Various - "Notes and Queries, Number 189, June 11, 1853"

Amy D. V. Chalmers - "Madge Morton's Secret"

Halliday G. Sutherland - "Birth Control"

Robert Barr - "One Day's Courtship"

Editorial
This paper argues that discourses of love in Ghanaian market literature for youth offer a view into complex negotiations of agency and empowerment. Drawing on Deborah Durham's notion of youth as "social `shifters'" and Francis Nyamnjoh's conception of the "interconnectedness" of agency, I take Ghanaian market literature as one specific case of how African literature for youth foregrounds questions of continuity and change as African societies enter into increasingly complex global relations. In this literature for youth, received notions of love, often constructed out of impressions from American pop and hip hop music, carry new notions of agency that compete with existing "domesticated" forms. Authors like Ike Tandoh and Evelyn Tay employ discourses of love to offer youth alternative avenues for empowerment in a context of socio-economic disenfranchizement. In a creative process of "straddling", this writing both reveals and reproduces the contradictions that obtain in youth configurations of agency.

The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Vol. 5

E >> Edward Gibbon >> The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Vol. 5




Yet an essential difference may be found between the hordes
of Scythia and the Arabian tribes; since many of the latter were
collected into towns, and employed in the labors of trade and
agriculture. A part of their time and industry was still devoted
to the management of their cattle: they mingled, in peace and
war, with their brethren of the desert; and the Bedoweens derived
from their useful intercourse some supply of their wants, and
some rudiments of art and knowledge. Among the forty-two cities
of Arabia, ^14 enumerated by Abulfeda, the most ancient and
populous were situate in the happy Yemen: the towers of Saana,
^15 and the marvellous reservoir of Merab, ^16 were constructed
by the kings of the Homerites; but their profane lustre was
eclipsed by the prophetic glories of Medina ^17 and Mecca, ^18
near the Red Sea, and at the distance from each other of two
hundred and seventy miles. The last of these holy places was
known to the Greeks under the name of Macoraba; and the
termination of the word is expressive of its greatness, which has
not, indeed, in the most flourishing period, exceeded the size
and populousness of Marseilles. Some latent motive, perhaps of
superstition, must have impelled the founders, in the choice of a
most unpromising situation. They erected their habitations of mud
or stone, in a plain about two miles long and one mile broad, at
the foot of three barren mountains: the soil is a rock; the water
even of the holy well of Zemzem is bitter or brackish; the
pastures are remote from the city; and grapes are transported
above seventy miles from the gardens of Tayef. The fame and
spirit of the Koreishites, who reigned in Mecca, were conspicuous
among the Arabian tribes; but their ungrateful soil refused the
labors of agriculture, and their position was favorable to the
enterprises of trade. By the seaport of Gedda, at the distance
only of forty miles, they maintained an easy correspondence with
Abyssinia; and that Christian kingdom afforded the first refuge
to the disciples of Mahomet. The treasures of Africa were
conveyed over the Peninsula to Gerrha or Katif, in the province
of Bahrein, a city built, as it is said, of rock-salt, by the
Chaldaean exiles; ^19 and from thence with the native pearls of
the Persian Gulf, they were floated on rafts to the mouth of the
Euphrates. Mecca is placed almost at an equal distance, a
month's journey, between Yemen on the right, and Syria on the
left hand. The former was the winter, the latter the summer,
station of her caravans; and their seasonable arrival relieved
the ships of India from the tedious and troublesome navigation of
the Red Sea. In the markets of Saana and Merab, in the harbors
of Oman and Aden, the camels of the Koreishites were laden with a
precious cargo of aromatics; a supply of corn and manufactures
was purchased in the fairs of Bostra and Damascus; the lucrative
exchange diffused plenty and riches in the streets of Mecca; and
the noblest of her sons united the love of arms with the
profession of merchandise. ^20

[Footnote 14: Yet Marcian of Heraclea (in Periplo, p. 16, in tom.
i. Hudson, Minor. Geograph.) reckons one hundred and sixty-four
towns in Arabia Felix. The size of the towns might be small - the
faith of the writer might be large.]

