They are warlike, unquiet, Bedouins, camel-riders (for they have no horses), and armed with matchlocks; and they are proud of their independence, and tenacious of their rights.  No serious attempt has ever been made, except by Mehemet Ali, to subdue them, and none at all has succeeded.  Unlike the generality of Peninsular Bedouins, however, they are professed Sunite Mohammedans, if not of a very pious type; and they acknowledge as their chief the head of their most noble tribe, the Grand Sherif of the Koreysh, who is also Prince of Mecca.

The Koreysh is still a distinct nomadic tribe, inhabiting the immediate neighbourhood of Mecca; not numerous, but not in decay.  They are divided into several sections, each governed by its Sheykh, the chief of which, the Abadleh, has for several centuries supplied the reigning family of Hejaz.  This last traces its descent from Ali ibn Abutaleb, the fourth Caliph, through his son Hassan, and through Ali’s wife, Fatmeh, from Mohammed himself.  It is probably the oldest authentic male descent in the world, and certainly the most sacred.  All the members of this Abadleh family enjoy the title of Sherif, the head of it only being distinguished as the Sherif el Kebir, the Great or Grand Sherif.  The rest of the Koreysh, not being descended from Fatmeh, do not receive the title.  All alike wear the Bedouin dress of abba and kefiyeh, even the Prince himself, standing in this strikingly in contrast with the Hejazi citizens, who affect the turban and gombaz.

The district of Medina is occupied by the Harb Bedouins, a larger and more powerful tribe than the Koreysh, who also recognize the Sherif, but their allegiance is precarious; while to the east and south of Mecca the Ateybeh and Assir, more powerful still, are wholly independent.  It has always been a difficult matter to keep these unruly elements at peace with each other and with the citizens, nor could the Sherif hope to effect it were he not himself of Bedouin and noble blood.

The early history of the Sherifate is exceedingly obscure.  When the Caliphs definitely abandoned Medina as their capital in the fortieth year of Islam (A.D. 662), they for a time left deputies of the Sherifal family behind them to govern in their name, and, as long as the Ommiad and Abbaside dynasties continued at Damascus and Bagdad, their sovereignty was acknowledged in Hejaz.  But on the destruction of the Arabian Caliphate in 1259, the Sherifal family seems to have set itself up independently, relying only on the casual help of the Egyptian Sultans and the Imams of Sana to protect them against the Bedouins of Nejd and Assir, now hardly any longer, even in name, Mohammedans.  The Egyptian Sultan, however, was the titular protector of the Holy Places, and it was he who transmitted the Surrah, or religious contributions made by the Faithful, and provided escort for the yearly pilgrimage made to the shrines.  Thus we read of Kaid Beg having rebuilt the Mosque of Medina in 1476, and having