Chapter 36

August 23d.—The plain of Haroun and the neighbouring mountlains have no springs: but the rain water collects in low grounds, and in natural hollows in the rocks, where it partly remains the whole year round, even on the top of the mountain; but this year had been remarkable for its drought. Juniper trees grow here in considerable numbers. I had no great desire to see the tomb of Haroun, which stands on the summit of the mountain that was opposite to us, for I had been informed by several persons who had visited it, that it contained nothing worth seeing except a large coffin, like that of Osha in the vicinity of Szalt. My guide, moreover, insisted upon my speedy return, as he was to set out the

[p.431] same day with a small caravan for Maan; I therefore complied with his wishes, and we returned by the same road we had come. I regretted afterwards, that I had not visited Haroun’s tomb, as I was told that there are several large and handsome sepulchres in the rock near it. A traveller ought, if possible, to see every thing with his own eyes, for the reports of the Arabs are little to be depended on, with regard to what may be interesting, in point of antiquity: they often extol things which upon examination, prove to be of no kind of interest, and speak with indifference of those which are curious and important. In a room adjoining the apartment, in which is the tomb of Haroun, there are three copper vessels for the use of those who slaughter the victims at the tomb: one is very large, and destined for the boiling of the flesh of the slaughtered camel. Although there is at present no guardian at the tomb, yet the Arabs venerate the Sheikh too highly, to rob him of any of his kitchen utensils. The road from Maan and from Wady Mousa to Ghaza, leads by the tomb, and is much frequented by the people of Maan and the Bedouins; on the other side of Haroun the road descends into the great valley.

In comparing the testimonies of the authors cited in Reland’s Palaestina, it appears very probable that the ruins in Wady Mousa are those of the ancient Petra, and it is remarkable that Eusebius says the tomb of Aaron was shewn near Petra. Of this at least I am persuaded, from all the information I procured, that there is no other ruin between the extremities of the Dead sea and Red sea, of sufficient importance to answer to that city. Whether or not I have discovered the remains of the capital of Arabia Petræa, I leave to the decision of Greek scholars, and shall only subjoin a few notes on these ruins.

The rocks, through which the river of Wady Mousa has worked its extraordinary passage, and in which all the tombs and mausolea

[p.432] of the city have been excavated, as high as the tomb of Haroun, are sand-stone of a reddish colour. The rocks above Eldjy are calcareous, and the sand-stone does not begin until the point where the first tombs are excavated. To the southward the sandstone follows the whole extent of the great valley, which is a continuation of the Ghor. The forms of the summits of these rocks are so irregular and grotesque, that when seen from afar, they have the appearance of volcanic mountains. The softness of the stone afforded great facilities to those who excavated the sides of the mountains; but, unfortunately, from the same cause it is in vain to look for inscriptions: I saw several spots where they had existed, but they are all now obliterated. The position of this town was well-chosen, in point of security; as a few hundred men might defend the entrance to it against a large army; but the communication with the neighbourhood must have been subjected to great inconveniences. I am not certain whether the passage of the Syk was made use of as a road, or whether the road from the town towards Eldjy was formed through one of the side valleys of the Syk. The road westwards towards Haroun, and the valley below, is very difficult for beasts of burthen. The summer heats must have been excessive, the situation being surrounded on all sides by high barren cliffs, which concentrate the reflection of the sun, while they prevent the westerly winds from cooling the air. I saw nothing in the position that could have compensated the inhabitants for these disadvantages, except the river, the benefit of which might have been equally enjoyed had the town been built below Eldjy. Security therefore was probably the only object which induced the people to overlook such objections, and to select such a singular position for a city. The architecture of the sepulchres, of which there are at least two hundred and fifty in the vicinity of the ruins, are of very different periods.

[p.433] On our return I stopped a few hours at Eldjy. The town is surrounded with fruit-trees of all kinds, the produce of which is of the finest quality. Great quantities of the grapes are sold at Ghaza, and to the Bedouins. The Lyathene cultivate the valley as far as the first sepulchres of the ancient city; in their townhouses they work at the loom. They pay tribute to the Howeytat and carry provisions to the Syrian pilgrims at Maan, and to the Egyptian pilgrims at Akaba. They have three encampments of about eighty tents each. Like the Bedouins and other inhabitants of Shera they have become Wahabis, but do not at present pay any tribute to the Wahabi chief.

Wady Mousa is comprised within the territory of Damascus, as are the entire districts of Shera and Djebal. The most southern frontiers of the Pashalik are Tor Hesma, a high mountain so called at one day’s journey north of Akaba; from thence northward to Kerek, the whole country belongs to the same Pashalik, and consequently to Syria; but it may easily be conceived that the Pasha has little authority in these parts. In the time of Djezzar, the Arabs of Wady Mousa paid their annual land- tax into his treasury, but no other Pasha has been able to exact it.

