CHAPTER VIII.
START FOR THE AURES — LAMBESSA — EL-ARBÄA — MENÄA.
We started for our excursion in the Aures Mountains on April 27. Our object was not to go by a direct route from Batna to Tebessa, but to obtain a general knowledge of the country, and to combine all that was best worth seeing from an archæological and a scenic point of view. We were, of course, in perfect ignorance of the country, but our good friend General Dastugue had so carefully traced our route in conjunction with some of the principal chiefs that we never had occasion to deviate from it, and so great was the hospitality we received, both from French officials and the Kaids of the districts, that we were never permitted to provide ourselves with a repast during all the period of our wanderings. Wherever we stopped for breakfast, and to pass the night, a sumptuous dhiffa awaited us. Not only were we supplied with every conceivable Arab delicacy, but the neighbouring station of Batna had been ransacked to supply us with unnecessary luxuries. Champagne, Bordeaux, pâtés de foie gras and even chairs and tables, were waiting us at every halting-place; considering all these things, and that our hosts were as perfect specimens of Berber nobility as it is possible to imagine, and looked, indeed, as if they had been thawed out of marble statues of Roman emperors in the British Museum, it is little wonder that our reminiscences of that journey are amongst the most pleasant of our lives.
From Batna we followed the high road to Lambessa, the ruins of which are too well known to require any detailed description. Nevertheless, as this place is amongst those illustrated by Bruce, I cannot pass it by without notice. First I quote his remarks on the place:—
As this is the Mons Audus of Ptolemy, here too must be fixed his Lambesa,[64] or Lambæsitanorum Colonia, which, by a hundred Latin inscriptions remaining on the spot, it is attested to have been. It is now called Tezzoute; the ruins of the city are very extensive. There are seven of the gates still standing, and great pieces of the walls solidly built with square masonry without lime. The buildings remaining are of very different ages, from Adrian to Aurelian, nay, even to Maximin. One building only, supported by columns of the Corinthian order, was in good taste. What its use was I know not. The drawing of this is in the King’s collection. It was certainly designed for some military purpose, by the size of its gates—I should suspect, a stable for elephants, or a repository for catapulta, or other large military machines, though there are no traces left upon the walls indicating either.[65] Upon the keystone of the arch of the principal gate there is a basso-relievo of the standard of a legion, and upon it an inscription ‘Legio tertia Augusta,’ which legion we know from history was quartered here. Dr. Shaw[66] says that there is here a neat round Corinthian temple called Cubb el Arrousa, the cupola or dome of the bride, or spouse. Such a building does exist, but it is by no means of a good taste, nor of the Corinthian order; but of a long disproportioned Doric of the time of Aurelian, and does not merit the attention of any architect. Dr. Shaw never was as far south as Jibbel Aurez, so could only say this from report.
The temple dedicated to Æsculapius turned out a very indifferent Doric. There was none of the others remaining except what he calls an oblong chamber, which is in bad taste likewise. The entire Tezzoute is on all sides surrounded by mountains covered with cedar, unless on the east, where there is only bare rock; two small but very clear streams run through it, but as there is a small aqueduct from the neighbouring mountain to the west, and as there are no traces of masonry along the banks of the stream . . . .[67] I suspect that they are part of the stream which formerly ran through the aqueduct, which now being broken down they have formed these channels.
Lambese, Lambæsis, or Lambæsitanorum Colonia, is mentioned in the Itinerary of Antonine,[68] in the Tables of Peutinger, by Ptolemy,[69] St. Augustine[70] and St. Cyprian.[71]
It was one of the most important cities in the interior of Numidia, belonging to the Massylii, and was in Roman times the head-quarters of the Third Legion, Augusta, which was stationed here for nearly three centuries, and was the only one located in Africa. It was the great military centre from which columns were despatched to maintain order or to suppress insurrection. It covered, or protected, the whole of Northern Numidia, and permitted Roman colonisation to attain a degree of importance unequalled in any other province of North Africa.
At present very few ruins remain to bear witness to its former magnificence, and these are by no means in the best style of art. Indeed, it is impossible to avoid the conclusion that, valuable as the place undoubtedly was as a military position, the importance of its public buildings has been greatly exaggerated.
The principal ruin here, and the only one figured by Bruce, is that called the Prætorium. He made a finished drawing, which he states to be in the collection of the King; the only one in the Kinnaird collection is a rough pencil outline, with sketches of architectural details and memoranda of measurements. This is the less to be regretted, as photographs of it are in the hands of every traveller who visits Lambessa.