The Land of Midian, Vol. 1 by Richard Burton

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The donjon or body is defended by an enceinte, opening northwards
upon a large yard, where, doubtless, the garrison mustered, and
whence a flight of steps leads to the wicket. The inside of the
works shows the roofless party-walls still standing; and the
ground is scattered over with the remains of many different
races: there are drums of columns and fragments of marble
pillars, but no sign of an inscription. Even in the upper
ramparts two epochs are distinctly traceable, the mediaval and
the modern. The lower ashlar, mostly yellow grit, is cut and
carefully cemented; the upper part is generally of rough dry
stone, the plutonic formations of the islet heaped up with scanty
care. The embrasures are framed with decaying palm-trunks; the
loop-holes belong partly to the age of archery; and nothing can
be ruder than the battlements placed close together, as if to be
manned by bowmen, while in not a few places there are the remains
of matting between the courses. At the highest part we found
another carefully cemented Sehrij, or underground cistern, with
two sharp-topped arches divided by a tall column, Saracenic
certainly and not Doric:[EN#125] above it a circular aperture,
arched round with the finest bricks, serves to lighten the
superstructure. It communicates to the north with a Hammam, whose
plan is easily traced by the double flues and earthenware tubes,
well made and mortared together. Here we found inscribed on the
plaster, "Arona Linant 22 Mars 1846."

The southern knob of the islet supports similar but inferior
constructions, still more ruinous withal: its quarry is on the
lower slopes, and its granitic base has also been scarped
seawards. Two stout walls, twelve feet thick below and six above,
crossing the length of the rock from north to south, here meet in
a Burj which shows signs of fine tiles on an upper floor; whilst
a third wall forms a southern spine bisecting the tail of the
"Jezirat." The castle is much more dilapidated than when sketched
by Ruppell, the first Frank who visited El-'Akabah, in 1826. His
illustration (p. 214) of Ruinen auf der Insel Emrag shows a
single compact building in good preservation, the towers being
round, when all are square; and it is garnished with the
impossible foreground and background of his epoch; the former,
enlivened with a Noah's-Ark camel, being placed quite close, when
it is distant some ten miles. In the German naturalist's time,
the now desolate island was occupied by die Emradi, a tribe which
he suspected to be Jewish, and of which he told the queerest
tales: I presume they are the 'Imram-Huwaytat of El-Hakl and the
Hisma. Wellsted's short description (II. ix) is still correct as
in 1838.

The castle is evidently European, built during the days when the
Crusaders held El-'Akabah; but it probably rests upon Roman
ruins; and the latter, perhaps, upon Egyptian remains of far
older date. It protected one section of the oldest overland
route, when the islet formed the key of the Gulf-head. It
subsequently became an eyrie whence its robber knights and
barons--including possibly "John, the Christian ruler of 'Akabah"
(A.D. 630), and, long after him, madcap Rainald de Chatillon
(A.D. 1182)--could live comfortably and sally out to plunder
merchants and pilgrims. The Saracenic buildings may date, as the
popular superstition has it, from the reign of Salah el-Din
(Saladin) who, in A.D. 1167, cleared his country of the Infidel
invader by carrying ships on camel-back from Cairo. Later
generations of thieves, pirates, and fishermen naturally made it
their refuge and abode. I hardly anticipate for it great things
in the immediate future, although it has been proposed for a
coal-depot.

