'The lands of the Eastern Caliphate Mesopotamia, Persia, and Central Asia from the Moslem conquest to the time of Timur' [‎68] (99/586)

town stood in a forest of date-palms. Mukaddasi likens it to the
towns of Palestine for the manner of its building; and Sarsar
continued to be a place of importance down to the close of the
8th (14th) century when Timiir took possession of Baghdad and
garrisoned the surrounding districts.
The third transverse canal was the Nahr-al-Malik, which began
at the village of Al-FaMjah 1 five leagues below the head of the
Nahr Sarsar, and flowed into the Tigris three leagues below
Madain. This, c the King's Canal/ dated from ancient times, and
is mentioned by the Greeks as the Nahar Malcha. YaMt reports
that tradition gave it as having been dug either by King Solomon
or by Alexander the Great. On its banks was the town called
Nahr-al-Malik, with a bridge of boats on the Kftfah road, this
lying seven miles south of Sarsar. According to Ibn Hawkal
Nahr-al-Malik town was larger by a half than the latter town,
being likewise famous for its corn lands and palm-groves;
Mustawfi adding that over 300 villages were of its district.
The fourth transverse canal was the Nahr Ktitha, its point of
origin on the Euphrates being three leagues below that of the
Nahr-al-Malik, and its outflow 10 leagues below Madain. The
Kfttha canal watered the district of this name, which was also
known as the Ardashir Babgan district (after the first Sassanian
king), though part of it was counted as the Nahr Jawbar district
on a branch canal. The city of Klitha Rabba, with its bridge of
boats, stood on the banks of the main channel, and is said to be
identical with the Biblical Cuthah, mentioned in 2 Kings xvii.
24, an important town of the neighbourhood of Babylon. Ac
cording to Moslem tradition Kfttha was the place where Abraham
w T as thrown into the fire by the tyrant Nimrod, and the town took
its name from Kiitha, the grandfather of Abraham, according to
the Moslem tradition. In the 4th (10th) century Ibn Hawkal
describes the place as a double city, KUtha-at-Tank, 4 of the
Road,' and Kiitha Rabba, which last was a city larger than
Babil (Babylon), and near here, he says, were great mounds of
1 This is the Feluchia (Feluge or Felugia) of Caesar Frederick, and other
Elizabethan merchants, where coming down the Euphrates they left their boats
and went by land across to Baghdad: as narrated in Hakluyt, Principal
Navigations (Glasgow, 1904), v. 367, 455, 466; vi. 4.