Kherdhar.
—‘The land of Kher’[30] has often been mentioned in the annals of these States. It was in this distant nook that the Rathors first established themselves, expelling the Gohil tribe, which migrated to the Gulf of Cambay, and are now lords of Gogha and Bhavnagar; and instead of steering ‘the ship of the desert’ in their piracies on the kafilas, plied the Great Indian Ocean, even “to the golden coast of Sofala,” in the yet more nefarious trade of slaves. It is difficult to learn what latitude they affixed to the ‘land of Kher,’ which in the time of the Gohils approximated to the Luni; nor is it necessary to perplex ourselves with such niceties, as we only use the names for the purpose of description. In all probability it comprehended the whole space afterwards occupied by the Mallani or Chauhans, who founded Juna-Chhotan, etc., which we shall therefore include in Kherdhar. Kheralu, the chief town, was one of the ‘nine castles of Maru,’ when the Pramar was its sovereign lord. It has now dwindled into an insignificant village, containing no more than forty houses, surrounded on all sides by hills “of a black colour,” part of the same chain from Bhuj.Jūna Chhotan.
—Juna Chhotan, or the ‘ancient’ Chhotan, though always conjoined in name, are two [303] distinct places, said to be of very great antiquity, and capitals of the Hapa sovereignty. But as to what this Hapa Raj was, beyond the bare fact of its princes being Chauhan, tradition is now mute. Both still present the vestiges of large cities, more especially Juna, ‘the ancient,’ which is enclosed in a mass of hills, having but one inlet, on the east side, where there are the ruins of a small castle which defended the entrance. There are likewise the remains of two more on the summit of the range. The mouldering remnants of mandirs (temples), and baoris (reservoirs), now choked up, all bear testimony to its extent, which is said to have included twelve thousand habitable dwellings! Now there are not above two hundred huts on its site, while Chhotan has shrunk into a poor hamlet. At Dhoriman, which is at the farther extremity of the range in which are Juna and Chhotan, there is a singular place of worship, to which the inhabitants flock on the tij, or third day of Sawan of each year. The patron saint is called Alandeo, through whose means some grand victory was obtained by the Mallani. The immediate objects of veneration are a number of brass images called Aswamukhi, from having the ‘heads of horses’ ranged on the top of a mountain called Alandeo. Whether these may further confirm the Scythic ancestry of the Mallani, as a branch of the Asi, or Aswa race of Central Asia, can at present be only matter of conjecture.Nagar Gurha.
—Between Barmer and Nagar-Gurha on the Luni is one immense continuous thal, or rather rui, containing deep jungles of khair, or kher, khejra, karil, khep, phog,[31] whose gums and berries are turned to account by the Bhils and Kolis of the southern districts. Nagar and Gurha are two large towns on the Luni (described in the itinerary), on the borders of the Chauhan raj of Suigam, and formerly part of it.Here terminate our remarks on the thals of western Marwar, which, sterile as it is by the hand of Nature, had its miseries completed by the famine that raged generally throughout these regions in S. 1868 (A.D. 1812), and of which this[32] is the third year. The disorders which we have depicted as prevailing at the seat of government for the last thirty years, have left these remote regions entirely to the mercy of the desert tribes [304], or their own scarce less lawless lords: in fact, it only excites our astonishment how man can vegetate in such a land, which has nothing but a few sars, or salt-lakes, to yield any profit to the proprietors, and the excellent camel pastures, more especially in the southern tracts, which produce the best breed in the desert.
1. The journals of all these routes, with others of Central and Western India, form eleven moderate-sized folio volumes, from which an itinerary of these regions might be constructed. It was my intention to have drawn up a more perfect and detailed map from these, but my health forbids the attempt. They are now deposited in the archives of the Company, and may serve, if judiciously used, to fill up the only void in the great map of India, executed by their commands.
2. [Kānod Mohindargarh in Patiāla State (IGI, xvii. 385).]
