24 THE NUBIANS, THE NUBA i.2.xxiil kingdom, while Meroe became the centre of material wealth and political power.... It was not until a generation or so after the death of Nastasen that the rulers of Meroe introduced a revival of learning and art under the influence of Ptolemaic Egypt and made their capital for the first time the cultural centre of Ethiopia.

XXIV Some further remarks on Meroe and its people will be attempted in the next chapter, but, before leaving the subject of the inhabitants of Nubia proper, we must first turn to the classical geographers of the Ptolemaic period, since they provide certain items of information that are of value.

XXV We have seen that it was Eratosthenes who first used the term Nou/Sat in the third century B.C. As quoted by Strabo he says: On the left side of the course of the Nile live the Noubai, in Libya, a great race, beginning from Meroe and extending as far as the bends [of the river]. They are not subject to the Ethiopians but live independently, being divided into several sovereignties i.

Agathemerus (third century a.d.) in a bald list of African races includes Novoi {sic) on either side of the Nile.

Phny says: "The island of the Semberritae on the Nile obeys a queen. Eight days journey further [north] are the Ethiopian Nubei. Their city of Tenupsis is on the Nile."

Ptolemaeus simply mentions a number of Ethiopian tribes with outlandish names, but contributes nothing definite to our knowledge of them beyond that they lived on the Nile, in the Island of Meroe and beyond, and in the western steppes.

Procopius says of Elephantine (Aswan) in the latter half of the sixth century, "There live, besides many other races, the very large tribes of Blemyes and Nobatae. The former occupy the interior of the country and the latter reside in the Nile valley"; and relates that i apiarepQiv Se t9 pi/ffeois rod Net'Xou NoD/3a£ KaroiKovaiv iv rfj AtOrj, fji.ya idvo%, airb Tijs McpoT/s dpdpLevoi MXP' ™'' iyKdvuv, ovx vvnTaTTo/xfvOL tois Mdibxpiv, dX\' iSiq.

Kai{?) irXeioLs (SatrtXeiats duiXTfj.fj.i'oi. Strabo, ed. Casaubon, xvil, 786.

* Bk. u, Ch. 5, p. 41 ap. Geogr. Minores. Agathemerus wrote in Greek an abridgement of Ptolemy's Geography entitled Geographias Hupotyposis.

' Pliny, Hist. Nat. Bk. vi, § 35. " Insula in Nilo Semberritarum reginae paret. Ab ea Nubei Aethiopes dierum octo itinere. Oppidum eorum Nilo impositum, Tenupsis." For the island of the Semberritae (Sembritae), which is perhaps the district between Kassala and Kallabat, see following chapter.

Pliny also calls some tribe in Syria by the same name of Nubei. "Nee non in media Syriae ad Libanum montem penetrantibus Nubeis, quibus junguntur Ramisi. Deinde Taranei, deinde Patami." (Bk. vi, § 32.)

* Ed. Muller, Bk. iv, 748-783.

De Bella Persico, Bk. I, 59. The text is as follows: ivravda Ovr) re &\\a ttoXXA lOpvrai Kal UX/xvs re /cat Nodrat, TroXvai/OpunrdTaTa •yivi) dXXa IVKifives /.lev rauT7)s 8r} rrji X'l'o.s s TO. pLffa u)Kr}VTai, Nofidrai 8e ra d/x(pl Nei'Xoj' woTaixbv x'"'"''-Procopius was born about 500 and died about 565 a.d.