Page 81 - Arabiab Studies (IV)

Early sites ofJabal *Iyal Yazld 71
Here there arc signs that trucks are being driven to the site to
carry away stones for re-use in new buildings in the nearby
villages.

Qata'ah Sharif
381751
This ruin, the name of which is probably more correctly Qata‘at
Sharif may not be pre-Islamic, and perhaps not even early, but the
small section of a wall which is still to be seen standing is of a kind
with the massive dark ashlar construction which was seen at
al-Madinah. The site is much smaller than any of the others on the
Jabal and it is situated on a small outcrop with a good outlook to
the north, as if it were a lookout point or a small fortification.

Al-LumI
382751
An informant told me in the summer of 1975 when I was travelling
in the mountains to the west of J. ‘Iyal Yazld of an inscribed stone
;
which was set into the outside wall of one of the mosques of
ai-Luml. When I arrived there I was shown this stone, which bears
four complete words. Apart from this there are no other remains to
be seen in the village except, perhaps, the yellow stone blocks
which have been used to line the edges of the large well in the
courtyard of another mosque there. These have been completely
worn by the friction of the ropes used to draw the buckets up from
the well and nothing can be learned from them.

YashV
383757
Both Yashf and the next site to be described, Hamidah, are
outside the administrative area of Jabal iyal Yazld but are so
closely associated with it geographically that they are well included
here.
Yashf in the highlands of the Bawn" (// zahir al-Bawri) is
mentioned in the $ifah and elsewhere in al-Hamdanfs works.12
The village of Yashf has numerous inscribed stones and ten
were recorded in two visits there. The village is certainly of ancient
foundation and all but one of the inscriptions are to be found built
into the walls of buildings in the village. Of particular interest is a
building beside the principal mosque of the village which incor-