'Persian Gulf Gazetteer Part II, Geographical and Descriptive Materials, Section II Western Side of the Gulf' [‎135v] (269/286)

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sometimes handsome, features and light eyes show the Syrian rather than
the Arabian type ; while their careless gaiety of manner strongly contrasts
with the cloudy and suspicious physiognomy of the wanderers among
whom they live. M Doughty remarks on the full faced beauty of then
children. Felly says the women have the finest features of any wandering
tribe; but are dirty to 9 proverb. In character they are tolerant and humane,
being themselves despised and oppressed ; Bedouins will not drmk out of a
vessel after a Selaibi. The term Selaib is burled as a reproach at other inferior
tribes of Central Arabia, such as the Ueteym, Sherarat and Sunna ; yet a weak
ly Bedouin child is sometimes name '* Sulabi" or Khelui, for luck, m the hope
that it may grow up. Their women beg at Bedouin tents, though probab y
better fed than the Bedouins. (6) In some cases they conform outwardly to
Muhammadanism, but among themselves they have their own religious
observances. They believe in one God and respect Muhammad as a man,
but deny his mission. They believe also in some anonymous heavenly
personages styled the "confidential friends of God. ^ They pray 3 times
daily; "once as the sun rises, so as to finish ere the disc is, full on
the horizon; secondlv, before the sun dips from the meridian ; and thirdly,
so as to finish with the setting of the sun. The Selaib of Irak are
said to have a purer worship and to have preserved certain sacred wiitmgs in
Assvrian or Chaldaean, including the Psalms of David and some cf the Jewish
Prophets. The Selaib fast 3 times a year ; 30 days in Ram7,an, 4 to 7 days
in Shaban, and from 6 to 9 days in one of the summer months. The belaib
adore the Pole Star (which they call -Tab) and reverence it by facing it and
spreading out their arms so as to form a cross. They also adore a star
called Jedy in the constellation Aries. They respect Mecca, but consider their
own proper place of pilgrimage to be Haran, in Irak oi Mesopotamia. ^ ihe
Selaib of the desert seem to have conformed to the ceremonies of the dominant
religion, until from generation to generation they have lost their own. They
declare they were originally Sabaeans, but Pelly considers this erroneous.
PaWave says they have a strong, unchanging hatred of Muhammadanism.
Doughtv, however, represents them as Muhammadans, know ing no other
religion; perhaps this holds of the Sulaba of Nejd. (6) ihe Selaib will eat any
thing, including sheep and camels that have died a natural death ; but their diet
is mainly dates and locusts, with the milk and butter afforded by their numer
ous herds and flocks. Any surplus they sell on the seaboard, wheie they pitch
for about 4 months of the year, wandering about for the remaining^ 8 months and
tending their sheep and camels. Their tents are of black goats'hair, and so
handy as to be readily transported. Ihey eat the flesh of the gazelle, w hich
they shoot, and wear a long shirt of its skin coming down to their feet. Doughty
says, they work for the Bedouins while they can get milk from them and in
summer go off to the desert and live by hunting. Their hunters drink 2 hours
before dawn and not again till noon, (7) They hunt the gazelle, and in Central
Arabia the ostrich; and are reported excellent marksmen and unrivalled in
the pursuit of both. In land craft they are as superior to the Bedouins as the
Bedouins to the fixed population of the oases. They act as drudges and
guides of the Arabs. They are the safest guides and best water-finders in the
desert. Tney come in at Koweit on white donkeys, riding cross-legged on a
peculiar saddle and without a bridle ; they bring for sale at tie town much
the same things as the Arab Bedouins. Their donkeys are famous, and with them
they go hunting, and make desert journeys which are diificult even for
Bedoums on dromedaries. According to Palgrave, the Selaib are cre
dited by the Arabs with the performance of difficult surgical operations.
They are tinkers and tin the brass kettles and pots of the Bedouins, whose
arms they also mend. They make hatchets, sickles and flint steels, but their
work is ruder than that of the Sunna (Section HI, Sub section A). They work
also in wood and construct camel saddles of desert acacia, well pulleys and
milk vessels. They are farriers and cattle surgeons to the Bedouins. (A few
in the direction of Mesopotamia are said to keep cattle of their own ) The
Sulaba also take away the vessels of townspeople at Kheybar, etc , to be tinned
or mended and return with them after a time; what money they make they aie
said to bury in the desert. (8) Language is Arabic (?). (9) Forty days after the
birth of a child it is immersed 7 times in water, and a male child must be cir
cumcised before it is 7 years old. At a circumcision some sheep are killed and