2 See the Table at p. cxlix. Some hold that Codhaa was descended from Maadd the Ishmaelite ancestor of Mahomet, and that his posterity settled in Yemen and became confounded with that or Himyar. But the legend is unlikely, and probably originated in the desire of the Codhaites to participate in the sacred descent from Ishmael. It shows however, how uncertain is Mahometan tradition of remote events. M. C.de Perceval vol. I. p. 207.
3 By the Meccan tribe I designate the ancestors or the Coreish running up to Adnan, and those of their descendants who continued in the neighbourhood and attached to Mecca.
4 By some the establishment of this town has been referred back to the time of Nebucanadnezzar II. who is said to have left here the captives carried off in his inroad into Arabia. But this is a mere hypothesis of the Arab historians, who are very expert in imagining such causes for the origin of towns and kingdoms. Another theory is that Tibban Asad Abu Carib, king or Yemen, left here his invalid soldiers; but his expedition did not take place till about 235 A.D. a considerable time after the foundation both of Hira and Anbar. The question is not one or much importance. The main point is undoubted, viz. that the kingdom of Hira originated in an Arab colony.
5 These consisted of three classes. I. The Ibad, or inhabitants of Hira and its environs. II The Tonukhites, or Arabs (Bedouin), who had immigrated from Arabia into the neighboring country. III. The Ahlaf, their dues. The two latter dwelt in tents, and lived a nomad life on the pasture lands adjoining the Euphrates.
6 According to some his daughter.
7 Her speech on this occasion.
"Let me fail by my own hand, not by the hand of the son of Adi" is proverbial.
So also the proverb
"It was for an important end Cusseir cut off his nose" - refers to the stratagem by
which Cusseir, the minister of Adi, ingratiated himself with Zebba, representing that he had fled from the cruelty of Adi's son who had mutilated his nose. He became her merchant, and introduced the soldiers, in the manner stated above, as a new investment of goods. M. C. de Perceval, Vol. ii, p.38. The whole of these circumstances, with many fabulous adjuncts, will be found in Price's Essay on Arabic: antecedent to Mohammed, chap. iv. Price's work is simply a compilation of Persian histories and legends, without any attempt at historical discrimination.
It is evident that these proverbs have an individual and exclusive reference to the incidents related, and must have taken their rise in those events, or in the popular tradition of them. Such is not the case with the great majority of the Arab proverbs mentioned by M. C. de Perceval in the coarse of his history as originating in special events or speeches: these are mostly of a general nature and, having nothing personal about them, are equally applicable to many different occasions. Thus, the adage "Sweet honey in a bad jar" (vol ii. p.651), or "After disarming comes captivity, and after captivity death," (ibid. p. 578,) might arise out of a thousand different circumstances.
8 See the account or these events in Gibbon's Decline and Fall chaps. x. and xi.; M. C. de Perceval vol. ii. p.193 et seq. If we followed only the similarity of names, Zenobia would stand for Zeinab, the sister of Zebba. It is remarkable that a Zabda or Zaba is also mentioned by the Greek and Roman authors, and Vopiscus speaks of "Zenobiam, et Zabam, ejus Sociam, as if the latter were a female: but as the person who went by that name was Zenobia's general in Egypt, the feminine gender must be a mistake, and the correspondence with the Arabic name occidental. Certainly the character of Zenobia agrees only with that of
Zebba. M. C. de Perceval vol. ii. p.30, note 4.
9 Consult the account given of her character and fortunes by Gibbon. Decline and Fall, chap. xi.
10 This subject illustrates the feeble authority of unsupported Mahometan history of remote date.-" Les Arabes ont travesti l'histoire de Zenobie; ils font jouer au roi de Hira Amr fils D'Adi, le rote de l'empereur Aurellen dans le denuoment du drame. Amr fils D'Adi ponvait avoir soutenu quelque guerre contre Zenobie; il aura suffi aux anteurs de la legende, pour lui attribuer la catastrophe de Zenobie on Zebba, que le renversement de la puissance de cette reine ait eu lieu sous son regne." M. C. de Perceval, vol.i. p.199. Gibbon has well drawn the same conclusion from a vital omission in the narrative of the East: -"So little has been preserved of eastern history before Mahomet, that the modern Persians are totally ignorant of the victory of Sapor, an event so glorious to their nation." Decline and Fall, chap. x. Mahometans look with coldness and indiference upon any conquests before the time of Islam; their nationality dates only from their Prophet. M. C. de Perceval vol. ii. p.21; Price's Essay, as above, p.121, et seq.
