Mount Meru

“ The vast concave, that is for ever hidden from our sight and which surrounded the southern pole, the first astronomers called the Pit, while observing, toward the northern pole, that a certain circuit in the heavens always appeared above the horizon—they called it the Mountain. As Meru is the high abode of the Gods, these were said to ascend and descend periodically; by which (astronomically) the Zodiacal Gods were meant, the passing of the original north pole of the Earth to the south pole of the Heaven. ”

“ Saunaka asked, ‘Why did the gods churn the Ocean for nectar, and under what circumstances and when as you say, did that best of steeds so powerful and resplendent spring?’
“Sauti said, ‘There is a mountain named Meru, of blazing appearance, and looking like a heap of effulgence. The rays of the Sun falling on its peaks of golden lustre are dispersed by them. Decked with gold and exceedingly beautiful, that mountain is the haunt of the gods and the Gandharvas. It is immeasurable and unapproachable by men of manifold sins. ”

“ Granite cliffs soar above tropical jungle and solemn forest; the narrow gap of the Anei widens into a luxuriant valley; sago-palms rustle in the breeze, and tree-ferns spread their green canopies over the brawling river. The splendid scenery is viewed to advantage from a platform of the foremost railway carriage, the train being pushed up the mountains by an engine in the rear. Beyond the climbing forests, a bare plateau affords a glimpse of ever-burning Merapi, with wooded flanks and lava-strewn summit, from whence a grey cloud of smoke mounts in a spiral curl to the azure sky. ”

“ The Meru (the polar axle or mountain) is its pillar, beset around by the regents of the ten sides, as statues carved upon it. The fourteen regions are as so many apartments of it, and the hollow concavity containing the three worlds, is lighted by the lamp of the luminous sun.
32. Its corners are inhabited by living creatures resembling ants and emmets, which are surrounded by mountains appearing as ant-hills in the sight of Brahmá, the prime lord of creatures and the primeval patriarch of many races of men. ”

“ The only mountains we saw on the other side of the river, were those of "Attar Baal," at the foot of which (they lie near the river, about three days march north of Shendi) are, as I have learned, to be seen the ruins of a city, temples, and fifty-four pyramids. This, I am inclined to believe, was the site of the famous Meroe, the capital of the island of that name. The territory in which these ruins are found is in fact nearly surrounded by rivers, being bounded on the west by the Nile, on the south by the rivers Ratt and Dander, and on the north by the Bahar el Uswood. ”

“ The shadow of the temple, kissing the drowsy eyelids of the Kadu, lengthens towards the Merapi over whose crater, gilt by the setting sun, hangs a cloud of dark smoke which drifts slowly in the direction of the Merbabu, while the Soombing, to the northeast, looks tranquilly on. The darkness, ushered by the smoke of the ill-tempered old fire-mountain, mingling with the pink and purple of the western sky, spreads over the land, envelops forests and gardens in gray, hushing all that breathes to sleep. ”

“ For a time he had sovereign control of affairs in Meru; he conquered the seven dwipas, and led his armies through all the known countries of the world; by means of matchless wisdom and miraculous heroism he made his empire universal." (Ibid., p. 287.)
Here we see that the great god Indra, chief god of the Hindoos, was formerly king of Meru, and that Deva-Nahusha (De (va) nushas—De-onyshas) had also been king of Meru; and we must remember that Theopompus tells us that the island of Atlantis was inhabited by the "Meropes;" ”

“ MEROE, the general name (as Island of Meroe) for the region bounded on three sides by the Nile (from Atbara to Khartum) , the Atbara, and the Blue Nile; and the special name of an ancient city on the east bank of the Nile, 877 m. from Wadi Halfa by river, and 554 by the route across the desert, near the site of which is a group of villages called Bakarawiya. The site of the city is marked by over two hundred pyramids in three groups, of which many are in ruinous condition. ”

