Yasdi also is properly in Persia; it is a good and noble city, and has a great amount of trade. They weave there quantities of a certain silk tissue known as Yasdi, which merchants carry into many quarters to dispose of. The people are worshippers of Mahommet.{1}

When you leave this city to travel further, you ride for seven days over great plains, finding harbour to receive you at three places only. There are many fine woods [producing dates] upon the way, such as one can easily ride through; and in them there is great sport to be had in hunting and hawking, there being partridges and quails and abundance of other game, so that the merchants who pass that way have plenty of diversion. There are also wild asses, handsome creatures. At the end of those seven marches over the plain you come to a fine kingdom which is called Kerman.{2}

Note 1.—Yezd, an ancient city, supposed by D’Anville to be the Isatichae of Ptolemy, is not called by Marco a kingdom, though having a better title to the distinction than some which he classes as such. The atabegs of Yezd dated from the middle of the 11th century, and their Dynasty was permitted by the Mongols to continue till the end of the 13th, when it was extinguished by Ghazan, and the administration made over to the Mongol Diwan.

Yezd, in pre-Mahomedan times, was a great sanctuary of the Gueber worship, though now it is a seat of fanatical Mahomedanism. It is, however, one of the few places where the old religion lingers. In 1859 there were reckoned 850 families of Guebers in Yezd and fifteen adjoining villages, but they diminish rapidly.

[Heyd (Com. du Levant, II. p. 109) says the inhabitants of Yezd wove the finest silk of Taberistan.—H. C.] The silk manufactures still continue, and, with other weaving, employ a large part of the population. The Yazdi, which Polo mentions, finds a place in the Persian dictionaries, and is spoken of by D’Herbelot as Ḳumásh-i-Yezdi, “Yezd stuff.” [“He [Nadir Shah] bestowed upon the ambassador [Hakeem Ataleek, the prime minister of Abulfiez Khan, King of Bokhara] a donation of a thousand mohurs of Hindostan, twenty-five pieces of Yezdy brocade, a rich dress, and a horse with silver harness....” (Memoirs of Khojah Abdulkurreem, a Cashmerian of distinction ... transl. from the original Persian, by Francis Gladwin ... Calcutta, 1788, 8vo, p. 36.)—H. C.]

Yezd is still a place of important trade, and carries on a thriving commerce with India by Bandar Abbási. A visitor in the end of 1865 says: “The external trade appears to be very considerable, and the merchants of Yezd are reputed to be amongst the most enterprising and respectable of their class in Persia. Some of their agents have lately gone, not only to Bombay, but to the Mauritius, Java, and China.”

(Ilch. I. 67–68; Khanikoff, Mém. p. 202; Report by Major R. M. Smith, R.E.)

Friar Odoric, who visited Yezd, calls it the third best city of the Persian Emperor, and says (Cathay, I. p. 52): “There is very great store of victuals and all other good things that you can mention; but especially is found there great plenty of figs; and raisins also, green as grass and very small, are found there in richer profusion than in any other part of the world.” [He also gives from the smaller version of Ramusio’s an awful description of the Sea of Sand, one day distant from Yezd. (Cf. Tavernier, 1679, I. p. 116.)—H. C.]

Note 2.—I believe Della Valle correctly generalises when he says of Persian travelling that “you always travel in a plain, but you always have mountains on either hand” (I. 462). [Compare Macgregor, I. 254: “I really cannot describe the road. Every road in Persia as yet seems to me to be exactly alike, so ... my readers will take it for granted that the road went over a waste, with barren rugged hills in the distance, or near; no water, no houses, no people passed.”—H. C.] The distance from Yezd to Kermán is, according to Khanikoff’s survey, 314 kilomètres, or about 195 miles. Ramusio makes the time eight days, which is probably the better reading, giving a little over 24 miles a day. Westergaard in 1844, and Khanikoff in 1859, took ten days; Colonel Goldsmid and Major Smith in 1865 twelve. [“The distance from Yezd to Kermán by the present high road, 229 miles, is by caravans, generally made in nine stages; persons travelling with all comforts do it in twelve stages; travellers whose time is of some value do it easily in seven days.” (Houtum-Schindler, l.c. pp. 490–491.)—H. C.]