3. It left Delhi October 13, 1808.
4. “Our marches,” says Mr. Elphinstone, “were seldom very long. The longest was twenty-six miles, and the shortest fifteen; but the fatigue which our people suffered bore no proportion to the distance. Our line, when in the closest order, was two miles long. The path by which we travelled wound much, to avoid the sand-hills. It was too narrow to allow of two camels going abreast; and if an animal stepped to one side, it sunk in the sand as in snow,” etc. etc.—Account of the Kingdom of Caubul, ed. 1842, vol. i. p. 11.
5. [In Sind, on the N. shore of the Great Rann, about 10 miles from Nagar-Pārkar.]
6. Trikuta, the epithet bestowed on the rock on which the castle of Jaisalmer is erected.
7. A name often given by Ferishta to the Indus.
8. [As has been already stated, Sahariya has no connexion with Arabic Sahra, ‘desert.’]
9. [Jhāl, of which there are two varieties, large and small, Salvadora persica and S. oleoides.]
10. When I penned this conjectural etymology, I was not aware that any speculation had been made upon this word: I find, however, the late M. Langlés suggested the derivation of oasis (variously written by the Greeks αὔασις, ἴασις and υἅσις, ὄασις, [αὔασις is the only other recognized form]) from the Arabic واح: and Dr. Wait, in a series of interesting etymologies (see Asiatic Journal, May 1830), suggests वसि, vasi from वस, vas, ‘to inhabit.’ Vasi and ὕασις quasi vasis are almost identical. My friend, Sir W. Ouseley, gave me nearly the same signification of وادي, Wadi, as appears in Johnson’s edition of Richardson, namely, a valley, a desert, a channel of a river—a river; وادي, wadi-al-kabir, ‘the great river,’ corrupted into Guadalquiver, which example is also given in d’Herbelot (see Vadi Gehennem), and by Thompson, who traces the word water through all the languages of Europe—the Saxon waeter, the Greek ὔδωρ, the Islandic udr, the Slavonic wod (whence woder and oder, ‘a river’): all appear derivable from the Arabic wad, ‘a river’—or the Sanskrit wah; and if Dr. W. will refer to p. 1322 of the Itinerary, he will find a singular confirmation of his etymology in the word bas (classically vas) applied to one of these habitable spots. The word basti, also of frequent occurrence therein, is from basna, to inhabit; vasi, an inhabitant; or vas, a habitation, perhaps derivable from wah, indispensable to an oasis! [The New English Dict. gives Lat. oasis, Greek ὄασις, apparently of Egyptian origin; cf. Coptic ouahe (whence Egyptian Arabic wāh), ‘dwelling-place, oasis,’ from ouih, ‘to dwell.’]
11. [See IGI, xii. 212 f.; E. H. Aitken, Gazetteer of Sind, 4; Calcutta Review, 1874; JRAS, xxv. 49 ff.]
12. [The derivation of Pārkar is unknown; that suggested in the text is impossible.]
13. [Nārāyansar, an important place of pilgrimage, with interesting temples, is situated at the Kori entrance of the W. Rann (BG, v. 245 ff.).]
14. [Or irina, Yule, Hobson-Jobson, 2nd ed. 774.]
15. [Equus hemionus (Blanford, Mammalia of India, 470 f.; Job xxxix. 5 ff.).]
16. “The greatest breadth of the valley of the Nile is four leagues, the least, one”; so that the narrowest portion of the valley of Sind equals the largest of the Nile. Egypt alone is said to have had eight millions of inhabitants; what then might Sind maintain! The condition of the peasantry, as described by Bourrienne, is exactly that of Rajputana; “The villages are fiefs belonging to any one on whom the prince may bestow them; the peasantry pay a tax to their superior, and are the actual proprietors of the soil; amidst all the revolutions and commotions, their privileges are not infringed.” This right (still obtaining), taken away by Joseph, was restored by Sesostris.
17. Another salt river.
18. [The Chauhān Rāo Kīrttipāl took it from the Pramāras towards the end of the twelfth century, and Kānardeo Chauhān lost it to Alāu-d-dīn (Erskine iii. A. 199 f.). In Briggs’ translation of Ferishta (i. 370) the place is called Jalwar, and the King Nāhardeo.]
