We bought in Aden a fragment of alabasteroid limestone, said to have come from the Hadhramout. It is broken on all sides. It is part of a perpendicular series of sunken square fields, on each of which is represented in flat relief a sitting or lying goat or chamois with enormous horns. My fragment has two complete goats and parts of another above as well as below. The goats look to the right, and there are some cuttings which may have been part of an inscription on the surface of the stone to the right of the column of goats. The squares are 4 inches high by 3½ inches wide—10 centimetres by about 9.

FRAGMENT OF ALABASTEROID LIMESTONE

Fragment of Alabasteroid Limestone

That these goats must have some significance is clear from their likeness to the following objects in the Hof Museum at Vienna, and figured in 'SÜd Arabische AlterthÜmer,' by Prof. Dr. D. H. MÜller. The first is the lower part of a slab, complete on three sides with a plain surface down the middle, and columns of goats in squares just like that described above, on either side, the goat facing inwards. In neither of these cases can one know how many goats were originally represented.

The second is an architectural fragment composed of alabasteroid limestone (yellowish in colour), 0.120 centimetres high, 0.202 long, 0.15 thick (so far as it remains).

It represents seven chamois (or goats) lying in a row. The heads are coarsely formed, the eyes like knobs, and the bodies of the two animals which are outside are indicated in profile. The original use of the object is uncertain, but, in any case, it must have been a topmost ornament, for the under-side, though regularly smoothed, is not polished like the other surfaces, and therefore cannot have been meant to be seen.

The trough which we brought from Al Gran is of the same stone as the former objects. It is 2 feet long by 11 inches wide and 4 inches high. It has an inscription containing a dedication to the God Sayan or Seiyin running all round it and finishing on one side of the top. In the top there is a depression sloping towards a spout, which is now broken off all but an inch. The depth of the depression is from one quarter to half an inch, and the channel in the spout runs down to three-quarters of an inch. Prof. Dr. D. H. MÜller has kindly translated this inscription, which appears to represent it as an altar. He thinks it must be for frankincense, but I think it must have been for some liquid. The inscription on the end opposite the spout is worn by marks of ropes being dragged against it.

SabÆan Antiquities

SabÆan Antiquities

We bought an object of fine alabaster in Aden. It was said to come from the Hadhramout. It seems like a seal or stamp and has a hollow round the back, with spouts in either of the short sides. It had been used as a lamp when we obtained it. There is a kind of handle or tube pierced through to the front, probably for suspension.

In the same illustration are also part of an earthenware stamp and the seal of Yarsahal, the younger of Shibahm, with its golden setting, and a copper seal with Sabota on it.

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