After a day given to tube-tinkering with tompions, stays, plugs,
plates, and wedges, to the distraction of the ship's carpenter
and blacksmith, steam was coaxed up; and, at 9.15 a.m. (February
7th), we ran northwards through the deep narrow channel, rounding
the upper end of the Pharaohnic islet. Here the encircling wall
is defended by two square Burj, to the north-east and to the
northwest, flanking what is probably the main entrance. On the
Sinaitic mainland to port, the broad mouth of the Wady el-Masri
leads to the Nakb, the rocky Pass which, so much dreaded till
repaired by Abba's Pasha, is popularly said to be described in
El-'Akabah--"the Steep." The Bedawin, however, declare that the
locale is so called because the Gulf here "heels" (Ya'kkab
el-Bahr), that is, comes to an end. At the head of the sea, the
confused mass of the Sinaitic mountains range themselves in line
to the west, fronting its sister wall, the grand block El-Shara'
(Seir); while in the middle lies the southern section of the
"Ghor," the noble and memorious Wady el-'Akabah, supposed to have
given a name to Arabia.[EN#126] The surface-water still rolls
down it after rains; and the mirage veiling the valley-sole
prolongs the Gulf-waters far to the north, their bed in the old
geologic ages. The view was charming to us; for the first time
since leaving Suez we saw the contrast of perpendicular and
horizontal, of height and flat. Nothing could be more refreshing,
more gladdening to the eye, after niente che montagne, as the
poor Italian described the Morea, than the soft sweeps and the
level lines of the hollow plain: it was enjoyable as a heavy
shower after an Egyptian summer. On the next day also, the play
of light and shade, and the hide and seek of sun-ray and
water-cloud, gave the view a cachet of its own. I am sorry to see
that scientific geologist, Mr. John Milne, F.G.S.,[EN#127]
proposing to cut through the two to five hundred feet of
elevation which separate the Gulf from the Dead Sea, some
thirteen hundred feet below water level. Does he reflect that he
simply proposes to obliterate the whole lower Jordan? to bury
Tiberias and its lake about eight hundred feet under the waves?
in fact, to overwhelm half the Holy Land in a brand-new
nineteenth-century deluge, the Deluge of Milne?

All were delighted at having reached our northernmost point,
without another visit from El-Ayli'. After one hour and
thirty-five minutes (= seven miles) the Mukhbir anchored, in
twelve fathoms of water, a couple of hundred yards off the fort
and its dependent group of brown-grey mud buildings, half
concealed by the luxuriant palms. The roads are safe enough: here
the north wind has not yet gained impetus; the south-easter is
bluffed off by a long point; and in only the strongest Gharbi
("westers") ships must run for refuge under the cliffs of Sinai.

This is not the place to enter into the history of Elath, Ailat,
Ailah, Alana, 'Akabah, or 'Akabat-Aylah: Robinson (i. 250-254)
and a host of others give ample and reliable details. Suffice it
to say that the site is mentioned in the Wanderings (Deut. ii.
8), which must not be confounded with the Exodus. It is
subsequently connected with the gold-fleet (I Kings ix. 26,
etc.); and, conquered by Rezin, king of Syria (B.C. 740), it was
permanently lost to the Jews (2 Kings xvi. 6). Under the Romans,
this great station upon the "Overland" between the southernmost
Nabathaan port, Leuke Kome, and Petra, the western capital, was a
Prasidium held by the Tenth Legion; and a highway connected it
with Gaza (Ghazzah), measuring one hundred and twenty direct
miles, when the Isthmus of Suez numbers only ninety-five. In
Christian times it had a prince and a bishop; and, under Mohammed
and the early Moslems, it preserved an importance which lasted
till the days of the Crusaders. El-Makrizi describes its ruins,
and here places the northern frontier of the Hejaz: in his day
"Madyan" was thus a section of the Tihamat el-Hejaz, the maritime
region of the Moslems' Holy Land.

A group of camels had gathered on the shore; and inland lay a mob
of pilgrims, the Hajj el-Magharibah, numbering some three
thousand North-West Africans; an equally large division had
already preceded them to Suez. Letters from Egypt assured us that
cholera had broken out at Meccah and Jeddah, killing in both
places ninety-eight per diem. Here the pilgrims swore by their
Allah that all were, and ever had been, in perfect health; it is
every man's business to ignore the truth, to hide the sick, and
to bury the dead out of sight. Hard swearing, however, did not
prevent the Hajj undergoing a long quarantine before entering
Suez. The English journals had reported another disaster: "Now
that the Sultan's power is collapsing, the most powerful Bedaween
tribes are rising because their subsidies are withheld. For weeks
the great pilgrim-traffic of autumn (? add the other three
seasons) was arrested by them; and even between Medina and Mecca
the road is unsafe." Of this I could hear nothing.