19. Multan and Juna (Chhotan, qu. Chauhan-tan?) have the same signification, ‘the ancient abode,’ and both were occupied by the tribe of Malli or Mallani, said to be of Chauhan race; and it is curious to find at Jalor (classically Jalandhar) the same divinities as in their haunts in the Panjab, namely, Mallinath, Jalandharnath, and Balnath. Abu-l-FazlAbu-l-Fazl says, “The cell of Balnath is in the middle of Sindsagar”; and Babur (Elliot-Dowson ii. 450, iv. 240, 415, v. 114, Āīn, ii. 315) places “Balnath-jogi below the hill of Jud, five marches east of the Indus,” the very spot claimed by the Yadus, when led out of India by their deified leader Baldeo, or Balnath.
20. [Bhojak, ‘a feeder,’ a term usually applied to those Brāhmans who are fed after a death, in order to pass on the food to the spirit.]
21. [Ferishta (i. 369) calls the Rāja Sītaldeo; Amīr Khusru (Elliot-Dowson iii. 78, 550, v. 166) Sutaldeo.]
22. [The population of these towns is now respectively 4545 and 2066.]
23. [The old name was Srīmāl or Bhillamāla, which Erskine (iii. A. 194) identifies with Pi-lo-mo-lo of Hiuen Tsiang. But Beal (Buddhist Records of the Western World, ii. 270) transliterates this name as Bālmer or Bārmer.]
24. [For the Sāchora or Sānchora Brāhmans see BG, ix. Part i. 18; Erskine iii. A. 84.]
25. [Tīlwāra is about 10 miles W. of Bālotra.]
26. It is asserted by the natives to be caused by a small thread-like worm, which also forms in the eyes of horses. I have seen it in the horse, moving about with great velocity. They puncture and discharge it with the aqueous humour.
27. [The name Tararoi seems to have disappeared from the maps, the tract being now known as Sānkra.]
28. [Rāmdeora is 12 miles N. of Pokaran. The saint is commonly called Rāmdeoji or Rāmsāh Pīr.]
29. [Bārmer, the ancient name of which is said to be Bāhadamer, ‘hill fort of Bāhada,’ is 130 miles W. of Jodhpur city; its present population is 6064. Mallināth was son of Rāo Salkha, eighth in descent from Siāhji, founder of Mārwār State.]
30. Named in all probability, from the superabundant tree of the desert termed Khair, and dhar, ‘land.’ It is also called Kheralu, but more properly Kherala, ‘the abode of Khair’; a shrub of great utility in these regions. Its astringent pods, similar in appearance to those of the laburnum, they convert into food. Its gum is collected as an article of trade; the camels browse upon its twigs, and the wood makes their huts. [Kher is a ruined village, not far from Jasol, at the point where the Lūni River turns eastward. Kherālu has disappeared from modern maps, if it be not a mistake for Kerādu, where there are interesting temples (ASR, West Circle, March 31, 1907, pp. 40-43; Erskine iii. A. 201).]
31. [Khair, Acacia catechu; Khejra, Prosopis spicigera; Karīl, Capparis aphylla; Khep, Crotolaria burhia; Phog, Calligonum polygonoides.]
32. That is, 1814. I am transcribing from my journals of that day, just after the return of one of my parties of discovery from these regions, bringing with them natives of Dhat, who, to use their own simple but expressive phraseology, “had the measure of the desert in the palm of their hands”; for they had been employed as kasids, or messengers, for thirty years of their lives. Two of them afterwards returned and brought away their families, and remained upwards of five years in my service, and were faithful, able, and honest in the duties I assigned them, as jamadars of daks, or superintendents of posts, which were for many years under my charge when at Sindhia’s court, extending at one time from the Ganges to Bombay, through the most savage and little-known regions in India. But with such men as I drilled to aid in these discoveries, I found nothing insurmountable. [The famine of 1812-13 was the most calamitous of the earlier visitations (Erskine iii. A. 125).]
