CHAPTER 13

(a) THE RASHAIDA AND ZEBAYDfA

I The Rashai'da are recent immigrants from Arabia. A number of them crossed the Red Sea and took up their abode between Tokar and the Eritrean border in 1846, and of these some pushed farther

west to graze on the Atbara in Berber Province. Until the Dervish

revolt they were a comparatively wealthy people, but they were then

plundered unmercifully, and the survivors fled for refuge to Massawa.

After the reoccupation they returned to the Atbara and the Kash, and they have since been joined by considerable numbers of other

Rashai'da from the Hegaz. Others are in Eritrea. They are camel-owning nomads and perhaps number at present between 1000 and 2000 men in the Red Sea and Berber Provinces^.

The Zebaydia of the Eastern Sudan are also comparatively recent immigrants from Arabia, where their main habitat is round the small

port of Rabigh, a nest of pirates between Yenbu' and Jedda. There

their immediate neighbours to the north are the Guhayna^.

II It has already been mentioned in dealing with the Beni Rashid and ZiUD Bakkara of Wadai and Bornu that the former really include

the latter and that one of their main divisions are the Zebada, who

claim a Himyaritic origin. The identity of the names "Beni Rashid," "Rowashda" and "Rashai'da" was also noticed; also the fact that

the Zebaydia of Arabia are a section of the Harb, who have always been neighbours of the Guhayna and who accompanied the latter in

large numbers to the Sudan and were equally concerned with them

in forming the Bakkara congeries. It is clear therefore that the influx

of Rashaida and Zebaydia to the Eastern Sudan is not confined to modern times but that it had its counterpart several centuries ago when the ancestors of the Beni Rashid and Ziud crossed over to

Africa, and, instead of remaining in the east, pushed through Kordo-

fan and Darfur and, leaving a certain number of their men among the

other Bakkara in those provinces, settled in Bornu and Wadai.

The name of the Zebaydia is a very ancient one and is taken from

Zebid, a town in the Yemen. The town, in its turn, may derive its

^ The section in Berber is the Zenaymat, subdivided into Dui 'Aid, Halamat, Duf Beraghith, Huaygat, Kezafza, 'Awazim and 'Araynat. Those in the Red Sea Province are Bara'asa (subdivided into Dui 'Amri Shenanlr and Geladfn), and Baratfkh (subdivided into Manaffr, 'Ayamirat, etc.).

- See too Burckhardt, Notes... 11, 36 and 37.