We awaited, on board, the departure of the pauper and infected
"Mogrebbins:" when the place was clear we fired a gun, and, after
an answer of three, I received the visits of the fort officials.
They were civility itself; they immensely admired our two
"splendid buttons" of poor iron; and they privily remarked, with
much penetration, that the colour was that of brass: they were,
in truth, far wiser than we had been. With them came Mohammed ibn
Jad (not Ijat) el-'Alawi (of the 'Alawlyyin-Huwaytat), who styles
himself "Shaykh of El-'Akabah:" he is remarkable for frank
countenance, pleasant manners, and exceeding greed. He was
gorgeously arrayed in an overall ('Abayah) of red silk and gold
thread (Gasab), covering a similar cloak of black wool: besides
which, a long-sleeved Egyptian caftan, striped stuff of silk and
wool, invested his cotton Kamis and Libas ("bag-breeches"). To
his A'kal or "fillet" of white fleecy wool hung a talisman; his
Khuff ("riding-boots") were of red morocco, and his
sword-scabbard was covered with the same material. The Arab ever
loves scarlet, and all varieties of the sanguine hue are as dear
to him as to the British soldier.

We held sundry long confabs with Shaykh Mohammed, who seemed to
know the neighbourhood unusually well. He declared that there
were ruins but no trees at 'Ayn el-Ghadya'n, distant one day's
march up the Wady el-'Arabah, and lying near the western wall.
This is the place first identified by Robinson, who says nothing
about the remains, with Ezion-geber, while Dean Stanley ("Sinai,"
etc., p. 85) opines that we have no means of fixing the position
of the "Giant's shoulder-blade."[EN#128] Josephus ("Antiq.,"
viii. 6, 4) places it near Alana; and the present distance from
the sea, like that of Heroopolis (Shaykh el-Ajrud?) from Suez,
may show the rise of the Wady el-'Arabah within historic times.
The Shaykh assured us that "Maru" was to be found everywhere
among the hills east of El-'Akabah, and Mr. Milne (Beke, p. 405)
brought from the very summit of the "true Mount Sinai" (Jebel
el-Yitm) a "fine piece of quartz, the same kind of stone as the
Brazilian pebbles of which they make the best spectacles." We
carried off a specimen of native copper from the Sinaitic Jebel
and Wady Raddadi, some six hours to the north-west of the fort:
it is found strewed upon the ground but not in veins (?). The
stone looked so new that we concluded it to be the work of later
generations; and the traces of smelting furnaces at old Elath
confirmed the idea.

Shaykh Mohammed, who boasted that his tribe could mount five
hundred horses--by which understand five--offered his safeguard
to the Hisma, three easy marches, without pass or climax, up the
Wady Yitm to the east, and behind the range El-Shara'. He made
the region begin northwards at one day south of El-Ma'an, the
fort lying to the east-south-east of Petra; and he confirmed the
accounts of Mabruk, the guide, who was never tired of expatiating
upon its merits. The fountains flow in winter, in summer the
wells are never dry; the people, especially the Huwaytat, are
kind and hospitable; sheep are cheap as dirt. At Jebel Saur a
Maghrabi magician raised a Kidr Dahab ("golden pot"); but, his
incense failing at the critical moment, it sank before yielding
its treasures.

Pointing north-eastwards to the majestic pile in the Shara" or
Seir Mountains, the Jebel el-Yitm,[EN#129] a corruption of
El-Yatim, the Shaykh told us a tale that greatly interested us.
It appears, I have said, a remarkable formation from whose group
of terminal domes and pinnacles the tomb of Aaron on Mount Hor
is,[EN#130] they say, visible; and it is certainly the highest
visible peak of the grand wall that forms the right bank of the
Wady Yitm. Thus it is but one of a long range; and the Bedawin
visit it, to make sacrifice, according to universal custom, at
the tomb of a certain Shaykh Bakir. Here, some years ago, came an
old man and a young man in a steamer (Erin) belonging to his
Highness the Khediv: the former told the Arabs that in his books
the height was called the Jebel el-Nur ("Mountain of Light"), a
title which apparently he had first applied to the Jebel el-Lauz;
and the latter climbed to the mountain-top. After that they went
their way.

