Published by Good Press, 2019

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      EAN 4064066235680

Table of Contents

       CHAPTER I.

       CHAPTER II.

       CHAPTER III.

       CHAPTER IV.

       CHAPTER V.

       CHAPTER VI.

       CHAPTER VII.

       CHAPTER VIII.

       CHAPTER IX.

       CHAPTER X.

       CHAPTER XI.

       CHAPTER XII.

       CHAPTER XIII.

       CHAPTER XIV.

       CHAPTER XV.

       CHAPTER XVI.

       CHAPTER XVII.

       NOTES.

CHAPTER I.

       Table of Contents

      Sketch of Arabia: Its Geographical Position, and Ancient History.

      The Peninsula of Arabia, forming the extreme southwestern corner of Asia, is partly detached, both in a geographical and historical sense, from the remainder of the continent. Although parts of it are mentioned in the oldest historical records, and its shores were probably familiar to the earliest navigators, the greater portion of its territory has always remained almost inaccessible and unknown.

      The desert, lying between Syria and the Euphrates is sometimes included by geographers as belonging to Arabia, but a line drawn from the Dead Sea to the mouth of the Euphrates (almost coinciding with the parallel of 30° N.) would more nearly represent the northern boundary of the peninsula. As the most southern point of the Arabian coast reaches the latitude of 12° 40′, the greater part of the entire territory, of more than one million square miles, lies within the tropics. In shape it is an irregular rhomboid, the longest diameter, from Suez to the Cape El-Had, in Oman, being 1,660, and from the Euphrates to the Straits of Bab-el-Mandeb, 1,400 miles.

      The entire coast region of Arabia, on the Red Sea, the Indian Ocean, and the Gulfs of Oman and Persia, is, for the most part, a belt of fertile country, inhabited by a settled, semi-civilized population. Back of this belt, which varies in width from a few miles to upwards of a hundred, commences a desert table-land, occasionally intersected by mountain chains, and containing, in the interior, many fertile valleys of considerable extent, which are inhabited. Very little has been known of this great interior region until the present century.

      The ancient geographers divided Arabia into three parts—Arabia Petræa, or the Rocky, comprising the northwestern portion, including the Sinaitic peninsula, between the Gulfs of Suez and Akaba; Arabia Deserta, the great central desert; and Arabia Felix, the Happy, by which they appear to have designated the southwestern part, now known as Yemen. The modern Arabic geography, which has been partly adopted on our maps, is based, to some extent, on the political divisions of the country. The coast region along the Red Sea, down to a point nearly half way between Djidda and the Straits of Bab-el-Mandeb, and including the holy cities of Medina and Mecca, is called the Hedjaz. Yemen, the capital of which is Sana, and the chief sea-ports Mocha, Hodeida, and Loheia, embraces all the southwestern portion of the peninsula. The southern coast, although divided into various little chiefdoms, is known under the general name of Hadramaut. The kingdom of Oman has extended itself along the eastern shore, nearly to the head of the Persian Gulf. The northern oases, the seat of the powerful sect of the Wahabees, are called Nedjed; and the unknown southern interior, which is believed to be almost wholly desert, inhabited only by a few wandering Bedouins, is known as the Dahna or Akhaf.

      Arabia has been inhabited by the same race since the earliest times, and has changed less, in the course of thousands of years, than any other country of the globe, not excepting China. According to Biblical genealogy, the natives are descended from Ham, through Cush; but the Bedouins have always claimed that they are the posterity of Ishmael. Some portions of the country, such as Edom, or Idumæa, Teman and Sheba, (the modern Yemen,) are mentioned in the Old Testament; but neither the Babylonian, Assyrian, Persian, nor Egyptian monarchies succeeded in gaining possession of the peninsula. Alexander the Great made preparations for a journey of conquest, which was prevented by his death, and Trajan was the only Roman emperor who penetrated into the interior.

      The inhabitants were idolaters, whose religion had probably some resemblance to that of the Phoenicians. After the destruction of Jerusalem, both Jews and Christians found their way thither, and made proselytes. There were Jews in Medina, Mecca, and Yemen; and even the last Himyaritic king of the latter country became a convert to Mosaic faith. Thus the strength of the ancient religion was already weakened when Mohammed was born (A.D. 570); and there are strong evidences for the conjecture that the demoralization of both Jews and Christians, resulting from their long enmity, was the chief cause which prevented Mohammed from adopting the belief of the latter. At the time of his birth, the civilization of the dominant Arab tribes was little inferior to that of Europe or the Eastern Empire. There was already an Arabic literature; and the arts and sciences of the ancient world had found their way even to the oases of Nedjed.

      The union of the best and strongest elements in the race, which followed the establishment of the new religion, gave to men of Arabian blood a part to play in the history of the world. For six hundred years after Mohammed’s death Islam and Christendom were nearly equal powers, and it is difficult, even now, to decide which contributed the more to the arts from which modern civilization has sprung. Arabia flourished, as never before, under the Caliphs; yet it does not appear that the life of the inhabitants was materially changed, or that any growth, acquired during the new importance of the country, became permanent. Its commerce was restricted to the products of its narrow belt of fertile shore; an arid desert separated it from Bagdad and Syria; none of the lines of traffic between Europe and the East Indies traversed its territory, and thus it remained comparatively unknown to the Christian world.