The tribe
o f Ad.
The moft famous tribes amongft thefe ancient Arabians were Ad,
Thamud, Tafm, Jadis, the former Jorbam, and Amalek.
The tribe of Ad were defeended from Ad, the fon of Aws', the
fon of Aram \ the fon of Sem, the fon of Noah, who after the con-
fufion of tongues fettled in al Ahkdf or the winding fands in the province
of Hadramaut, where his pofterity greatly multiplyed. Their
firft king was Sheddd the fon o f Ad, of whom the eaftern writers
deliver many fabulous things, particularly that he finifhed the magnificent
city his father had begun, wherein he built a fine palace,
adorned with delicious gardens, to embellilh which he fpared neither
coft nor labour, propofing thereby to create in his fubjedts a fuper-
ftitious veneration of himfelf as a G od ». This garden pr paradife
was called the garden of Irem, and is mentioned in the Koran \ and
often alluded to by the oriental writers. The city, they tell us, is ftill
ftanding in the defarts of Aden, being preferved by providence as a
monument of divine juftice, tho’- it be invifible, unlefs very rarely,
when G od permits it to be feen, a favour one Colabah pretended to have
received in the reign of the Khalif Modwiyah, who fending for him to
know the truth of the matter, Colabah related his whole adventure;
that as he was feeking a camel he had loft, he found himfelf on a
fudden at the gates of this city, and entering it faw not one inhabitant,
at which being terrified, he flayed no longer than to take
with him fome fine ftones which he fhewed the Khalif7 -,
The defeendants of Ad in procefs o f time falling from the worlhip
o f the true G od into idolatry, G od fent the prophet Hud (who is
generally agreed to be Hebers) to preach to and reclaim them. But
they refilling to acknowledge his million, or to obey him, G od fent
a hot and fuffocating wind, which blew feven nights and eight days
together, and entring at their noftrils paft thro’ their bodies 7, and
deftroved them all, a very few only excepted, who had believed in
Hud, and retired with him to another place8. That prophet afterwards
returned into Hadramaut, and was buried near Hafec, where
' there is a fmall town now ftanding called Kabr Hud, or the fepulchre
of Hud. Before the Adites were thus feverely punilhed, G od to
humble them, and incline them to hearken to the preaching o f his
prophet, afflifted them with a drought for four years, fo that all
their cattle perilhed, and themfelves were very near it; upon which
1 Or Uz. Gen. x. 22. 23. 2 V. Kor. c. 89. Some make Ad the fon of Amalek, the Ion of
"Ham ; but the other is the received opinion. See D’Herbel. 51. 3 V. Eund. 498. 4 Cap. 89.
< D*Hcrbel. 51. 6 The Jews acknowledge Heber to have been a great prophet. Seder Qlam. p. 2.
7 A l Beidawi. 8 Poc. Spec. 35. Ac,
they fent Lokmdn (different from one of the fame name who lived in
David’s time) with 60 others to Mecca to beg rain, which they not
obtaining, Lokmdn with fome of his company ftaid at Mecca, and thereby
efcaped deftruftion, giving rife to a tribe called the latter Ad, who
were afterward changed into monkeys.1.
Some commentators on the Koran1 tell us thefe old Adites were
of prodigious ftature, the largeft being ioo cubits high, and the leaft
60; which extraordinary fize they pretend to prove by the teftimony
of the KoranK „ , ,
The tribe of Thamud were the pofterity of Thamud the fon of Grf- JrL Z 'l.
ther4 the fon of Aram, who falling into idolatry, the prophet it aleb
was fent to bring them back to the worlhip of the true G o d . This
prophet lived between the time of Hud and of Abraham, and therefore
cannot be the fame with the patriarch Selah, as Mr. dHerbelot
imagines7. The learned Bochart with more probability takes him to
be Phaleg6. A fmall number of the people o f Thamud hearkened to
the remonftrances o f Saleh, but the reft requiring, as a proof of his
million, that he Ihould caufe a Ihe-camel big with young to come
out of a rock in their prefence, he accordingly obtained it of G o d ,
and the camel was immediately, delivered of a young one ready weaned;
but they inftead of believing, cut the hamftrings of the camel
and killed her; at which aft of impiety G od being highly difpleafed,
three days after ftruck them dead in their houfes by an earthquake
and a terribe noife from heaven, which, fome7 fay, was the voice of
Gabriel the archangel crying aloud, Die all o f you. Saleh with thole
who were reformed by him, were faved from this deftiuftion; the
prophet going into Palejline, and from thence to Mecca , where he
ended his days. TJ
This tribe firft dwelt in Taman, but being expelled thence by Ham-
yar the fon of Saba*, they fettled in the territory o f Hejr in the
province of Hejdz, where their habitations cut out of the rocks,
mentioned in the Koran'0, are ftill to be feen, and alfo the crack of
the rock whence the camel iffued, which as an eye witnefs“ hath
declared, is 60 cubits wide. Thefe houfes of the Thamudites being
of the ordinary proportion, are ufed as an argument to convince thole
o f a miftake who make this people to have been of a gigantic
ftature
I Poc. Spec. 36. 2 JalKlo’ddin & Zamakhlhari. 7 Kor. c. 7. 4 ° r Gether. V. Gen. x. 23.
1 D’Herbcl. Bibl. Orient. 740. ‘ Bochart Geogr. Sac. ƒ See D’Herbel. 366- 8 Ebn
Shohnah. 8 Poc.Spec. 57. 10 Kor. cap. 25. 1' Abu Mufa al Alhan. V. Poc. Spec. 37.