Part 5

Footnote 4: The above view of the geography of animals appeared partly in an American periodical and partly in Professor Agassiz's beautiful and important work (just received) on Lake Superior.

_On the Geography and Geology of the Peninsula of Mount Sinai, and the adjacent Countries._ By JOHN HOGG, M.A., F.R.S., F.L.S.; Honorary Secretary of the Royal Geographical Society, &c. Communicated by the Author.

(_Continued from page 219._)

This town is named in Scripture Elath or Eloth; in the Septuagint Ailath, and Ailôn; Ailas, Aeila, or Aila by the Greeks; Ælana by the Romans; and Ailah by the Arabians: it is described in 1 Kings ix. 26, as "on the _shore_ of the _Red Sea_ in the land of Edom;" and in 2 Chron. viii. 17, "at the _sea-side_ in the land of Idumea." From Procopius, in the 6th century, we learn the following exact account,[5] which agrees very well with the site of those _mounds_--"the eastern limits of _Palæstina_ (including of course that part of the peninsula which he elsewhere relates[6] was called _Palæstina Tertia_), reach along the Red Sea. On the shore is placed the town _Aïlas_, where, the sea ending, it is contracted into a very narrow bay."

Footnote 5: _Procopii_ de Bell. Pers., lib. i., cap. 19.

Footnote 6: _Procop._ de Ædificiis Justiniani, lib. v., cap, 8. Tom. ii. Edit. _Par._ 1663.

Edrisi, in the 12th century, terms the steep descent from the Desert El Tyh by El Nakb to Akaba--"Akaba Ailah"--_i.e._, the "Descent of Ailah;" and Makrisi, in the 14th century, as cited by Burckhardt (p. 511), speaks of "the _Akaba_, or steep mountain _before Aila_." Consequently, I take it to be correct that these _mounds_ indicate the former position of _Elath_,[7] on the shore of the Sea of Edom or Idumea--an arm of the Red Sea.

Footnote 7: Ailah was in the middle ages considered (Robinson, i., p. 252, and Lepsius' Tour, p. 20), as _Elim_, the sixth station of the Israelites after they passed the Red Sea. But I apprehend that the error very likely arose from the word Ailam occurring in the _Alexandrine MS._, (2 Kings xvi. 6; and 2 Chron. viii. 17), for Ailath, which is used in the LXX., in those verses. So Ailam had here been _mistaken_ for Aileim, _Elim_, the word which is found in Exodus, xvi. 1; of the LXX.

At a short distance from them, but westward, a large space, like a marsh, seemed to be impregnated with _nitre_, which is left incrusted in some spots upon their surface. From hence, going up the extensive valley El Araba, it is found to be full of sand drifts, with here and there a few trees scattered about; the torrents, after rain, flow along the west side, and their waters, which are _not absorbed_ by the _sand_, enter the sea at the north-west angle. The width of this part of the Wadi is near 5 miles, but in advancing farther to the north it becomes wider. The mountains on the east are high--from 2000 to 2500 feet; being of _granitic_, or rather _porphyritic_ formation, they are highly picturesque, and have fine, lofty, jagged peaks: but those on the west, which are _sandstone_ and _chalk_, are lower; rising to about a level with the desert El Tyh, they do not exceed 1500, or in places 1800 feet in elevation.

Not far from Wadi Ghadyan,[8] towards the west side, a great marsh-like tract, apparently impregnated with _nitre_, exhibits an incrustation on its surface. And the water in the spring itself is, according to _M. De Bertou_, strong of _sulphur_.

Footnote 8: How Robinson could suppose that this might afford a _trace_ of Eziongaber, I cannot imagine. See Bib. Res., vol. i., pp. 251, 268.

Passing the opening of Wadi Beianeh, and still ascending, the most elevated table-land or small plateau of the Wadi-El-Araba is reached at about the line of 30° north latitude, and 35° 15' east longitude nearly, which is very near 500 feet higher than the level of the Gulf of Akaba, according to _Herr Schubert_. About that point the _water-shed_ occurs; some of the waters of the Araba flow south into the sea of Akaba, but most are carried off north by the tributaries of the Wadi-el-Jeib into the Dead Sea.

