This treaty was for a long time observed; after which the Bedjas re-assumed their inroads into Upper Egypt, and clamorous representations were repeatedly made on that subject to the Emir of the true Believers, Djafar el Motewakel al’Allah; upon which the latter ordered Mohammed Ibn Abdallah el Komy to prepare to attack them. He begged to be permitted to take with him those only he liked, as he did not wish for great numbers, the passage through the country being difficult. He set out against them from Egypt, with a well furnished and well chosen force,i[111] and the ships departed by sea.i[112] The Bedjas collected in vast numbers, all mounted on camels, and the Moslims were frightened. But their commander drew off the attention of the Bedjas by a long letter which he wrote to them on a roll wrapped up in cloth.i[113] They assembled to read it, and at that moment the Moslims attacked them, having small bells hung to the necks of their horses. The camels of the Bedjas could not withstand the noise of the bells, and fled. They were pursued by the Moslims, who killed many of them, and among their numbers, the chief. He was succeeded by the son of his brother, who sued for reconciliation, which was acceded to, on condition that he should pay his personal obeissance to the Emir of the true Believers. He repaired to Bagdad, and presented himself before Motewakel, at the place called Sermanraa, in the year of the Hedjra 241. Peace was then granted to him, on condition of the payment of his dues, and the Bakt;i[114] and it was prescribed to him that the Bedja should not put any obstacles to the work of the Moslims at the mines. El Komy remained a long time at Assouan, and deposited in the treasury of that town all his arms and instruments of war, of which the governors of Assouan continued to take till none were left.
When the Moslims increased at the mines, and intermixed with the Bedjas, the mischievous doings of the latter diminished. The number of people who now went in search of gold-dust discovered it (in abundance), the news spread, and people of all countries repaired thither. There arrived Abou Abderrahman Ibn Abdallah Ibn Abd el Hamyd el Amry, after his campaign against the Noubas in the year 255. He had with him the Rabya, and Djeheyne, and others, by whom Bedja became more cultivated and populous, so that the caravans which brought the provisions from Assouan consisted of six thousand camels; and this was exclusive of what the ships carried by the sea of Kolzoum to Aidab. The Bedja liked the Rabyas, and intermarried with them. It is related that the priests of the Bedja, before some of that nation had become Moslims, had told them that their gods ordered them to obey the Rabya, and likewise Kanoun, which they did. When Amry was killed, and that the Rabya became masters of the island (of Bedja) and that the Bedja according to this injunction united with them; those Arabs who were inimical to them, left the country. The Rabya married the daughters of the chiefs of the Bedja, and the conduct of the latter towards the Moslims (of Egypt) became now less mischievous.
The interior Bedja live in the desert between the country of Aloa and the salt sea, and extend to the limits of the country of Habesh. Their people rear cattle and are pastors; their way of living, their ships, and army, are like those of the Hadharebe, but the latter are a more courageous and more religious people, while those of the interior all remain infidels. They adore the devil, and follow the example of their priests: every clan has its priest, who pitches a tent made of feathers, in the shape of a dome, wherein he practises his adorations; when they consult him about their affairs, he strips naked, and enters the tent stepping backwards; he afterwards issues with the appearance of a mad and delirious person, and exclaims, “the devil salutes you, and tells you to depart from this place, for that a hostile party (naming it) will fall upon you.” If you ask advice about an expedition which you may be about to undertake against any particular country, he often answers, “march on, and you will be victorious, and will take booty to such an amount, and the camels you will take at such a place must be my property, as well as the female slave you will find in such a tent, and the sheep, &c.” On the march, the priest loads his tent upon a camel destined for that sole purpose, and they believe that the camel rises up from the ground, and walks with great difficulty, and that it sweats profusely, although the tent is quite empty, and nothing is in it. Among the Hadharebe live some of those people who still retain this religion, and others who mix with it the Islam.
The Nubian historian (Selym) from whom I (Macrizi) have made these extracts, says, “I have read in the “Discourse of the Ahbas,” by the Emir of the true Believers, Aly Ibn Aly Taleb,i[115] and found therein mention made of the Bedja and the Kedja, and that they are warlike nations who do not make much booty.” The Bedja are of that description, but I know not who the Kedja are.
