The Consequence Was
A Walled Circuit Upon The Present Site Of Zayla:
Of its old locality
almost may be said "periere ruinae."
During my stay with Sharmarkay I made many inquiries about historical
works, and the Kazi; Mohammed Khatib, a Harar man of the Hawiyah tribe,
was at last persuaded to send his Daftar, or office papers, for my
inspection. They formed a kind of parish register of births, deaths,
marriages, divorces, and manumissions. From them it appeared that in A.H.
1081 (A.D. 1670-71) the Shanabila Sayyids were Kazis of Zayla and retained
the office for 138 years. It passed two generations ago into the hands of
Mohammed Musa, a Hawiyah, and the present Kazi is his nephew.
The origin of Zayla, or, as it is locally called, "Audal," is lost in the
fogs of Phoenician fable. The Avalites [2] of the Periplus and Pliny, it
was in earliest ages dependent upon the kingdom of Axum. [3] About the
seventh century, when the Southern Arabs penetrated into the heart of
Abyssinia [4], it became the great factory of the eastern coast, and rose
to its height of splendour. Taki el Din Makrizi [5] includes under the
name of Zayla, a territory of forty-three days' march by forty, and
divides it into seven great provinces, speaking about fifty languages, and
ruled by Amirs, subject to the Hati (Hatze) of Abyssinia.
In the fourteenth century it became celebrated by its wars with the kings
of Abyssinia: sustaining severe defeats the Moslems retired upon their
harbour, which, after an obstinate defence fell into the hands of the
Christians.
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