12. Marwát, ruins on a ridge near Badá, and signs of a settlement in the valley. In the Wady Laylah, remains also spoken of.
13. Aba'l-Marú, probably the Zu'l-Marwah of Bilázurí; extensive remains of buildings; a huge reef of quartz, carefully worked, and smaller ruins further down the valley.
14. The classical temple or tomb on the left bank of the great Wady Hamz, dividing Southern Midian from El-Hejaz in the Turkish dominions.
15. Large remains, in two divisions, at El-Haurá.[85]
Concerning the ateliers, details will be found in the following pages. Many of them suggest a kind of compromise between the camps and settlements of the Stone Age, where, e.g. at Pressigny and Grimes' Graves, the only remnant of man is a vast strew of worked silexes; and the wandering fraternity of Freemasons who hutted themselves near the work in hand. And I would here lay special stress upon my suspicion that the ancestors of the despised Hutaym may have been the Gypsy-caste that worked the metals in Midian.
For the date of the many ruins which stud the country, I will assume empirically that their destruction is coeval with that of the Christian Churches in Negeb, or the South Country,[86] that adjoins Midian Proper on the north-west. It may date from either the invasion of Khusrau Anúshírawán, the conquering Sassanian King Chosroes (A.D. 531-579); or from the expedition, sent by the Caliph Omar and his successors, beginning in A.D. 651. But, as will appear in the course of these pages, there was a second destruction; and that evidently dates from the early sixteenth century, when Sultán Selim laid out his maritime road for the Hajj-caravan. Before that time the Egyptian caravans, as will be seen, marched inland, and often passed from Midian to El-Hijr.
Chapter V.— Work At, and Excursions From, Magháir Shu'Ayb.
By the blessing of Nebi Shu'ayb and a glance from his eyrie, I at once suspected that the western Shigd was the "Mountain on a mountain" alluded to by Haji Wali;[87] and, on January 12, 1878, I ascertained that such was the case. The old man had given me a hand-sketch of the most artless, showing a gorge between two rocks, a hill of two stages to the left or west, and a couple of Wadys draining it to the sea; one (Wady Makná) trending northwest, and the other (Wady 'Afál) south-west. The word "Ishmah," affixed to the northern part of the route, is evidently the Hismá plateau, and not, as I had supposed it to be, the Jebel Tayyib Ism.