I quite agree with my lamented friend, Dr. Beke, that it is an
enormous blunder to transfer Midian, the "East Country," to the
west of El-'Arabah, and to place it south of the South Country
(El-Negeb, Gen. xx. I). I own that it is ridiculous to make the
Lawgiver lead his fugitives into a veritable cul-de-sac, then a
centre of Egyptian conquest. Evidently we have still to find the
"true Mount Sinai," if at least it be not a myth, pure and
simple. The profound Egyptologist, Dr. Heinrich Brugsch-Bey,
observes that the vulgar official site lies to the south of and
far from the line taken by the Beni Israil, and that the papyri
show no route leading to it; whilst many have remarked that the
Sinai of the Exodus is described as a single isolated mountain or
hill, not as one projection from a range of heights.[EN#131] I
would also suggest that the best proof of how empirical is the
actual identification, will be found in the fact that the
Jews--except only the Rev. Jos. Wolff (1821)--have never visited,
nor made pilgrimages to, what ought to be one of their holiest of
holy places. This crucial point has been utterly neglected by the
officers of the Ordnance Survey of Sinai. It is evident that
Jebel Serbal dates only from the early days of Koptic
Christianity; that Jebel Musa, its Greek rival, rose after the
visions of Helena in the fourth century; whilst the building of
the convent by Justinian belongs to A.D. 527. Ras Sufsafah, its
rival to the north, is an affair of yesterday, and may be called
the invention of Robinson; and Jebel Katerina, to the south, is
the property of Ruppell. Thus the oft-quoted legends of the
Sinaitic Arabs are mere monkish traditions, adopted by
Ishmaelitic ignorance. The great Lawgiver probably led his horde
of fugitive slaves over the plains of El-Negeb and El-Tih, north
of the so-called Sinaitic mountain-blocks, marching in small
divisions like those of a modern Bedawi tribe; and we know from
the latest surveys that the land, now alternately a fiery or
frozen wilderness, was once well supplied with wood and water.
The "true Mount Sinai" is probably some unimportant elevation in
the Desert named by moderns after the Wanderings.

Dr. Beke, I am persuaded, is right in denying that Mount Sinai
occupies the site at present assigned to it; but I cannot believe
that he has found it in the Jebel el-Yitm, near El-'Akabah. His
"Mount Barghir" is evidently a corruption of the "Wali" on the
summit, Shaykh Bakir--a common Arab name. His "Mountain of Light"
is a term wholly unknown to the Arabs, except so far as they
would assign the term to any saintly place. The "sounds heard in
the mountain like the firing of a cannon," is a legend applied to
two other neighbouring places. All the Bedawin still sacrifice at
the tombs of their Santons: at the little white building which
covers the reputed tomb of Aaron, sheep are slaughtered and
boiled in a huge black cauldron. The "pile of large rounded
boulders" bearing "cut Sinaitic inscriptions" (p. 423) are
clearly Wusum: these tribal-marks, which the highly imaginative
M. de Saulcy calls "planetary signs," are found throughout
Midian. The name of the Wady is, I have said, not El-Ithem, but
El-Yitm, a very different word. Lastly, the "Mountain Eretowa,"
or "Ertowa" (p. 404), is probably a corruption of El-Taur
(El-Hisma), the "inaccessible wall" of the plateau, which Dr.
Beke calls Jebel Hisma. My old friend, with his usual candour and
straightforwardness, honestly admitted that he had been
"egregiously mistaken with respect to the volcanic character of
(the true) 'Mount Sinai."' But without the eruption, the "fire
and smoke theory," what becomes of his whole argument?[EN#132]
Save for the death of my friend, I should have greatly enjoyed
the comical side of his subject; the horror and disgust with
which he, one of the greatest of geographical innovators, regards
a younger rival theory, the exodist innovation of Dr. Heinrich
Brugsch-Bey. The latter is the first who has rescued the "March
of the Children of Israel" from the condition of mere guesswork
described by the Rev. Mr. Holland.

