (Gobya), (Perath of Borsip), (Nahr Birs), ZEU (Bahr Nedjeff), (Nahr Sada), (Pallacopas), ii. 1 9. Winter Wanderings, i. 97 Wurdi, (Al Erzi), (Al Irzah), (? Ezra), (Corsote), i. 388 YAILASH, (Porsica), i. 153 Yarbassam, ii. 367 Yarumjah, ii. 318, 319 Yimama, i. 315 Yukkah, Mound of, ii. 57 Yulduz Tagh, (Star Mountain), ii. 371 Yuzler, (Yusla), (? Issus), i. 112 ZAB, the Greater, and Lesser, ii. 301 Zab, Greater (Zabatus), (Lycus), ii. 310 Zab, Lesser (Caprus), ii. 307 Zabothra, (Rumkalah), i. 188, 190 Zanghis, (Zenghis), (Nubians), ii. 228 Zaita, (Zait), (Olive Grove), Gor- dian's Tomb, i. 369, 370. Zaitún, (Place of Olives), (Arme- nian Town), i. 184 Zaitūn on the Indiyan, ii. 215 Zakho, (Zakhū), ii. 327 Zamzuma, (Hamayeh), (Tomb of Ezra), ii. 249 Zanguebar, (Zanzibar), ii 103 Zaragardia, (Ozogardana), i. 445 Zawiyah, (Zawyhe), (Zovia), (cor- mer), i. 422 Zelebe, (Zenobia), (Zilba), i. 310 Zenobia, Queen, (her summer re- treat), i. 306 Zenodotium, (? Arakla), i. 276 Zephyrium, i. 135 Zeugma, (Bridge of Boats), at Bir, i. 217 Zeugma of Commagena, (Samo- sak), i. 195 Zeugma of Hierapolis, (Kalah Nesjm), i. 229 Zeugma of Osroëne, (Rum Ralah), i. 191 Zeugma at Hillah, (Babylon), ii. 13 492 THE EUPHRATES EXPEDITION 2IB Zibeneh, (sources of the Tigris), ii. 359 Zibliya, (mounds), ii. 58, 258 Zilba, (Zilya), i. 310 Zim al Abadin, (The Best of Her- mits), ii. 290 Zim al Abadin at Nisibim, ii. 336 Zobah, (Zobad), (Chalcidene), i.63, (Aleppo), (App. No. 8) ZüR. 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