I returned from Eldjy to the encampment above Ain Mousa, which is considerably higher than the town, and set out from thence immediately, for I very much disliked the people, who are less civil to strangers than any other Arabs in Shera. We travelled in a southern direction along the windings of a broad valley which ascends from Ain Mousa, and reached its summit at the end of two hours and a quarter. The soil, though flinty, is very capable of cultivation.

This valley is comprised within the appellation of Wady Mousa, because the rain water which collects here joins, in the winter, the torrent below Eldjy. The water was anciently conducted through this valley in an artificial channel, of which the

AIN MEFRAK

[p.434] stone walls remain in several places. At the extremity of the Wady are the ruins of an ancient city, called Betahy (Arabic), consisting of large heaps of hewn blocks of silicious stone; the trees on this mountain are thinly scattered. At a quarter of an hour from Betahy we reached an encampment, composed of Lyathene and Naymat, where we alighted, and rested for the night.

August 24th.—Our road lay S.S.W.; in one hour we came to Ain Mefrak (Arabic), where are some ruins. From thence we ascended a mountain, and continued along the upper ridge of Djebel Shera. To our right was a tremendous precipice, on the other side of which runs the chain of sand- rocks which begin near Wady Mousa. To the west of these rocks we saw the great valley forming the continuation of the Ghor. At the end of three hours, after having turned a little more southward, we arrived at a small encampment of Djaylat (Arabic) where we stopped to breakfast. The Bedouin tents which composed a great part of this encampment were the smallest I had ever seen; they were about four feet high, and ten in length. The inhabitants were very poor, and could not afford to give us coffee; our breakfast or dinner therefore consisted of dry barley cakes, which we dipped in melted goat’s grease. The intelligence which I learnt here was extremely agreeable; our landlord told us that a caravan was to set out in a few days for Cairo, from a neighbouring encampment of Howeytat, and that they intended to proceed straight across the desert. This was exactly what I wished, for I could not divest myself of apprehensions of danger in being exposed to the undisciplined soldiers of Akaba. It had been our intention to reach Akaba from hence in two days, by way of the mountainous district of Reszeyfa (a part of Shera so called) and Djebel Hesma; but we now gladly changed our route, and departed for the encampment of the Howeytat. We turned to the S.E. and in half an

EL SZADEKE

[p.435] hour from the Djeylat passed the fine spring called El Szadeke (Arabic), near which is a hill with extensive ruins of an ancient town consisting of heaps of hewn stones. From thence we descended by a slight declivity into the eastern plain, and reached the encampment, distant one hour and a half from Szadeke. The same immense plain which we had entered in coming from Beszeyra, on the eastern borders of the Ghoeyr, here presented itself to our view. We were about six hours S. of Maan, whose two hills, upon which the two divisions of the town are situated, were distinctly visible. The Syrian Hadj route passes at about one hour to the east of the encampment. About eight hours S. of Maan, a branch of the Shera extends for three or four hours in an eastern direction across the plain; it is a low hilly chain.

The mountains of Shera are considerably elevated above the level of the Ghor, but they appear only as low hills, when seen from the eastern plain, which is upon a much higher level than the Ghor. I have already noticed the same peculiarity with regard to the upper plains of El Kerek and the Belka: and it is observable also in the plain of Djolan relatively to the level of the lake of Tiberias. The valley of the Ghor, which has a rapid slope southward, from the lake of Tiberias to the Dead sea, appears to continue descending from the southern extremity of the latter as far as the Red sea, for the mountains on the E. of it appear to increase in height the farther we proceed southward, while the upper plain, apparently continues upon the same level. This plain terminates to the S. near Akaba, on the Syrian Hadj route, by a steep rocky descent, at the bottom of which begins the desert of Nedjed, covered, for the greater part, with flints. The same descent, or cliff, continues westward towards Akaba on the Egyptian Hadj road, where it joins the Djebel Hesma (a prolongation of Shera),

