BEJA (or BiJA)  , the name under which is comprised a wide-spread family of tribes, usually classed as Hamitic . They may, however, represent very early Semitic immigrants (see HAMITIC RACES) . When first recorded the Beja occupied the whole region between the Nile and the Red Sea from the border of Upper Egypt to the foot of the Abyssinian plateau . They were known to the ancient Egyptians, upon whose monuments they are represented . They are the Blemmyes of Strabo (xvii . 53), and have also been identified with the Macrobii of Herodotus, " tallest and finest of men " (iii . 17) . It has been suggested, though on insufficient grounds, that the Beja, rather than the Abyssinians, are the " Ethiopians " of Herodotus, the civilized people who built the city of Meroe and its pyramids . During the Roman period the Beja were much what they are to-day, nomadic and aggressive, and were constantly at war . In 216 A.H . (A.D . 832) the Moslem governor of Assuan made a treaty with the Beja chief, by which the latter undertook to guard the road to Aidhab and pay an annual tribute of one hundred camels .

This is the earliest

record of a government engagement with the northern section of the Beja, now the Ababda . Ibn Batuta, early in the 14th century, mentions a king of Beja, El Hadrabi, who received two-thirds of the revenue of Aidhab, the other third going to the king of Egypt . The Beja territory contained gold and emerald mines . The tribesmen were-the usual escort for pilgrims to Mecca from Kus to Aidhab . According to Leo Africanus, at the close of the 14th or very early in the 15th century their rich town of Zibid (Aidhab?) on the Red Sea was destroyed . This seems to have broken up the tribal cohesion . Leo Africanus describes the Beja as " most base, miserable and living only on milk and camels' flesh." In the middle ages the Beja, partially at any rate, were Christians . The kingdom of Meroe was succeeded by that of " Aloa," the capital of which, Soba, was on the Blue Nile, about 13 M. above Khartum . The country was conquered by the Funj (q.v.), a negroid people who subsequently became Mahommedan and compelled the Beja to adopt that religion . Until the invasion of the Egyptians, under Ismail, son of Mehemet All (1820), the Funj remained in possession . All the Beja are now Mahommedans, but generally only so in name, though some of the tribes enthusiastically fought for Mandiism (1883--99) . As a race the Beja are remarkable forphysical beauty, with a colour more red than black, and of a distinctly Caucasic type of face .

The chiefs are, as a

rule, of much fairer complexion than the tribesmen . In spite of their claim to Arab origin, the tribes have preserved many negro customs in the matter of costume and scarring the body . Their hair-dressing is very characteristic . The hair, worn thick as a protection against the sun, is parted in a circle round the head on a level with the eyes, above which the hair, saturated with mutton fat or butter, is trained straight up like a mop, with separate tufts at sides and back . Most of the tribes are nomadic shepherds, driving their cattle from pasture to pasture; some few are occupied in agriculture . They are polygynous, but, unlike the Arabs, great independence is granted their women . Among most of the Beja peoples the wife can return to her mother's tent whenever she likes, and after a birth of a child she can repudiate the husband, who must make a present to be re-accepted . Cases are said to have occurred where the woman has thus obtained all her husband's possessions . The whole social position of the Beja women points, indeed, to an earlier matriarchal system . Among some of the tribes the custom of the " fourth day free " is observed, by which the women are only considered married for so many days a week, forming what liaisons they please on the odd day . The chief Beja tribes are the Ababda, Bisharin, Hadendoa, Beni-Amer, Amarar, Shukuria, Hallenga and Hamran .