The same traveller (_Schubert_) found the depression of the bed of that deep Wadi at about 4 miles south of El Weibeh ("hole with water,") to be 91 Paris feet, or 97 English feet _below_ the level of the Red Sea; the commencement, or most southern limit of that depression taking place at about 15 miles northward of Gebel Harun in Wadi-el-Araba. Consequently, the Dead Sea, Asphaltic Lake (_Bahr Lut_)--the "Sea of Lot"--must lie considerably _lower_ than the level of the Gulf of Akaba; indeed, _Herr Schubert_ gives the level of the _Dead Sea_ as being 598 Paris feet, and M. Russegger even more than 1300 English feet _below_ that of the Mediterranean.

These geographical facts then afford, as some authors have supposed, sufficient evidence that the River Jordan, although taking its source at an elevation of 1800 feet in the north Syrian mountains--_has not_ flowed through the entire valley _El Araba_ into the Gulf of Akaba; or rather, into the Red Sea, beyond what is now the Strait of Tiran. And certainly these facts are _decisive_ that it _never has done so_--if the natural conformation of this region has _always_ been the _same_, as it now exists with regard to _depth_ and _height_. But against its having continued the _same_, _ab initio_, up to the present time, much reasonable hypothesis, and several remarkable appearances may be fairly advanced.

Of the latter, some are the _volcanic_ phenomena apparent around the Dead Sea and El Ghor,[9] on the north; in the basaltic cliffs and creeks nearly opposite the Isle of Kureiyeh; the frequent displacements of strata and rocks in many places on the north-west side of the Gulf of Akaba; the coincidences exhibited by the strata in the Isle of Tiran, with those of the Arabian and Sinaic shores; and the volcanic remains and crater-like hills between them and Sherm on the south. Moreover, it may be collected from Scripture, that certain _changes_ had actually been _effected_ in the vicinity of the _Dead Sea_ (Gen. xix. 25); and that they were caused by _fire_ (_Ibid._ xxiv. 28); if then, at that period, the southern part of the valley of the Jordan, the plain of the Dead Sea, and El Ghor had, through igneous, or volcanic, or other agency, _sunk_ much _below_ their former levels, it is possible that a corresponding _elevation_ of the land in _Wadi-el-Araba_ might have taken place at the same (or perhaps at another) time, by the same (or by a subsequent similar) agency.

Footnote 9: _Ghor_ signifies "a long _valley_ between two mountains." Refer to some of these _volcanic_ indications, p. 122 of _Dr Kitto's_ "Physical Geography of the Holy Land." El Ghor, on the south of the Dead Sea, abounding in _salt_, is most probably "the _valley_ of salt" mentioned in 2 Kings xiv. 7.

Again, it seems probable from Scripture, that the _Dead Sea_ and _Wadi-el-Araba_ had been once continued, or more connected in their levels; because in Joshua iii. 16, and xii. 3, the former is called "the _sea of the plain_ (even) the Salt Sea;" and in Deut. iv. 49, only "the _sea of the plain_;" the original Hebrew expression in all three verses is, "Yam ha Arabah;" that is, the _Sea of the Araba_; and the Septuagint renders it hê thalassa Araba. "Ha Arabah," in Hebrew, signifies the same as _El Arabah_ in Arabic--a "desert-plain," or a "plain." So, likewise, we find in Deut. ii. 8, "the children of Edom" described as dwelling "in Seir, through the way of the _Plain_ from Elath, and from Eziongaber;" the Hebrew and Greek words for _the plain_ are here also the same, viz., "_Arabah_." Consequently, these passages from Scripture, shewing that _both extremes_, north and south, of this great _plain_ or _Wadi_, bore the _same_ appellation, prove that it was esteemed one _entire_ valley in its _whole extent_, from the Dead, or Salt Sea, to Elath and Eziongaber on the Red Sea, or Ælanitic Gulf, in the land of Edom (1 Kings ix. 26, and 2 Chron. viii. 17.) And, indeed, according to Dr Robertson, _no_ such _division_ of it, as _M. De Bertou_ and some other travellers assert, into _Wadi-el-Akaba_, and _Wadi-el-Araba_,[10] at this day exists.

Footnote 10: See _M. De Bertou's_ paper in the "Journal of the Royal Geographical Society," vol. ix., p. 282.

After having attained the highest point, or short table-land of the Wadi-el-Araba, the descent in fact begins in a direct line nearly due north to the Dead Sea; it is in places more elevated, rougher, and more sandy than in others; and its width also becomes greater. Gebel-el-Beianeh appears the _loftiest_ of the chain on the west; but this is scarcely two-thirds as _high_ as the east range, Gebel-el-Shera (_Mount Seir_); the former is entirely sterile and arid, whilst the latter is covered with herbs and occasional trees, and seems to have a sufficiency of rain. The east _Wadis_ also, which are numerous, are filled with trees, shrubs, and flowers; and their eastern and _higher_ portions, being well cultivated, yield good crops. So Strabo, calling the district "Nabathæa," states it _abounded in pastures_; hê Nabataia polyandros ousa hê chôra kai eubotos;[11] and being the country of Esau, it was "of the fatness of the earth, and of the dew of heaven from above."--_Gen._ xxvii. 39.

