The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Edward Gibbon [1665]
[Footnote 44: Whatever can now be known of the idolatry of the ancient Arabians may be found in Pocock, (Specimen, p. 89 - 136, 163, 164.) His profound erudition is more clearly and concisely interpreted by Sale, (Preliminary Discourse, p. 14 - 24;) and Assemanni (Bibliot. Orient tom. iv. p. 580 - 590) has added some valuable remarks.]
[Footnote 45: (Diodor. Sicul. tom. i. l. iii. p. 211.) The character and position are so correctly apposite, that I am surprised how this curious passage should have been read without notice or application. Yet this famous temple had been overlooked by Agatharcides, (de Mari Rubro, p. 58, in Hudson, tom. i.,) whom Diodorus copies in the rest of the description. Was the Sicilian more knowing than the Egyptian? Or was the Caaba built between the years of Rome 650 and 746, the dates of their respective histories? (Dodwell, in Dissert. ad tom. i. Hudson, p. 72. Fabricius, Bibliot. Graec. tom. ii. p. 770.)
Note: Mr. Forster (Geography of Arabia, vol. ii. p. 118, et seq.) has raised an objection, as I think, fatal to this hypothesis of Gibbon. The temple, situated in the country of the Banizomeneis, was not between the Thamudites and the Sabaeans, but higher up than the coast inhabited by the former. Mr. Forster would place it as far north as Moiiah. I am not quite satisfied that this will agree with the whole description of Diodorus - M. 1845.]
[Footnote 46: Pocock, Specimen, p. 60, 61. From the death of Mahomet we ascend to 68, from his birth to 129, years before the Christian aera. The veil or curtain, which is now of silk and gold, was no more than a piece of Egyptian linen, (Abulfeda, in Vit. Mohammed. c. 6, p. 14.)]
[Footnote 47: The original plan of the Caaba (which is servilely copied in Sale, the Universal History, &c.) was a Turkish draught, which Reland (de Religione Mohammedica, p. 113 - 123) has corrected and explained from the best authorities. For the description and legend of the Caaba, consult Pocock, (Specimen, p. 115 - 122,) the Bibliotheque Orientale of D'Herbelot, (Caaba, Hagir, Zemzem, &c.,) and Sale (Preliminary Discourse, p. 114 - 122.)]
[Footnote 48: Cosa, the fifth ancestor of Mahomet, must have usurped the Caaba A.D. 440; but the story is differently told by Jannabi, (Gagnier, Vie de Mahomet, tom. i. p. 65 - 69,) and by Abulfeda, (in Vit. Moham. c. 6, p. 13.)]
[Footnote 49: In the second century, Maximus of Tyre attributes to the Arabs the worship of a stone, (Dissert. viii. tom. i. p. 142, edit. Reiske;) and the reproach is furiously reechoed by the Christians, (Clemens Alex. in Protreptico, p. 40. Arnobius contra Gentes, l. vi. p. 246.) Yet these stones were no other than of Syria and Greece, so renowned in sacred and profane antiquity, (Euseb. Praep. Evangel. l. i. p. 37. Marsham, Canon. Chron. p. 54 - 56.)]
[Footnote 50: The two horrid subjects are accurately discussed by the learned Sir John Marsham, (Canon. Chron. p. 76 - 78, 301 - 304.) Sanchoniatho derives the Phoenician sacrifices from the example of Chronus; but we are ignorant whether Chronus lived before, or after, Abraham, or indeed whether he lived at all.]
[Footnote 51: The reproach of Porphyry; but he likewise imputes to the Roman the same barbarous custom, which, A. U. C. 657, had been finally abolished. Dumaetha, Daumat al Gendai, is noticed by Ptolemy (Tabul. p. 37, Arabia, p. 9 - 29) and Abulfeda, (p. 57,) and may be found in D'Anville's maps, in the mid-desert between Chaibar and Tadmor.]
[Footnote 52: Prcoopius, (de Bell. Persico, l. i. c. 28,) Evagrius, (l. vi. c. 21,) and Pocock, (Specimen, p. 72, 86,) attest the human sacrifices of the