Between Bir And Feluchia, There Are Certain Places On The
Euphrates Where You Have To Pay Custom, Being So Many
_Medins_ for a
_some_ or camels load, together with certain quantities of raisins and
soap, which are for the sons
Of _Aborise_, who is lord of the Arabs and
of that great desert, and hath some villages on the river. Feluchia,
where the goods coming from Bir are unladed, is a small village, from
whence you go to Bagdat in one day.
Babylon, or Bagdat, is not a very large town, but is very populous, and
much frequented by strangers, being the centre of intercourse between
Persia, Turkey, and Arabia, caravans going frequently from it to these
and other countries. It is well supplied with provisions, which are
brought from Armenia down the river Tigris, upon rafts made of goat skin
bags blown full of wind, over which boards are laid, on which the goods
are loaded. When these are discharged, the skin bags are opened and
emptied of air, and are then carried back to Armenia on camels to serve
again. Bagdat belonged formerly to Persia, but is now subject to the
Turks. Over against Bagdat, on the other side of the Tigris, is a very
fair village, to which there is a passage across from Bagdat by a long
bridge of boats, connected by a vast iron chain made fast at each side
of the river. When any boats have to pass up or down the river, a
passage is made for them by removing some of the boats of this bridge.
The Tower of Babel is on this side of the Tigris towards Arabia, about
seven or eight miles from Bagdat, being now ruined on all sides, and
with the ruins thereof hath made a little mountain, so that no shape or
form of a tower remains. It was built of bricks dried in the sun, having
canes and leaves of the palm-tree laid between the courses of bricks. It
stands in a great plain between the Tigris and Euphrates, and no
entrance can be any where seen for going into it.
Near the river Euphrates, two days journey from Bagdat, in a field near
a place called _Ait_, there is a hole in the ground which continually
throws out boiling pitch accompanied by a filthy smoke, the pitch
flowing into a great field which is always full of it. The _Moors_ call
this opening the mouth of hell; and on account of the great abundance
of the pitch, the people of the country daub all their boats two or
three inches thick with it on the outside, so that no water can enter
them. These boats are called _danec_. When there is plenty of water in
the Tigris, the boats may go down from Bagdat to Basora in eight or nine
days; but when the water is low it requires a longer time.
In times past, Basora belonged to the Arabs, but is now subject to the
Turks.
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