Under the guidance of our new acquaintances, we rowed to the site
of Elath, which evidently extended all round the Gulf-head from
north-east to north-west. Linant and Laborde ("Voyage de l'Arabie
Petree," etc., Paris, 1830) confine it to the western shore, near
the mouth of the Wady el-'Arabah, and make Ezion-geber to face it
as suggested by the writings of the Hebrews. Disembarking at the
northern palm-clump, we inspected El-Dar, the old halting-place
of the pilgrim-caravan before New 'Akabah was founded. The only
ruins[EN#133] are large blocks under the clearest water, and off
a beach of the softest sand, which would make the fortune of a
bathing-place in Europe. Further eastward lies an enclosed
date-orchard called El-Hammam: the two pits in it are said to be
wells, but I suspect the treasure-seeker. Inland and to the north
rise the mounds and tumuli, the sole remains of ancient Elath,
once the port of Petra, which is distant only two dromedary
marches. During rain-floods the site is an island: to the west
flows the surface-water of the Wady el-'Arabah, and eastward the
drainage of the Wady Yitm has dug a well-defined bed. A line of
larger heaps to the north shows where, according to the people,
ran the city wall: finding it thickly strewed with scoriae, old
and new, I decided that this was the Siyaghah or "smiths'
quarter." Between it and the sea the surface is scattered with
glass, shards, and slag: I inquired in vain for "written stones,"
and for the petroleum reported to exist in the neighbourhood.

Shaykh Mohammed declared that of old a chain stretched from the
Pharaohnic island-castle to the Jebel el-Burayj or Kasr el-Bedawi
on the Midianite shore: this chain is a lieu commun of Eastern
legends. The "Bedawi's Castle" is mentioned by Robinson and
Burckhardt ("Syria," p. 510), as lying one hour south of
El-'Akabah. Moreover, the Wady Yitm, whose upper bed shows two
ruins, was closed, at the narrow above the mouth, by a fortified
wall of stone and lime, thus cutting off all intercourse with the
interior. The Bedawin declare it to be the work of King Hadid
(Iron), who thus kept out the Beni Hilal of El-Nejd. We were
shown large earth-dams, thrown across the embouchure of the
torrent to prevent the floods injuring the palm-groves of New
'Akabah. These may date from ancient days, when the old city here
extended its south-eastern suburb; as usual, they have become a
cemetery, modern and Moslem; and on the summit of the largest the
holy Shaykh el-Girmi (Jirmi) still names his ruined tomb.

Walking round the eastern bay, where the ubiquitous black sand
striped the yellow shore, we observed that the tide here rises
only one foot,[EN#134] whereas at Suez it may reach a metre and a
half to seven feet. According to the chart, the springs attain
four feet at "Omeider" (El-Humayzah), some nineteen direct knots
to the south; and in the Sharm Yaharr we found them about one
metre. Presently we entered, by wooden doors with locks and keys,
the carefully kept palm-groves, walled with pise and dry stone.
Wells were being sunk; and a depth of nine to ten feet gave
tolerably sweet water. Striking the broad northern trail which
leads to the Wady Yitm and to the upper El-'Arabah, still a
favourite camping-ground of the tribes,[EN#135] we reached the
modern settlement, which has something of the aspect of a
townlet, not composed, like El-Muwaylah, of a single house. The
women fled at our approach, as we threaded the alleys formed by
the mud tenements.

