Travels in Syria and the Holy Land. John Lewis Burckhardt

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ admits of culture, wheat and barley are sown among the rocks. If such spots are distant from a village, the cultivators pitch a few tents for the purpose of watching the seed and crop; such encampments are called Mezraa [Arabic]. In an hour and ten minutes we reached Nahle; two hours and forty minutes the village Meghara [Arabic], with many remains of ancient buildings. Here I saw a neat sepulchral cave with a vaulted portico supported by two pillars. In three hours we reached the village Merayan [Arabic]; the direction of our route sometimes S.W. sometimes S.S.W. Just by Merayan is a large coffin, cut in the rocky ground, like those of Kefr Lata; and near it a spring, with ancient walls. In three hours and twenty minutes we came to Ahsin [Arabic], half an hour to the west of which is the village Eblim [Arabic]. The principal produce of all these villages is grapes, which are carried to the Aleppo market, and there sold, in ordinary years, at about nine shillings per quintal; or else they are boiled to form the sweet glutinous extract called Debs, which is a substitute for sugar all over the East. At the end of four hours and a half we reached the village El Bara [Arabic], where we finished our day's journey; but we met with a very cold reception, although I had taken the precaution of obtaining a letter of recommendation to the Sheikh of the village from the proprietor of it, Taleb Effendi, of the family Tcheleby Effendi Toha Zade, the first house of Aleppo.

      Half an hour N.W. of Bara lies the village Belyoum. A high hill, contiguous to the Djebel Rieha, called Neby Ayoub [Arabic], bears N.W. from El Bara, distant about an hour and three

      [p.130]quarters. On its summit is a Turkish chapel sacred to the memory of the prophet Ayoub (Job). Two hours distant from El Bara, S. by W. lies the village Kefr Nebyl.

      February 20th.—The mountain of Rieha, of which El Bara forms a part, is full of the ruins of cities, which flourished in the times of the lower empire;[The following are the names of other villages and ruined towns, situated upon the mountain of Rieha from the information of a man or El Bara: viz. Medjellye [Arabic], Betersa [Arabic], Baouza [Arabic], Has [Arabic], El Rebeya [Arabic], Serdjelle [Arabic], El Djerada [Arabic], Moarrat Houl [Arabic], Moarrat Menhas [Arabic], Beshelle [Arabic], Babouza [Arabic], El Deir [Arabic], El Roweyha [Arabic], with extensive ruins; Zer Szabber [Arabic], Zer Louza [Arabic], Moar Bellyt [Arabic], Moar Szaf [Arabic], Serdjeb Mantef [Arabic], Nahle [Arabic], El Rama [Arabic], Kefr Rouma [Arabic], Shennan [Arabic], Ferkya [Arabic], Belshou [Arabic], Ahsarein [Arabic], Moarrat Maater [Arabic], Djebale [Arabic], Kefrneba [Arabic], Beskala [Arabic], Moarrata [Arabic], Djousef [Arabic], El Fetteyry [Arabic], El Ahmeyry [Arabic], Erneba [Arabic], El Arous [Arabic], Kon Szafra [Arabic], El Mezra [Arabic], Aweyt [Arabic], Kefr Shelaye [Arabic], Szakhrein [Arabic], Benames [Arabic], Kefr Djennab [Arabic], Szankoul [Arabic].] those of El Bara are the most considerable of the whole, and as I had often heard the people of the country mention them, I thought it worth while to take this circuitous road to Hamah.

      The ruins are about ten minutes walk to the west of the village. Directing our researches to that side we met with a sepulchral cave in the immediate vicinity of the town; a broad staircase leads down to the entrance of it, over which I copied this inscription:

      [Greek].

      The following figure, in relief, was over it. We saw the same figure, with variations, over the gates of several buildings in these ruins; the episcopal staff is found in all

      [p.131]of them. The best executed one that I saw was of this form. On the outside of the town are several sepulchral caves, and a few coffins.

