April — june 1857.] Memoir on the Aden Reservoirs. %9 



of Yemen, between his accession to the throne in A. D. 1472, and 

 the great famine which decimated Yemen in A. D. 1502, built 

 many religious edifices throughout the country, especially in Aden, 

 amongst others, numerous reservoirs, aqueducts, &c. the most im- 

 portant of which was the aqueduct to convey the water of Bir Am. 

 bait into Aden. 



There is also a tradition in Aden, that about A. H. 906 (A. D. 

 1500,) the Governor persevered in digging wells for sweet water, 

 and being successful, the reservoirs were permitted to fall to ruins, 

 or to be filled up with the debris washed down from the hills. 



Probably the water obtained from these wells, and from the Bir 

 Amhait, sufficed for the supply of the place, which had begun to 

 decline in consequence of the Indian traffic having been diverted 

 from its ancient channel, by the discovery of the route to Europe 

 round the Cape of Good Hope, and the preservation and repair of 

 the reservoirs became no longer a matter of pressing necessity. 



The aqueduct above mentioned appears not always to have suffic- 

 ed for the supply of Aden, (which continued, as late as the seven- 

 teenth century, to have a population of 30,000 souls,) as, in a Latin 

 tract written by Resendius bearing date A. D. 1530 and entitled 

 " Epitome Rerum Gestarum in India aLusitanis," he remarks, " that 

 the water was daily brought in on camels, which on some days 

 amounted to 1,500 or 1,600 and even 2,000, and that if they came 

 in the day time, the water was taken to the city, but if in the 

 evening, it was deposited in a large cistern near the ivater house.''* 



The above extract is quoted by Mr. Salt, to prove that the aque- 

 duct from Bir Amhait did not exist in the time of Resendius, but 

 I think this conclusion hastily formed, as there is no reason to doubt 

 the fact that it was constructed by Abd-el-Wahab ibn Tahir, and 

 that the " cistern near the water house" was the large reservoir 

 built at the Aden termination of the aqueduct, to receive the water 

 of Bir Amhait. 



This aqueduct and reservoir were in use when Aden was visited 

 by a deputation of French merchants of St. Malo under M. de Mer- 

 veille in A. D. 1708, and the remains of both were seen and de- 