Footnote 11: _Strabo Geog._, vol. ii., lib. 16-35, p. 1103. Edit. _Falconer_.

The range of Mount Seir, _Gebel-el-Shera_, _i.e._, the mountains of a "region" or "tract," under which I have only included those mountains, commencing with Mount _Seir_ itself on the north, and extending to Gebel-el-Ithm on the south. On the eastern side is now _sandstone_, veined with _oxide of iron_; and those mountains still further to the east, forming a part of the Nabathæan chain, are _limestone_ with _flints_, of the same _cretaceous_ series as that of the Sinaic Peninsula; they present many varied forms and shapes.

El Araba, in the approach to Wadi Gharandel, is more covered with shifting sands, broken by innumerable undulations, and low hills; into these sands the waters of Wadi Gharandel, which, according to Burckhardt, have a _sulphureous_ taste, lose themselves. In the ascent of this Wadi (Gharandel) towards Gebel Kula, a mountain is climbed which is composed of _calcareous_ rocks, _sandstone_ and _flints_, lying over each other in horizontal layers. Gebel Kula is covered on its summit, with a _chalky_ surface. But in Wadi Dalegheh the mountains are _calcareous_, with some _flints_, and perfectly bare.

East of these valleys, and distant about six miles, are said to be the vestiges of a Roman road, which probably led near Usdaka--the _Szadeke_ of Burckhardt--to Petra. Near that place is a hill with some considerable ruins, very possibly the remains of what the Peutingerian Table calls _Zadagasta_; which word seems to have been corrupted into _Zadeka_, and _Sudaka_, or _Usdaka_. A fine spring, or _Ain_, is there much noted. Also, further north five or six miles, at Ain Mefrak, some ruins are visible. And the same traveller noticed, a few miles north of the present picturesque village of Eljy--situate a little east of Petra, in a more fertile spot--the substructions of walls and paved roads, all constructed of flints. The present road, traversed by the _Hadj_, or pilgrims, from Syria to Mecca, passes about five miles more eastwards, through Maan (_Maon_, Judges x. 12), placed in a rocky district. This town is divided by two hills, on each of which stands a portion of it. The fruits, especially pomegranates, peaches, apricots, and grapes, are there excellent, and are much sought after by the Syrian pilgrims. Burckhardt (p. 436), says here, "are several _springs_, to which the town owes its _origin_;" and I presume the word itself, Ma'an, is abbreviated by use from _Mayan_, signifying a "fountain."

_Fourthly._--"Petra," the Greek appellation of the capital of the ancient _Nabathæa_, or territory of the Nabathæi, and the _Edom_ of Scripture, was called in Hebrew, _Sela_; both words meaning a "rock," and the first of which gave _its name_ to the country--"Arabia _Petræa_." It is also called _Joktheel_, in 2 Kings xiv. 7. Strabo has distinctly recorded that "Petra was the capital of the _Nabathæans who were Idumæans_." (Lib. xvi.) The former appellation having been bestowed upon this people as descendants of _Nebaioth_, (1 Chron. i. 29), or _Nebajoth_ (Gen. xxv. 13), who was Abraham and Hagar's grandson, and Ishmael's first-born son. Petra is correctly described by the same Greek geographer, as well as by the Roman naturalist. The short account of the last I here transcribe: "Nabatæi oppidum _includunt Petram_ nomine in _convalle_, paulo minus duum mill. passuum amplitudinis, _circumdatum montibus_ inaccessis _amne interfluente_."[12] I will not add here any description of the very magnificent remains of this remarkable city, the city of the _Rock_--or rather excavated and carved out of the _natural rock_--whose dwellings are said to have been "in the clefts of the _rock_," (Obadiah 3), since they are now so well known.

Footnote 12: _Plin._ Nat. Hist., Lib. vi., cap. 28.

Coming to Petra from Eljy, on the east, the body of the regular mountain on that side is limestone, and higher than the red sandstone, where the tombs in Wadi Mousa are excavated. The cliffs at Petra are of _red sandstone_, which is soft and easily cut, causing the sculptures to decay quickly, unless where they may have been _protected_ from the weather. This formation extends far to the north and south, and rests on the lower masses of porphyry.