Abou el Hassan el Massoudy relates as follows, (continues Macrizi:i[116]) The Bedja took up their abode in the country between the sea of Kolzoum and the Egyptian Nile; they separated into branches, and chose a king. In this country are the mines of gold, that is the gold dust, and the emerald mines. Their hostile parties and partizans, mounted upon camels, penetrate as far as Nouba, which country they attack, and from thence they carry off prisoners. In former times the Nouba were stronger than the Bedja, until the Islam took firm footing among the latter. A number of Moslims came then to inhabit the gold mines, and the country of Ollaky and Aidab, and Arabs of the tribe of Rabya Ibn Nezar Ibn Mad Ibn Adnan settled in these parts. Their chiefs grew powerful and intermarried with the Bedja, whose strength increased by this connection, while they on their side supported the Rabya against the Arabs of the tribe of Kahtan and Modher, who had settled there, and other tribes who had settled in the vicinity of this territory. The possessor of the mines in our times (says Masoudy,) which is in the year 332 (A. H.) is Besheir Ibn Merwan Ibn Is-hak of the Rabya, who has under his command three thousand horsemen of the Arabs Rabya and other Arabs of Egypt and Yemen, and thirty thousand fighting men of the Bedja mounted upon camels of good race, armed with the Bedja bucklers, and these are the people called Hadharebe, who are the only Moslims among the Bedja, those of the interior being infidels and adoring an idol. By the valley of Bedja, which encloses the emerald mines, this country extends to the Ollaky, where are the gold mines. From the Ollaky to the Nile are fifteen days journey, and the nearest cultivated part of it is Assouan.i[117]
The island of Souakin is less than one mile in length and in breadth. Its inhabitants are a tribe of Bedja called Khasa; they are Moslims, and have a king. Hamadany relates, that Kenan, the son of Ham, married Arteyt,i[118] the daughter of Benawyl Ibn Ters Ibn Yafeth. She gave birth to Haka and El Asáwed, and the Nouba, and Koran,i[119] and Zendj, and Zaghawa,i[120] and all the tribes of the Negroes. It is also said that the Bedja descend from Ham, the son of Noah, or else from the son of Koush, the son of Kenan, the son of Ham. Others state, that they are a tribe of the Habesh. The Bedja live under tents of hair, their colour is darker than that of the Habesh;i[121] they have the manners of Arabs. They have no towns, no villages, no fields. Their provisions are carried to them from Egypt, and Habesh, and Nouba. They were formerly idolatrous, and then took the Islam, under the governorship of Abdallah Ibn Sad Ibn Aly Sarh. They are hospitable and charitable people; they are divided into tribes and branches, every one of which has its chief. They are pastors, and live entirely on flesh and milk.
Of the Tribute of the Nouba, called Bakt, by Ibn Selym el Assouany.
The captives received in tribute from the Nouba are called Bakt.—(Here follow some etymological remarks on the word Bakt).—It was levied at the Kaszer (Philæ) five miles from Assouan, situated between Belak and the Nouba territory. The income of the customs of the Kaszer belongs to Kous. This Bakti[122] was first instituted in the reign of Amr Ibn el Ras,i[123] who after the conquest of Egypt sent Abdallah Ibn Sad Ibn Aly Sarh, in the year 20 or 21 (A. H.) with twenty thousand soldiers against the Nouba. He tarried there a long time, until Amr el Aas wrote to him to come back. After the death of Amr, the peace that had been concluded between the Nouba and Aly Sarh was broken, and they frequently renewed their invasions of Upper Egypt, when they ruined the country and committed many excesses. Aly Sarh now attacked them a second time, while he was governor of Egypt, in the time of the Khalifat of Othman, in the year 31 (A. H.) He besieged them very closely in the city of Dóngola, and with slinging machines,i[124] unknown to the Nouba, launched stones into the town, which shattered their church. This appalled them, and their king, Koleydozo,i[125] asked for a renewal of peace. He issued from the town, and met Aly Sarh with all the signs of weakness, misery, and humbleness. Aly Sarh gave him a polite and kind reception, and concluded the peace upon the condition of an annual tribute of three hundred and sixty head of slaves. Upon the king’s complaints of the want of provisions in his country, he promised him a present of grain. A document was written out on that occasion, of which the following is a copy.
After the invocation of God:—“This is a pledge of peace given by the Emir Abdallah Ibn Sad Ibn Aly Sarh, to the chief of Nouba, and all his people, valid for the great and the small among the Nouba, from the limits of Assouan to those of Aloa. Aly Sarh establishes safe conduct and peace between them, the neighbouring Moslims of Upper Egypt, and the other Moslims, and all their tributaries. You people of Nouba shall be in complete security, the security of God and his prophet Mohammed, that we shall not attack you, or wage war upon you, or make hostile incursions against you, as long as you fulfil the conditions existing between us; which are, that you shall enter our country merely to pass through it, without remaining therein, and that we likewise shall only pass through your country, without taking up our residence there. You shall protect those Moslims, or their allies, who arrive in your country and travel through it until they have left it. You shall send back to the country of the Islam the run-away slaves of the Moslims, who have come to you, and likewise the Moslim who is at war with the Moslims, and has demanded your protection. You shall expel him, and oblige him to return to the country of the Islam; you shall not embrace his party, and prevent his being seized; and you shall not put any obstacle to the business of a Moslim (in your country); on the contrary, you shall favour him with respect to it, until he quits the country.—You shall take care of the mosque which the Moslims have built on the side of your town, and not prevent any body from praying there; you shall keep it clean, and light it, and honour it. Every year you shall pay three hundred and sixty head of slaves to the chief of the Moslims, of the middle sort of slaves of your country; none with bodily defects; males and females, but no old men and women, and no children under age; these you shall deliver into the hands of the governor of Assouan. No Moslim shall be obliged to protect or defend you against enemies that may attack you from Aloa, as far as Assouan. If you harbour the slave of a Moslim, or kill a Moslim, or an ally, or attempt to ruin the mosque built by the Moslims on the side of your town, or withhold any part of the 360 head of slaves, then this peace and pledged security shall be void, and we shall return to be enemies, until God shall judge between us, and he is the best of all judges. Upon these conditions we pledge to you, and engage to you our promise and security, in the name of God and his Prophet; and you stand pledged to us by those you hold most holy in your faith, the Messiah and the Apostles, and all those you venerate in your religion, and who are witnesses between you and ourselves.”
Omar Ibn Sharhabyl wrote (this) in the month of Ramadhan, in the year 31 ———i[126]