Introduction.
The Oasis of Baharia (or Northern Oasis), also known as the Little Oasis, lies between the parallels 27° 48′ and 28° 30′ of north latitude, and between the meridians 28° 35′ and 29° 10′ east of Greenwich, being thus situated in the Libyan Desert about 180 kilometres, or four to five days’ march by camel, west of the Nile Valley (Sketchmap, [Plate II]). Like the other oases of the Western Desert (Farafra, Dakhla and Kharga) to the south, Baharia is a large natural excavation in the great Libyan plateau; it differs, however, from those oases, which are open on one or more sides, in being entirely surrounded by escarpments, and the vast number of isolated hills within the depression form an unique topographical feature. In Baharia, as, with the exception of Dakhla, in the oases generally, the cultivated area bears only a very small proportion to the total oasis-area, the remainder of the floor of the natural excavation being barren desert. The oasis contains four principal villages, all situated in its northern portion, and it is in the neighbourhood of these that water, and consequently vegetation, is most abundant.
The early history of Baharia is shrouded in an obscurity greater even than that surrounding the history of Kharga. That it was inhabited at a very early date is shown however by a stela of the reign of Thothmes II (about B.C. 1600-1500) found there by Ascherson, by a tomb of the 19th dynasty (B.C. 1300) and fragments of two temples, one dating from the reign of King Apries (B.C. 588-570) and the other from the reign of Amasis (B.C. 569-526), discovered by Steindorff in 1900, and by the references to it in the Ptolemaic inscriptions of the temple of Edfu. The oasis of Baharia is referred to in the hieroglyphic inscriptions of its newly-discovered temples as “the northern oasis of Amenhotep,” and as “the oasis Huye”; by Strabo it is called δεύτερα “the second” and by Ptolemy ὄασις μικρὰ “the small oasis.” The Romans have left traces of their occupation of Baharia in an arch near the village of El Qasr[1] and other ruins, as well as in numerous wells and underground aqueducts, which latter are still used by the present inhabitants. Fragmentary ruins of churches and a Coptic village attest the fact of the occupation of the place during Christian times. At present Baharia, along with the neighbouring oasis of Farafra to the south, is administered as part of the Mudiria of Minia, and is fairly prosperous, though lacking in enterprise to an even greater extent than is shown by the two southern oases of Dakhla and Kharga.
The first European traveller to reach the oasis of Baharia appears to have been Belzoni,[2] who reached it from Beni Suef on May 26th, 1819, and after spending some eleven days there returned by the same route. Though his observations appear to have been correctly made, the description of his travels is largely coloured by imagination, and his map appears only to have been a rough sketch. He erroneously confused Baharia with the oasis of Jupiter Ammon, whose temple he imagined he had found in the remains of the Roman arch near El Qasr, the chief village of the oasis. It is hardly necessary to remark that the oasis of Jupiter Ammon is really that now known as Siwa, situated some 340 kilometres west-north-west of Baharia.
The earliest connected modern account of the oasis of any value is that of Cailliaud,[3] who with Letorzec visited the place in 1820 on his way from Siwa to Farafra, and during a stay of about six weeks examined and mapped some of its principal features. He drew attention to its antiquities and gave a careful description of the hot springs and ancient aqueducts, besides taking a number of observations of latitude and noting some of the topographical and geological features, such as the occurrence of volcanic rocks in the oasis. Cailliaud records his meeting in Baharia with Hyde, an English traveller, who, however, does not appear to have published any account of his wanderings.
In the winter of 1823-1824 Baharia was visited by Pacho in company with F. Muller. In an account of Pacho’s travels[4] published after his unhappy death, there is no reference to his observations in this oasis beyond an indication of his route on the map.
Wilkinson[5] visited the oasis of Baharia in 1825.
The Rohlfs’ expedition of 1874,[6] with the distinguished scientists K. von Zittel and W. Jordan as geologist and topographer respectively, added very considerably to our knowledge of Baharia, more especially in the way of fixing precisely the geographical positions and levels of its principal points. Zittel, however, did not visit this oasis, and in consequence its geological structure was not studied, the few references to it made in the publications of the Rohlfs’ expedition being based on an examination of specimens collected by Ascherson.
Probably the most accurate map hitherto existing of Baharia Oasis is that of Ascherson,[7] who spent nearly three months there in 1876. Ascherson, who entered the oasis by the road from the Fayum and returned to Samalut, chiefly directed his attention to botanical observations, but his memoir contains some valuable topographical and geological information which supplements that of previous and later observers in important measure; he has also the distinction of finding the stela of the reign of Thothmes III already referred to, and the remains of an Egyptian temple; the latter is probably identical with one of those discovered by Steindorff in 1900.