      The town walls on the E. side are yet standing; they are very neatly built with small stones, with a square pillar at every six or seven paces, about nine feet high. The ruins extend for about half an hour from south to north, and consist of a number of public buildings, churches, and private habitations, the walls and roofs of some of which are still standing. I found no inscriptions here. The stone with which the buildings are constructed is a soft calcareous rock, that speedily decays wherever it is exposed to the air; it is of the same description as that found in the buildings of the towns about the mountain of St. Simon, and in the ruins of St. Simon, where not a single legible inscription remains, though, as at Bara, traces of them are seen in many places. We surveyed the town in all directions, but saw no building worth noticing, except three tombs, which are plain square structures surmounted with pyramids. The pyramidal summit of one of them has fallen. The interior of these tombs is a square of six paces; on the side opposite the door is a stone coffin; and two others in each of the other two walls; the pyramidal roof is well constructed, being hollow to the top, with rounded angles, and without any interior support. On the outside the pyramid is covered with thin slabs, on each of which is a kind of knob, which gives the whole a very singular appearance. The height of the whole building may be about twenty-four feet. In one of the tombs is a window, the other is quite dark. Two of them stand near together; a third is in a different part of the town. The sides of one of the coffins is carved with a cross in the middle.

      [p.132]The mode of construction in all the private habitations is similar to that which I noticed in the ancient towns of the Haouran, and which, in fact, is still in use in most of the Arab villages in Syria, with this difference, that the latter build with timber and mud instead of stone.

      On the N. side of El Bara stands a castle, built in the Saracen or Crusade style, with a spring near it, called Bir Alloun [Arabic], the only one in the neighbourhood of the ancient town, and which apparently was insufficient to the inhabitants, as we found many cisterns cut very deep in the rock. Turning from the spring towards the present village, we passed the tomb of a Turkish saint, called Kubbet Ibn Imaum Abou Beker, where the son of Abou Beker is reported to have been killed: near it is a cave, with eight receptacles for the dead. I saw there some rocks of the same basaltic tufwacke which I met with in the Djebel el Hasz and in ome of the districts of Haouran.

      The greater part of the villages of Djebel Rieha belong to the Dehly Bashi, at Rieha. Feteyry belongs to the district of Marra; its inhabitants have often been punished for their rebellious conduct, and their predatory incursions into the neighbouring districts; their spirit, however, is unbroken, and they still follow the same practices. The frontiers of the Pashaliks of Damascus and Aleppo run across the mountain of Rieha, which commences above Rieha, and extends to Kalaat el Medyk, varying in breadth from two to five hours: it is a low but very rocky chain, little fit for culture, except in the valleys; but it abounds in game, especially wild boars; and ounces have sometimes been killed in it.

      We left the inhospitable Bara at mid-day, with two armed men, to escort us over the mountain into the valley of the Orontes. In half an hour we passed a ruined stone bridge across a narrow Wady; it rests upon piers, which are formed of immense blocks

      EL GHAB.

      [p.133]of stone piled upon one another. In one hour and twenty minutes we came to Kon Szafra, in a fertile valley on the top of the mountain, where a few families live in wretched huts amidst the ruins of an ancient town. N.W. about three quarters of an hour is the village of Mezraa. In an hour and forty minutes we reached the ruined town Djerada, and at the end of two hours and a half, Kefr Aweyt, a small village; Kefr, in the vulgar dialect, means ruins. Here the mountain is much less rocky, and more fit for culture. Our road lay S.W. b. S. The village of Feteyry, lies about one hour and a half south of Aweyt. After travelling three hours we came in sight of the Orontes, and then began to descend. The mountain on this side is rather steep, and its side is overgrown with herbs which afford an excellent pasturage. The plant asphodel (Siris [Arabic]) is very common; the inhabitants of Syria, by pulverising its dried roots, and mixing the powder with water, make a good glue, which is superior to that made with flour, as it is not attacked by worms. In the summer the inhabitants of the valley pasture their cattle in these mountains, as do likewise a few tribes of Arabs; among these are the Akeydat, of whom we passed a small encampment.

      The part of Djebel Rieha which, beginning at Kon Szafra, extends to the valley of the Orontes, on the one side towards Kalaat el Medyk, on the other towards Djissr Shogher, bears the appellation of Djebel Shaehsabou [Arabic]. СКАЧАТЬ