CHAPTER 2
The Chauhān Rāj.
—This sovereignty (raj) of the Chauhans occupies the most remote corner of Rajputana, and its existence is now for the first time noticed. As the quality of greatness as well as goodness is, in a great measure, relative, the Raj of the Chauhans may appear an empire to the lesser chieftains of the desert. Externally, it is environed, on the north and east, by the tracts of the Marwar State we have just been sketching. To the south-east it is bounded by Koliwara, to the south hemmed-in by the Rann, and to the west by the desert of Dhat. Internally, it is partitioned into two distinct governments, the eastern being termed Virawah, and the western from its position ‘across the Luni,’ Parkar;[1] which appellation, conjoined to Nagar, is also applied to the capital, with the distinction of Srinagar, or metropolis. This is the Negar-Parker of the distinguished Rennel, a place visited at a very early stage of our intercourse with these regions by an enterprising Englishman, named Whittington.[2]History of the Chauhāns.
—The Chauhans of this desert boast the great antiquity of their settlement, as well as the nobility of their blood: they have only to refer to Manik Rae and Bisaldeo of Ajmer, and to Prithiraj, the last Hindu sovereign of Delhi, to establish the latter fact; but the first we must leave to conjecture and their bards, though we may [305] fearlessly assert that they were posterior to the Sodhas and other branches of the Pramar race, who to all appearance were its masters when Alexander descended the Indus. Neither is it improbable that the Malli or Mallani, whom he expelled in that corner of the Panjab, wrested ‘the land of Kher’ from the Sodhas. At all events, it is certain that a chain of Chauhan principalities extended, from the eighth to the thirteenth century, from Ajmer to the frontiers of Sind, of which Ajmer, Nadol, Jalor, Sirohi, and Juna-Chhotan were the capitals; and though all of these in their annals claim to be independent, it may be assumed that some kind of obedience was paid to Ajmer. We possess inscriptions which justify this assertion. Moreover, each of them was conspicuous in Muslim history, from the time of the conqueror of Ghazni to that of Alau-d-din, surnamed ‘the second Alexander.’ Mahmud, in his twelfth expedition, by Multan to Ajmer (whose citadel, Ferishta says, “he was compelled to leave in the hands of the enemy”),[3] passed and sacked Nadol (transliterated Buzule);[4] and the traditions of the desert have preserved the recollection of his visit to Juna-Chhotan, and they yet point out the mines by which its castle on the rock was destroyed. Whether this was after his visitation and destruction of Nahrvala (Anhilwara Patan), or while on his journey, we have no means of knowing; but when we recollect that in this his last invasion, he attempted to return by Sind, and nearly perished with all his army in the desert, we might fairly suppose his determination to destroy Juna-Chhotan betrayed him into this danger: for besides the all-ruling motive of the conversion or destruction of the ‘infidels,’ in all likelihood the expatriated princes of Nahrvala had sought refuge with the Chauhans amidst the sandhills of Kherdhar, and may thus have fallen into his grasp.Although nominally a single principality, the chieftain of Parkar pays little, if any, submission to his superior of Virawah. Both of them have the ancient Hindu title of Rana, and are said at least to possess the quality of hereditary valour, which is synonymous with Chauhan. It is unnecessary to particularize the extent in square miles of thal in this raj, or to attempt to number its population, which is so fluctuating; but we shall subjoin a brief account of the chief towns, which will aid in estimating the population of Marusthali. We begin with the first division.
Chief Towns.
—The principal towns in the Chauhan raj are Suigam, Dharanidhar,[5] Bakhasar, Tharad, Hotiganv, and Chitalwana. Rana Narayan Rao resides alternately at Sui and Bah, both large towns surrounded by an abbatis, chiefly of the babul and other thorny trees, called in these regions kantha-ka-kot, which has given these simple, but very [306] efficient fortifications the term of kantha-ka-kot, or ‘fort of thorns.’ The resources of Narayan Rao, derived from this desert domain, are said to be three lakhs of rupees, of which he pays a triennial tribute of one lakh to Jodhpur, to which no right exists, and which is rarely realized without an army. The tracts watered by the Luni yield good crops of the richer grains; and although, in the dry season, there is no constant stream, plenty of sweet water is procured by excavating wells in its bed. But it is asserted that, even when not continuous, a gentle current is perceptible in those detached portions or pools, filtrating under the porous sand: a phenomenon remarked in the bed of the Kunwari River (in the district of Gwalior), where, after a perfectly dry space of several miles, we have observed in the next portion of water a very perceptible current.[6]Nagar Pārkar.
