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, a port on the Red Sea coast of the Tihāma or lowland of the southern Ḥid̲j̲āz, situated in lat. 19°9′ N. and long. 41°04′ E. and at the mouth of the Wādī Ḳanawnā. It lies 210 miles south of D̲j̲idda or D̲j̲udda [ q.v.] and 45 miles north of Ḥaly. The town is in the form of a large rectangle enclosed by a wall, strengthened at several points by towers and pierced by three gates. Practically the only stone buildings are at the harbour, where is the bazaar with its one-storied warehouses in an irregular line, and the chief mosque and smaller mosq…

(a. “uplands”), conventionally defined as the plateau region of the Arabian peninsula lying to the east of the Red Sea lowlands (al-Tihāma [ q.v.]) and the mountain barrier running down through the western side of the peninsula (al-Ḥid̲j̲āz [ q.v.]). 1. Geography and habitat. ¶ The exact application of this originally topographical conception is very differently understood, and sometimes it means more generally the elevated country above the coastal plain or the extensive country, the upper part of which is formed by the Tihāma and the Yam…

, a nominally independent state on the Persian Gulf under the protectorate of England. Its extent has varied considerably in the course of its history. While Iṣṭak̲h̲rī, for example, who gives ʿOmān an extent of 300 parasangs, includes the district of Mahra in it, Idrīsī describes the latter as an independent country. In the northwest ʿOmān was bounded by the province of al-Baḥrain or al-Had̲j̲ar, in the south by Yaman and Ḥaḍramōt. The sultanate reached its greatest extent under Sulṭān Ibn Māli…

, 1. a seaport on the Gulf of ʿOmān, on the east coast of Arabia in 23° 37′ 26″ N. Lat. and 56° 15′ 26″ East Long. Masḳaṭ is the only harbour between ʿAden and the Persian Gulf, which ships of any size can enter and next to ʿAden and Ḏj̲idda, the best harbour in the Peninsula. The port is of considerable importance from its position commanding the entrance to the Persian Gulf. It lies at the end of a horse-shoeshaped bay 900 fathoms long and 400 broad which is enclosed and sheltered from the win…

, a range of hills in South West Arabia, a day’s journey from Yanbuʿ and seven stages from Medīna, between Yanbuʿ and al-Ḥawrāʾ. It lies on the right side of the road to Medīna, and on the left of the road in the direction of Mecca, two nights distant from the sea. The hills, which are mentioned in a tradition of the Prophet, have passes and valleys, are very well watered and covered with all kinds of trees so that they look green from Yanbuʿ. The rocks produce whetstones which were exported to all countries. (A. Grohmann) Bibliography al-Iṣṭak̲h̲rī, in B. G. A.,i. 21 Ibn Ḥawḳal, in B. G. A., ii. 28 al-Ba…

, a port on the African coast o the Gulf of ʿAden. It lies on a narrow tongue of land, which is cut off from the mainland at high water and is the only harbour of importance in British Somaliland. Formerly an important trading centre and one of the largest ports of export for the slave trade with Arabia, the town now only possesses modest remnants of buildings of the middle of the xivth century like the tomb of S̲h̲ēk̲h̲ Ibrāhīm, and also the fort erected to the west of it by the Indian government, the palace of S̲h̲armakai ʿAlī of which only the groundfloor and the …

, Addendum. The above article had already been completely set up when, while I was in Cairo, Prof. G. Wiet most kindly gave me access to his rich collection of ṭirāz inscriptions, which contains a wealth of new material, some of which is in the possession of dealers or private collectors and some in various museums. Pride of place must be given to the Arab Museum in Cairo which has in the course of the past few years added to its valuable collection of textiles a whole series of fine pieces with ṭirāz inscriptions; next in i…