[Footnote 15: It is compared by Abulfeda (in Hudson, tom. ii. p.
54) to Damascus, and is still the residence of the Iman of Yemen,
(Voyages de Niebuhr, tom. i. p. 331 - 342.) Saana is twenty-four
parasangs from Dafar, (Abulfeda, p. 51,) and sixty-eight from
Aden, (p. 53.)]

[Footnote 16: Pocock, Specimen, p. 57. Geograph. Nubiensis, p.
52. Meriaba, or Merab, six miles in circumference, was destroyed
by the legions of Augustus, (Plin. Hist. Nat. vi. 32,) and had
not revived in the xivth century, (Abulfed. Descript. Arab. p.
58.)

Note: See note 2 to chap. i. The destruction of Meriaba by
the Romans is doubtful. The town never recovered the inundation
which took place from the bursting of a large reservoir of water
- an event of great importance in the Arabian annals, and
discussed at considerable length by modern Orientalists. - M.]

[Footnote 17: The name of city, Medina, was appropriated, to
Yatreb. (the Iatrippa of the Greeks,) the seat of the prophet.
The distances from Medina are reckoned by Abulfeda in stations,
or days' journey of a caravan, (p. 15: ) to Bahrein, xv.; to
Bassora, xviii.; to Cufah, xx.; to Damascus or Palestine, xx.; to
Cairo, xxv.; to Mecca. x.; from Mecca to Saana, (p. 52,) or Aden,
xxx.; to Cairo, xxxi. days, or 412 hours, (Shaw's Travels, p.
477;) which, according to the estimate of D'Anville, (Mesures
Itineraires, p. 99,) allows about twenty-five English miles for a
day's journey. From the land of frankincense (Hadramaut, in
Yemen, between Aden and Cape Fartasch) to Gaza in Syria, Pliny
(Hist. Nat. xii. 32) computes lxv. mansions of camels. These
measures may assist fancy and elucidate facts.]

[Footnote 18: Our notions of Mecca must be drawn from the
Arabians, (D'Herbelot, Bibliotheque Orientale, p. 368 - 371.
Pocock, Specimen, p. 125 - 128. Abulfeda, p. 11 - 40.) As no
unbeliever is permitted to enter the city, our travellers are
silent; and the short hints of Thevenot (Voyages du Levant, part
i. p. 490) are taken from the suspicious mouth of an African
renegado. Some Persians counted 6000 houses, (Chardin. tom. iv.
p. 167.)

Note: Even in the time of Gibbon, Mecca had not been so
inaccessible to Europeans. It had been visited by Ludovico
Barthema, and by one Joseph Pitts, of Exeter, who was taken
prisoner by the Moors, and forcibly converted to Mahometanism.
His volume is a curious, though plain, account of his sufferings
and travels. Since that time Mecca has been entered, and the
ceremonies witnessed, by Dr. Seetzen, whose papers were
unfortunately lost; by the Spaniard, who called himself Ali Bey;
and, lastly, by Burckhardt, whose description leaves nothing
wanting to satisfy the curiosity. - M.]

[Footnote 19: Strabo, l. xvi. p. 1110. See one of these salt
houses near Bassora, in D'Herbelot, Bibliot. Orient. p. 6.]

[Footnote 20: Mirum dictu ex innumeris populis pars aequa in
commerciis aut in latrociniis degit, (Plin. Hist. Nat. vi. 32.)
See Sale's Koran, Sura. cvi. p. 503. Pocock, Specimen, p. 2.
D'Herbelot, Bibliot. Orient. p. 361. Prideaux's Life of Mahomet,
p. 5. Gagnier, Vie de Mahomet, tom. i. p. 72, 120, 126, &c.]

