Page:Early Christianity in Arabia.djvu/102

90 the city of Adulis, but had afterwards risen to rank in the Abyssinian army. Aryat was assisted with fresh supplies from the king of Auxuma, and the opposing armies were preparing to engage, when it was proposed to decide the quarrel by single combat. Abrahah was short and corpulent, his antagonist tall and strong. The latter aimed a spear at his head; but it only slightly wounded his forehead and nose, and the scar which remained procured for him afterwards the surname of Al Ashram, or the split-nosed. Abrahah had with him an attendant called Abûda, who, when he saw his master wounded, flew to his assistance and slew Aryat, and the whole army embraced the cause of his rival.

After the death of Aryat the new king of Hamyar solicited a reconciliation with the nadjash. The latter, if we credit the Arabian histories, had vowed, in the first moments of his rage against the usurper, that he would not lay aside his arms till he had trampled under his feet the land of Abrahah, both mountain and vale, till he had stained his hand in his blood, and dragged him by the hair of the head. To appease the anger of the indignant monarch, Abrahah caused two sacks to be filled with earth collected from the mountains and vales of Hamyar, he suffered himself also to be bled, and filled a small bottle with his blood; to these he added some locks of hair which he had cut from his head. "O king,"