Khanikoff observes on this chapter: “This notice of woods easy to ride through, covering the plain of Yezd, is very curious. Now you find it a plain of great extent indeed from N.W. to S.E., but narrow and arid; indeed I saw in it only thirteen inhabited spots, counting two caravanserais. Water for the inhabitants is brought from a great distance by subterraneous conduits, a practice which may have tended to desiccate the soil, for every trace of wood has completely disappeared.”

Abbott travelled from Yezd to Kermán in 1849, by a road through Báfk, east of the usual road, which Khanikoff followed, and parallel to it; and it is worthy of note that he found circumstances more accordant with Marco’s description. Before getting to Báfk he says of the plain that it “extends to a great distance north and south, and is probably 20 miles in breadth;” whilst Báfk “is remarkable for its groves of date-trees, in the midst of which it stands, and which occupy a considerable space.” Further on he speaks of “wild tufts and bushes growing abundantly,” and then of “thickets of the Ghez tree.” He heard of the wild asses, but did not see any. In his report to the Foreign Office, alluding to Marco Polo’s account, he says: “It is still true that wild asses and other game are found in the wooded spots on the road.” The ass is the Asinus Onager, the Gor Khar of Persia, or Kulan of the Tartars. (Khan. Mém. p. 200; Id. sur Marco Polo, p. 21; J. R. G. S. XXV. 20–29; Mr. Abbott’s MS. Report in Foreign office.) [The difficulty has now been explained by General Houtum-Schindler in a valuable paper published in the Jour. Roy. As. Soc. N.S. XIII., October, 1881, p. 490. He says: “Marco Polo travelled from Yazd to Kermán viâ Báfk. His description of the road, seven days over great plains, harbour at three places only, is perfectly exact. The fine woods, producing dates, are at Báfk itself. (The place is generally called Báft.) Partridges and quails still abound; wild asses I saw several on the western road, and I was told that there were a great many on the Báfk road. Travellers and caravans now always go by the eastern road viâ Anár and Bahrámábád. Before the Sefavíehs (i.e. before A.D. 1500) the Anár road was hardly, if ever, used; travellers always took the Báfk road. The country from Yazd to Anár, 97 miles, seems to have been totally uninhabited before the Sefavíehs. Anár, as late as A.D. 1340, is mentioned as the frontier place of Kermán to the north, on the confines of the Yazd desert. When Sháh Abbás had caravanserais built at three places between Yazd and Anár (Zein ud-dín, Kermán-sháhán, and Shamsh), the eastern road began to be neglected.” (Cf. Major Sykes’ Persia, ch. xxiii.)—H. C.]

CHAPTER XVII.

Kerman is a kingdom which is also properly in Persia, and formerly it had a hereditary prince. Since the Tartars conquered the country the rule is no longer hereditary, but the Tartar sends to administer whatever lord he pleases.{1} In this kingdom are produced the stones called turquoises in great abundance; they are found in the mountains, where they are extracted from the rocks.{2} There are also plenty of veins of steel and Ondanique.{3} The people are very skilful in making harness of war; their saddles, bridles, spurs, swords, bows, quivers, and arms of every kind, are very well made indeed according to the fashion of those parts. The ladies of the country and their daughters also produce exquisite needlework in the embroidery of silk stuffs in different colours, with figures of beasts and birds, trees and flowers, and a variety of other patterns. They work hangings for the use of noblemen so deftly that they are marvels to see, as well as cushions, pillows quilts, and all sorts of things.{4}

In the mountains of Kerman are found the best falcons in the world. They are inferior in size to the Peregrine, red on the breast, under the neck, and between the thighs; their flight so swift that no bird can escape them.{5}

On quitting the city you ride on for seven days, always finding towns, villages, and handsome dwelling-houses, so that it is very pleasant travelling; and there is excellent sport also to be had by the way in hunting and hawking. When you have ridden those seven days over a plain country, you come to a great mountain; and when you have got to the top of the pass you find a great descent which occupies some two days to go down. All along you find a variety and abundance of fruits; and in former days there were plenty of inhabited places on the road, but now there are none; and you meet with only a few people looking after their cattle at pasture. From the city of Kerman to this descent the cold in winter is so great that you can scarcely abide it, even with a great quantity of clothing.{6}

Note 1.—Kermán is mentioned by Ptolemy, and also by Ammianus amongst the cities of the country so called (Carmania): “inter quas nitet Carmana omnium mater.” (XXIII. 6.)

