Again, the same intermixture which a certain amount of the Arab stock has undergone in combining with Coptic, Syriac, and other imperfectly-incorporated populations, occurs in the history of the primitive, ante-Mahometan religion of Arabia. Without, at present, being enabled to separate the Mahometan, Christian, and other elements from the anomalous creeds of the Yezids, as described by Layard; of the Mendajaha, of Chesney; and, perhaps, of the Druses, as well, it is nearly certain that Sabæanism is the oldest element in them all. The ground, however, here is full of ethnological problems.
The immigrant Arabs of Africa may be viewed under four aspects:—
1. In respect to their geographical distribution.—a. Of Ægypt. b. Nubia. c. Dongola. d. Mauritania. e. The Northern and Middle Sahara. f. The Southern Sahara.
2. In respect to their origin.—a. Arabs direct from Arabia. b. Arabs from tribes already occupants of Africa.
3. In respect to their habits.—a. Beduins, or wandering, pastoral, or predatory Arabs. b. Settled agricultural Arabs.
4. In respect to the purity or intermixture of blood.—From what I collect from Prichard, purity of blood is the rule rather than the exception; the chief Africans by which it is crossed being those of the Tuarick division of the Amazirgh. The Southern Sahara, to the north of the Niger and the Sahara, and the ethnological frontier of the Woloff, Mandingo, Fulah, Sungai, and Howssa Negroes form the great area of the Arab and Tuarick intermixture.
ÆTHIOPIANS.
Area.—Abyssinia.
Physical condition of area.—An elevated table-land, or system of terraces—disconnected from the other portions of the Semitic area by the Red Sea (geographically), and by the Nubian and Ægyptian areas (ethnologically).