Page 249 - Records of Bahrain (2)(ii)_Neat

Topography and archaeology, 1878-1879 575

194 THE ISLANDS OF BAHREIN.

situation, by telling tho Moollahs that it was a fire-
worshipper's stone, probably an idol, and* had no business
where it was. To back my argument, I gavo a few rupees
to repair tho mosque, and thus the loss was made up to them.
Sheikh Ahmed sent a slavo who dug it out and carried it
homo for me. Tho characters are evidently Babylonian or
Assyrian Cuneiform, but some of the characters look like
hieroglyphs.
With regard to the tumuli, it is possible that some of
these may be tho remains of tho Phoenician temples noticed
by Androsthcncs. Thoso nearest to the village of Ali havo
had buildings on tho top of them formed of shaped blocks
of sandstone. I cannot mention all tho places on these
islands which probably contain buried buildings, but content
myself with drawing attention to one or two of the most
prominent.
On leaving the town of Manamch, tho western road, pass­
ing through lines of date gardens, lands one in the Wilayat-i-
Kadim or Bilad-i-Kadim, ‘the ancient city,' where, probably
from time immemorial, building has been piled upon build­
ing. Here several mounds, rising white and shrubless,
attract attention, but leaving these again, and inclining to
the north of west, passing tho Portuguese fort on the sea­
board still massive and imposing in its decay, we .como upon
a lino of high sand-hills, chained together, facing the northern
sea, at the distance of a mile or so from the beach, near tho
villages of Barboora and Shirebi. These I walked over, but
found only ono outlying stone, a large mass that borq signs
of shaping. One square-cut hole, as if for the jamb of a-
largo door, was obvious, as also two channels square-cut
on the same face. I regret that I took at the time but littlo
notico of these. It is only deductively, after seeing other
mounds and going over half tho island, that I havo been
led to attach importance to these particular mounds, from
tho fact, firstly, of their size, secondly, of their position in
a lino facing tho sea, and, thirdly, because there aro no
mounds of lesser proportions near them.
Leaving these, however, I retraced my steps to tho Bilad-