[535] Irak-Ajemi.
[536] Bir, on the Euphrates; formerly a large town. It was taken and destroyed by Timour, the ancient Apamea.
[537] Kaiid Beg.
[538] Devetdar, an officer of Mamelukes. Tomant Bey, the last of the Soldans of Cairo, defeated and put to death by Selim I. in 1517, after a gallant resistance to the Turkish arms; he succeeded Campson Gauri.
[539] Orfa, anciently called Edessa by the successors of Alexander, and more recently Rhoa. It became a Roman colony, and one of their chief strongholds against the Parthians. At the time of the Crusades it was the residence of the Courtneys, who were called Counts of Edessa, and was taken from them by Saladin. Timour sacked it in 1426; it is now subject to Turkey. Kinneir, in his Geographical Memoir of Persia, says:—“It is situated in a barren country, sixty-seven miles from Bir and two hundred and thirty-two from Diarbekr. The town is surrounded by a stone wall and defended by a citadel. The ditch, which is broad and deep, is hewn out of the rock, and, when necessary, can be filled with water from the river Scirtus. The houses are well built, and the inhabitants, who are composed of Turks, Arabs, Armenians, Jews, and Nestorians, are said to amount to about twenty thousand souls. The chief ornaments of the city are a magnificent mosque consecrated to Abraham, and the cathedral of the Armenians, now fallen to decay. On a mountain, which overlooks and commands the citadel, are the ruins of a building called by the Arabs the Palace of Nimrod, and several extraordinary subterraneous apartments apparently of great antiquity.”
[540] Nimrod.
[541] Now the mosque of Ibrahim al Khaleel.
[542] The same tradition prevails now, and the fish alluded to seem as plentiful as ever, it being held sacrilege to catch them.
[543] The region is now very barren.
[544] Bagdad.