“ I visited a good many of the Mororan Ainos, saw their well-grown bear in its cage, and, tearing myself away with difficulty at noon, crossed a steep hill and a wood of scrub oak, and then followed a trail which runs on the amber sands close to the sea, crosses several small streams, and passes the lonely Aino village of Maripu, the ocean always on the left and wooded ranges on the right, and in front an apparent bar to farther progress in the volcano of Usu-taki, an imposing mountain, rising abruptly to a height of nearly 3000 feet, I should think. ”

“ The best way to secure an intelligible notion of the work of these monkish builders is to walk around the Mount at low tide and study the buildings from the outside. The feature that will most impress one in following this course is the wonderful north side of the Mount, known as the Merveille, which rears its massive walls sheer from the rock face, supported along its entire length by enormous buttresses, that spring with a fine suggestion of strength and permanency from their rocky base. ”

“ Deep, ever greening and blooming, or, in harvest-time, brown-yellow or earth-colored planes, most often cloud-likely bedewed early at morn, breathing life and enjoyment of life, so to say under the powerful ribs of mount Mĕnoreh, badly bursten and highly crowned, and the cloud-like tops of craters of more than three volcanoes, and the active Mĕrapi still vomitting death or destruction in their surroundings, but also producing new life on the soil all covered with time-worn volcanic-ruins. ”

“ For a considerable part of the way to Mori there is no track at all, though there is a good deal of travel. One makes one’s way fatiguingly along soft sea sand or coarse shingle close to the sea, or absolutely in it, under cliffs of hardened clay or yellow conglomerate, fording many small streams, several of which have cut their way deeply through a stratum of black volcanic sand. ”

“ The surface, though smooth in a general way as seen from a distance, is dotted with hillocks and rough crater-like pits, and traversed by a network of yawning fissures, forming a combination of topographical conditions of very striking character. The way lies by Mount Bremer, over stretches of gray sage plains, interrupted by rough lava slopes timbered with juniper and yellow pine, and with here and there a green meadow and a stream. ”

“ The Hindoos called Meru, the Thracians Olympus, the residence of the gods. East African tribes, such as the Masais, the Wakamba, the Wakwasi, and the Gallas, say that their gods dwell in Kilimanjaro or Kenia, or a third equally lofty mountain of their regions. And the Indians of the American prairies believe that the happy hunting-grounds of their departed are to be found in the Rocky Mountains. ”

“ But soon the sun burnt out and cleansed everything, turning filth into black earth; the wind of the desert covered it with sand and what had once been a place of pollution was fragrant with the fresh smell of mint and bitter wormwood.
"Seven courts—seven temples: of Tammuz of Babylon, Attis of the Hittites, Adon of Canaan, Adun of Crete, Mithra of Mitanni, Ashmun of Phoenicia, Zagreus of Thrace. All these gods are the shadow of the One to come," Merira recalled and again he thought drearily: "He is always everywhere, there is no escaping from Him." ”

“ Nile which flows in a straight line, and that it is filled by the summer rains; that above the confluence of the Astaboras and the Nile, at the distance of 700 stadia, is Meroë, a city having the same name as the island; and that there is another island above Meroë, occupied by the fugitive Egyptians, who revolted in the time of Psammitichus,798 and are called Sembritæ, or foreigners. Their sovereign is a queen, but they obey the king of Meroë. ”

“ The mythical sacred mountain Meru, the throne of the supreme eternal power, constituted the fixed centre of the world and strikingly exemplified quadruplicate division and organization, being associated with four lakes and four rivers; four mythical animals and four guardians. In consonance with this plan Brahma was endowed with four heads and four hands; the empire was divided into four quarters and seven zones, and the population into four castes identified with four colors, and governed by a king and seven councillors. ”

“ The coast-line of the district, off which lies an archipelago of two hundred and seven islands, is much broken, and for several miles inland is very little raised above sea-level, and is drained by numerous muddy tidal creeks. Southwards of Mergui town it consists chiefly of low mangrove swamps alternating with small fertile rice plains. After passing the mangrove limits, the ground to the east gradually rises till it becomes mountainous, even to the banks of the rivers, and finally culminates in the grand natural barrier dividing Burma from Siam. ”

