Note 56 — CONTENTS OF THE SEVENTH VOLUME. (continued 2)

Arab. “Akyál,” lit. whose word (Kaul) is obeyed, a title of the Himyarite Kings, of whom Al-Bergendi relates that one of them left an inscription at Samarcand, which many centuries ago no man could read. This evidently alludes to the dynasty which preceded the “Tobba” and to No. xxiv. Shamar Yar’ash (Shamar the Palsied). Some make him son of Malik surnamed Náshir al-Ni’am (Scatterer of Blessings) others of Afríkús (No. xviii.), who, according to Al-Jannabi, Ahmad bin Yusuf and Ibn Ibdun (Pocock, Spec. Hist. Arab.) founded the Berber (Barbar) race, the remnants of the Causanites expelled by the “robber, Joshua son of Nún,” and became the eponymous of “Africa.” This word which, under the Romans, denoted a small province on the Northern Sea-board, is, I would suggest, A’far-Káhi (Afar-land), the Afar being now the Dankali race, the country of Osiris whom my learned friend, the late Mariette Pasha, derived from the Egyptian “Punt” identified by him with the Somali country. This would make “Africa,” as it ought to be, an Egyptian (Coptic) term.