On these tombs are the inscriptions about which so many ridiculous tales are told; but two only at present retain them, and these are on the point of falling.
The Zuela people, like all other Moors, attribute strange buildings and writings to the Christians, so that some excuse may be offered for those who have circulated such pompous stories of Fezzan.
The inscriptions are on the upper part of the walls, and on the sides instead of the front, which makes it very difficult to see them, owing to the neighbouring buildings not allowing sufficient space to walk back in order to distinguish them more clearly. The least perfect has only one or two lines, resembling the tops of letters, on a white cement of about a foot square; the other has about two feet of plaster, and some long letters are sunk in it, apparently Arabic, and much broken. The Shreefs said that these were the only ones they recollected, and that they were written by the Christians soon after the time of our Lord Noah. Having fancied I could distinguish Arabic characters, I made my friends sit on the sand, whilst with my finger I traced them one by one. They immediately saw the resemblance, but said, that having fancied them to be of Christian origin, they had taken it for granted, and never troubled their heads about decyphering them.
The letters I drew were these,
which I conceive clearly prove the Arabic origin of these buildings. Under these characters is a small piece of very neat cornice, of the size of a cocoa-nut, having little flourishes on it.
One of the people told me that papers and parchments had been discovered amongst the ruined houses in the neighbourhood of the town; but no one could inform me who had found them, or where they were deposited.
On my return I went to see the Castle, or rather the ruins of one, which occupies a large space in the centre of the town. Its walls must once have been of great strength, as in some places I observed them to be above thirty feet in thickness, and built in the same manner as the houses at Tripoli. The Castle had nothing to boast of but the solidity of its materials. Near the town my horse stumbled and fell into a grave, which, from its being hollow, led me to examine it; and I found, that instead of resembling the shallow graves of Morzouk, those at Zuela are rather in the form of vaults. From the side of the first pit a chamber of the same length is excavated in the gravel, which lies under the surface of the sand, and the body being placed in the vault, the pit alone is filled with earth. The present walls of Zuela are of the same materials as the Castle. The town has but few good houses in it; but, judging from the ruins I saw, I should conceive it must once have been of much consequence, and built in a manner rather superior to the Arab towns in general. The inhabitants boasted that the door of Zuela was in Egypt, which leads me to conclude, that some town there may have so named one of its gates, and that the Arabs have taken it literally. Zuela is even now called Zella by old people. The town has three very good Mosques, and three gates of entrance.
December 24th. Thermometer 8°. I found that the hour of Friday’s prayer had been put off on my account, a deputation being sent to announce to me that the Imaum only waited my arrival to begin prayers. The Shreefs were already at the Joumma, and as they are persons of consequence, this attention on their part was a mark of great honour done me. I therefore did not hesitate to obey the summons, and was received by them most graciously, although I perceived that several of them very narrowly scrutinized me, and appeared evidently watching the manner in which I went through the ceremonies. After the prayers the Imaum showed me the Mosque, of which he seemed very proud, and with some reason, for it was certainly the neatest I had seen in this country.
We were constantly attended by an idiot, who took a particular fancy to me, and my reputation as a good man became established in consequence, it having been invariably remarked that he never distinguished any person by his notice who was not deserving of it. His name was Boo Mousa (or Father Moses), and many miracles were attributed to him. The Sheikh here told me, that for some offence this fool had been guilty of, he had once beaten him, but had soon cause to repent his imprudence; for on the same night, Iblis, and a troop of gholes, appeared to him, and under the directions of Mousa, who stood in the midst, and appeared of gigantic stature, beat, pinched, and scratched him to such a degree, as to deter him from ever again daring to insult a saint. They were afterwards, and still continued to be, good friends. In one of the slave-hunts the men and cattle had been without water for two days, and were consequently reduced to great distress, when a Zuela man, recollecting the miraculous powers of his countryman, immediately implored him to pray to God in their difficulty. This person soon after falling asleep, Boo Mousa appeared to him, and pointing to a particular spot on an adjoining mountain, assured him that he would, on going there, find what he wanted. The man, on awaking, followed his directions, and happily found a sufficient supply of water for the whole army! This poor creature is readily admitted into all the houses, where, however foolish in other respects, he never fails to show his talents in eating.