“ Maru standing aft saw the island with the white foam fighting the coral and the gulls threshing around the break, saw the palms cut against the pale aquamarine of the skyline that swept up the burning blue of the noon, heard the long rumble and boom of the surf on the following wind, and watched and listened till the sound of the surf died to nothingness and of the island nothing remained but the palm tops, like pinheads above the sea dazzle. ”

“ It seems just as if giants had for a whim amused themselves by erecting cones and pyramids, mounds and ramparts to form a weirdly-disordered parapet on the river’s rocky embankment. But it is not so much to this strange natural architecture as to ancient works of man’s own hand, that the third group of rapids owes its characteristic appearance. On all suitable rock-projections, and especially on the larger islands, rise buildings with inclosing walls, towers, and jagged battlements, such as are not seen elsewhere in the Nile valley. ”

“ In those days that little island was uncharted and entirely desolate but for the gulls of the reef and the birds of the woods, and it was a wonderland to Maru, whose idea of land as a sea-beaten ring of coral was shattered by woods that bloomed green as a sea cave to the moonlight, high ground where rivulets danced amidst the fern, and a beach protected from the outer seas by a far-flung line of reefs. Talia to him was as wonderful as the island ”

“ And if any one fixes a post upright in the ground, or sees a man or a tree standing erect, he will perceive that their shadow is consumed at the extremities of their outlines. This also happens at Meroe, which is the spot in Ethiopia nearest to the equinoctial circle, and where for ninety days the shadows fall in a way just opposite to ours, on account of which the natives of that district are called Antiscii. ”

“ Mori is a large, ramshackle village, near the southern point of Volcano Bay—a wild, dreary-looking place on a sandy shore, with a number of joroyas and disreputable characters. Several of the yadoyas are not respectable, but I rather like this one, and it has a very fine view of the volcano, which forms one point of the bay. Mori has no anchorage, though it has an unfinished pier 345 feet long. The steam ferry across the mouth of the bay is here, and there is a very difficult bridle-track running for nearly 100 miles round the bay besides, and a road into the interior. ”

“ Mount Amyot had the appearance of granite from the plains, but I found that it consisted of the ferruginous sandstone. It is the southern extremity of a long ridge elevated not more than 200 feet above the plains at its base. We encamped at a bend of the river, on the border of a small plain named Merumba in latitude 33 degrees 19 minutes 16 seconds South. Variation 8 degrees 54 minutes 15 seconds East.
MOUNT MELVILLE (OF OXLEY) , FROM MERUMBA.
We were here disturbed by herds of cattle running towards our spare bullocks and mixing with them and the horses. ”

“ Moeru may almost be regarded as a rival of Kilima-Njaro itself, for its terminal cone is considerub'y over 16,000 feet high, and even in the month of July slight streaks of snow are occasionally observed on its summit in the early dawn, which, however, are s>on dissipated by the rays of the rising sun. At most other times, when the volcanic peak shakes off the mantle of fleecy clouds in which it is usually wrapped, it is seen standing out dark against the azure sky. ”

“ The next circumstance, peculiar to Meroë, is, that the ebony-tree grew there, which is spread all over the peninsula of Atbara, and out of it this tree is not found, (as far as I know) unless a few trees in the province of Kuara, in the low and northernmost part of it; a country, for its intolerable heat, not inferior to that of Atbara, and contiguous to it; but in 652 Gojam, a country deluged with six months rain, this tree would not grow; though so much farther south it is near two English miles higher than Atbara, and is therefore too cold. ”

“ Men, tiny as ants, dragged by a rope a huge barge with a granite obelisk, singing a mournful song; it made the stillness seem more still and the expanse of the river more limitless. The white houses of the City of the Sun, scattered about like dice in the narrow green strip of palm groves, were disappearing in the distance.
"What is the matter with you?" Dio asked Merira. "Happy? in good spirits? ”