M. Pauthier’s supposition that Sirján was in Polo’s time the capital, is incorrect. (See N. et E. XIV. 208, 290.) Our Author’s Kermán is the city still so called; and its proper name would seem to have been Kuwáshír. (See Reinaud, Mém. sur l’Inde, 171; also Sprenger P. and R. R. 77.) According to Khanikoff it is 5535 feet above the sea.

Kermán, on the fall of the Beni Búya Dynasty, in the middle of the 11th century, came into the hands of a branch of the Seljukian Turks, who retained it till the conquests of the Kings of Khwarizm, which just preceded the Mongol invasion. In 1226 the Amir Borák, a Kara Khitaian, who was governor on behalf of Jaláluddin of Khwarizm, became independent under the title of Kutlugh Sultan. [He died in 1234.] The Mongols allowed this family to retain the immediate authority, and at the time when Polo returned from China the representative of the house was a lady known as the Pádishah Khátún [who reigned from 1291], the wife successively of the Ilkhans Abaka and Kaikhatu; an ambitious, clever, and masterful woman, who put her own brother Siyurgutmish to death as a rival, and was herself, after the decease of Kaikhatu, put to death by her brother’s widow and daughter [1294]. The Dynasty continued, nominally at least, to the reign of the Ilkhan Khodabanda (1304–13), when it was extinguished. [See Major Sykes’ Persia, chaps, v. and xxiii.]

Kermán was a Nestorian see, under the Metropolitan of Fars. (Ilch. passim; Weil, III. 454; Lequien, II. 1256.)

[“There is some confusion with regard to the names of Kermán both as a town and as a province or kingdom. We have the names Kermán, Kuwáshír, Bardshír. I should say the original name of the whole country was Kermán, the ancient Karamania. A province of this was called Kúreh-i-Ardeshír, which, being contracted, became Kuwáshír, and is spoken of as the province in which Ardeshír Bábekán, the first Sassanian monarch, resided. A part of Kúreh-i-Ardeshír was called Bardshír, or Bard-i-Ardeshír, now occasionally Bardsír, and the present city of Kermán was situated at its north-eastern corner. This town, during the Middle Ages, was called Bardshír. On a coin of Qara Arslán Beg, King of Kermán, of A.H. 462, Mr. Stanley Lane Poole reads Yazdashír instead of Bardshír. Of Al Idrísí’s Yazdashír I see no mention in histories; Bardshír was the capital and the place where most of the coins were struck. Yazdashír, if such a place existed, can only have been a place of small importance. It is, perhaps, a clerical error for Bardshír; without diacritical points, both words are written alike. Later, the name of the city became Kermán, the name Bardshír reverting to the district lying south-west of it, with its principal place Mashíz. In a similar manner Mashíz was often, and is so now, called Bardshír. Another old town sometimes confused with Bardshír was Sírján or Shírján, once more important than Bardshír; it is spoken of as the capital of Kermán, of Bardshír, and of Sardsír. Its name now exists only as that of a district, with principal place S’aídábád. The history of Kermán, ’Agd-ul-’Olá, plainly says Bardshír is the capital of Kermán, and from the description of Bardshír there is no doubt of its having been the present town Kermán. It is strange that Marco Polo does not give the name of the city. In Assemanni’s Bibliotheca Orientalis Kuwáshír and Bardashír are mentioned as separate cities, the latter being probably the old Mashíz, which as early as A.H. 582 (A.D. 1186) is spoken of in the History of Kermán as an important town. The Nestorian bishop of the province Kermán, who stood under the Metropolitan of Fars, resided at Hormúz.” (Houtum-Schindler, l.c. pp. 491–492.)

