RED SEA, or ARABIAN Getz', an inlet of the Indian ocean, in form a long and nar row gulf, stretching u.w. from the strait of Bab-el-Mandeb (lat. 12° 40' u.), by which it communicates with the gulf of Aden, to the isthmus of Suez (hit. 80° n.), which parts it from the Mediterranean sea. It separates Arabia on the e. from Egypt, Nubid, and Abyssinia on the west. Its extreme length is over 1400 English in.: it varies greatly in breadth—front about 20 in. at the strait of Bab-el-Mandeb, to upward of 230 at about lat. 10' 30'. At Riis (cape) Mohammed (hit. 27° 40' n.), the sea is parted into two arms or smaller gulfs, which inclose between them the peninsula of Mount Sinai; that on the W., continuing the direction of the main body of tic• sea: is the gulf of Suez (Bahr-es-Suweis), of which the strait of Jabal or JOlah forms the entrance; its length is about 180 m.; extreme breadth (about lat. 29°), upward of 30. The e. arm, called the gulf of Alsabali (Bahr-el-'Akabah), is entered by the strait of Tiran, and runs n.n.e. to lat. 29' 30 north. Its length is upward of 100 in.; greatest breadth, rather more tl.aa 15. The depth of the Red sea varies considerably, but is in many places very great; tie deepest sounding is marked as 1054 fathoms, in lat. 22° 30'. Southward of 16° it is comparatively shallow; but the shallowest part of the whole sea is the gulf of Suez, which decreases in depth from 40 or 50 fathoms at the entrance to 3 fathoms in Suez harbcr, at the U. end, where the gulf, which is supposed in ancient times to have extended considerably further n., has apparently been filled up by the sand washed up by the strong tides, or drifted in by the winds. The gulf of Akaball is much deeper; it is, in fact, a narrow, deep ravine, with steep and rocky sides, forming the termination of the long valley of the Anibal), running n. into the Dead sea. The basin of the Red sea itself is the lowest portion of a deep valley lying between the highlands of Africa on the w., and the lofty plateau of the Arabian hills on the e., which latter, rising at some little distance inland, leave for the most part a sandy and sterile tract along the sea. The navigation of the Red sea has always been accounted difficult and dangerous, owing to the prevalence of violent winds, and the number of islands, shoals, and coral reefs, which line the shores. The coral
reefs extend generally in parallel lines along the coast; they abound in all parts, but are especially frequent on the Arabian side, where the navigation is consequently very intri cate. The coral is very beautiful, often red or reddish in color, but more edmmonly white. The islands generally occur singly, but between the parallels of hit. 15° and they are found massed in two groups—the Farsan (q.v.) islands on the eastern, and the Dhalac (q.v.) islands on the western side. In mid-channel, s. of Ras Mohammed, there is generally a width of 100 tn. clear. Along this channel, the winds are constant through out the year in one of two directions: from May to October, the u.w. monsoon blows; for the rest of the year, the s.e. is the prevailing wind. and the water in the northern part of the sea is then raised to a higher level than the Mediterranean. It had been gen erally supposed that the level of the Red sea was more than 30 ft. higher than that of the Mediterranean, but it is now known, from careful observations, that the levels of the two seas are really the same. The principal ports are. on the Arabian side, Mocha, Jeddah (the port of Meccas, and (the non of on the w., Suez, Cosseir, Suakin, and Massowah. The origin of the name Red sea has given rise to a variety of i conjectures, and has never vet been satisfactorily settled. It is supposed to have been so called from the name Effiim (red), as the mountains of that country are washed by the waters of the gulf of Akabah : from the red and pnrpie coloring of the rocks which in some parts border it ; from the red color sometimes given to the waters by animalcules and sea-weed; or from the reddish tinge imparted to them in some places' by the subja cent red sandstone and reddish coral reefs. To the Hebrews it was known as Yam Sliplt. the sea of weeds or sedge. By the Greeks, in the earliest times, the name Red sea was aiven to the whole of the Indian ocean, including both the Red sea and the Persian gulf. and not distinctively to the former (which was then and afterward known as the Arabian gulf), though the name in later times gradually became restricted in its application.