next in order came the Edomites, Ammonites, and Moabites. The native tradition of the Arabs is without historical value. Their recollections hardly go back as far as the beginning of the Christian era, and all that their historians who began to write after Mohammed knew of the older fortunes of their race is either borrowed from the Hebrews or mere imagination. The Amalekites, whom they found in the Hebrew Scriptures, they took for their original stock, and represented them as dwelling in Canaan and Damascus, as well as in the land of Mecca and Oman, and even as ruling over Egypt. These Amalekites--the Tasmites and Dshadi, the A'adites and Dshorhomites--they consider as the genuine Arabs; to whom God had taught Arabic after the confusion of speech. But the Tasmites and Dshadi are as little historic as Amalek in the Arabian tradition; their names signify "the extinct" and "the lost;" the A'adites are a purely fabulous nation, and the Dshorhomites (near Mecca) are a tribe of no great antiquity.[463] The progenitor of the southern tribes of Yemen is, in the Arabian tradition, Kachtan, the son of Eber, and great-grandson of Noah. This is the Joktan of Genesis. Kachtan's son, J'arab, founded the monarchy of the Kachtanids, in South Arabia; Abd-Shams-Sabah, the grandson of J'arab, built the city of Mareb, the chief city of the Sabæans, according to the Greeks. This founder of the monarchy of the Sabæans left two sons, Himyar and Kachlan. The first was the progenitor of the Himyarites, who are mentioned even by Western writers, but not till the first century A.D., and then on the south coast between Mareb and Hadramaut. The name Himyarites includes the tribes of the Chatramites, the Codaa, the Kinana, the Dshoheina, &c. Kachlan founded Dshafar (p. 324), and was the progenitor of the Kachlanids, _i.e._ the Hamdanids, the Badshila, the Odthan, the Chozaa, and other tribes. To the kingdom of Mareb, founded by Abd-Shams-Sabah, the Arab tradition ascribes a long list of princes. But even if we ascribe a period of more than thirty years to every name in this series, the date of Kachtan is not carried back beyond 700 B.C.[464] Abd-Shams-Sabah is said to have built not only Mareb, but also a great dam for the irrigation of the country. The excellent dams, canals, and sluices at Sanaa (the Uzal of the Hebrews, westward of Mareb) are said to have been built by Asad.[465] The castles of Sahlin and Bainun (at Sanaa) are said to have been built by demons at the bidding of Solomon for Belkis, queen of Shebah. Besides these the Arabs talk of numerous castles and fortresses in the south. Towards the year 100 B.C. Harith, a descendant of Himyar, obtained the throne of the Sabæans; and the place of the Sabæans is taken by the Himyarites, the Homerites of Western nations, who henceforth are the ruling nation in Yemen, a change for which Arab tradition prepares the way by making Himyar the son and successor of Abd-Shams-Sabah. Harith's successors fixed their residence