—Nagar, or Srinagar, the capital of Parkar, is a town containing fifteen hundred houses, of which, in 1814, one-half were inhabited. There is a small fort to the south-west of the town on the ridge, which is said to be about two hundred feet high. There are wells and beras (reservoirs) in abundance. The river Luni is called seven coss south of Nagar, from which we may infer that its bed is distinctly to be traced through the Rann. The chief of Parkar assumes the title of Rana, as well as his superior of Virawah whose allegiance he has entirely renounced, though we are ignorant of the relation in which they ever stood to each other: all are of the same family, the Hapa-Raj, of which Juna-Chhotan was the capital.Bakhasar.
—Bakhasar ranks next to Srinagar. It was at no distant period a large and, for the desert, a flourishing town; but now (1814) it contains but three hundred and sixty inhabited dwellings. A son of the Nagar chief resides here, who enjoys, as well as his father, the title of Rana. We shall make no further mention of the inferior towns, as they will appear in the itinerary.Tharād.
—Tharad is another subdivision of the Chauhans of the Luni whose chief town of the same name is but a few coss to the east of Suigam, and which like Parkar is but nominally dependent upon it. With this we shall conclude the subject of Virawah, which, we repeat, may contain many errors.Face of the Chauhān Rāj.
—As the itinerary will point out in detail the state of the country, it would be superfluous to attempt a more minute description here. The same sterile ridge, already described as passing through Chhotan to Jaisalmer, is to be [307] traced two coss west of Bakhasar, and thence to Nagar, in detached masses. The tracts on both banks of the Luni yield good crops of wheat and the richer grains, and Virawah, though enclosing considerable thal, has a good portion of flat, especially towards Radhanpur, seventeen coss from Sui. Beyond the Luni, the thal rises into lofty tibas: and indeed from Chhotan to Bakhasar, all is sterile, and consists of lofty sandhills and broken ridges often covered by the sands.Water Production.
—Throughout the Chauhan raj, or at least its most habitable portion, water is obtained at a moderate distance from the surface, the wells being from ten to twenty pursas,[7] or about sixty-five to a hundred and thirty feet in depth; nothing, when compared with those in Dhat, sometimes near seven hundred. Besides wheat, on the Luni, the oil-plant (til), mung, moth, and other pulses, with bajra, are produced in sufficient quantities for internal consumption; but plunder is the chief pursuit throughout this land, in which the lordly Chauhan and the Koli menial vie in dexterity. Wherever the soil is least calculated for agriculture, there is often abundance of fine pasture, especially for camels, which browse upon a variety of thorny shrubs. Sheep and goats are also in great numbers, and bullocks and horses of a very good description, which find a ready sale at the Tilwara fair.Inhabitants.
—We must describe the descendants, whether of the Malli, foe of Alexander, or of the no less heroic Prithiraj, as a community of thieves, who used to carry their raids into Sind, Gujarat, and Marwar, to avenge themselves on private property for the wrongs they suffered from the want of all government, or the oppression of those (Jodhpur) who asserted supremacy over, and the right to plunder them. All classes are to be found in the Chauhan raj: but those predominate, the names of whose tribes are synonyms for ‘robber,’ as the Sahariya, Khosa, Koli, Bhil. Although the Chauhan is lord-paramount, a few of whom are to be found in every village, yet the Koli and Bhil tribe, with another class called Pital,[8] are the most numerous: the last named, though equally low in caste, is the only industrious class in this region. Besides cultivation, they make a trade of the gums, which they collect in great quantities from the various trees whose names have been already mentioned. The Chauhans, like most of these remote Rajput tribes, dispense with the zunnar[9] or janeo, the distinctive thread of a ‘twice-born tribe,’ and are altogether free from [308] the prejudices of those whom association with Brahmans has bound down with chains of iron. But to make amends for this laxity in ceremonials, there is a material amendment in their moral character, in comparison with the Chauhans of the purab (east); for here the unnatural law of infanticide is unknown, in spite of the examples of their neighbours, the Jarejas, amongst whom it prevails to the most frightful extent. In eating, they have no prejudices; they make no chauka, or fireplace; their cooks are generally of the barber (Nai) tribe, and what is left at one meal, they, contrary to all good manners, tie up and eat at the next.Kolis and Bhils.