, the name of several places in South Arabia (ʿAsīr, el-Yaman, Ḥaḍramūt). The best known is Raida on the Ḏj̲abal Talfum with the fort of the same name in the district of Baun (Hamdān), a day’s journey from Ṣanʿāʾ. There are a number of places of this name in Ḥaḍramūt (Raidat al-Ṣaiʿar, Raidat al-ʿIbād, Raidat al-Ḥarmīya, Raida Arḍain, as well as Raidat el-Kebīra, Raidat el-Daiyin, Raidat el-Ḏj̲ōhīn). The wide use of this place-name is explained by its meaning: depression in a rocky plateau, then the chief place of a Beduin district. (A. Grohmann) Bibliography Ibu al-Faḳīh al-Hamad̲h̲ānī, B.…

, capital of the kingdom of Nad̲j̲d, in the oasis of the same name which lies on the left bank of the Wādī Ḥanīfa stretching towards the north, forming a shallow valley which forms part of the S̲h̲amsīya basin. The lozengeshaped oasis is three miles long and barely one broad. The town is surrounded on all sides except the northeast by dense palm-groves. In the north-east, a few scattered groves interrupt the view to the highlands of Abū Mak̲h̲rūḳ, from which the main source of water for the oasi…

, the capital of the ḳaḍā of the same name in the sand̲j̲aḳ of Taʾizz in the Yemen. Besides the pronunciation with i peculiar to the Yemen we also find Abb (in Niebuhr: Aebb). At an earlier period the walled town with a population estimated at 4,000 belonged to the territory of Ḏh̲ū Ḏj̲ibla. It stands on a hill on the pilgrims’ road which runs from Ḥaḍramawt to the Yemen Tihāma or from ʿAden to Ṣanʿāʾ, in a fertile region where cereals and fruit are grown, also coffee, ḳāt, indigo and wars. In the vicinity there was at one time a silver mine (photographs in the Islām-Stiftung in Leiden). (A. Grohmann) Bi…

, al-Muḳawḳis, the individual who in Arab tradition plays the leading part on the side of the Copts and Greeks at the conquest of Egypt. The Prophet is said to have sent a letter to him in the year 6 a. h. In the address on this letter, the text of which is given in Ibn ʿAbd al-Ḥakam (ed. Torrey, p. 46), al-Maḳrīzī ( Ḵh̲iṭaṭ, i. 29), al-Suyūṭī ( Ḥusn al-Muḥāḍara, i. 58) and al-Manūfī (p. 29), as well as in an entirely different version in Pseudo-Wāḳidī (p. 10), and also in the accounts of the incident in the Arab historians, the position of Muḳawḳis is described in the following phrases: 1. Ṣāḥib al-Iskan…

, a district and village in the Yaman, a day’s journey south of Ṣanʿāʾ The Arab geographers mention a cornelian mine here. The name is also given to a mountain in the Yaman Sarāt. According to Sprenger, we cannot connect the Ḥimyar tribe of this name with the Μoχρῖται of Ptolemy. (A. Grohmann) Bibliography al-Hamdānī, Ṣifal Ḏj̲azīrat al-ʿArab, ed. D. H. Müller (Leyden 1884-1891), p. 68, 104 sq. al-Muḳaddasī, B. G. A., iii. 91 al-Hamad̲h̲ānī, B. G. A., v. 36 Ibn Ḵh̲urdād̲h̲bih, vi. 141 al-Yaʿḳūbī, B. G. A., vii. 319 Yāḳūt, Muʿd̲j̲am, ed. F. Wüstenfeld, iii. 130 iv. 437, 603 A. Sprenger, Die alte …

, a town in South Arabia, the capital of the district of the same name in Yemen. It lies on the pilgrim road from Mekka to Ṣanʿāʾ, 60 parasangs (180 miles) or five days’ journey from the latter town. In the days of paganism the town is said to have been called Ḏj̲umāʿ and to have been built on the site later occupied by Ḥiṣn Talammuṣ built by the Imām al-Mutawakkil ʿala ’llāh Aḥmad b. Sulaimān b. al-Muṭahhir. According to al-Hamdānī, the name Ṣaʿda owes its origin to the following circumstance: …

