Although this stripe of land along the Indian Ocean, and afterwards along the Red Sea, was necessary to the shepherds, because they carried their merchandise to the ports there, and thence to Thebes and Memphis upon the Nile, yet the principal seat of their residence and power was that flat part of Africa between the northern tropic and the mountains of Abyssinia. This is divided into various districts; it reaches from Masuah along the sea-coast to Suakem, then turns westward, and continues in that direction, having the Nile on the south, the tropic on the north, to the deserts of Selima, and the confines of Libya on the west. This large extent of country is called _Beja_. The next is that district[224] in form of a shield, as Meroë is said to have been; this name was given it by Cambyses. It is between the Nile and Astaboras, and is now called Atbara. Between the river Mareb, the ancient Astusaspes on the east, and Atbara on the west, is the small plain territory of Derkin, another district of the shepherds. All that range of mountains running east and west, inclosing Derkin and Atbara on the south, and which begins the mountainous country of Abyssinia, is inhabited by the negro woolly-headed Cushite, or Shangalla, living as formerly in caves, who, from having been the most cultivated and instructed people in the world, have, by a strange reverse of fortune, relapsed into brutal ignorance, and are hunted by their neighbours like wild beasts in those forests, where they used to reign in the utmost luxury, liberty, and splendour. But the noblest, and most warlike of all the shepherds, were those that inhabited the mountains of the Habab, a considerable ridge reaching from the neighbourhood of Masuah to Suakem, and who, still dwell there. In the ancient language of this country, _So_, or _Suah_, signified shepherd, or shepherds; though we do not know any particular rank or degrees among them, yet we may suppose these called simply _shepherds_ were the common sort that attended the flocks. Another denomination, part of them bore, was _Hycsos_, sounded by us Agsos, which signifies _armed shepherds_, or such as wore harness, which may be supposed the soldiers, or armed force of that nation. The third we see mentioned is Ag-ag, which is thought to be the nobles or chiefs of those armed shepherds, whence came their title _King of Kings_[225]. The plural of this is Agagi, or, as it is written in the Ethiopic, Agaazi.