1. 3. XXIV. AND THE NUBA OF MERGE 45

in the first part of the fourth century, the period of the Flavian and Antonine Emperors, a revival of trade occurred in both countries. The buildings erected at this period at Basa, el Musowwarat and Naka (the Graeco-Roman temple), all probably the work of a single

dynasty, represent, in Crowfoot's words, "a bye-product of the

imperial prosperity, directly due to the overflow of Romano-Egyptian

energy and wealth beyond the imperial boundaries^."

XXIII Thus we are left with a general impression of the outlying

districts of the Island of Meroe as peopled during the centuries

immediately preceding and following the Christian era by half- nomadic half-sedentary indigenous savages living by the chase and

sparse cultivation of the soil. To the south was the colony founded by the Automoloi or Sembritae, who were probably of Egyptian, but

possibly of Libyan origin. To the north lay the comparatively highly

civilized town of Meroe shewing both a successive predominance of

Egyptian, Greek and Roman influences and also a certain measure

of indebtedness to the Himyarites of southern Arabia.

There seems to be little evidence to date that the ruler of Meroe

exercised at any period a permanent control inland and southwards

further afield than Gebel Kayli and Gebel Moya^.

XXIV Meroe, standing at the meeting of several great trade routes, owed most of its fame and prosperity to the popularity and acces-

sibility of its markets. North and south were the riverways, west- wards the road to Napata, eastwards the great caravan route which

crosses the Atbara and runs to the Red Sea ports, and southwards

the wddi routes which tap the cornlands and grazing areas of the Hawad and Abu Delayk.

Meroe thus formed an excellent site for an emporium where

slaves, ivory and gold might be obtained by exchange^.

^ Crowfoot, loc. cit. pp. 37-39.

^ There is a rock at I^ayli with a carving representing an Ethiopian king wearing the uraeus, and a Sun God (see Crowfoot, loc. cit. p. 25) ; and in a cave close by I found in 191 2 a drawing which Mr Griffith thinks represents the Hon- headed Arsenuphis or Apizemak. Upon the rock with the carving are heaped a number of stones. This may illustrate the Arab practice whereby, it is said, the passer-by signifies his detestation of something abominable (see Jaussen, p. 336), or may be connected with the ancient beliefs exemplified in a similar way in northern Dartur (see App. 5 to Part I, Ch. 4).

From the Nastasenen stela (298-278 B.C.) it appears that that monarch may have invaded Kordofan, and "operations at this distance from Meroe would imply that the Gezira or a large part of it was permanently occupied by the Ethiopians." (Reisner in Sudan Notes and Records, Jan. 19 19, pp. 65, 66.)

' So Crowfoot, loc. cit. p. 7. He continues, however, in agreement with Lepsius

{Discoveries..., p. 163), "but the true basis of their prosperity was agricultural and pastoral," and this, I think, is something of an overstatement. In a year of good rains the ivddis produce a fair crop of millet, but even if one allow that the rainfall