This city is mentioned by Sallust under the name of Vacca or Vaga; the latter was probably the authentic one, as it is found in more than one inscription still existing. During ancient and mediæval times, it was renowned for its richness and commerce. Sallust says that it was a regular resort of Italian merchants, ubi et incolere et mercari consueverunt Italici generis multi mortales.
It has ever been one of the most important corn markets in Ifrikia, by which name the northern part of the Regency has always been called since it was the Provincia Africa of the Romans.
El-Edrisi (A.D. 1154) says: ‘It is a beautiful city, built in a plain extremely fertile in corn and barley, so that there is not in all the Moghreb a city so important or more rich in cereals.’
El-Bekri calls it the granary of Ifrikia, and says that its soil is so fertile, its cereals so fine, and its harvests so abundant, that everything is exceedingly cheap, and that when there is famine elsewhere, here there is abundance. Every day, he says, 1,000 camels and other beasts of burden carry away corn, but that has no influence on the price of food, so abundant is it.[229]
El-Badja is situated on the slope of a hill, with a commanding view of the plain beyond. The selection of the site was, no doubt, influenced by the existence of a copious spring of fresh water, which the Romans carefully led to a central position and enclosed within a vaulted chamber of their usual solid construction; this exists uninjured to the present day, but the drainage of the town has been allowed to flow into it and utterly pollute its waters.
It is impossible to imagine a city more filthy; the fable of King Augeas, with his stable of 3,000 oxen uncleaned during thirty years, is actually realised. The inhabitants have large flocks and herds, which they drive into the town every evening, and from its streets and houses nothing is ever removed. The old Roman drains are choked up, so that the rain, instead of washing down the streets, only dissolves the black abominations with which they are filled, and makes walking about an impossibility to one who is not hardened to it. Putrid animal and vegetable matter festering in the sun poisoned the air, and we did not require to be told that fever and other preventible diseases were common, especially in the summer months, and that the mortality is sometimes very great. The wonder to our mind was that anyone escaped, and that such a state of things did not bring back the plague, which used to commit such ravages on the Barbary coast.
The ancient city was surrounded by a wall, flanked by square towers, and on the culminating point of the enclosure was situated the citadel. No doubt, this was originally constructed by the Byzantines; the trace was adopted by the Arabs; but as the walls were not continued as the town extended, they soon ceased to surround it, and were allowed to fall into decay. The only part in a relative state of preservation is the Kasba, a great part of which seems to me the original construction of Belisarius or Solomon. Many tombstones and fragments of sculpture are built into the walls, and several interesting inscriptions recording the name of the place, which have already been given by M. Guérin.[230]
The Kasba is a half-ruinous building, on the terrace of which are mounted a few old pieces of ordnance; the view from it is splendid, but what most interested us was the prison in the interior, which, as an exceptional favour, we were permitted to visit. We entered by a small door, three feet and a half high and thirteen inches broad, leading into a passage of the same width in the thickness of the wall.
The door is fastened by a curious and complicated system of chains and padlocks; it has a grating, at which there is just room enough for one man at a time to stand and communicate with his friends outside, but anything like a general rush to get out is quite impossible. Beyond this passage is a large and lofty hall, about fifteen paces long and ten wide, with a vaulted roof supported on two square pillars. It was lighted only by two grated openings in the roof, which secure, happily, a certain amount of ventilation, but are in no way protected from the rain. In this place, on an average, fifty prisoners are always confined, and when I say that none of these are ever permitted to leave the room for a moment, and that no attempt is ever made to clean it out, it may well be imagined that the atmosphere is foul and pestilential beyond the power of words to describe; the unhappy wretches are supplied neither with food nor bedding, but are entirely dependent on their friends outside for subsistence. Woe to the unfortunate, who has been brought from a great distance, perhaps from failure to pay his contributions, and whose family are too poor to supply him with food so far from home. The Arab can subsist and keep in good condition on a very small modicum of food; he is very willing to aid others more unfortunate than himself; he cares little for comfort or personal luxuries, and is always ready to submit with patience to what he believes to be the will of Providence, so he probably gets through his period of imprisonment without any very acute suffering; but twenty-four hours here would turn most Europeans into raging lunatics.
We observed two interesting and hitherto unpublished inscriptions high up in one of the pillars. The first was turned upside down, and the light was very bad, so that it took us a considerable time to decipher them. The operation was a most sickening one.