—The first is the most numerous class in these regions, and may be ranked with the most degraded portion of the human species. Although they puja all the symbols of Hindu worship, and chiefly the terrific Mata, they scoff at all laws, human or divine, and are little superior to the brutes of their own forests. To them every thing edible is lawful food; cows, buffaloes, the camel, deer, hog; nor do they even object to such as have died a natural death. Like the other debased tribes, they affect to have Rajput blood, and call themselves Chauhan Koli, Rathor Koli, Parihar Koli, etc., which only tends to prove their illegitimate descent from the aboriginal Koli stock. Almost all the cloth-weavers throughout India are of the Koli class, though they endeavour to conceal their origin under the term Julaha, which ought only to distinguish the Muslim weaver.[10] The Bhils partake of all the vices of the Kolis, and perhaps descend one step lower in the scale of humanity; for they will feed on vermin of any kind, foxes, jackals, rats, guanas,[11] and snakes; and although they make an exception of the camel and the pea-fowl, the latter being sacred to Mata, the goddess they propitiate, yet in moral degradation their fellowship is complete. The Kolis and Bhils have no matrimonial intercourse, nor will they even eat with each other—such is caste! The bow and arrow form their arms, occasionally swords, but rarely the matchlock.Pital is the chief husbandman of this region, and, with the Bania, the only respectable class. They possess flocks, and are also cultivators, and are said to be almost as numerous as either the Bhils or Kolis. The Pital is reputed synonymous with the Kurmi of Hindustan and the Kulambi of Malwa and the Deccan. There are other tribes, such as the Rabari, or rearer of camels, who will be described with the classes appertaining to the whole desert.
Dhāt and Umrasūmra.
—We now take leave of Rajputana, as it is, for the desert depending upon Sind, or that space between the frontier of Rajputana to the valley [309] of the Indus, on the west, and from Daudputra north, to Baliari on the Rann.[12] This space measures about two hundred and twenty miles of longitude, and its greatest breadth is eighty; it is one entire thal, having but few villages, though there are many hamlets of shepherds sprinkled over it, too ephemeral to have a place in the map. A few of these puras and vas, as they are termed, where the springs are perennial, have a name assigned to them, but to multiply them would only mislead, as they exist no longer than the vegetation. The whole of this tract may be characterized as essentially desert, having spaces of fifty miles without a drop of water, and without great precaution, impassable. The sandhills rise into little mountains, and the wells are so deep, that with a large kafila, many might die before the thirst of all could be slaked. The enumeration of a few of these will put the reader in possession of one of the difficulties of a journey through Maru; they range from eleven to seventy-five pursa, or seventy to five hundred feet in depth. One at Jaisinghdesar, fifty pursa; Dhot-ki-basti, sixty; Girab, sixty; Hamirdeora, seventy; Jinjiniali, seventy-five; Chailak, seventy-five to eighty.The Horrors of Humāyūn’s March.