The perpetual independence of the Arabs has been the theme
of praise among strangers and natives; and the arts of
controversy transform this singular event into a prophecy and a
miracle, in favor of the posterity of Ismael. ^21 Some
exceptions, that can neither be dismissed nor eluded, render this
mode of reasoning as indiscreet as it is superfluous; the kingdom
of Yemen has been successively subdued by the Abyssinians, the
Persians, the sultans of Egypt, ^22 and the Turks; ^23 the holy
cities of Mecca and Medina have repeatedly bowed under a Scythian
tyrant; and the Roman province of Arabia ^24 embraced the
peculiar wilderness in which Ismael and his sons must have
pitched their tents in the face of their brethren. Yet these
exceptions are temporary or local; the body of the nation has
escaped the yoke of the most powerful monarchies: the arms of
Sesostris and Cyrus, of Pompey and Trajan, could never achieve
the conquest of Arabia; the present sovereign of the Turks ^25
may exercise a shadow of jurisdiction, but his pride is reduced
to solicit the friendship of a people, whom it is dangerous to
provoke, and fruitless to attack. The obvious causes of their
freedom are inscribed on the character and country of the Arabs.
Many ages before Mahomet, ^26 their intrepid valor had been
severely felt by their neighbors in offensive and defensive war.
The patient and active virtues of a soldier are insensibly nursed
in the habits and discipline of a pastoral life. The care of the
sheep and camels is abandoned to the women of the tribe; but the
martial youth, under the banner of the emir, is ever on
horseback, and in the field, to practise the exercise of the bow,
the javelin, and the cimeter. The long memory of their
independence is the firmest pledge of its perpetuity and
succeeding generations are animated to prove their descent, and
to maintain their inheritance. Their domestic feuds are
suspended on the approach of a common enemy; and in their last
hostilities against the Turks, the caravan of Mecca was attacked
and pillaged by fourscore thousand of the confederates. When they
advance to battle, the hope of victory is in the front; in the
rear, the assurance of a retreat. Their horses and camels, who,
in eight or ten days, can perform a march of four or five hundred
miles, disappear before the conqueror; the secret waters of the
desert elude his search, and his victorious troops are consumed
with thirst, hunger, and fatigue, in the pursuit of an invisible
foe, who scorns his efforts, and safely reposes in the heart of
the burning solitude. The arms and deserts of the Bedoweens are
not only the safeguards of their own freedom, but the barriers
also of the happy Arabia, whose inhabitants, remote from war, are
enervated by the luxury of the soil and climate. The legions of
Augustus melted away in disease and lassitude; ^27 and it is only
by a naval power that the reduction of Yemen has been
successfully attempted. When Mahomet erected his holy standard,
^28 that kingdom was a province of the Persian empire; yet seven
princes of the Homerites still reigned in the mountains; and the
vicegerent of Chosroes was tempted to forget his distant country
and his unfortunate master. The historians of the age of
Justinian represent the state of the independent Arabs, who were
divided by interest or affection in the long quarrel of the East:
the tribe of Gassan was allowed to encamp on the Syrian
territory: the princes of Hira were permitted to form a city
about forty miles to the southward of the ruins of Babylon.
Their service in the field was speedy and vigorous; but their
friendship was venal, their faith inconstant, their enmity
capricious: it was an easier task to excite than to disarm these
roving barbarians; and, in the familiar intercourse of war, they
learned to see, and to despise, the splendid weakness both of
Rome and of Persia. From Mecca to the Euphrates, the Arabian
tribes ^29 were confounded by the Greeks and Latins, under the
general appellation of Saracens, ^30 a name which every Christian
mouth has been taught to pronounce with terror and abhorrence.

[Footnote 21: A nameless doctor (Universal Hist. vol. xx. octavo
edition) has formally demonstrated the truth of Christianity by
the independence of the Arabs. A critic, besides the exceptions
of fact, might dispute the meaning of the text (Gen. xvi. 12,)
the extent of the application, and the foundation of the
pedigree.

Note: See note 3 to chap. xlvi. The atter point is probably
the least contestable of the three. - M.]

[Footnote 22: It was subdued, A.D. 1173, by a brother of the
great Saladin, who founded a dynasty of Curds or Ayoubites,
(Guignes, Hist. des Huns, tom. i. p. 425. D'Herbelot, p. 477.)]

[Footnote 23: By the lieutenant of Soliman I. (A.D. 1538) and
Selim II., (1568.) See Cantemir's Hist. of the Othman Empire, p.
201, 221. The pacha, who resided at Saana, commanded twenty-one
beys; but no revenue was ever remitted to the Porte, (Marsigli,
Stato Militare dell' Imperio Ottomanno, p. 124,) and the Turks
were expelled about the year 1630, (Niebuhr, p. 167, 168.)]

