Page:The age of Justinian and Theodora (Volume 1).djvu/215

 of emeralds lay in the uncivilized territory between Egypt and Axume, where the mines were worked by a ferocious tribe of nomads called Blemmyes. From them the Axumite merchants obtained the gems, which they exported chiefly to northern India. Amongst the White Huns, the dominant race in that region, they were esteemed so highly that the traders were enabled to load their ships with the proceeds of a few of these precious stones.

Down the Red Sea to Adule resorted the Byzantine merchants, engaged in the home trade, in great numbers. After loading their vessels they again sailed northward, a proportion of them to the small island of Jotabe, situated near the apex of the peninsula of Mount Sinai, which separated the Elanitic from the Heroopolitan gulf. At a station there they were awaited by the officials of the excise, who collected from them a tenth part of the value of their merchandise. Some of these ships proceeded up the eastern arm of the sea to Elath; the rest of them chose the western inlet and