Page:The Northern Ḥeǧâz (1926).djvu/324

 by his enemies but also, on account of his severity, by the barbarians who pay him allegiance. The palm oasis now belongs to the Emperor but only nominally, because it can only be reached after a ten days’ march through a territory devoid of people or water.—

Procopius does not state exactly the borders of the province of Palestine. A thousand stades (i. e. about 150 kilometers) from Aila, or the modern settlement of al-ʻAḳaba, brings us through the gulf to Iotabe; and this, according to the account given by Procopius, is situated at the very entrance to the Gulf of Aila, or the modern Gulf of al-ʻAḳaba. Iotabe, as we have already seen, was the third or fourth name by which this islet had been known. The statement made by Procopius, that it then belonged to free Hebrew traders, is interesting. They were perhaps the original toll gatherers, who as time progressed failed to deliver up the collected toll, until they were again compelled to do so during the reign of Justinian. The presence of Hebrews on this islet is not strange, for at that time there were larger or smaller Hebrew settlements in all the cities and in numerous villages in Arabia near by. They could not have been independent for long, as in the year 490 A. D. the administration of the islet by a Roman commander was renewed. It seems that Iotabe and the adjacent eastern islets still belonged to the province of Palestina Tertia. It is a pity that Procopius does not define the frontiers more carefully. According to him, Palestina Tertia then extended as far as the beginning of the Gulf of al-ʻAḳaba, or as far as the northern frontier of Arabia called Felix. The Saracens camping on the coast acknowledged the supremacy of Abocharab, who ruled over the great palm oasis which he offered to the Emperor Justinian. It is exceedingly regrettable that Procopius does not give the name of this oasis. His statement that it can be reached by a ten days’ march does not help us to fix it more closely, because we do not know whether he means the march of camel caravans or riders on camels, and we do not know the starting point. If we admit the palm oasis is ten days’ march from the shore in the vicinity of the islet of Iotabe, to which Procopius has just referred, and that he means riders on camels, then ten days’ journey in a northeasterly direction at the rate of fifty kilometers a day will bring us to the great palm oasis of Dûmat al-Ǧandal (al-Ǧowf), which from Iotabe is reached by a road actually through territory devoid of people or water. The palm oasis of Dajdân, or the modern al-ʻEla’, is situated about 360 kilometers to the east of Iotabe; but this distance does not tally either with the speed of a camel rider or of a goods caravan. Ten days’ march of a trading caravan from the shore near the islet of Iotabe in an easterly direction leads to the oasis of Tebûk, 180 kilometers away; yet I do not think that we can identify Tebûk with the palm oasis referred to by Procopius, because the former was never large, and the authority exerted by its chief was never equal to that of the rulers of the oasis of al-Ǧowf, which commanded two or three important trade routes. Moreover, the oasis of Tebûk is situated comparatively close to the frontiers of the province of Palestine, so that connection with it was convenient and the stronger dux of that province could easily rule it.

The Arabic writers do not describe as carefully as the Greeks either the Gulf of al-ʻAḳaba or the eastern shore of the Red Sea bordering upon it or the islets situated near it.