—In what vivid colours does the historian Ferishta describe the miseries of the fugitive emperor, Humayun, and his faithful followers, at one of these wells! “The country through which they fled being an entire desert of sand, the Moguls were in the utmost distress for water: some ran mad; others fell down dead. For three whole days there was no water; on the fourth day they came to a well, which was so deep that a drum was beaten, to give notice to the man driving the bullocks, that the bucket had reached the top; but the unhappy followers were so impatient for drink, that, so soon as the first bucket appeared, several threw themselves upon it, before it had quite reached the surface, and fell in. The next day, they arrived at a brook, and the camels, which had not tasted water for several days, were allowed to quench their thirst; but, having drunk to excess, several of them died. The king, after enduring unheard-of miseries, at length reached Omurkote with only a few attendants. The Raja, who has the title of Rana, took compassion on his misfortunes, and spared nothing that could alleviate his sufferings, or console him in his distress.”—Briggs’ Ferishta, vol. ii. p. 93.[13]We are now in the very region where Humayun suffered these miseries, and in its chief town, Umarkot, Akbar, the greatest monarch India ever knew, first saw the light. Let us throw aside the veil which conceals the history of the race of Humayun’s protector, and notwithstanding he is now but nominal sovereign of Umarkot, and lord [310] of the village of Chor,[14] give him “a local habitation and a name,” even in the days of the Macedonian invader of India.
Dhāt.
—Dhat,[15] of which Umarkot is the capital, was one of the divisions of Marusthali, which from time immemorial was subject to the Pramar. Amongst the thirty-five tribes of this the most numerous of the races called Agnikula, were the Sodha, the Umar, and the Sumra;[16] and the conjunction of the two last has given a distinctive appellation to the more northern thal, still known as Umarsumra, though many centuries have fled since they possessed any power.Aror, Umarsūmra.
—Aror, of which we have already narrated the discovery, and which is laid down in the map about six miles east of Bakhar on the Indus, was in the region styled Umarsumra, which may once have had a much wider acceptation, when a dynasty of thirty-six princes of the Sumra tribe ruled all these countries during five hundred years.[17] On the extinction of its power, and the restoration of their ancient rivals, the Sind-Samma princes, who in their turn gave way to the Bhattis, this tract obtained the epithet of Bhattipoh; but the ancient and more legitimate name, Umarsumra, is yet recognized, and many hamlets of shepherds, both of Umars and Sumras, are still existing amidst its sandhills. To them we shall return, after discussing their elder brethren, the Sodhas. We can trace the colonization of the Bhattis, the Chawaras, and the Solankis, the Guhilots, and the Rathors, throughout all these countries, both of central and western Rajputana; and wherever we go, whatever new capital is founded, it is always on the site of a Pramar establishment. Pirthi tain na Pramar ka, or ‘the world is the Pramars,’[18] I may here repeat, is hardly hyperbolical when applied to the Rajput world.Aror.
—Aror, or Alor as written by Abu-l Fazl, and described by that celebrated geographer, Ibn-Haukal, as “rivalling Multan in greatness,” was one of the ‘nine divisions of Maru’ governed by the Pramar, of which we must repeat, one of the chief branches was the Sodha. The islandic Bakhar, or Mansura (so named by the lieutenant of the Khalif Al-Mansur), a few miles west of Aror, is considered as the capital of the Sogdoi, when Alexander sailed down the Indus,[19] and if we couple the similarity of name to the well-authenticated fact of immemorial sovereignty over this region, it might not be drawing too largely on credulity to suggest that the Sogdoi and Soda are one and [311] the same.