DARRAE
DARRAE (
Δαρραί). Two tribes of this name are mentioned in the Arabian peninsula, one in the
Hedjaz by Ptolemy (
6.7), the other in modern
Omân by Pliny (
6.28). Mr. Forster says “that two tribes of different origin, but similar appellations, anciently existed, as the places which they inhabited, and which still respectively preserve their names, actually exist in both situations; the one a Joktanite race, inhabitants of
Darrha, in
Omân; the other an Ishmaelite people, inhabitants of
Khedheyre, near
Yembo, and in whose name we discover, under the disguise of a familiar contraction (Kedarrhae, Darrhae), a branch of the renowned people of Kedar.” (
Arabia, vol. i. p. 54; comp. p. 79.) Of the latter he further writes: “The town of
Khedheyre, upon the same coast (of
Hedjaz), north-west of the
Lobh mountain, taken in conjunction with the tribe of
Khadhera, carries the existing traces of Kedar to the northern frontier of the
Hedjaz; the ascertained site of the Darrae, Cedrei, or Kedranitae, of Ptolemy, Pliny, and Stephanus of Byzantium after Uranius” (vol. i. p. 261). Of the former, in
Omân, he says, “the name of Hadoram reappears, apparently, in the Dora and Darrae of Pliny, or the modern tribe and town of Darrha” (vol. i. p. 139), to the west of
Ras-el-Had. [
G.W]
