Page:The Northern Ḥeǧâz (1926).djvu/15



In 1896, at the request of Dr. Fr. Ladislav Rieger, the Czech Academy of Sciences and Arts made me a grant for the purpose of carrying out explorations in Arabia Petraea. In 1908, after the fruits of these explorations had been published, the Academy, as a result of the intercession of its founder and first president, Mr. Joseph Hlávka, made me a new grant which provided funds for my investigations in Arabia proper. Therefore it is with a profound sense of obligation that I dedicate the first part of this new scientific work to the Academy which has done so much to make it possible.

To Dr. J. K. Wright the author owes a debt of gratitude for his services as editor of this volume.

The skeleton of the accompanying map of the Northern Ḥeǧâz was based on my detailed itinerary, determinations of latitude, and extensive plane-table surveys. The Ḥeǧâz Railway was drawn according to the sketch lent to me by the Board of the Railway at Damascus; the Red Sea coast according to the British Admiralty chart. In filling in the parts not previously investigated I have made use of many sketches obtained from the natives. The northwestern part of the map I have compared and checked with the map in Sir Richard F. Burton’s The Land of Midian, 2 vols., London, 1879. To ascertain the elevations we took readings of three aneroid barometers examined before and after the trip at the Military Geographical Institute at Vienna. The Directorate of this Institute has determined the heights above sea level by comparing our observations with those taken simultaneously at the stations at Jerusalem and Beirut.

To the spelling of the proper names I have given great attention, since names correctly spelled may form the basis of historical investigation. In transliterating Arabic sounds I have used the same signs as in my Arabia Petraea and Ḳuṣejr ‛Amra. I have endeavored to express every sound by a single letter or a single symbal. The meaning of the different symbols will be found by experts below the title of the map of the Northern Ḥeǧâz. For the general reader I would point