Request a high resolution copy

Diary entry by Gertrude Bell

Reference code
GB/2/11/3/6
Creator
Bell, Gertrude Margaret Lowthian
Creation Date
Extent and medium
1 entry, paper
Language
English
Location
Coordinates

35.1547024, 40.4287111

Sat March 6. [6 March 1909] We got off at 7 and the baggage animals
must have followed soon after. It was hot and the country very dull, an
absolutely flat plain. There was generally a stretch by the river, old
bed, partly irrigated by creaking water wheels Jird with small villages
from time to time. Along the higher ground, above the old bed, there
were occasional mounds some of which were certainly villages. The
Euphrates now flows further W. for the most part, and only the E of its
loops touch the old bank. The first village by the Euphrates from Ed
Der [Dayr az Zawr] is El Hakla - I did not see it - At 8 we passed close
to the E of Marrak. At 8.35 we rode just below Tell Es Sesin[?] which
can be seen a long way off but is said not to have asasat - it is on the
edge of the old bank. At 9 Keriyat Mazlum (a little cultivation and a
wooded island opposite). At 9.40 At Tabwiyyeh lay between us and
the river. At 10 there was a village on the opposite bank which Kiepert
calls Abu Hassan but my soldier, Hmeideh, called Nuh Hassan. At
10.15 we climbed up onto the old bank at a tell above the village of
Jedid el Bakkara (which is by the river) On this tell I saw brick
foundations. At 11 another tell. Then in the low ground the stretching
village of Sa'duni and at 11.25 a tell with nothing on it that I could see.
From 12-12.30 we lunched. At 1 we reached Tell Helawi - there are
several tells here and there must I think have been a village.
Opposite in the Shamiyyeh [Shamiyah] is Braha, a village and a tell
near it. At 1.30 Al Buseira [Busayrah] - just 6 hours' riding and the
baggage did not take quite 7. There is a Mudir here but no oats! The
mound lies on the river Khabur by which we are camped. The govt. is
busy digging out stones and bricks for a bridge over the Khabur. I
think all the work thus revealed is Arab. I saw scarcely any but Arab
coins and the pottery is mostly Arab of the Rakka period some of it. A
full moon shining on the Khabur and a creaking water wheel beyond it,
the fellahin singing as they work.

IIIF Manifest
https://pageturners.ncl.ac.uk/adapter/api/iiif/https%3A%2F%2Fcdm21051.contentdm.oclc.org%2Fiiif%2Finfo%2Fp21051coll46%2F3101%2Fmanifest.json?showOnlyPages=91-92