In Search of King Solomon's Mines: A Modern Adventurer's Quest for Gold and History in the Land of the Queen of Sheba
By Tahir Shah
4/5
()
Currently unavailable
Currently unavailable
About this ebook
A thrilling, modern-day quest into our ancient past to find a legendary historical site buried in memory and time.
King Solomon, the Bible’s wisest king, possessed extraordinary wealth. The grand temple he built in Jerusalem was covered in gold from the porch to the inner sanctum, where the Ark of the Covenant was kept. Long before H. Rider Haggard’s classic adventure novel King Solomon’s Mines unleashed gold fever more than a century ago, many had attempted to find the source of the great king’s wealth. In this new adventure, Tahir Shah tries his hand at the quest.
Intrigued by a map he finds in a shop not far from the site of the temple, Shah assembles a multitude of clues to the location of Solomon’s mines. Some come from ancient texts, including the Septuagint, the earliest form of the Bible, and some from geological, geographical, and folkloric sources. All point across the Red Sea to Ethiopia, the land of the Queen of Sheba, Solomon’s lover, who bore Solomon’s son Menelik and founded Ethiopia’s imperial line. Shah’s trail takes him on a wild ride—by taxi, bus, camel, donkey, and Jeep—that is sure to delight all travelers.
“A hybrid of Indiana Jones and Herodotus.” —The Sunday Times
Read more from Tahir Shah
In Search of King Solomon's Mines: A Modern Adventurer's Quest for Gold and History in the Land of the Queen of Sheba Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Daydreams of an Octopus & Other Stories Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSorcerer's Apprentice: An Incredible Journey into the World of India's Godmen Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Sorcerer's Apprentice Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Arabian Nights Adventures (British Edition) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTales Told to a Melon Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Anthologies: Morocco: The Anthologies Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTrail of Feathers: In Search of the Birdmen of Peru Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsHannibal Fogg and the Supreme Secret of Man Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Travels With Myself Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Anthologies: Magic: The Anthologies Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Anthologies: Jinns: The Anthologies Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Anthologies: Nasrudin: The Anthologies Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Voyages & Vicissitudes of Nasrudin: Nasrudin Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Misadventures of the Mystifying Nasrudin: Nasrudin Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Middle East Bedside Book Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Anthologies: Jungle: The Anthologies Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGodman Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Anthologies: South Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Anthologies: Frontier: The Anthologies Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Anthologies: East: The Anthologies Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Anthologies: India: The Anthologies Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTimbuctoo Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Anthologies: City: The Anthologies Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Anthologies: Teaching Stories: The Anthologies Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Anthologies: Taboo: The Anthologies Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Tahir Shah Fiction Reader Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Anthologies: Africa: The Anthologies Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Anthologies: Danger: The Anthologies Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Anthologies: People: The Anthologies Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to In Search of King Solomon's Mines
Related ebooks
Destination Mecca Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTwo Sons from Egypt: The Story of Thutmose Iii and Moses Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5A PROPHETIC LOOK AT ETHIOPIAN JEWS FROM A NUBIAN PERSPECTIVE: Their Connection to the Ark of the Covenant Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLife and Travels of Mungo Park Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNubian Encounters: The Story of the Nubian Ethnological Survey 19611964 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Roman, Christian, and Arabic Periods, History of Egypt Vol. 11 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Story of Siegfried Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIsrael: Stripped Bare Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Conscript: A Novel of Libya’s Anticolonial War Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Searching for Zion: The Quest for Home in the African Diaspora Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Kabbalist Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Solomon and Sheba Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe O. Henry Collection Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Black Man's Journey in America: Glimpses of Islam, Conversations and Travels Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDavid’S Star Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTales from the Mountain of Gold Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNew Atlantis Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Diary of a Black Jewish Messiah: The Sixteenth-Century Journey of David Reubeni through Africa, the Middle East, and Europe Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Study Guide for Lucille Clifton's "Homage to My Hips" Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGule Wamkulu - the Big Dance Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Secrets of the Self Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThis, Too, is Liberia: Selected writings of Tom Kamara Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTippu Tip: Ivory, Slavery and Discovery in the Scramble for Africa Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Alexandrian Cosmopolitanism: An Archive Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCrusaders of the Jungle Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Crossing Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIntwasa Poetry Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsImprisoned with the Pharohs Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Voodoo Kingdoms And Dodgy Places: Travels in Timbuktu, Burkina Faso And Other West African Lands Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Africa Travel For You
