long ago, Mr Ludolf had shewn, from the testimony of Gregory the Abyssinian, that there was no such place in Abyssinia as Tigrè Mahon. That there was, indeed, a large province called Tigrè, of which Axum was the capital; and Le Grande, the first publisher of Jerome Lobo, has repeatedly said the same. And Ludolf has given a very probable conjecture, that the first Portuguese, ignorant of the Abyssinian language, heard the officer commanding that province called Tigrè Mocuonen, which is governor of Tigré, and had mistaken the name of his office for that of his province. Be that as it will, the reader may rest assured there is no such kingdom, province, or town in all Abyssinia.
There still remains, however, a difficulty much greater than this, and an error much more difficult to be corrected. Lobo is said to have sailed from the peninsula of India, and, being bound for Zeyla, to have embarked in a vessel going to Caxume, or Axum, capital of Tigrè, and to have arrived there safely, and been well accommodated. Now Zeyla, he says, is a city in the kingdom of Adel, at the mouth of the Red Sea[1]; and Axum, being two hundred miles inland, in the middle of the kingdom of Tigrè, a ship going to Axum must have passed Zeyla 300 miles, or been 300 miles to the westward of it. Zeyla is not a city, as is said, but an island. It is not in the kingdom of Adel, but in the bay of Tajoura, opposite to a kingdom of that name; but the island itself belongs to the Imam of Sana, sovereign of Arabia Felix; so that it is inexplicable, how a ship going to Zeyla should choose to land 300 miles beyond it; and still more so, how, being oncearrived
- ↑ See page 28.
