Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume II.djvu/256

 2-10 MACE A. census was taken, and the number found to be 1 2,000 men, women, and children." In earlier times the population was much more considerable ; for '•when Abou Dhaker sacked Mekka in A. h. 314 (a. d. 926) 30,000 of the inhabitants were killed by his ferocious soldiers." Ali Bey'sestimatein a.d. 1807 is much lower tlian Burekhardt's in a.d. 1814. Yet the former says " that the population of Mekka diminishes sensibly. This city, which is known to liave contained more than 100,000 souls, does not at j)reserit shelter more than from 16,000 to 18,000;" and conjectures that " it will be reduced, in the course of a century, to the tenth part of the size it now is." The celebrated Kaaba demands a cursory notice. It is situated in the midst of a great court, which forms a parallelogram of about 536 feet by 356, surrounded by a double piazza. This sanc- tuary, called, like that of Jerusalem, El-Haram, is situated near the middle of the city, which is built in a narrow valley, having a considerable slope from north to south. In order to form a level area for the great court of the temple, the ground has evi- dently been hollowed out, subsequently to the erection of the Kaaba, which is tiie only ancient edifice in the temple. The building itself (called by the natives Beit-Ullah, the House of God), pro- bably the most ancient sacred building now existing, is a quadrilateral tower, the sides and angles of which are unequal. Its dimensions are 38 feet by 29, and its height 34 feet 4 inches; built of square- hewn but unpolished blocks of quartz, schorl, and mica, brought from the neighbouring mountains. The black stone, the most sacred object of vene- ration, is built into the angle formed by the NE. and SE. sides, 42 inches above the pavement. It is believed by the iloslems to have been presented to Abraham by the angel Gabriel, and is called " the heavenly stone." Ali Bey says that " it is a frag- ment of volcanic basalt, sprinkled throughout its circumference with small, pointed, coloured crystals, and varied with red felJspath upon a dark black ground like coal." The famous well of Zemzem, in the great mosk, is 56 feet deep to the surface of the water, fed by a copious spring ; but its water, says Burckhardt, " however holy, is heavy to the taste, and impedes digestion." Ali Bey, on the contrary, says that it is wholesome, though warmer than the air even in that hot climate. The town is further supplied with rain-water preserved in cisterns : but the best water in Mekka is brought by a conduit from the vicinity of Arafat, six or seven hours distant." (Ali Bey, Travels, vo. ii. pp. 74 — 114; Burckhardt, Travels in Arabia, pp. 94, &c.) [G.W.] JIACRA (o MaKpris, Strab. ; Ptolemy has the corrupt form MaKpdWu : Magra'), a considerable river of Northern Italy, rising in the Apennines and flowing into the Tyrrhenian Sea near Luna. It was under the Roman dominion the established limit be- tween Liguria and Etruria (PHn. iii. 5. s. 7 ; Flor. ii. 3. § 4; Strab. v. p. 222 ; Vib. Seq. p. 14) ; but at an earlier period the Ligurian tribe of the Apuani occupied the country on both sides of it, and it was not till after a long struggle with that people that the Romans were able to carry their arms as far as tlie banks of the ^lacra. (Liv. xsxix. 32, xl. 41.) The Macra is one of the most considerable of the rivers on the Ligurian coast, but it still retains the character of a mountain torrent, at times very vio- lent and impetuous, at others so shallow as to be wholly unfit for navigation (Lucan, ii. 426). The ruins of Luna are situated on the left bank of die MACROBII. Magra, about a mile from the sea, while the cele- brated Port of Luna (the Gulf of Spezia) is some miles distant to the W., and separated from it by an intervening range of hills [Luna]. About 10 miles from its mouth the Magra receives from its W. bank the waters of the Vara, also a formidable torrent, which is in all probabihty the Boactes of Ptolemy (iii. 1. § 3). [E. H. B.] MACRA COME, a place mentioned by Li^y (xxsii. 1 3) along with Sperchiae. Its position is un- certain, but it was perhaps a town of the Aenianes. MACRIS, an island off the coast of Attica, also called Helena. [Helena.] JIACRO'BII (Herod, iii. 17—25 ; Plin. vi. 30. s. 35, vii. 1. s. 2 ; Solin. 30. § 9 ; Mela, iii. 9. § 1), or the long-Uved, might have been briefly enume- rated among the numerous and obscure tribes which dwelt above Philae and the second cataract of the Nile, were it not for the conspicuous nosition as- signed to them by Herodotus. He describes the Macrobii as a strong and opulent nation, remarkable for its stature, beauty and longevity, and, in some respects, as highly civilised. According to this his- torian, a rumour of the abundance of gold in the Macrobian territory stimulated the avarice of the Persian king, Cambyses, who led a great army against them : but in his haste he omitted to pro- vide his host with food and water, and the city was distant many days' journey, and between the Macro- bian land and Egypt lay sandy wastes, and the Per- sians perished through drought and hunger, Cam- byses alone and a small residue of his army returning to Egypt. In the description of Herodotus, the most important point is the geographical position assigned to them. It is in the fiirthest south (cttI rrj vot'ltj ^aXdcrarj, c. 17, to, enx^Ta ttjs yris, c. 25) the limits of the habitable world, according to the know- ledge of Herodotus. The Macrobian land was ac- cordingly beyond the Arabian Gulf, on the shores of the Indian ocean, and in that undefined and illimit- able region called Barbaria by the ancient cosmo- graphers. Travellers and writers on geography have advanced several theories respecting their position in Africa. Bruce {Travels, vol. iv. p. 43) supposes the Ma- crobii to have been a tribe of Shangalla or lowland blacks. Eennell {Geogr. System of Herod, ii. p.29, 2nd edit.) identifies them with the Abyssinians; Heeren {African Nations, vol. ii. pp. 321 — 338) believes them to have been a branch of the Semaleh who occupied the maritime district around Cape Guardafui: -while Kiehnhi {Dissertation on theOeog. of Herod, p. 20) objects to all these surmises, as taking for granted too much knovfledge in Herodotus himself. In the story, as it stands, there is one in- surmountable objection to the position in the far south assigned to them by the historian, and too readily accepted by his modem commentators. No army, much less an oriental army with its many incumbrances, could have marched from Egypt into Abyssinia without previously sending forward maga- zines and securing wells. There were neither roads, nor tanks of water, nor com land nor herbage to be found in a considerable portion of the route {"Vd/iifios, c. 25). Even at the present day no direct commu- nication exists between Aegypt and the land of the Nubians of Somdleh. No single traveller, no caravan, could adventure to proceed by land from the cata- racts to Cape Guardafui. An army far inferior in numbers to the alleged host of Cambyses would in a few davs exhaust the grass and the millet of Nu-