11 See p. clix, and Table at cxlix.
12 This final result of the struggle may possibly have given the turn to the legend which connects the fall of Zenobia with the princes of Hira M. C. de Perceval vol. ii. p.46.
13 M. C. de Perceval mentions on the authority of do Lequien (Oriens Christianus, ii. 1078,) that some Roman captives brought to Babylonia, inroduced Christianity there about 271 A.D.. Even apart from such cause, it is probable that, in the ordinary course of diffusion, Christianity had reached across the desert by that period. But the court of Hira was addicted to idolatry for some time after.
14 Hence "to recieve the reward of Sinnimar," means to be treated ungratefully.
15 This was the period when Yerdegird distinguished himself by the persecution of Christianity, 416 A.D.
16 Nearly two centuries afterwards the Poet Adi made allusion to this fact in the following verses, addressed as an admonition to Noman V. his pupil, and a descendant of this prince:-
Reflect upon the Lord of Khawarnac, (for reflection leadeth to wisdom,) how, when one day he looked abroad from his battlements
His heart was entranced by the view or his wealth, the multitude of his possessions, the river that flowed beneath him, and the palace of Sedir : --
But suddenly his heart smote him, and he said, What is there to be envied in the living (possessor of all these things), seeing that he hasteth unto the dead?"
Sedir was another famous country palace, which Noman built for himself. M. C. de Perceval vol.ii. p. 59.
17 Cnf Gibbon, chap. xxxii. These facts are of course gathered from the Greek and Latin authorities alone.
18 Joshua the Stylite, a contemporary historian, calls these invaders Thalabites. Their leader is also called by Theophanes "Aretas surnamed Thalabanes,"
19 He is called by the Greek historians
20 They appear to have coalesced with the Manicheans. Indeed the Greeks
call both by the latter name: and the Arabs both by the term Zenudica Chap. xlii. of Gibbon's Decline and Fall may be consulted for the details of this period.
21 It is however somewhat suspicious that this scene,
so critical for the Christians of the East, should have been enacted just as the embassy
happened to be there. The account may be coloured and exaggerated but even its invention
would have been in the highest degree improbable had Mundzir been a Christian.
22 It was through the exercise or the influence thus acquired, that Mundzir III. put a stop to the desolating war, (the war of Basus,) which so long raged between the Bakr and Taghlib tribes; and forced them to send to the court of Hira eighty young men yearly as pledges of peace. These formed the corps of the Rahain, and were regarded as the flower of Arab chivalry. The greater part, if not the whole or the Maaddite tribe (i.e. those of Meccan origin) submitted themselves to Hira.
23 In these lengthened campaigns the private disputes of their respective vassals not unfrequently embroiled the Persian and Roman Governments themselves, or were at least the ostensible cause of war. The following is an example: - "Unpractised in the art of violating treaties, he (the Persian King,) secretly excited his bold and subtle vassal Almondar. That prince of the Saracens, who resided at Hira, had not been included in the general peace, and still waged an obscure war against his rival Arethas, (i.e. Harith V.) the chief of the tribe of Ghassan, and confederate of the empire. The subject of their dispute was an extensive sheep-walk in the desert to the south of Palmyra. An immemorial tribute for the license of pasture appeared to attest the rights or Almondar, while the Ghassinide appealed to the Latin name of Strata, it paved road, as an unquestionable evidence of the sovereignty and labours of the Romans. The two monarchs supported the cause of their respective vassals; and the Persian Arab, without expecting the event of a slow and doubtful arbitration, enriched his flying camp with the spoil and captives or Syria" Gibbon's Decline and Fall chap. xlii; M. C. de Perceval, vol. ii. p.98.
