ADUA. 171 



attested by its Mohammedan settlers. The Agau, who form the basis of the local 

 population, are not sufficiently energetic to trade or work the coalfields in the 

 neighbourhood. The market of Sokota, which lasts three days every week, is 

 mostly visited by the merchants and dealers in salt which serves as the chief small 

 currency of southern Abyssinia, whereas in northern Tigré bales of cloth are 

 employed. The amoleh, or salt money, shaped like French whetstones, is procured 

 from the salt lake Alalbed. The mean weight of each block is a pound and a 

 quarter, and it naturally increases in value as it penetrates farther into the 

 interior. Whilst the Danakil quarries of the Taltal tribe supply over a hundred 

 of these amoleh for a Maria-Theresa talari, they are occasionally sold on the 

 western banks of Lake Tana at tenpence a-piece. When Sarzec and Rafïray 

 crossed this country in 1873, they were worth at Sokota about threepence half- 

 penny ; but eight years afterwards, at the time of Rohlfs' visit, their value had 

 diminished by three-fourths. When the means of communication shall have 

 become more easy, they will entirely lose their conventional value in the barter 

 trade, and will be exclusively used as a condiment. The Abyssinian proverb, " He 

 eats salt," applied to prodigals and spendthrifts, will then have lost its point. 

 The packers are very careful to protect the salt bricks from moisture ; they lay 

 them in parallel rows on copper plates, made like cartridge boxes, which are 

 placed in layers on the back of a mule and covered with an awning. 



Sokota has recently been greatly impoverished ; devastated by epidemic fevers, 

 it has lost three-fourths of its population, which from 4,000 to 5,000 in 1868 had 

 fallen to not more than 1,500 at the time of Rohlfs' visit in 1881. In the vicinity 

 of Sokota a monolithic church, like those of Lasta, has been hewn in the granite ; 

 its crypt contains the mummies of several kings of the country. The roads are 

 bordered with dolmens similar to those of Brittany. One of the neighbouring 

 Agau tribes bears the name of Kam, or Ham, after whom D'Abbadie applies this 

 term to the whole group of " Hamitic " languages, of which the Ham, or Hamtenga, 

 is regarded as typical. 



Adita. 



From Sokota to the country of the Bogos another caravan route, passing about 

 60 miles to the west of the Abyssinian border-range, traverses Ahbi-Addi, capital 

 of the province of Tembien, on the route to Adiia, present capital of the Tigré, and 

 next to Gondar and Basso, the largest market in all Abyssinia. This town stands 

 nearly in the middle of the region of plateaux separating the two large curves 

 described by the Takkazeh and the Upper Mareb. The River Assam, a tributary 

 of the Takkazeh, winding through the naked but fertile plain of Adua, flows 

 southwards, whilst to the north of the hill on whose side the town is built (6,500 

 feet), stands the isolated and precipitous Mount Shelota, or Sholoda, 9,000 feet 

 high. Eastwards, overtopping the other summits, stands the lofty Semayata, 

 10,300 feet high. Adua, with its steep winding streets lined with small stone 

 houses thatched with straw and encircled by slate terraces, scarcely presents the 



