Road to Ubar Pa - Nicholas Clapp [87]
It is in frankincense that the subsequent story of the rise and fall of the People of 'Ad would be written. The resin became an integral part of their lives over the next several millennia. Frankincense would beguile them. It would cause them to prosper and take on the airs of a classic civilization. And then, at least according to legend, the 'Ad became arrogant and unjust and were punished. Their desert city of Ubar was destroyed. At the same time, because of the rise of Christianity, the demand for frankincense fell off. And, whether or not they deserved God's wrath, the 'Ad would be left illiterate and poor, dwellers in the ruins of their past glory.
20. The Incense Trade
ONE REASON the People of 'Ad were so long cloaked in mystery is that outsiders were not welcome in their land; the harvesting of frankincense was a secretive affair. Nevertheless, Pliny the Elder managed to come by a good description of the process. Considerable pains were taken not to injure the trees, and timing was important. Only under the best conditions would the trees produce the finest, most fragrant incense. A midsummer harvest was augured by
...the rising of the Dog Star, a period when the heat is most intense; on which occasion they cut the tree where the bark appears to be the fullest of juice, and extremely thin, from being distended to the greatest extent. The incision thus made is gradually extended, but nothing is removed; the consequence of which is, that an unctuous foam oozes forth, which gradually coagulates and thickens ... this juice is received upon mats of palm-leaves ... The incense which has accumulated during the summer is gathered in the autumn: it is the purest of all, and is of a white color.1
Around 3000 B.C., the range of the frankincense tree, encouraged by abundant rains, may well have extended out to and even beyond the spring at Shisur. In any case, the surrounding oasis was an ideal staging area for caravans heading north. It provided fodder for donkeys and dates for their drivers. Its palms shaded a primitive market, a place to barter for pack saddles, sacks of salt, obsidian tools, and luxuries like beads and decorative shells.2
Forming at Shisur and striking north, the donkey caravans followed a trail of springs and seasonal lakes spaced no more than a day apart. Over the years, over the centuries, the footprints of thousands and thousands of animals compacted the desert pavement, creating a singular track, which at a later time would be called "the road to Ubar."
This great track led to Jabrin, a Mesopotamian-controlled oasis on the far northern edge of the Rub' al-Khali, where in all probability the People of'Ad sold (or bartered) their frankincense, then hastened home. Even though the climate was cooler than it is now and moist, the round trip was arduous. If a caravan failed to reach a spring or found it fouled or dry, animals and men could perish.
As they crossed the Rub' al-Khali, early caravans would have sighted a wild, humpbacked, ungainly animal that was at home in the desert wasteland. According to legend, the 'Adites thought it a creature conjured by djinns. But it would transform their lives. Over the previous centuries, man's livelihood in Arabia had benefited from the domestication of a sequence of animals: cattle provided mobility and sustenance, goats offered tents and textiles (as well as sustenance), and donkeys opened the way for long-range travel and trade. Finally, the camel was to make distant trade commercially viable year in and year out, in bountiful times and bad.
The camel could carry a six-hundred-pound load and could go two weeks or more without water. No longer was it necessary for caravans to meander from spring to spring; they could now move in straight lines. On level ground a camel caravan could cover thirty miles in a day.