24 In 528 A.D. Mundzir appeared in the vicinity of Antioch, and burnt the suburbs of Chalcis (Kinasrin). By the time the Roman troops were put in motion, he had regained the desert with a multitude of captives. M. C. de Perceval, vol. ii. p.93. This is not to he confounded with the invasion of Syria and sack of Antioch by Chosroes in 540 A.D. Gibbon, chap. xlii.
25 An incident in one of these Syrian campaigns throws light on the religious practices of the northern Arabs. In the year 541 A.D. Belisarius having convoked a council of war two Roman officers in command of Syrian garrisons declined to follow the army to Nisibis, on the plea that their absence would leave Syria and Phenicia exposed to the attacks of Mundzir. Belisarius argued that as the summer solstice was at hand, when the Arabs devoted two months to the rites of their religion without resorting to arms, there was no cause for apprehension; and he promised to let them go when that period was expired. These were the months of Meccan pilgrimage: and hence we learn that Mundzir and the majority of his Arabs followed the religion of the Hejaz. On turning to the chronological tables of M. C. de Perceval, we find that at the period referred to the Meccan pilgrimage actually fell at the summer solstice ; - singular coincidence in confirmation of his system and calculations.
In another place Procopius loosely states, that Mundzir having made prisoner a son of the Ghassanide prince, immolated him to Venus. By Venus he may possibly mean Lat or Ozza.
26 This is the account of the Greek historians; the Arabs make him perish in a battle with the Ghassanide army.
27 The city poets were regarded as inferior to the free poets of the desert.
28 See the statement at p. cxcv.
29 His grandfather was secretary to Noman III., and his father director of the Post. On the death of Noman IV. his father was placed by the people in temporary charge of the government.
30 This occurred on a Maundy Thursday, - with such detail has the narrative been preserved.
31 It is said that he was won over from idolatry to Christianity thus: The prince and his preceptor chanced in their walks to pass by a cemetery situated between the city and the river. Adi said, "Dost thou know what the inhabitants of these tombs say? This is their language,"
"Oh ye company of travellers hasting along upon the earth and labouring! Like you, we lived like us, ye too shall die! Many a company have made their camels kneel down around as ; - And as they halted, quaffed wine mingled with the limpid stream; - The morning passed away, and lo! they had become the sport of time; - Even thus is time but one change following upon another." Noman was deeply moved by the solemn warning conveyed in these touching lines, and embraced the Christian faith. Others say that Simeon, the bishop of Hira delivered him from a demon by which he had been possessed: and that he then became a Christian. Under any circumstances it is agreed that he was converted before his accession to the throne. M. C. de Perceval, vol.11. p.143.
", or son of the Thalabitess. The Arab historians tell us that the invaders were of the Bani Bakr, which corresponds with the title given them by the Greek writers as including the great branch of the descendants of Thalaba, the fourth in descent from Bakr son of Wail. It is remarkable that Harith's mother was descended from Thalaba, though his father was or the tribe of Kinda. The Matronymic of the Greek historian thus singularly coincides with the facts given us by the Arabs; and the coincidence imparts credibility to the whole narrative.
or Al Mundzir, the descendent of Sheikika. M. C. de Perceval, by an ingenious and apparently sound deduction, checks by means of this title a confusion in the chronology of the Arab historians themselves. Some of them misguided by the similarity of name, make Shakika the mother or Noman I.; whereas she must have been the wife of his son Mundzir I. and mother of Noman the Second, who was the ancestor of Mundzir III. in the text. Mundzir I. had a second wife, Hind, the mother of Mundzir II.; and to distinguish Mundzir III. from him, he was styled by the Arabs "the descendant of Shakika." But had Shakika been the wife of Mundzir the First's father, the title would have been meaningless, as applying to Mundzir II. as well as to Munzir III. The phrase 
preserved by the Greeks from the Arab currency of the day, thus ingeniously applied, serves to correct the later Arab authorities. M. C. de Perceval, vol ii. p. 77.