There does not seem any doubt as to the identity of Bardashir with the present city of Kermán. (See The Cities of Kirmān in the time of Hamd-Allah Mustawfi and Marco Polo, by Guy le Strange, Jour. R. As. Soc. April, 1901, pp. 281, 290.) Hamd-Allah is the author of the Cosmography known as the Nuzhat-al-Kūlūb or “Heart’s Delight.” (Cf. Major Sykes’ Persia, chap. xvi., and the Geographical Journal for February, 1902, p. 166.)—H. C.]

Note 2.—A MS. treatise on precious stones cited by Ouseley mentions Shebavek in Kermán as the site of a Turquoise mine. This is probably Shahr-i-Babek, about 100 miles west of the city of Kermán, and not far from Párez, where Abbott tells us there is a mine of these stones, now abandoned. Goebel, one of Khanikoff’s party, found a deposit of turquoises at Taft, near Yezd. (Ouseley’s Travels, I. 211; J. R. G. S. XXVI. 63–65; Khan. Mém. 203.)

[“The province Kermán is still rich in turquoises. The mines of Páríz or Párez are at Chemen-i-mó-aspán, 16 miles from Páríz on the road to Bahrámábád (principal place of Rafsinján), and opposite the village or garden called Gód-i-Ahmer. These mines were worked up to a few years ago; the turquoises were of a pale blue. Other turquoises are found in the present Bardshír plain, and not far from Mashíz, on the slopes of the Chehel tan mountain, opposite a hill called the Bear Hill (tal-i-Khers). The Shehr-i-Bábek turquoise mines are at the small village Kárík, a mile from Medvár-i-Bálá, 10 miles north of Shehr-i-Bábek. They have two shafts, one of which has lately been closed by an earthquake, and were worked up to about twenty years ago. At another place, 12 miles from Shehr-i-Bábek, are seven old shafts now not worked for a long period. The stones of these mines are also of a very pale blue, and have no great value.” (Houtum-Schindler, l.c. 1881, p. 491.)

The finest turquoises came from Khorasan; the mines were near Maaden, about 48 miles to the north of Nishapūr. (Heyd, Com. du Levant, II. p. 653; Ritter, Erdk. pp. 325–330.)

It is noticeable that Polo does not mention indigo at Kermán.—H. C.]

Note 3.—Edrisi says that excellent iron was produced in the “cold mountains” N.W. of Jiruft, i.e. somewhere south of the capital; and Jihán Numá, or Great Turkish Geography, that the steel mines of Niriz, on the borders of Kermán, were famous. These are also spoken of by Teixeira. Major St. John enables me to indicate their position, in the hills east of Niriz. (Edrisi, vol. i. p. 430; Hammer, Mém. sur la Perse, p. 275; Teixeira, Relaciones, p. 378; and see Map of Itineraries, No. II.)

[“Marco Polo’s steel mines are probably the Parpa iron mines on the road from Kermán to Shíráz, called even to-day M’aden-i-fúlád (steel mine); they are not worked now. Old Kermán weapons, daggers, swords, old stirrups, etc., made of steel, are really beautiful, and justify Marco Polo’s praise of them” (Houtum-Schindler, l.c. p. 491.)—H. C.]

Ondanique of the Geog. Text, Andaine of Pauthier’s, Andanicum of the Latin, is an expression on which no light has been thrown since Ramusio’s time. The latter often asked the Persian merchants who visited Venice, and they all agreed in stating that it was a sort of steel of such surpassing value and excellence, that in the days of yore a man who possessed a mirror, or sword, of Andanic regarded it as he would some precious jewel. This seems to me excellent evidence, and to give the true clue to the meaning of Ondanique. I have retained the latter form because it points most distinctly to what I believe to be the real word, viz. Hundwáníy, “Indian Steel.”[1] (See Johnson’s Pers. Dict. and De Sacy’s Chrestomathie Arabe, II. 148.) In the Vocabulista Arabico, of about A.D. 1200 (Florence, 1871, p. 211), Hunduwán is explained by Ensis. Vüllers explains Hundwán as “anything peculiar to India, especially swords,” and quotes from Firdúsi, “Khanjar-i-Hundwán,” a hanger of Indian steel.

