AXUM. 95 
eastward (marked P in ground plan), in hopes of finding some more 
remains. There is the appearance of a double door-way excavated 
in the rock on the western side of this hill, and on the northern 
side are steps leading to the top, but on the summit itself there is 
not the least appearance of any work of ancient art. My labour 
however was not entirely fruitless, as hence I took bearings of all 
the principal objects, and thus compleated my idea of the situation 
of Axum. 
" The town of Axum stands partly in and partly at the mouth 
of a nook (yyy in the ground plan) formed by two hills on the 
north-west end of an extensive valley (z z), the soil of which is 
very fertile, and interspersed with small pieces of spar and agates. 
North of the plain stands the church of Abba Lucanus on a lofty hill, 
the summit of which is covered with trees ; to the north east is the 
church Abba Pantaleon, built on the point of a bare and rugged 
rock called Mantillees ; on the south-east are the towering hills of 
Adowa ; and on the south-west the convent or church of Tecla 
Haimanont. The road from Adowa ( T T in ground plan) lies 
directly west across the plain, and winds round the bottom of the 
hill that stands to the east of Axum, which hill is entirely com- 
posed of a brown coarse granite. Upon the first rising of this hill, 
and about two hundred yards north north-east from the stone with 
the inscription, stands a plain obelisk (S in ground plan) about 
twenty feet high, and in a line eastward are fourteen more that are 
fallen. The one that is now standing, I suppose to be that mentioned 
by Bruce on his entering Axum, as the high road from Adowa leads 
close under it ; though by the way in which Bruce has described it, 
the reader would be led to look for it above the convent of Abboo 
