Abstract
Unknown Tribes in Arabia.—An account of a journey undertaken in 1928 in a part of S.E. Arabia previously untrodden by Europeans, is given by Mr. Bertram Thomas in the Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, vol. 59, part 1. The journey of 650 miles from Suwaih to lJhufar occupied 48 days. From Wadi Sarab (lat. 20.10: long. 57.45 E.) to Salala, capital of Dhufar (lat. 17.20: long. 54.6 E.) is the habitat of a group of five tribes which are racially distinct from the Semitic Arabs, speaking four dialects not understood by Arabs, and having closer affinities with Ethiopia than Arabia. There are Harasīs, Bautāhara, Mahra, Qara, and Shahara. They are clearly a block of non-Arab tribes of great local antiquity, and as regards the last four, at least, of Hamitic origin. They have an ancient tradition of a North African origin. They have many interesting and perhaps unique customs. The women are not veiled and tattoo the chin with a short vertical line with a dot on each side. Some have a bracelet-like design round the wrist. In Dhufar they paint the face red, black, and green for religious festivals, marriages, circumcisions, etc.—generally a line along the edge of the cheek under the cheekbone and one bridging the nose across the eyebrows. The men are not tattooed. The women shave a half-inch parting along the centre of the top of the head and around the forehead to show a large expanse of brow. The boys' hair is cut short except for an inch wide strip. The men shave clean except for the chin tuft by which they swear. Circumcision is universal, the boys at adolescence, the girls on the day of birth or the second day, the reverse of the custom in Oman, where the ages are 6 for boys and 10 years for girls. In Dhufar elaborate rites are performed in which, after the operation, the boy, carrying a sword, is chased three times round the assembly by an unveiled virgin, also holding a sword. A wife must not show grief at the death of her husband. With the Qara death is a time of wholesale sacrifice of cattle, camels, and sheep. Special reverence is shown for the cow, especially at milking, which is a male prerogative. It is shameful for a woman to touch the udders. This reverence for the cow is completely reversed in Oman, where milking is only fit for women, and the cow is almost an unclean animal. The Harasis will neither milk nor slaughter their sheep in sunlight, andtwo breeds of sheep no tribesman whatsoever will slaughter until after dark.
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Research Items. Nature 124, 705–707 (1929). https://doi.org/10.1038/124705a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/124705a0