And Obal, and Abimael, and Sheba. The first of these, Obal, or Aubal, as the Arabs pronounce, Bochart t is obliged to make his posterity pass over the straits of the Arabian Gulf out of Arabia Felix into Arabia Troglodytice; where he finds a bay, called by Pliny u the Abalite bay, which carries in it some trace of this man's name, and by Ptolemy v the Avalite bay; and where was not only an emporium of this name, but a people called Avalites and also Adulites, which Bishop Patrick believes should be read "Abulites", more agreeably to the name of this man, but Pliny w speaks of a town of the Adulites also: Abimael is supposed by Bochart x to be the father of Mali, or the Malitae, as his name may be thought to signify, Theophrastus y making mention of a place called Mali along with Saba, Adramyta, and Citibaena, in spicy Arabia, which is the only foundation there is for this conjecture: Sheba gave name to the Sabaeans, a numerous people in Arabia; their country was famous for frankincense; the nations of them, according to Pliny z, reached both seas, that is, extended from the Arabian to the Persian Gulf; one part of them, as he says a, was called Atramitae, and the capital of their kingdom Sabota, on a high mountain, eight mansions from which was their frankincense country, called Saba; elsewhere he says b, their capital was called Sobotale, including sixty temples within its walls; but the royal seat was Mariabe; and so Eratosthenes in Strabo c says, the metropolis of the Sabaeans was Mariaba, or, as others call it, Merab, and which, it seems, is the same with Saba; for Diodorus Siculus d and Philostorgius e say, the metropolis of the Sabaeans is Saba; and which the former represents as built on a mountain, as the Sabota of Pliny is said to be,
t Ut supra, (Phaleg. l. 2.) c. 23. u Nat. Hist. l. 26. c. 29. v Geograph. l. 4. c. 7, 8. w Nat. Hist. l. 26. c. 29. x Ut supra. (Phaleg. l. 2. c. 24.) y Ut supra, (Hist. Plant. l. 9.) c.4. z Nat. Hist. l. 6. c. 28. a Ib. l. 12. c. 14. b Ut supra. (Nat. Hist. l. 6. c. 28.) c Geograph. l. 16. p. 528. d Bibliothec. l. 3. p. 180. e Hist. Ecclesiast. l. 3. p. 477.