A Primate's Memoir: A Neuroscientist's Unconventional Life Among the Baboons Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Death in the Long Grass: A Big Game Hunter's Adventures in the African Bush Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The 21: A Journey into the Land of Coptic Martyrs Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Kebra Nagast: The Lost Bible of Rastafarian Wisdom and Faith Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Smart Money Woman Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Yoruba-English/ English-Yoruba Dictionary & Phrasebook Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Cry Of The Kalahari Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Blood River: The Terrifying Journey through the World's Most Dangerous Country Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5West with the Night (Warbler Classics) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSwahili Grammar for Introductory and Intermediate Levels: Sarufi ya Kiswahili cha Ngazi ya Kwanza na Kati Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Eye of the Elephant: An Epic Adventure in the African Wilderness Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The South African Story: 4th Edition Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Love, Africa: A Memoir of Romance, War, and Survival Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Fodor's Essential Egypt Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Weight of Sand: My 450 Days Held Hostage in the Sahara Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Peter Capstick's Africa: A Return To The Long Grass Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Lonely Planet Cape Town & the Garden Route Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Lonely Planet South Africa, Lesotho & Eswatini Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDeath in the Dark Continent Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Death in a Lonely Land: More Hunting, Fishing, and Shooting on Five Continents Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Kenya - Culture Smart!: The Essential Guide to Customs & Culture Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Book of Marvels: The Orient Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5A Zoo in My Luggage Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Wildlife of Southern Africa Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Lonely Planet Africa Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Stories of the Sahara Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Last Horizons: Hunting, Fishing, and Shooting On Five Continents Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Rough Guide to Egypt Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLonely Planet Southern Africa Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5
Reviews for In Search of King Solomon's Mines
31 ratings5 reviews
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A keen observer of culture and place, Shah sets off on a quest through largely undeveloped landscape. He hires a nominally-Christian cab driver to take him via roads often more than ruts and bare ground. I really enjoyed (?) this adventure -- one I'll never have the courage nor opportunity to take.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Makes me want to go to Ethiopia (visit Lalibela's rock-cut churches and stay in the Jerusalem guesthouse). But it's not as good as Shah's best, The Sorceror's Apprentice - the narrative here is less coherent and more rushed.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5After finding an intrigueing map in a tourist shop in Old Jerusalem Shah became obsessed with finding the legendary King Solomon's Mines.He traveled extensively through Ethiopia in search of the source of King Solomon's celebrated wealth, and this is his account of those travels.The destinations that he visited were so remote and rugged that this book might well have been written in the 19th Century, but it was written just a few years ago.I'm a confirmed arm-chair adventurer. I adore reading about a time when the world was so much bigger, when there was so much left to discover. In Search of King Solomon's Mines both satisfied and inflamed my appetite for travel/adventure writing.I must read more of Shah's travel writing, not to mention H. Rider Haggard's famous novel of a similar title.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5A fun book by a writer whose style is unobtrusive and light-hearted. This one takes the reader to Ethiopia and on an adventure to discover the fabled gold mines of Biblical times.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Tahir Shah is one of the best travel writers ever. Period. I want desperately want to travel with him. No, scratch that, I want to BE him. I want to get paid to go on grand adventures with the threat of death and disease in foreign countries in pursuit of impossible goals. Is this so much to ask?
Shah’s first two books take place in India and Peru respectively. In this book, Shah finally writes about a continent near and dear to my heart – Africa. While on vacation in Isreal, Shah finds an “old map” in Ali Baba’s shop in one of the many touristy sections of town. It claims to be a map to King Solomon’s gold mines in Ophir. The location of Ophir is something of great debate between religious scholars, but Shah decides to go with the ones that advocate Ethiopia as being the mystical land of Ophir. And so, he goes in search of King Solomon’s gold mines in various regions of Ethiopia, including Gondar, Lalibela, and eventually into the mountains on the border between Ethiopia and Somalia. As in his other adventures, he finds a guide somewhat arbitrarily. In this case, he meets Samson, a taxi driver who used to be a gold miner. He happily employs Samson and takes off in search of gold. On the way, he experiences what I would consider to be hellish circumstances, but he always manages to relay these in a humorous and self-deprecating manner.
Shah is one of the most underrated travel writers ever. WHY AREN’T YOU ALL READING HIS BOOKS? And that’s all I have to say about that.