[Footnote 24: Of the Roman province, under the name of Arabia and
the third Palestine, the principal cities were Bostra and Petra,
which dated their aera from the year 105, when they were subdued
by Palma, a lieutenant of Trajan, (Dion. Cassius, l. lxviii.)
Petra was the capital of the Nabathaeans; whose name is derived
from the eldest of the sons of Ismael, (Gen. xxv. 12, &c., with
the Commentaries of Jerom, Le Clerc, and Calmet.) Justinian
relinquished a palm country of ten days' journey to the south of
Aelah, (Procop. de Bell. Persic. l. i. c. 19,) and the Romans
maintained a centurion and a custom-house, (Arrian in Periplo
Maris Erythraei, p. 11, in Hudson, tom. i.,) at a place (Pagus
Albus, Hawara) in the territory of Medina, (D'Anville, Memoire
sur l'Egypte, p. 243.) These real possessions, and some naval
inroads of Trajan, (Peripl. p. 14, 15,) are magnified by history
and medals into the Roman conquest of Arabia.

Note: On the ruins of Petra, see the travels of Messrs. Irby
and Mangles, and of Leon de Laborde. - M.]

[Footnote 25: Niebuhr (Description de l'Arabie, p. 302, 303, 329
- 331) affords the most recent and authentic intelligence of the
Turkish empire in Arabia.

Note: Niebuhr's, notwithstanding the multitude of later
travellers, maintains its ground, as the classical work on
Arabia. - M.]

[Footnote 26: Diodorus Siculus (tom. ii. l. xix. p. 390 - 393,
edit. Wesseling) has clearly exposed the freedom of the
Nabathaean Arabs, who resisted the arms of Antigonus and his
son.]

[Footnote 27: Strabo, l. xvi. p. 1127 - 1129. Plin. Hist. Natur.
vi. 32. Aelius Gallus landed near Medina, and marched near a
thousand miles into the part of Yemen between Mareb and the
Ocean. The non ante devictis Sabeae regibus, (Od. i. 29,) and
the intacti Arabum thesanri (Od. iii. 24) of Horace, attest the
virgin purity of Arabia.]

[Footnote 28: See the imperfect history of Yemen in Pocock,
Specimen, p. 55 - 66, of Hira, p. 66 - 74, of Gassan, p. 75 - 78,
as far as it could be known or preserved in the time of
ignorance.

Note: Compare the Hist. Yemanae, published by Johannsen at
Bonn 1880 particularly the translator's preface. - M.]

[Footnote 29: They are described by Menander, (Excerpt. Legation
p. 149,) Procopius, (de Bell. Persic. l. i. c. 17, 19, l. ii. c.
10,) and, in the most lively colors, by Ammianus Marcellinus, (l.
xiv. c. 4,) who had spoken of them as early as the reign of
Marcus.]

[Footnote 30: The name which, used by Ptolemy and Pliny in a more
confined, by Ammianus and Procopius in a larger, sense, has been
derived, ridiculously, from Sarah, the wife of Abraham, obscurely
from the village of Saraka, (Stephan. de Urbibus,) more plausibly
from the Arabic words, which signify a thievish character, or
Oriental situation, (Hottinger, Hist. Oriental. l. i. c. i. p. 7,
8. Pocock, Specimen, p. 33, 35. Asseman. Bibliot. Orient. tom.
iv. p. 567.) Yet the last and most popular of these etymologies
is refuted by Ptolemy, (Arabia, p. 2, 18, in Hudson, tom. iv.,)
who expressly remarks the western and southern position of the
Saracens, then an obscure tribe on the borders of Egypt. The
appellation cannot therefore allude to any national character;
and, since it was imposed by strangers, it must be found, not in
the Arabic, but in a foreign language.

Note: Dr. Clarke, (Travels, vol. ii. p. 491,) after
expressing contemptuous pity for Gibbon's ignorance, derives the
word from Zara, Zaara, Sara, the Desert, whence Saraceni, the
children of the Desert. De Marles adopts the derivation from
Sarrik, a robber, (Hist. des Arabes, vol. i. p. 36, S.L. Martin
from Scharkioun, or Sharkun, Eastern, vol. xi. p. 55. - M.]



Chapter L: Description Of Arabia And Its Inhabitants.

Part II.

