AND

PRESENT CONDITION

OF

THE BARBARY STATES:

COMPREHENDING A VIEW OF

THEIR CIVIL INSTITUTIONS, ANTIQUITIES, ARTS, RELIGION, LITERATURE, COMMERCE, AGRICULTURE, AND

NATURAL PRODUCTIONS.

BY THE REV. MICHAEL RUSSELL, LL.D.,
Author of "View of Ancient and Modern Egypt," "Palestine, or the
Holy Land," "Nubia and Abyssinia," &c.

WITH A MAP, AND ELEVEN ENGRAVINGS BY JACKSON.

EDINBURGH:

OLIVER & BOYD, TWEEDDALE COURT;

AND SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, & CO., LONDON.

MDCCCXXXV.

PREFACE.

THIS Volume completes the plan, originally formed by the Publishers of the EDINBURGH CABINET LIBRARY, for illustrating the History, the Antiquities, and the Present Condition of Africa.

In the first instance, they drew the attention of their readers to the progress of Discovery in that vast continent; describing the natural features of its several kingdoms, the social state of its people, and thereby bringing into one view all that appeared valuable in the observations of those travellers, whether in ancient or modern times, who have sought to explore the remote recesses of its interior. They next made it their endeavour to collect, within a narrow compass, all that is known respecting Egypt, Nubia, and Abyssinia,-those countries so full of interest to the scholar and the antiquary, and which are universally acknowledged to have been the cradle of the arts, so far as the elements of these were communicated to the inhabitants of Europe.

The Work now presented to the Public has for its object an historical outline of those remarkable provinces which stretch along the southern shores of the Mediterranean, during the successive periods. when they were occupied by the Phoenicians, the Romans, the Vandals, the Arabs, and the Moors; as well as a delineation of their condition since they acknowledged the dominion of the Porte.