Page:The Northern Ḥeǧâz (1926).djvu/201

 ruins of an old building. These are the remains of the sanctuary of Ṛwâfa, by which we dismounted at 7.35 A. M. (Figs. 70, 71, 72). In front of the wall there is a caved-in well, behind the wall a large burial place on the old building site, and about five hundred meters farther to the southwest, at the foot of the rocks of al-Mesâbe, a rain water well, mšâš, near which stood eight camels. A larger well, known as al-Lâwi, is situated about five kilometers to the southwest of Ṛwâfa. I ordered Šerîf, Sbejḥ, and Muṭalleḳ to lead our camels away immediately to the well and to give them plenty to drink there. Ḫalîl was to guard our baggage while I examined the ruins. I found it difficult to sketch their plan. Nothing was left except the above-mentioned wall; the rest of the foundation walls had been covered up by large stones, which we could not remove in order to draw a sketch plan. On the building site among some stones I discovered one stone with a Greek inscription and another with a Nabataean inscription. Among the building material I perceived a stone more than two meters long, which I regarded as an architrave. Surmising that there might be some inscriptions upon it, with the help of Tûmân I scraped away some of the smaller stones with which it was covered and endeavored to insert my hand beneath it. From under the stone a snake ran out; after thrusting my stick underneath to make sure that no more snakes were concealed there, I rummaged beneath its lower portion and by my sense of touch traced the cuttings of separate letters. When our comrades had come back from the well, we turned the stone over. On it was carved a long Nabataean and Greek inscription of which I prepared two molds.

The spelling of the name of this building is uncertain. I recorded Ṛwâfa and Rwâfa; my companions, speaking the vernacular, said that it is generally known as Rwâfa, but the old natives call the ruins Ṛwâfa. According to the bilingual inscription, the sanctuary was built by the Thamudenoi tribe at the beginning of the second half of the second century of our era.

We should have liked to have remained at least two days by these ruins and, with the help of the Ḥwêṭât camping not far away, to have cleared the débris, examined the separate stones, and drawn an accurate plan. Among the stones there are certainly many others with inscriptions, and possibly more records are buried beneath the building material. We were