The colour of the _sandstone_ rocks in Wadi Mousa is not a dull monotonous _red_, but a variety of bright hues, "from the deepest crimson," as Dr Robinson writes (vol. ii., p. 531), "to the softest pink; verging also sometimes to orange and yellow. These varying shades are often distinctly marked by waving lines, imparting to the surface of the rock a succession of brilliant and changing tints, like the hues of watered silk, and adding greatly to the imposing effect of the sculptured monuments."

The site of Petra, in the high ravine, is called by the Arabs, Wadi _Mousa_; most likely corrupted from _Moseroth_, or _Mosera_ (Deut. x. 6), "where Aaron died and was buried." It is extremely interesting, and is well watered by a flowing stream--the _El Syk_ of Burckhardt. The _sandstone_ rocks, with their craggy and precipitous sides, have their summits resembling rounded peaks; peaks, probably owing to the softness of the stone, rounded by the effects of weather. The height of this _Wadi_ is estimated at near 2200 feet above the adjoining Wadi-el-Araba. To the west of Petra, Mount Hor, Gebel _Harun_ constitutes the loftiest point of this _sandstone_ tract. It stands out conspicuously, and is a _cone_ irregularly truncated with three rugged peaks, of which that to the NE. is the _highest_, and has upon it the Mahommetan _Wely_; or the tomb of _Aaron_, called _Neby Harun_. This peak rises to about 2700 feet above Wadi _Mousa_, or to 5300 feet above the sea.

Captains Irby and Mangles, the _first_ Europeans who ascended Gebel _Harun_, thus describe "the view from the summit." It "is extremely extensive in every direction; but the eye rests on few objects which it can clearly distinguish, and give a name to, although an excellent idea is obtained of the general face and features of the country. The chain of Idumean mountains, which form the western shore of the Dead Sea, seem to run on to the south, though losing considerably in their height. They appear in this point of view, barren and desolate. Below them is spread out a white sandy plain, seamed with the beds of occasional torrents, and presenting much the same features as the most desert parts of the Ghor. Where this desert expanse approaches the foot of Mount Hor, there arise out of it, like islands, several lower peaks and ridges, of a purple colour, probably composed of the same kind of _sandstone_ as that of Mount Hor itself, which, variegated as it is in its hues, presents in the distance one uniform mass of dark purple. Towards the Egyptian side there is an expanse of country without features or limit, and lost in the distance. The lofty district which we had quitted in our descent to Wadi Mousa, shuts up the prospect on the south-east side; but there is no part of the landscape which the eye wanders over with more curiosity and delight than the crags of Mount Hor itself, which stand up on every side, in the most rugged and fantastic forms, sometimes strangely piled one on the other, and sometimes as strangely yawning in clefts of a frightful depth."

Under the term _Nabathæan Chain_, or the chain of the mountains of Edom, I have restricted those mountains beginning north of 30° N. Lat., and which then tend round northward, by the east of Petra. They are the loftiest on the east, attaining probably to an altitude of 3000 feet above the Wadi-el-Araba. This chain presents to the view, on the east, long elevated ranges of _limestone_, sometimes with _flints_, but of more easy slopes, _without_ precipices, being smooth and rounded. Further still to the east, the high plateau of the Great Eastern Desert--of which _El Nejd_ is a portion--stretches out to an almost indefinite extent. To the west and north, and around Mount _Hor_, lofty party-coloured _sandstone_ ridges and cliffs prevail; then succeed high masses of _porphyry_, constituting the body of the mountains, but _lower_ than the _sandstone_. And, lastly, more northwards, the chain sinks down into low hills of _argillaceous_ rock, or of _limestone_.

The entire breadth of the _Seir_ range seems not to exceed eighteen English miles, between Wadi-el-Araba and the Eastern Desert; whilst that of the more northern, or _Nabathæan chain_, does not exceed twenty-two miles between those districts.

Going west from Petra, the valley of the _Araba_ is again entered, where the deeper _Wadi-el-Jeib_ is seen to wind along, very near the middle of it, from the south, then sweeping off NW., it meets the _Wadi-el-Jerafah_, which comes in from the SW. Afterwards, it is called only _Wadi-el-Jeib_; and being a deep valley within a larger valley, it forms the chief water-course of the greater portion of the Araba, and carries down to the Dead Sea, in the wet season, an immense body of water.