The slaves of domestic tyranny may vainly exult in their
national independence: but the Arab is personally free; and he
enjoys, in some degree, the benefits of society, without
forfeiting the prerogatives of nature. In every tribe,
superstition, or gratitude, or fortune, has exalted a particular
family above the heads of their equals. The dignities of sheick
and emir invariably descend in this chosen race; but the order of
succession is loose and precarious; and the most worthy or aged
of the noble kinsmen are preferred to the simple, though
important, office of composing disputes by their advice, and
guiding valor by their example. Even a female of sense and spirit
has been permitted to command the countrymen of Zenobia. ^31 The
momentary junction of several tribes produces an army: their more
lasting union constitutes a nation; and the supreme chief, the
emir of emirs, whose banner is displayed at their head, may
deserve, in the eyes of strangers, the honors of the kingly name.

If the Arabian princes abuse their power, they are quickly
punished by the desertion of their subjects, who had been
accustomed to a mild and parental jurisdiction. Their spirit is
free, their steps are unconfined, the desert is open, and the
tribes and families are held together by a mutual and voluntary
compact. The softer natives of Yemen supported the pomp and
majesty of a monarch; but if he could not leave his palace
without endangering his life, ^32 the active powers of government
must have been devolved on his nobles and magistrates. The
cities of Mecca and Medina present, in the heart of Asia, the
form, or rather the substance, of a commonwealth. The
grandfather of Mahomet, and his lineal ancestors, appear in
foreign and domestic transactions as the princes of their
country; but they reigned, like Pericles at Athens, or the Medici
at Florence, by the opinion of their wisdom and integrity; their
influence was divided with their patrimony; and the sceptre was
transferred from the uncles of the prophet to a younger branch of
the tribe of Koreish. On solemn occasions they convened the
assembly of the people; and, since mankind must be either
compelled or persuaded to obey, the use and reputation of oratory
among the ancient Arabs is the clearest evidence of public
freedom. ^33 But their simple freedom was of a very different
cast from the nice and artificial machinery of the Greek and
Roman republics, in which each member possessed an undivided
share of the civil and political rights of the community. In the
more simple state of the Arabs, the nation is free, because each
of her sons disdains a base submission to the will of a master.
His breast is fortified by the austere virtues of courage,
patience, and sobriety; the love of independence prompts him to
exercise the habits of self-command; and the fear of dishonor
guards him from the meaner apprehension of pain, of danger, and
of death. The gravity and firmness of the mind is conspicuous in
his outward demeanor; his speech is low, weighty, and concise; he
is seldom provoked to laughter; his only gesture is that of
stroking his beard, the venerable symbol of manhood; and the
sense of his own importance teaches him to accost his equals
without levity, and his superiors without awe. ^34 The liberty of
the Saracens survived their conquests: the first caliphs indulged
the bold and familiar language of their subjects; they ascended
the pulpit to persuade and edify the congregation; nor was it
before the seat of empire was removed to the Tigris, that the
Abbasides adopted the proud and pompous ceremonial of the Persian
and Byzantine courts.

[Footnote 31: Saraceni ... mulieres aiunt in eos regnare,
(Expositio totius Mundi, p. 3, in Hudson, tom. iii.) The reign of
Mavia is famous in ecclesiastical story Pocock, Specimen, p. 69,
83.]

[Footnote 32: The report of Agatharcides, (de Mari Rubro, p. 63,
64, in Hudson, tom. i.) Diodorus Siculus, (tom. i. l. iii. c. 47,
p. 215,) and Strabo, (l. xvi. p. 1124.) But I much suspect that
this is one of the popular tales, or extraordinary accidents,
which the credulity of travellers so often transforms into a
fact, a custom, and a law.]

[Footnote 33: Non gloriabantur antiquitus Arabes, nisi gladio,
hospite, et eloquentia (Sephadius apud Pocock, Specimen, p. 161,
162.) This gift of speech they shared only with the Persians; and
the sententious Arabs would probably have disdained the simple
and sublime logic of Demosthenes.]

[Footnote 34: I must remind the reader that D'Arvieux,
D'Herbelot, and Niebuhr, represent, in the most lively colors,
the manners and government of the Arabs, which are illustrated by
many incidental passages in the Life of Mahomet.

Note: See, likewise the curious romance of Antar, the most
vivid and authentic picture of Arabian manners. - M.]