[20] The Sodha princes were the patriarchs of the desert when the Bhattis immigrated thither from the north: but whether they deprived them of Aror as well as Lodorva, the chronicle does not intimate. It is by no means unlikely that the Umars and Sumras, instead of being coequal or coeval branches with the Sodha, may be merely subdivisions of them.We may follow Abu-l Fazl and Ferishta in their summaries of the history of ancient Sind, and these races. The former says: “In former times, there lived a Rāja named Siharas, whose capital was Alor. His sway extended eastward, as far as Kashmīr and towards the sea to Mekrān, while the sea confined it on the south and the mountains to the north. An invading army entered the country from Persia, in opposing which the Rāja lost his life. The invaders, contenting themselves with devastating part of the territory, returned. Rāē Sahi,[21] the Rāja’s son, succeeded his father, by whose enlightened wisdom and the aid of his intelligent minister Rām, justice was universally administered and the repose of the country secured.... In the caliphate of Walīd bin Abdu’l Malik, when Hajjāj was governor of Irāk, he dispatched on his own authority Muhammad Kāsim, his cousin and son-in-law, to Sind, who fought Dāhir in several engagements.... After Muhammad Kāsim’s death, the sovereignty of this country devolved on the descendants of the Banu Tamīm Ansāri. They were succeeded by the Sūmrah race, who established their rule, and were followed by the Sammas, who asserted their descent from Jamshīd, and each of them assumed the name of Jām.”[22]
Ferishta gives a similar version. “On the death of Mahomed Kasim, a tribe who trace their origin from the Ansarias established a government in Sind; after which the zamindars [lords of the soil or indigenous chiefs], denominated in their country Soomura, usurped the power, and held independent rule over the kingdom of Sinde for the space of five hundred years. These [312], the Soomuras, subverted the country of another dynasty called Soomuna [the Samma of Abu-l Fazl], whose chief assumed the title of Jam.”[23]
The difficulty of establishing the identity of these tribes from the cacography of both the Greek and Persian writers, is well exemplified in another portion of Ferishta, treating of the same race, called by him Soomuna, and Samma by Abu-l Fazl. “The tribe of Sahna appears to be of obscure origin, and originally to have occupied the tract lying between Bekher and Tatta in Sinde, and pretend to trace their origin from Jemshid.” We can pardon his spelling for his exact location of the tribe, which, whether written Soomuna, Sehna, or Seemeh, is the Summa or Samma tribe of the great Yadu race, whose capital was Summa-ka-kot, or Sammanagari, converted into Minnagara, and its princes into Sambas, by the Greeks.[24] Thus the Sodhas appear to have ruled at Aror and Bakhar, or Upper Sind, and the Sammas in the lower,[25] when Alexander passed through this region. The Jarejas and Jams of Navanagar in Saurashtra claim descent from the Sammas, hence called elsewhere by Abu-l Fazl “the Sind-Samma dynasty”; but having been, from their amalgamation with the ‘faithful,’ put out of the pale of Hinduism, they desired to conceal their Samma-Yadu descent, which they abandoned for Jamshid, and Samma was converted into Jam.[26]
We may, therefore, assume that a prince of the Sodha tribe held that division of the great Puar sovereignty, of which Aror, or the insular Bakhar, was the capital, when Alexander passed down the Indus: nor is it improbable that the army, styled Persian by Abu-l Fazl, which invaded Aror, and slew Raja Siharas, was a Graeco-Bactrian army led by Apollodotus, or Menander, who traversed this region, “ruled by Sigertides” (qu. Raja Siharas?) even to “the country of the Σῶρα,” or Saurashtra,[27] where, according to their historian, their medals were existent when he wrote in the second century.[28] The histories so largely quoted give us decided proof that Dahir, and his son [313] Raesa, the victims of the first Islamite invasion led by Kasim, were of the same lineage as Raja Siharas; and the Bhatti annals prove to demonstration, that at this, the very period of their settling in the desert, the Sodha tribe was paramount (see p. 1185); which, together with the strong analogies in names of places and princes, affords a very reasonable ground for the conclusion we have come to, that the Sodha tribe of Puar race was in possession of Upper Sind, when the Macedonian passed down the stream; and that, amidst all the vicissitudes of fortune, it has continued (contesting possession with its ancient Yadu antagonist, the Samma) to maintain some portion of its ancient sovereignty unto these days. Of this portion we shall now instruct the reader, after hazarding a passing remark on the almost miraculous tenacity which has preserved this race in its desert abode during a period of at least two thousand two hundred years,[29] bidding defiance to foreign foes, whether Greek, Bactrian, or Muhammadan, and even to those visitations of nature, famines, pestilence, and earthquakes, which have periodically swept over the land, and at length rendered it the scene of desolation it now presents; for in this desert, as in that of Egypt, tradition records that its increase has been and still is progressive, as well in the valley of the Indus as towards the Jumna.