Leuke Kome

Leuke Kome (Gr. λευκή κώμη, the ‘white village’), is the name of a seaport, market place, and customs post on the Red Sea coast of Northwest Arabia.

Leuke Kome is mentioned in three ancient sources: the Periplus Maris Erythraei (§19) in the mid-first century CE, Strabo’s Geography (XVI.4.23-24), and a Greek inscription from Adulis known as the Monumentum Adulitanum (RIÉ 277 – Bernand 2000: 32–45), generally dated, with no absolute certainty, to the third century CE, and only known through the reading provided by a Greek merchant and geographer named Cosmas Indicopleustes in the sixth century CE. This inscription was written by an Ethiopian king describing his wars in Arabia “from Leuke Kome to the land of the Sabaeans”.

The Periplus Maris Erythraei says that Leuke Kome was an emporion, a harbour, associated with a phrourion, a fortified structure, where the ships loaded and unloaded goods as part of Red Sea maritime trade. From Leuke Kome, an inland route led up to Petra, where Malichos, king of the Nabataeans, reigned. Leuke Kome was also a customs post where a ἑκατοντάρχης (ekatontarches) was in charge of collecting a 25 % tax on goods. This official can be considered as being either Nabataean or Roman. According to recent opinions, he was Roman because his title would have been understood by readers of the Periplus – Greek-speaking merchants from the Eastern Roman Empire – as Roman rather than as Nabataean. Also, the use of παραφυλακῆς (paraphulakes) in the same sentence to designate the place itself is a Roman customs technical term.

In Strabo, Leuke Kome is mentioned in the context of the expedition of the Roman prefect of Egypt, Aelius Gallus, to South Arabia, in 25 BCE. It is the place where Roman troops arrived after crossing the Red Sea and where they spent the winter. Strabo insists on the role of this place in trade: “From Leuke Kome camel traders travel safely and easily on the route to and from Petra” (Geog. XVI.4.23) and “loads of aromatics are conveyed from Leuke Kome to Petra” (Geog. XVI.4.24).

The identification of this harbour with a modern locality has long been debated among scholars. The two main challengers are al-Wajh, 580 km north of Jedda, and ʿAynūna, 240 km further north, at the southern outlet of the Gulf of Aqaba. Other proposals, such as Umm Lajj or Yanbuʿ are usually discarded in modern works. The main arguments in favour of al-Wajh are the following: al-Wajh was more practical because departing from there would have avoided sailing against the prevailing northern winds throughout the year in the northern part of the Red Sea. The Periplus says that Leuke Kome is east of Myos Hormos (Quṣayr), an important harbour on the Egyptian shore of the Red Sea, and al-Wajh is indeed located just opposite Myos Hormos, two or three sailing days away. Leuke Kome stands at the limit between the Nabataean kingdom and what the author calls the “country of Arabia”, and this applies more to al-Wajh than to ʿAynūna. A monumental Nabataean triclinium and a probable settlement with pottery from the first centuries BCE and CE were identified at a site called al-Quṣayr (not to be confused with the Egyptian Quṣayr mentioned above), 6 km inland of al-Wajh. Finally, amphorae of the same type as those found in the jetty of Myos Hormos were collected at al-Quṣayr in 2016.

As for ʿAynūna, it has been favoured more recently, particularly by scholars involved in the Saudi-Polish Archaeological Project which started there in 2014. ʿAynūna lies three kilometres inland of the port of Khurayba and the arguments put forward are the discovery of pre-Islamic ruins interpreted as a storage facility for goods which would have come from Khurayba, a neighbouring fortified structure, water and pasture accessibility, the existence of good and large anchorage, easy land connections with Petra, and the presence of at least one Nabataean inscription.

In the absence of consensus at the time of writing this article, the identification of Leuke Kome cannot be considered to be definitively solved.

Laïla Nehmé

References and suggested reading

• Bernand, É. 2000. Recueil des inscriptions de l’Éthiopie des périodes pré-axoumite et axoumite. Tome III - Traductions et commentaires. A - Les inscriptions grecques. Paris.
• Gawlikowski, M. 2019. Looking for Leuke Kome, in A. Manzo, C. Zazzaro, D. Joyce de Falco (eds) Stories of Globalisation: The Red Sea and the Persian Gulf from Late Prehistory to Early Modernity. Selected Papers of Red Sea Project VII: 281–291. Leiden, Boston: Brill.
• Gawlikowski, M., K. Juchniewicz & A. al-Zahrani (eds) 2021. Aynuna. A Nabataean Port on the Red Sea. Seven Seasons of Saudi-Polish Excavations (2014-2018). Warsaw, Riyadh: Polish Centre of Mediterranean Archaeology, University of Warsaw, Saudi Commission for Tourism and Heritage. https://depot.ceon.pl/handle/123456789/19983
• Juchniewicz, K. 2017. The Port of Aynuna in the Pre-Islamic Period: Nautical and Topographical Considerations on the Location of Leuke Kome. Polish Archaeology in the Mediterranean 26: 31–42. DOI: 10.5604/01.3001.0012.1819.
• Nappo, D. 2010. On the Location of Leuke Kome. JRA 23: 335–348. DOI: 10.1017/S1047759400002439.