IV. D 3. OF THE SUDAN
291
2. (also of the rain) w*U.~JL> U ^jJ:^ w>l.o UL». jj!, i.e. "if it pour down upon us what matter the clouds to us."
The idea in both cases is that the primary consideration is that rain should fall : whether its coming is foretold by clouds or whether the houses are rainproof are secondary matters. Note the play on words in the first quotation.
96. These two brothers are only allotted four lines in the text: they
lived at a date rather beyond our author's ken, i.e. about the middle of the sixteenth century.
Hildlia {sic) is between el Kamlin and el Rufa'a on the east bank. 97. Gad el Nebi is mentioned again in No. 127. The text gives no further details.
99. The title is olUI^I^.^ ^JUbU. but the ^ should be interpreted
as "or" instead of "and"; or jl may be read. An exactly similar case arises in No. 103; and the inference is that the author was copying the names from a MS.: the writing of G and H only differs by a single dot, whereas the sound of the two letters is absolutely distinct. The text here
and in No. 103 speaks as though one man and not two was intended.
loi . " £/ Gdma'i el Kordofdli," i.e. one of the Gawama'a of Kordofan (or Kordofal) : for the spelling of the latter word see MacMichael, Tribes..., p. 223, and cp. No. 102.
Auli is a hill about 26 miles south of Khartoum.
Busdti was no doubt so named after the son of Ghanim's teacher el Arbab (see No. 94).
" Walad KaddF' is perhaps son of No. 147; but see notes to Nos. 124 and 125. 'Ayesha is mentioned again in No. 154.
102. There is nothing in the text, which is translated practically com-
plete, to show who Edoma was.
Godatidla in No. 207 is called "Muhammad Godatulla."
103. Cp. note to No. 99.
105. For the meaning of " Nesi" see No. 90. Cp. D i, cxviii. 106. Shaiibdt is a few miles north of Khartoum. 107. Here note an instance of the common occurrence of a man being
known not by his father's name but his mother's: cp. sub Nos. 17, 46 and 85. Note also the almost universal mistake of writing a ^^ for an c
(^it.rfl)' for i-fawijl). In the Sudan the ^J is pronounced in ordinary dialect like a hard g but any one desirous of being thought learned pronounces it deliberately as gh (c), and hence the fekis being used to pronounce
the J as gh generally spell proper names really containing a c with a ^^.
This Hagu is called Hagu "Abu Kurn" in Jackson (Yacubabi Tribe) and appears to have been one of the most famous of a famous family. His
mother Batul appears as such in Jackson's Tree, but Ya'akub (No. 254), the eponymous ancestor of the Ya'akubab, is there shown as Hagu's brother, and son of Batul, instead of brother of Batul. Jackson's Tree being based on oral information is probably wrong, and the detailed consistency of the
Tabakdt is probably correct. The Ya'akubab too told Jackson that Batul's
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