236 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academt/. 



census of population. It is recorded that 'Amr only raised one 

 million dinars in the first year, two millions in the second, and four 

 in the third year of his occupation of Egypt ; and however we may 

 distrust this geometrical progression, it indicates at least that at the 

 beginning the revenue from the poll-tax was incomplete. 



Another point in the Treaty which is of the first importance 

 relates to the Eoman garrisons. ' The garrisons shall not settle 

 amongst them ' : but ' whoso of the Romans and garrisons shall come 

 into their treaty, for him is the like as for them.' I wish to draw 

 particular attention to these clauses because my translation differs 

 from all previous versions. Hitherto the word nuh t_jy has been 

 translated 'the Nubians,' and in my History of Egypt iyi the Middle 

 Ages I followed the received version. But the introduction of 

 Nubians into a treaty made with the people of the Egyptian Delta at 

 a time when the Arabs had not even penetrated into Upper Egypt 

 struck me from the first as curiously unnecessary. We read nothing 

 in history about Nubian influence or Nubian settlements in Egypt, at 

 least since the Ethiopian dynasty of thirteen hundred years before. 

 A passage in Tabarl*' set me on what I think is the right path. He 

 says, in reference to 'Amr's arrival at Heliopolis ('Ayn Shems), ' and 

 the dominion (or rule, (jjl^ ) was between the Copts and the Nuh.'' 

 This apparent omission of the Romans as the ruling power points 

 clearly to some other meaning of Nub. It could not be stated 

 seriously that the government of Egypt was shared between Copts 

 and Nubians. The phrase puzzled the copyists, for two transcripts 

 (I H) have a marginal note to en-Nub, ' perhaps the Romans,' 



f})y ^ 



Now I need scarcely explain to you that Arabic MSS. seldom 

 give the vowel-points, and that a word without vowel-points may 

 mean several different things. Nub certainly means Nubian, but put 



^^ De Goeje's text, i. 2587. 



