Page:Early Christianity in Arabia.djvu/157

Rh

the reign of Yecsoum, the son and successor of Abrahah, the page of history has not preserved a single particular. His mother was of the ancient royal family of Hamyar. Arabian writers declaim against his cruelties and tyrannic oppressions of the people, which drove many to seek protection from the tribe of Koreish, whose victory over his predecessor had raised them to importance among the Arabian tribes. The only Greek writer who mentions him, and whose authority may be doubted, calls him Serdius, and informs us that he resembled his father in justice and piety.

When the chiefs of Hamyar saw that the dominion of the Abyssinian conquerors continued, and that the crown of their country descended in regular succession through a family whom they considered as usurpers, and whose treatment of their subjects caused them now to be regarded as tyrants, they began to conspire for their expulsion. The last of the old royal race of Hamyar was Seif, the son of Dzu