MAAN

[p.436] about eight hours to the N. of the Red sea. We have thus a natural division of the country, which appears to have been well known to the ancients, for it is probably to a part of this upper plain, together with the mountains of Shera, Djebal, Kerek, and Belka, that the name of Arabia Petræa was applied, the western limits of which must have been the great valley or Ghor. It might with truth be called Petræa, not only on account of its rocky mountains, but also of the elevated plain already described, which is so much covered with stones, especially flints, that it may with great propriety be called a stony desert, although susceptible of culture: in many places it is overgrown with wild herbs, and must once have been thickly inhabited, for the traces of many ruined towns and villages are met with on both sides of the Hadj road between Maan and Akaba, as well as between Maan and the plains of Haouran, in which direction are also many springs. At present all this country is a desert, and Maan (Arabic) is the only inhabited place in it. All the castles on the Syrian Hadj route from Fedhein to Medina are deserted. At Maan are several springs, to which the town owes its origin, and these, together with the circumstance of its being a station of the Syrian Hadj, are the cause of its still existing. The inhabitants have scarcely any other means of subsistence than the profits which they gain from the pilgrims in their way to and from Mekka, by buying up all kinds of provisions at Hebron and Ghaza, and selling them with great profit to the weary pilgrims; to whom the gardens and vineyards of Maan are no less agreeable, than the wild herbs collected by the people of Maan are to their camels. The pomgranates, apricots, and peaches of Maan are of the finest quality. In years when a very numerous caravan passes, pomgranates are sold at one piastre each, and every thing in the same proportion. During

[p.437] the two days stay of the pilgrims, in going, and as many in returning, the people of Maan earn as much as keeps them the whole year.

Maan is situated in the midst of a rocky country, not capable of cultivation; the inhabitants therefore depend upon their neighbours of Djebal and Shera for their provision of wheat and barley. At present, owing to the discontinuance of the Syrian Hadj, they are scarcely able to obtain money to purchase it. Many of them have commenced pedlars among the Bedouins, and fabricators of different articles for their use, especially sheep-skin furs, while others have emigrated to Tafyle and Kerek. The Barbary pilgrims who were permitted by the Wahabi chief to perform their pilgrimage in 1810, and 1811, returned from Medina by the way of Maan and Shobak to Hebron, Jerusalem, and Yaffa, where they embarked for their own country, having taken this circuitous route on account of the hostile demonstrations of Mohammed Ali Pasha on the Egyptian road. Several thousands of them died of fatigue before they reached Maan. The people of this town derived large profits from the survivors, and for the transport of their effects; but it is probable that if the Syrian Hadj is not soon reestablished, the place will in a few years be abandoned. The inhabitants considering their town as an advanced post to the sacred city of Medina, apply themselves with great eagerness to the study of the Koran. The greater part of them read and write, and many serve in the capacity of Imams or secretaries to the great Bedouin Sheikhs. The two hills upon which the town is built, divide the inhabitants into two parties, almost incessantly engaged in quarrels which are often sanguinary; no individual of one party even marries into a family belonging to the other.

On arriving at the encampment of the Howeytat, we were informed that the caravan was to set out on the second day; I had

HOWEYTAT ENCAMPMENT

[p.438] the advantage, therefore, of one day’s repose. I was now reduced to that state which can alone ensure tranquillity to the traveller in the desert; having nothing with me that could attract the notice or excite the cupidity of the Bedouins; my clothes and linen were torn to rags; a dirty Keffye, or yellow handkerchief, covered my head; my leathern girdle and shoes had long been exchanged, by way of present, against similar articles of an inferior kind, so that those I now wore were of the very worst sort. The tube of my pipe was reduced from two yards to a span, for I had been obliged to cut off from it as much as would make two pipes for my friends at Kerek; and the last article of my baggage, a pocket handkerchief, had fallen to the lot of the Sheikh of Eldjy. Having thus nothing more to give, I expected to be freed from all further demands: but I was mistaken: I had forgotten some rags torn from my shirt, which were tied round my ancles, wounded by the stirrups which I had received in exchange from the Sheikh of Kerek. These rags happening to be of white linen, some of the ladies of the Howeytat thought they might serve to make a Berkoa (Arabic), or face veil, and whenever I stepped out of the tent I found myself surrounded by half a dozen of them, begging for the rags. In vain I represented that they were absolutely necessary to me in the wounded state of my ancles: their answer was, “you will soon reach Cairo, where you may get as much linen as you like.” By thus incessantly teazing me they at last obtained their wishes; but in my anger I gave the rags to an ugly old woman, to the no slight disappointment of the young ones.

