Races and Peoples: Lectures on the Science of Ethnography

by Daniel G. Brinton

At that time, and for centuries afterwards, there were few parts of the world more favored than the southern portions of the peninsula. It was known as “Arabia felix,” Araby the Blest, and was famed for its abundant products, its spices and perfumes, and the wealth and luxury of its inhabitants. Some change of climate apparently, and the inroads of the Ishmaelitic hordes, quite destroyed this happy condition about the fifth century, A. D. The Himyaritic language disappeared, the cities were laid waste, many of the people migrated to Africa or sank into despised outcasts, as the present Ehkili of the Hadramaut. In this manner the whole of the great peninsula fell under the control of the true Arab.

It is he who preserves in his language the oldest and purest form of Semitic speech, and in mind and body its most pronounced mental and physical type. He is rather tall (1.65), his face oval, the nose straight or aquiline, the features sometimes singularly noble and prepossessing, the skull long (index 73°-75°), the complexion ruddy rather than brown, when due allowance is made for the tan, and the hair slightly wavy or straight. Crisp hair is looked upon with disapproval, as indicating mixed and ignoble blood.[83] In temperament the Arab is abstemious, and his powers of physical endurance are phenomenal. His mental temperament is that of an idealist; he has added nothing to the grand creations of plastic art, nothing to inventions of utility in life, nothing to the marvels of architecture or the beauties that appeal to the senses; he cares neither for history nor the drama. In his dreams he conquers the world, and it falls at his feet; in fact, his greatest states have been ephemeral bubbles.

Yet his dreams have been realized. The Semite has conquered the world, and it is at his feet. Twice have arisen among his people majestic forms, before whom all civilized nations bow, Jesus and Mahomet.

The religious idealism which led the Semite in the days of Moses to reject the images of stone and wood and proclaim that God is one, overawed in its later expressions the whole of the white race, and now extends its sway to the farthest seas.

Though the Aryan to-day may dislike the Semite and doubt of the God whom he preached, let him not forget that the first vivid impression of such a great idea came from the Semitic stock. If in his marts, his diplomacy and his learned professions, he finds the Semites still pressing him aside, let him remember that this is the people whose destiny seems to be to own no country, but to rule all.

2. The Abyssinian Group

Of tribes is evidently descended from fugitives from the Arabian peninsula. The Ethiopians, or Geez (a word meaning emigrants), speak a dialect the nearest related to the Himyaritic of the inscriptions. It has a literature and an ancient alphabet of its own. The Tigre, the Massawa, the Amhara, and, further to the south, the Harrari, are Semitic dialects, more or less akin to the Ethiopic.

The period when this migration took place is not precisely known, but it was at a calculable period before the beginning of our era. Quite likely it was about the time of the dissolution of the Joktanide monarchy in the Hadramaut. There can be no question but that the course of migration at this point was from Arabia into Africa.

The Tigre is the predominant nation of North Abyssinia, the Amhara in the south of that region. The Harrari extends into the land of the Somalis. All these are of Himyaritic descent, but near them are a number of later Arab tribes who speak dialects of the modern Arabic. These are the Jalin about Khartoum, and others near Senaar and Baqqara, west of the Nile. There are also many Jews, who have inhabited the country from the early centuries of our era.

An infusion of negro blood is visible in much of the population. Their color is dark brown, the hair is crisp, and the features are negroid. Where this mingling is absent, the color is a light or bright brown, the face oval, the nose thin, lips not at all thick, and the hair wavy and straight. In other words, the features are truly European, framed in a brown setting.