In the study of nations and men, we may observe the causes
that render them hostile or friendly to each other, that tend to
narrow or enlarge, to mollify or exasperate, the social
character. The separation of the Arabs from the rest of mankind
has accustomed them to confound the ideas of stranger and enemy;
and the poverty of the land has introduced a maxim of
jurisprudence, which they believe and practise to the present
hour. They pretend, that, in the division of the earth, the rich
and fertile climates were assigned to the other branches of the
human family; and that the posterity of the outlaw Ismael might
recover, by fraud or force, the portion of inheritance of which
he had been unjustly deprived. According to the remark of Pliny,
the Arabian tribes are equally addicted to theft and merchandise;
the caravans that traverse the desert are ransomed or pillaged;
and their neighbors, since the remote times of Job and Sesostris,
^35 have been the victims of their rapacious spirit. If a
Bedoween discovers from afar a solitary traveller, he rides
furiously against him, crying, with a loud voice, "Undress
thyself, thy aunt (my wife) is without a garment." A ready
submission entitles him to mercy; resistance will provoke the
aggressor, and his own blood must expiate the blood which he
presumes to shed in legitimate defence. A single robber, or a
few associates, are branded with their genuine name; but the
exploits of a numerous band assume the character of lawful and
honorable war. The temper of a people thus armed against mankind
was doubly inflamed by the domestic license of rapine, murder,
and revenge. In the constitution of Europe, the right of peace
and war is now confined to a small, and the actual exercise to a
much smaller, list of respectable potentates; but each Arab, with
impunity and renown, might point his javelin against the life of
his countrymen. The union of the nation consisted only in a
vague resemblance of language and manners; and in each community,
the jurisdiction of the magistrate was mute and impotent. Of the
time of ignorance which preceded Mahomet, seventeen hundred
battles ^36 are recorded by tradition: hostility was imbittered
with the rancor of civil faction; and the recital, in prose or
verse, of an obsolete feud, was sufficient to rekindle the same
passions among the descendants of the hostile tribes. In private
life every man, at least every family, was the judge and avenger
of his own cause. The nice sensibility of honor, which weighs
the insult rather than the injury, sheds its deadly venom on the
quarrels of the Arabs: the honor of their women, and of their
beards, is most easily wounded; an indecent action, a
contemptuous word, can be expiated only by the blood of the
offender; and such is their patient inveteracy, that they expect
whole months and years the opportunity of revenge. A fine or
compensation for murder is familiar to the Barbarians of every
age: but in Arabia the kinsmen of the dead are at liberty to
accept the atonement, or to exercise with their own hands the law
of retaliation. The refined malice of the Arabs refuses even the
head of the murderer, substitutes an innocent for the guilty
person, and transfers the penalty to the best and most
considerable of the race by whom they have been injured. If he
falls by their hands, they are exposed, in their turn, to the
danger of reprisals, the interest and principal of the bloody
debt are accumulated: the individuals of either family lead a
life of malice and suspicion, and fifty years may sometimes
elapse before the account of vengeance be finally settled. ^37
This sanguinary spirit, ignorant of pity or forgiveness, has been
moderated, however, by the maxims of honor, which require in
every private encounter some decent equality of age and strength,
of numbers and weapons. An annual festival of two, perhaps of
four, months, was observed by the Arabs before the time of
Mahomet, during which their swords were religiously sheathed both
in foreign and domestic hostility; and this partial truce is more
strongly expressive of the habits of anarchy and warfare. ^38

[Footnote 35: Observe the first chapter of Job, and the long wall
of 1500 stadia which Sesostris built from Pelusium to Heliopolis,
(Diodor. Sicul. tom. i. l. i. p. 67.) Under the name of Hycsos,
the shepherd kings, they had formerly subdued Egypt, (Marsham,
Canon. Chron. p. 98 - 163) &c.)

Note: This origin of the Hycsos, though probable, is by no
means so certain here is some reason for supposing them
Scythians. - M]

[Footnote 36: Or, according to another account, 1200,
(D'Herbelot, Bibliotheque Orientale, p. 75: ) the two historians
who wrote of the Ayam al Arab, the battles of the Arabs, lived in
the 9th and 10th century. The famous war of Dahes and Gabrah was
occasioned by two horses, lasted forty years, and ended in a
proverb, (Pocock, Specimen, p. 48.)]

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