'Memoir on Part of Mesopotamia contained between Sheriat-el-Beytha on the Tigris to Tel Ibrahim, by Lieutenant J B Bewsher, Surveyor in Mesopotamia' [‎116r] (9/16)

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^hefXrbe trTect"^ 6 '^ ***>** io ->y of
Irihp th '"If? 0 f Arabs caI, be trusted . when from laziness or fear of other
found thu'^nh t 0 l aV0 3CO r nt V countr y- Commander Jones seems to have
have been the Medkn waU ^ the em,jankment su PP osed to
Five and a half miles to the east-south-eastward of Knneeseh are the remains
what appears to have been a house or fort, surrounded by a rampart. A
small hill ot pebbles has been taken advantage of to build it with. The walls or
ramparts are about 18 feet high, and have others projecting from them. The
main ones surround the building or ruin, the whole covering about a square mile
of ground. Less than a mile to the eastward is another similar ruin, but
smaller. Ihey are both known by the name of Dowair, which is the diminutive Dowair.
of Dour, a circle*
There are two very high mounds in this neighbourhood, both called Akr or
Akar. Akr-el-Ajedeh* is IJ miles east of Kuneeseh, and is a most imposing Akar -el-Ajedeh.
looking mound. It is built of kiln-burnt bricks, and is 74 feet high, by far the
highest in this sheet. It does not cover much ground, being 220 yards long. The
other Akr, which is distinguished from its namesake by the word Gherbi or the Akr-el-Gherbi.
west, is in the north-west angle of this sheet, and a little north of west, distant
9 miles from Akr-el-Ajedeh. This mound is built of sun-dried bricks, and is not
so large as the other one.
The mound of Kuneeseh is about one mile in length, and about 35 feet high. Kuneeseh.
It is separated by a chasm into two parts, and is covered with a loose nitrous soil
called in Arabic Subkh. Indeed, the country close to the southward is as white
with saltpetre as if it had been covered with a thick fall of snow.
The next old navigable canal to the southward is one which is universally Nahr Malka.
allowed to correspond with the Nahr Malka, Basileios, Potamos or Flumen
Regium of the ancient geographers and historians. The Ruthwaniyeh, a canal, Euthwaniyeh.
now in use, but with several mouths of older date, has been cut apparently for a
part of its course in the bed of the Nahr Malka. A part of it, which is unused,
now reaches an old village called Ibrahim-el-Khaleel, beyond which the Ibrahim -el
Ruthwaniyeh seems never to have extended. This village has some well-built Khaleei.
houses in it, with an upper story to the rooms. The tomb of Ibrahim-el-Khaleel
is now in ruins. The Arabs say this village was built by a Pacha of Baghdad, for
a favourite daughter, and was in existence in the beginning of the century. It is
20 miles south-west of Baghdad ; 2^ miles to the east-south-eastward is another
old tomb in ruins, called Sheikh Samer. From Ibrahim-el-Khaleel, the Nahr Sheikh Samer.
Malka, which is now called the Yuseffiyeb, takes a direction of south-east by east
with many twists, and many ruins on its banks. Following the old stream, we
come to a very curious ruin called Abu Hubba, which bears south-south-west from
Baghdad distant 20 miles. Here the stream bifurcates, one branch, the Yuseffiyeh, yuseffiyeh.
going on'towards Ctesiphon, and the other, which is simply called et Trab, or soil, Trab.
taking a more southerly course. . r™ TT ^
Abu Hubba itself consists of a mass of rums of a very irregular shape 1 he Abu Hubba.
highest part, which is 59 feet high, is of a dome shape, and is on the south-west
side of the building. This ruin is surrounded on three sides by a rampart or wall,
in shape a rectangle, with openings every here and there This is 30 feet high in
places The building inside is skirted on the south-west face by the blanch canal
from the Nahr Malka, and it extends from that till it touches the north-east face
of the rectangle. Its length is 1,300 yards, and breadth 900 yards. Deir, another D eir.
ruin close to northward of the Nahr Malka, is something similar in shape to Abu
Hubba and is distant from the lattor three miles to the north-eastward. The
ramparts of Deir are, if anything, higher than those of Abu Hubba, but in shap
ramparts oi > J ' • . .f Th e tl . aces 0 f branch canals or entrench-
men™ 11 round ITthTbese ruins They have the appearance of fortified camps,
rmetbing Uke the old Roman ones I have seen in the north of France.
-r* ^ 'a rii/ifinnnrv forresDondinff to a mound or palace or keep^
a p;,"brreZr r Z m MeMe K, a„d J. being often interehangeable (though not
correctly) this latter word may be pronounced Ajdc .