The like expression appears in the quotation from Edrisi below as Hindiah, and found its way into Spanish in the shapes of Alhinde, Alfinde, Alinde, first with the meaning of steel, then assuming, that of steel mirror, and finally that of metallic foil of a glass mirror. (See Dozy and Engelmann, 2d ed. pp. 144–145.) Hint or Al-hint is used in Berber also for steel. (See J. R. A. S. IX. 255.)

The sword-blades of India had a great fame over the East, and Indian steel, according to esteemed authorities, continued to be imported into Persia till days quite recent. Its fame goes back to very old times. Ctesias mentions two wonderful swords of such material that he got from the king of Persia and his mother. It is perhaps the ferrum candidum of which the Malli and Oxydracae sent a 100 talents weight as a present to Alexander.[2] Indian Iron and Steel (σíδηρος Ἰνδικòς καì στóμωμα) are mentioned in the Periplus as imports into the Abyssinian ports. Ferrum Indicum appears (at least according to one reading) among the Oriental species subject to duty in the Law of Marcus Aurelius and Commodus on that matter. Salmasius notes that among surviving Greek chemical treatises there was one περì βαφῆς Ἰνδικοῦ σιδήρου, “On the Tempering of Indian Steel.” Edrisi says on this subject: “The Hindus excel in the manufacture of iron, and in the preparation of those ingredients along with which it is fused to obtain that kind of soft Iron which is usually styled Indian Steel (Hindiah).[3] They also have workshops wherein are forged the most famous sabres in the world.... It is impossible to find anything to surpass the edge that you get from Indian Steel (al-hadíd al-Hindí).”

Allusions to the famous sword-blades of India would seem to be frequent in Arabic literature. Several will be found in Hamása’s collection of ancient Arabic poems translated by Freytag. The old commentator on one of these passages says: “Ut optimos gladios significet ... Indicos esse dixit,” and here the word used in the original is Hundwániyah. In Manger’s version of Arabshah’s Life of Timur are several allusions of the same kind; one, a quotation from Antar, recalls the ferrum candidum of Curtius:

“Albi (gladii) Indici meo in sanguine abluuntur.”

In the histories, even of the Mahomedan conquest of India, the Hindu infidels are sent to Jihannam with “the well-watered blade of the Hindi sword”; or the sword is personified as “a Hindu of good family.” Coming down to later days, Chardin says of the steel of Persia: “They combine it with Indian steel, which is more tractable ... and is much more esteemed.” Dupré, at the beginning of this century, tells us: “I used to believe ... that the steel for the famous Persian sabres came from certain mines in Khorasan. But according to all the information I have obtained, I can assert that no mine of steel exists in that province. What is used for these blades comes in the shape of disks from Lahore.” Pottinger names steel among the imports into Kermán from India. Elphinstone the Accurate, in his Caubul, confirms Dupré: “Indian Steel [in Afghanistan] is most prized for the material; but the best swords are made in Persia and in Syria;” and in his History of India, he repeats: “The steel of India was in request with the ancients; it is celebrated in the oldest Persian poem, and is still the material of the scimitars of Khorasan and Damascus.”[4]

Klaproth, in his Asia Polyglotta, gives Andun as the Ossetish and Andan as the Wotiak, for Steel. Possibly these are essentially the same with Hundwáníy and Alhinde, pointing to India as the original source of supply. [In the Sikandar Nāma,e Bará (or “Book of Alexander the Great,” written A.D. 1200, by Abū Muhammad bin Yusuf bin Mu,Ayyid-i-Nizāmu-’d-Dīn), translated by Captain H. Wilberforce Clarke (Lond., 1881, large 8vo), steel is frequently mentioned: Canto xix. 257, p. 202; xx. 12, p. 211; xlv. 38, p. 567; lviii. 32, pp. 695, 42, pp. 697, 62, 66, pp. 699; lix. 28, p. 703.—H. C.]

