"كتيّب بلاد الرافدين. المجلد II. ١٩١٧" [‎١‎١‎٦] (٥٤٢/١٢٥)

116
EIVEE KOUTES
a detour to N. round the border of the Hammar Lake, and rejoining
the river at the upper end of the Haqiqeh Channel. Thence it follows
the 1. bank to Nasirlyeh.
Inhabitants. —In the marsh country and in the dry desert to the S.
the Muntefiq tribe is still by far the most important; but in recent
years its influence seems to have suffered a considerable decline,
partly, perhaps, owing to Turkish policy. The Muntefiq properly so
called are still the core of a loose confederacy of clans (held together
by ties of blood or political association) to which the name Muntefiq
in a wider and vaguer sense is given. But at the present time not
only have the Muntefiq been separated from their former section the
Beni Malik (on the lower Tigris), and almost entirely displaced from
those parts of the Shatt el- e Arab below Basra which they used to
occupy, but in the area now under consideration their once sub
ordinate allies, and possibly kinsmen, the Beni Mansur and Ahl el-
Jazair, who live intermingled along the Euphrates above Kurna as
far as the Hammar Lake, are now entirely independent. These
Beni Mansur and Ahl el-Jazair are Shiahs by religion. That they
are now scattered over the Kaza of Kurna and over a large part of
the Kaza of Suq esh-Shuyukh is the result of a Turkish punitive
expedition, which was provoked about fifteen years ago by the murder
of some Ottoman officials. The main portion of the Beni Mansur
live on the S. side of the Old Channel of the Euphrates from about
1 m. above Kurna to the Nahr c Antar (m. 11|). Other tribal groups in
this neighbourhood are the Beni'Asad, who live interspersed among
the Beni Mansur and Ah] el-Jazair (as at Chubeish) and inhabit some
of the marsh villages S. of the Hammar Lake, and the Duaiyish, who
are to be found along its NE. shores.
The authority of the Arab sheikhs from Kurna to Chubeish is
distributed as follows :—
The Sheikh of Kurna claims control over Kurna, Muzeira'ah,
opposite Kurna on the 1. bank of the Tigris, over the villages above
Kurna on the Tigris (r. bank) for about 3 m., over all the settlements
on the N. bank of the Euphrates from Kurna to El-Howeir Creek, and
on the S. bank from the boundary of Sherish opposite Norfolk Creek
to a creek on the border of Medineh.
The Sheikh of Sherish used to be subject to Kurna, but is now
independent, and controls the Sherish tract between the Beni Mansur
lands on the W. and Deir on the r. bank of the Shatt el- e Arab to
the S.
Under Medineh. are the country on the S. bank from Nahr c Antar
to Nahr Salih, and the N. bank of the Euphrates from El Howeir
Creek towards Chubeish, including El-Khas and Turabeh.