, a town on the Gulf of ʿOmān, two miles west of Masḳaṭ on the east coast of Arabia. The town, which has about 14,000 inhabitants, is the starting-point for caravan traffic into the interior of Arabia and, next to Masḳaṭ, the most important commercial centre in ʿOmān. The town is beautifully situated in fertile surroundings, has a good harbour, easily entered but little sheltered, from which Masḳaṭ can be reached in an hour by boat. The sulṭāns of ʿOmān used to have wharves for shipbuilding here…

, an important town in South Arabia, formerly the capital of the Turkish sand̲j̲aḳ of Taʿizzīya, which according to the provincial law regarding the general administration of wilāyets Taḳwīm-i Weḳāʾiʿ (March 15, 1913) included the ḳaḍās of ʿUdain, Ibb, Muk̲h̲ā. Ḳamāʿira, Ḳaʿṭaba, Ḥud̲j̲arīya, and, according to R. Manzoni, also Mak̲h̲ādir, Ḏh̲ī Sufāl, Māwiya, i. e. the whole country between al-Ḥudaida and the independent lands northeast of ʿAden. The town, which lies in 44° 6’ 45” East. Long (Greenw.) and 13° 36’ 55” North L…

, the nameof a dynasty in South Arabia, which rules over three sultanates, those of Bīr ʿAlī ʿAmaḳīn, Bāl Ḥāf ʿIzzān and Ḥabbān. H. v. Maltzan (p. 222) after investigation divided the whole territory belonging to this ruling house into two groups: Lower Wāḥidī on the coast from 48° to 48° 30′ East Long. (Greenwich) in the 14° N. Lat. reaching barely two hours journey into the interior, and Upper Wāḥidī from 47° to 47° 40′ East Long. (Greenwich) and from 14° 20′ to 14° 58′ N. Lat. C. v. Landberg …

, governor of Egypt from Ḏh̲u ’l-Ḥid̲j̲d̲j̲a 161 (August 30 to September 27, 778) until Muḥarram 162 (October 778). ¶ (A. Grohmann) Bibliography al-Ṭabarī, ed. de Goeje, iii. 492, 493 Ibn al-At̲h̲īr, Kāmil, vi. 38, 39 Corpus Papyrorum Raineri, iii. Series Arabica, ed. A. Grohmann, 1/ii. 119, 120.

a small seaport on the Arabian coast of the Red Sea in 13° 19′50″ N. Lat. and 43° 12′ 10″ East Long. (Greenwich). The once imposing town lies on a small bay between two promontories with forts on each about one and a half miles apart. The wall which surrounds the town in a semicircle is pierced by four gates. In the north the Bāb al-Ḥamūdīya leads to the citadel of the town and to a tongue of land which runs out into the sea; in the east roughly in the centre of the wall is the Bāb al-S̲h̲ād̲h̲ilī through which the fo…

(al-Zand̲j̲abār), capital of the island of the same name, which lies off the east coast of Africa in 6° South Lat. The town is on the west side of the island 26 miles N. E. of the harbour of Bagamoyo in 6° 9′ S. Lat. and 39° 15′ East Long, and forms a triangular peninsula 1½ miles in length, which runs from east to west and affords a roomy anchorage, one of the best in Africa. The peninsula is connected with the mainland of the island by a narrow isthmus on which there is a cemetery; on the bay …

, the narrow strip of low land along the coast which runs from the Sinai Peninsula along the west and south side of Arabia. Al-Idrīsī gives us the fullest account of Tihāma. According to him, it is traversed by a chain of hills which begin at the Gulf of Ḳulzum ¶ and send out a ridge to the east. The frontier of Tihāma is in the west the Gulf of Ḳulzum and in the east a range of hills running north and south (the Sarāt). The province called Tihāma stretches, according to Idrīsī, from Sard̲j̲a to ʿAden, 12 days’ journey along the sea-coast and 4…