The fort[EN#136] is usually supposed to have been built by
Sulta'n Selim I., in A.D. 1517, or three years before his death,
after he had subdued the military aristocracy of the Mamluks, who
had ruled Egypt for three centuries. Much smaller than that of
El-Muwaylah, it is the normal affair: an enceinte once striped
red and white; curtains flanked by four Burj, all circular,
except the new polygon to the north-west; and a huge, gloomy
main-gateway fronting north, and flanked by two bastions. On the
proper right side is a circle of stone bearing, without date, the
name of "Sultan Selim Khan el-Fatih," who first laid out the
pilgrim-route along the Red Sea shore. Inside the dark cool porch
a large inscription bears the name "El-Ashraf Kansur
(sic)[EN#137] El-Ghori," the last but one of the Circassian
Mamluk kings of Egypt, who was defeated and slain by the Turkish
conqueror near Aleppo in A.D. 1501. Above it stand two stone
shields dated A.H. 992 (= A.D. 1583--1584). In the southern wall
of the courtyard is the mosque, fronted by a large deep well dug,
they say, during the building of the fort: it still supplies the
whole Hajj-caravan with warmish sweet water. On the ground lies a
good brass gun with Arabic inscription and numerals; and the
towers, commanding the little kitchen-gardens outside the
fort-wall, are armed with old iron carronades. The garrison,
consisting of half a dozen gunners and a few Ba'sh-Buzuks, looks
pale, bloodless, and unwholesome: the heats of summer are almost
unsupportable; and 'Akabah has the name of a "little hell."
Moreover, they eat, drink, smoke, sleep, chat, quarrel, and never
take exercise: the officers complained sadly that I had made them
walk perhaps a mile round the bay-head. And yet they have, within
two days of sharp ride, that finest of sanitaria, the Hisma,
which extends as far north and south as they please to go.

I at once made arrangements for a dromedary-post to Suez, and
wrote officially to Prince Husayn Pasha, requesting that his
Highness would exchange the Mukhbir for a steamer less likely to
drown herself. Moreover, the delay at Maghair Shu'ayb had
exhausted our resources; and the Expedition required a month's
additional rations for men and mules. The application was, it
will appear, granted in the most gracious manner, with as little
delay as possible; and my wife, who had reached Cairo, saw that
the execution of the order was not put off till the end of March.
Messrs. Voltera Brothers were also requested to forward another
instalment of necessaries and comforts; and they were as punctual
and satisfactory as before. For this postal service, and by way
of propitiatory present, Shaykh Mohammed received ten dollars, of
which probably two were disbursed. We therefore parted fast
friends, he giving me an especial invitation to his home in the
Hisma, and I accepting it with the firm intention of visiting him
as soon as possible.

Meanwhile Mr. Clarke and Ali Marie were busy with buying up such
stores as El-'Akabah contains; and the officers of the fort, who
stayed with us to the last, were profuse in kind expressions and
in little gifts which, as usual, cost us double their worth. In
these lands one must expect to be "done" as surely as in Italy.
What the process will be, no one knows till it discloses itself;
but all experts feel that it is in preparation.

NOTE ON THE SUPPLIES TO BE BOUGHT AT EL-'AKABAH.

The following is a list of the stores with their prices. It must
be borne in mind that the Hajj-caravan was passing at the time we
visited El-'Akabah.

A large sheep cost half a napoleon; the same was the price of a
small sheep, with a kid.

Fowls (seventy-one bought), thirteen pence each; pigeons,
sixpence a head.

Eggs (sixty), two for threepence.

Tobacco (8 lbs.), coarse and uncut, but welcome to the Bedawin,
one shilling per pound.

Samn ("liquefied butter" for the kitchen) also one shilling per
pound. This article is always dear in Arabia, but much cheaper
than in Egypt.

Pomegranates (fifty), four shillings a hundred.

Onions (one kanta'r or cwt.), one sovereign.

Thin-skinned Syrian raisins, fivepence per pound.

Dried figs, twopence halfpenny per pound.

Matches (sixteen boxes), three halfpence per box.

A small quantity of grain may be bought. Lentils (Revalenta
Arabica) are to be had in any quantity, and they make an
admirable travelling soup. Unfortunately it is supposed to be a
food for Fellahs, and the cook shirks it--the same is the case
with junk, salt pork, and pease-pudding on board an English
cruiser. Sour limes are not yet in season; they will be plentiful
in April. A little garden stuff may be had for salads. The list
of deficiencies is great; including bread and beef, potatoes,
'Raki, and all forms of "diffusable stimulants."

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