decidedly anachronistic, probably by intention.
Footnote 107:
The first Moslem conqueror of Spain whose lieutenant, Tárik, the
gallant and unfortunate, named Gibraltar (Jabal al-Tarik).
Footnote 108:
The colours of the Banú Umayyah (Ommiade) Caliphs were white; of the
Banú Abbás (Abbasides) black, and of the Fatimites green. Carrying the
royal flag denoted the generalissimo or plenipotentiary.
Footnote 109:
_i.e._ Old Cairo, or Fustat: the present Cairo was then a Coptic
village founded on an old Egyptian settlement called Lui-Tkeshroma, to
which belonged the tanks on the hill and the great well, Bir Yusuf,
absurdly attributed to Joseph the Patriarch. Lui is evidently the
origin of Levi and means a high priest (Brugsh ii. 130) and his son’s
name was Roma.
Footnote 110:
I cannot but suspect that this is a clerical error for “Al-Samanhúdi,”
a native of Samanhúd (Wilkinson’s “Semenood”) in the Delta on the
Damietta branch, the old Sebennytus (in Coptic Jem-nuti = Jem the
God), a town which has produced many distinguished men in Moslem
times. But there is also a Samhúd lying a few miles down stream from
Denderah and, as its mounds prove, it is an ancient site.
Footnote 111:
Egypt had not then been conquered from the Christians.
Footnote 112:
Arab. “Kízán fukká’a,” _i.e._ thin and slightly porous earthenware
jars used for Fukká’a, a fermented drink, made of barley or raisins.
Footnote 113:
I retain this venerable blunder: the right form is Samúm, from Samm,
the poison-wind.
Footnote 114:
_i.e._ for worship and to prepare for futurity.
Footnote 115:
The camel carries the Badawi’s corpse to the cemetery which is often
distant: hence to dream of a camel is an omen of death.
Footnote 116:
Koran xxiv. 39. The word “Saráb” (mirage) is found in Isaiah (xxxv. 7)
where the passage should be rendered “And the mirage (sharab) shall
become a lake” (not, “and the parched ground shall become a pool”).
The Hindus prettily call it “Mrigatrishná” = the thirst of the deer.
Footnote 117:
A name of Allah.
Footnote 118:
Arab. “Kintár” = a hundredweight (_i.e._ 100 lbs.), about 98¾ lbs.
avoir. Hence the French _quintal_ and its congeners (Littré).
Footnote 119:
_i.e._ “from Shám” (Syria) to (the land of) Adnan, ancestor of the
Naturalized Arabs that is, to Arabia.
Footnote 120:
Koran lii. 21. “Every man is given in pledge for that which he shall
have wrought.”
Footnote 121:
There is a constant clerical confusion in the texts between “Arar”
(Juniperus Oxycedrus used by the Greeks for the images of their gods)
and “Marmar” marble or alabaster, in the Talmud “Marmora” = marble,
evidently from μάρμαρος = brilliant, the brilliant stone.
Footnote 122:
These Ifritical names are chosen for their _bizarrerie_. “Al-Dáhish” =
the Amazed; and “Al-A’amash” = one with weak eyes always watering.
Footnote 123:
The Arabs have no word for million; so Messer Marco Miglione could not
have learned it from them. On the other hand the Hindus have more
quadrillions than modern Europe.
Footnote 124:
This formula, according to Moslems, would begin with the beginning
“There is no iláh but Allah and Adam is the Apostle (rasúl = one sent,
a messenger; not nabí = prophet) of Allah.” And so on with Noah,
Moses, David (not Solomon as a rule) and Jesus to Mohammed.
Footnote 125:
This son of Barachia has been noticed before. The text embroiders the
Koranic chapter No. xxvii.
Footnote 126:
The Bresl. Edit. (vi. 371) reads “Samm-hu” = his poison, prob. a
clerical error for “Sahmhu” = his shaft. It was a duel with the
“Shiháb” or falling stars, the meteors which are popularly supposed, I
have said, to be the arrows shot by the angels against devils and evil
spirits when they approach too near Heaven in order to overhear divine
secrets.
Footnote 127:
A fancy sea from the Lat. “Carcer” (?).
Footnote 128:
Andalusian = Spanish, the Vandal-land, a term accepted by the Moslem
invader.
Footnote 129:
This fine description will remind the traveller of the old Haurani
towns deserted since the sixth century, which a silly writer miscalled
the “Giant Cities of Bashan.” I have never seen anything weirder than
a moonlight night in one of these strong places whose masonry is
perfect as when first built, the snowy light pouring on the jet-black
basalt and the breeze sighing and the jackal wailing in the desert
around.
Footnote 130:
“Zanj,” I have said, is the Arab. form of the Persian “Zang-bar” (=
Black-land), our Zanzibar. Those who would know more of the etymology
will consult my “Zanzibar,” etc., chapt. i.
Footnote 131:
Arab. “Tanjah” = Strabo Τίγγις (derivation uncertain), Tingitania,
Tangiers. But why the terminal _s_?
Footnote 132:
Or Amidah, by the Turks called “Kara (black) Amid” from the colour of
the stones; and the Arabs “Diyar-bakr” (Diarbekir), a name which they
also give to the whole province—Mesopotamia.
Footnote 133:
Mayyáfárikín, an episcopal city in Diyar-bakr: the natives are called
Fárikí; hence the abbreviation in the text.