August 26th.—We broke up in the morning, our caravan consisting of nine persons, including myself, and of about twenty camels, part of which were for sale at Cairo; with the rest the Arabs expected to be able to transport, on their return home, some provisions and army-baggage to Akaba, where Mohammed Ali Pasha

DEPARTURE FOR CAIRO

[p.439] had established a depot for his Arabian expedition. The provisions of my companions consisted only of flour; besides flour, I carried some butter and dried Leben (sour milk), which when dissolved in water, forms not only a refreshing beverage, but is much to be recommended as a preservative of health when travelling in summer. These were our only provisions. During the journey we did not sup till after sunset, and we breakfasted in the morning upon a piece of dry bread, which we had baked in the ashes the preceding evening, without either salt or leven. The frugality of these Bedouins is indeed without example; my companions, who walked at least five hours every day, supported themselves for four and twenty hours with a piece of dry black bread of about a pound and a half weight, without any other kind of nourishment. I endeavoured, as much as possible to imitate their abstemiousness, being already convinced from experience that it is the best preservative against the effects of the fatigues of such a journey. My companions proved to be very good natured people: and not a single quarrel happened during our route, except between myself and my guide. He too was an honest, good tempered man, but I suffered from his negligence, and rather from his ignorance of my wants, as an European. He had brought only one water-skin with him, which was to serve us both for drinking and cooking; and as we had several intervals of three days without meeting with water, I found myself on very short allowance, and could not receive any assistance from my companions, who had scarcely enough for themselves. But these people think nothing of hardships and privations, and take it for granted, that other people’s constitutions are hardened to the same aptitude of enduring thirst and fatigue, as their own.

We returned to Szadeke, where we filled our water-skins, and proceeded from thence in a W.S.W. direction, ascending the eastern

DJEBEL KOULA

[p.440] hills of Djebel Shera. After two hours march we began to descend, in following the course of a Wady. At the end of four hours is a spring called Ibn Reszeysz (Arabic). The highest point of Djebel Hesma, in the direction of Akaba, bears from hence S.W. Hesma is higher than any part of Shera. In five hours we reached Ain Daleghe (Arabic), a spring in a fertile valley, where the Howeytat have built a few huts, and cultivate some Dhourra fields. We continued descending Wady Daleghe, which in winter is an impetuous torrent. The mountains are quite barren here; calcareous rock predominates, with some flint. At the end of seven hours we left the Wady, which takes a more northern direction, and ascended a steep mountain. At eight hours and a half we alighted on the declivity of the mountain, which is called Djebel Koula (Arabic), and which appears to be the highest summit of Djebel Shera. Our road was tolerably good all the way.

August 27th.—After one hour’s march we reached the summit of Djebel Koula, which is covered with a chalky surface. The descent on the other side is very wild, the road lying along the edges of almost perpendicular precipices amidst large blocks of detached rocks, down a mountain entirely destitute of vegetation, and composed of calcareous rocks, sand-stone, and flint, lying over each other in horizontal layers. At the end of three hours we came to a number of tombs on the road side, where the Howeytat and other Bedouins who encamp in these mountains bury their dead. In three hours and a half we reached the bottom of the mountain, and entered the bed of a winter torrent, which like Wady Mousa has worked its passage through the chain of sand-stone rocks that form a continuation of the Syk. These rocks extend southwards as far as Djebel Hesma. The narrow bed is enclosed by perpendicular cliffs, which, at the entrance of the Wady, are about fifteen or twenty yards distant from each other, but wider lower down.

WADY GHARENDEL

[p.441] We continued in a western direction for an hour and a half, in this Wady, which is called Gharendel (Arabic). At five hours the valley opens, and we found ourselves upon a sandy plain, interspersed with rocks; the bed of the Wady was covered with white sand. A few trees of the species called by the Arabs Talh, Tarfa, and Adha (Arabic), grow in the midst of the sand, but their withered leaves cannot divert the traveller’s eye from the dreary scene around him. At six hours the valley again becomes narrower; here are some more tombs of Bedouins on the side of the road. At the end of six hours and a half we came to the mouth of the Wady, where it joins the great lower valley, issuing from the mountainous country into the plain by a narrow passage, formed by the approaching rocks. These rocks are of sand-stone and contain many natural caverns. A few hundred paces above the issue of the Wady are several springs, called Ayoun Gharendel, surrounded by a few date trees, and some verdant pasture ground. The water has a sulphureous taste, but these being the only springs on the borders of the great valley within one day’s journey to the N. and S. the Bedouins are obliged to resort to them. The wells are full of leeches, some of which fixed themselves to the palates of several of our camels whilst drinking, and it was with difficulty that we could remove them. The name of Arindela, an ancient town of Palæstina Tertia, bears great resemblance to that of Gharendel.

On issuing from this rocky country, which terminates the Djebel Shera, on its western side, the Wady Gharendel empties itself into the valley El Araba, in whose sands its waters are lost. This valley is a continuation of the Ghor, which may be said to extend from the Red sea to the sources of the Jordan. The valley of that river widens about Jericho, and its inclosing hills are united to a chain of mountains which open and enclose the Dead sea. At the southern

WADY EL ARABA