El Araba, more to the north of Gebel Harun, is much wider; in parts of it there are _gravel_ hills; and here and there, masses of _porphyry_ lie about in the sand, having been washed down by the torrents. Eleven or twelve miles north of that Mount (_Hor_), occurs the pass of _Nemela_ among low hills of _limestone_, or rather a yellowish _argillaceous_ rock, the dark steep mass of the mountain being _porphyry_, as before described; thence the Wadi ascends between the porphyry and limestone formations; and on the top is a little basin of _yellow sandstone_ capping the _porphyry_.

Coming back southward through the Wadi-el-Araba, as far as the _embouchure_ of the valley of the _Jerafah_--meaning "gullying,"--which is about a mile wide, the mountains on this west side are found to be composed of _chalk_ and _limestone_; and, in many places, with large pieces of black _flint_.

On the north, and to the east of Lussan, the mountains of Idumæa are lofty, consisting of precipitous _limestone_ ranges; the solitary conical mount, about 600 feet above the plain, named _Gebel Araif-el-Naka_--"the crest of a she-camel," forms a conspicuous object; it is _calcareous_, and strewed with _flints_. Low ridges extend from it westward and eastward; the latter terminating in a headland or bluff, called Gebel _Makrah_.

The wide sandy _Wadi-el-Ghudhagidh_--the _Ghudhaghidh_ of Robinson--is probably the _Gudgodah_; or, as it is written in Hebrew, _Ghudghodah_, mentioned in Deut. x. 7, whither the Israelites journeyed from Mosera (_Wadi Mousa_) after Aaron's death. After this valley were some low _chalky_ cliffs, and then succeeded a barren _flinty_ tract.

Towards the NW. and W., a broad open district stretches out apparently to _Gebel Jaraf_, said to be 1300 feet above the sea level, through which is the course of the _Wadi Khereir_, elevated about 1000 feet at its nearest point to that mount, and flowing northward into the large _Wadi-el-Agaba_,--upon one side, and to _Gebel Yelak_, the "white mountain," on the other side; but it is broken in some places by _limestone_ or _chalk_ hills.

The Wadi Ghudhagidh, and the more southern tributaries of the Jerafah, flow to the NE. to the Dead Sea, as already explained; and they, with some smaller winter torrents that unite with them, are the only water-courses in this part of _Arabia Petræa_ which supply that sea. On the SE. of the upper Jerafah, some low _limestone_ ridges present themselves; but, on the other side is the _sandy_ plain _El Adhbeh_: beyond this, northwards, follows a level plain covered with pebbles and black _flints_. The high West Desert, called by the Arabs El Tyh, the "wandering," and so named in Edrisi and Abul-feda, near its centre at _Nakhl_, signifying "date trees" (at which station there exists a grove of those trees), at an elevation of near 1500 feet above the sea, consists of vast plains, or _plateaux_ of varying, mostly higher, altitudes, a sandy, flinty, or gravelly soil, and limestone hills of the _cretaceous_ or secondary formation, having very irregular ridges disposed in different directions.

The numerous _Wadis_, or water-courses, and winter torrents of this enormous desert, all run to the N. or NW., and pour their waters into the Mediterranean Sea; while those _Wadis_ that lie on the other side of the Great Mountain range, which bounds the desert in its western and southern extremities--_Gebel-el-Rahah_ and _Gebel-el-Tyh_--divide their waters, and so supply, in part, the Gulf of _Suez_, and in part the Gulf of _Akaba_. Of the former _Wadis_, two are the principal; namely, _Wadi-el-Agaba_, which rises somewhat to the east of the line of 34° E. long.; and _Wadi-el-Arish_, which Russegger and later authors affirm as springing to the _west_ of it, and of _Gebels_ Heiyalah, Yelak, and Mishea, and of which _Wadi Nesil_ seems to me to be only a tributary.

The chain called _Gebel-el-Egmeh_, or _El Odjme_ by Burckhardt, appears, as he says, _chalky_; and such, also, is the soil of the plain, and frequently covered with _black_ pebbles (_flints_); it unites with the higher chain of the Gebel-el-Tyh, about the centre of the Peninsula,--that is to say, of the _Peninsular Triangle_, and where the branches North-el-Tyh and South-el-Tyh separate. There the height of the summit of _El Tyh_ is given by Russegger as 4322 Paris feet, or 4615 English feet, above the sea; descending thence by the pass of Mureikhi, into the sandy plain of _Debbet-el-Ramleh_, the elevation of that plateau, just about the middle of it, and about half way to the head of _Wadi-el-Sheikh_, is near 4000 feet above the sea level; Alahadar being a little to the east.