Footnote 134:
Arab. “Ayát al-Naját,” certain Koranic verses which act as talismans,
such as, “And wherefore should we not put our trust in Allah?” (xiv.
15); “Say thou, ‘Naught shall befal us save what Allah hath decreed
for us.’” (ix. 51), and sundry others.
Footnote 135:
These were the “Brides of the Treasure,” alluded to in the story of
Hasan of Bassorah and elsewhere.
Footnote 136:
Arab. “Ishárah,” which may also mean beckoning. Easterns reverse our
process: we wave band or finger towards ourselves; they towards the
object; and our fashion represents to them, Go away!
Footnote 137:
_i.e._ musing a long time and a longsome.
Footnote 138:
Arab. “Dihlíz” from the Persian. This is the long dark passage which
leads to the inner or main gate of an Eastern city, and which is built
up before a siege. It is usually furnished with Mastabah-benches of
wood and masonry, and forms a favourite lounge in hot weather. Hence
Lot and Moses sat and stood in the gate, and here man speaks with his
enemies.
Footnote 139:
The names of colours are as loosely used by the Arabs as by the
Classics of Europe; for instance, a light grey is called a “blue or a
green horse.” Much nonsense has been written upon the colours in Homer
by men who imagine that the semi-civilised determine tints as we do.
They see them but they do not name them, having no occasion for the
words. As I have noticed, however, the Arabs have a complete
terminology for the varieties of horse-hues. In our day we have
witnessed the birth of colours, named by the dozen, because required
by women’s dress.
Footnote 140:
For David’s miracles of metallurgy see vol. i. 286.
Footnote 141:
Arab. “Khwárazm,” the land of the Chorasmioi, who are mentioned by
Herodotus (iii. 93) and a host of classical geographers. They place it
in Sogdiana (hod. Sughd) and it corresponds with the Khiva country.
Footnote 142:
Arab. “Burka’,” usually applied to a woman’s face-veil and hence to
the covering of the Ka’abah, which is the “Bride of Meccah.”
Footnote 143:
Alluding to the trick played upon Bilkís by Solomon who had heard that
her legs were hairy like those of an ass: he laid down a pavement of
glass over flowing water in which fish were swimming and thus she
raised her skirts as she approached him and he saw that the report was
true. Hence, as I have said, the depilatory (Koran xxvii.).
Footnote 144:
I understand the curiously carved windows cut in arabesque-work of
marble (India) or basalt (the Haurán) and provided with small panes of
glass set in emeralds where tinfoil would be used by the vulgar.
Footnote 145:
Arab. “Bulád” from the Pers. “Pulád.” Hence the name of the famous
Druze family “Jumblat,” a corruption of “Ján-pulád” = Life o’ Steel.
Footnote 146:
Pharaoh, so called in Koran (xxxviii. 11) because he tortured men by
fastening them to four stakes driven into the ground. Sale translates
“the contriver of the stakes” and adds, “Some understand the word
figuratively, of the firm establishment of Pharaoh’s kingdom, because
the Arabs fix their tents with stakes; but they may possibly intend
that prince’s obstinacy and hardness of heart.” I may note that in
“Tasawwuf,” or Moslem Gnosticism, Pharaoh represents, like Prometheus
and Job, the typical creature who upholds his own dignity and rights
in presence and despight of the Creator. Sáhib the Súfí declares that
the secret of man’s soul (_i.e._ its emanation) was first revealed
when Pharaoh declared himself god; and Al-Ghazálí sees in his claim
the most noble aspiration to the divine, innate in the human spirit
(Dabistan, vol. iii.).
Footnote 147:
In the Calc. Edit. “Tarmuz, son of the daughter,” etc. According to
the Arabs, Tadmur (Palmyra) was built by Queen Tadmurah, daughter of
Hassán bin Uzaynah.
Footnote 148:
It is only by some such drought that I can account for the survival of
those marvellous Haurani cities in the great valley S. E. of Damascus.
Footnote 149:
So Moses described his own death and burial.
Footnote 150:
A man’s “aurat” (shame) extends from the navel (included) to his
knees; a woman’s from the top of the head to the tips of her toes. I
have before noticed the Hindostaní application of the word.
Footnote 151:
Arab. “Jum’ah” (= the assembly) so called because the General
Resurrection will take place on that day and it witnessed the creation
of Adam. Both these reasons are evidently after-thoughts; as the Jews
received a divine order to keep Saturday, and the Christians, at their
own sweet will, transferred the weekly rest-day to Sunday, wherefore
the Moslem preferred Friday. Sabbatarianism, however, is unknown to
Al-Islam and business is interrupted, by Koranic order (lxii. 9–10),
only during congregational prayers in the Mosque. The most a
Mohammedan does is not to work or travel till after public service.
But the Moslem hardly wants a “day of rest;” whereas a Christian,
especially in the desperately dull routine of daily life and toil,
without a gleam of light to break the darkness of his civilised and
most unhappy existence, distinctly requires it.
Footnote 152:
Mankind, which sees itself everywhere and in everything, must create
its own analogues in all the elements, air (Sylphs), fire (Jinns),
water (Mermen and Mermaids) and earth (Kobolds). These merwomen were
of course seals or manatees, as the wild women of Hanno were gorillas.
CRAFT AND MALICE OF WOMEN,[153] OR THE TALE OF THE KING, HIS SON, HIS
CONCUBINE AND THE SEVEN WAZIRS.