'The Transactions of the Bombay Geographical Society. From January 1863 to December 1864. (Edited by the Secretary.) Volume XVII.' [‎138] (305/524)

138 RECENT TOUR ROUND THE NORTHERN
the Gonawali district. SE. by S. and about two miles irom the mined
Imams we found another, called Imam Zein-el-Abedeen, apparently
recently built, but near it was another banyan Merchant of Indian extraction. tree.
Here were small gardens and a sprinkling of fig, Nebbuck, and
castor-oil trees.
The ground to the West of this was covered with mounds, the ruins
of the city of Ghiramth or Ghirampta. Here we could trace the founda
tions of buildings of a bazaar, a hummum, and a caravanserai A roadside inn providing accommodation for caravans (groups of travellers). ; but it may
be doubted whether those were not the remains of a more recent town,
as they were all placed together and very much more distinct than any
thing that surrounded them.
Near this was a small round well, plastered inside, and with abund
ance of water. It had an anticpie look about it. T. o tne South of the
whole was a mound forty yards sepiare, said to be the groundwork of a
fortress.
Now the mounds extended about two miles from North to South, and
about half a mile across. A large and deep nullah ran along the East
side, and then along the South, and opened into the sea, so that the
town must have been placed in a sacK.
On examining the banks of the nullah, we found that the foundations
of most of the buildings were some eight feet deep down to the sand
stone, and about two feet thick.
A few fragments of vases and some bricks which seem to have been
used sparingly here, were the only antiques we could find, with the excep
tion of things made of baked clay, and said to have been thrown by
slingers.
O
Those, or fragments of them, were found in abundance all over the
mounds.
The bricks were of the same size and colour as those at Ctesephon
and Asheriah.
The building stone is fossiliferous sandstone, not to be found in the
neighbourhood, and said to have been brought from the isand of
Karrack.
On the opposite bank of the nullah w r e found what might be the
remains of a work protecting the ford.
Tradition has it that a river of sweet water once flowed through this
unllah, and that the whole plain was irrigated from it, but now the
rising tide is the only water that enters it.