Avicenna, in his fifth book De Animâ, according to Roger Bacon, distinguishes three very different species of iron: “1st. Iron which is good for striking or bearing heavy strokes, and for being forged by hammer and fire, but not for cutting-tools. Of this hammers and anvils are made, and this is what we commonly call Iron simply. 2nd. That which is purer, has more heat in it, and is better adapted to take an edge and to form cutting-tools, but is not so malleable, viz. Steel. And the 3rd is that which is called Andena. This is less known among the Latin nations. Its special character is that like silver it is malleable and ductile under a very low degree of heat. In other properties it is intermediate between iron and steel.” (Fr. R. Baconis Opera Inedita, 1859, pp. 382–383.) The same passage, apparently, of Avicenna is quoted by Vincent of Beauvais, but with considerable differences. (See Speculum Naturale, VII. ch. lii. lx., and Specul. Doctrinale, XV. ch. lxiii.) The latter author writes Alidena, and I have not been able to refer to Avicenna, so that I am doubtful whether his Andena is the same term with the Andaine of Pauthier and our Ondanique.

The popular view, at least in the Middle Ages, seems to have regarded Steel as a distinct natural species, the product of a necessarily different ore, from iron; and some such view is, I suspect, still common in the East. An old Indian officer told me of the reply of a native friend to whom he had tried to explain the conversion of iron into steel—“What! You would have me believe that if I put an ass into the furnace it will come forth a horse.” And Indian Steel again seems to have been regarded as a distinct natural species from ordinary steel. It is in fact made by a peculiar but simple process, by which the iron is converted directly into cast-steel, without passing through any intermediate stage analogous to that of blister-steel. When specimens were first examined in England, chemists concluded that the steel was made direct from the ore. The Ondanique of Marco no doubt was a fine steel resembling the Indian article. (Müller’s Ctesias, p. 80; Curtius, IX. 24; Müller’s Geog. Gr. Min. I. 262; Digest. Novum, Lugd. 1551, Lib. XXXIX. Tit. 4; Salmas. Ex. Plinian. II. 763; Edrisi, I. 65–66; J. R. S. A. A. 387 seqq.; Hamasae Carmina, I. 526; Elliot, II. 209, 394; Reynolds’s Utbi, p. 216.)

Texture, with Animals, etc., from a Cashmere Scarf in the Indian Museum.

“De deverses maineres laborés à bestes et ausiaus mout richement.”

Note 4.—Paulus Jovius in the 16th century says, I know not on what authority, that Kermán was then celebrated for the fine temper of its steel in scimitars and lance-points. These were eagerly bought at high prices by the Turks, and their quality was such that one blow of a Kermán sabre would cleave an European helmet without turning the edge. And I see that the phrase, “Kermání blade” is used in poetry by Marco’s contemporary Amír Khusrú of Delhi. (P. Jov. Hist. of his own Time, Bk. XIV.; Elliot, III. 537.)

There is, or was in Pottinger’s time, still a great manufacture of matchlocks at Kermán; but rose-water, shawls, and carpets are the staples of the place now. Polo says nothing that points to shawl-making, but it would seem from Edrisi that some such manufacture already existed in the adjoining district of Bamm. It is possible that the “hangings” spoken of by Polo may refer to the carpets. I have seen a genuine Kermán carpet in the house of my friend, Sir Bartle Frere. It is of very short pile, very even and dense; the design, a combination of vases, birds, and floral tracery, closely resembling the illuminated frontispiece of some Persian MSS.

The shawls are inferior to those of Kashmir in exquisite softness, but scarcely in delicacy of texture and beauty of design. In 1850, their highest quality did not exceed 30 tomans (14l.) in price. About 2200 looms were employed on the fabric. A good deal of Kermán wool called Kurk, goes viâ Bandar Abbási and Karáchi to Amritsar, where it is mixed with the genuine Tibetan wool in the shawl manufacture. Several of the articles named in the text, including pardahs (“cortines”) are woven in shawl-fabric. I scarcely think, however, that Marco would have confounded woven shawl with needle embroidery. And Mr. Khanikoff states that the silk embroidery, of which Marco speaks, is still performed with great skill and beauty at Kermán. Our cut illustrates the textures figured with animals, already noticed at p. 66.

The Guebers were numerous here at the end of last century, but they are rapidly disappearing now. The Musulman of Kermán is, according to Khanikoff, an epicurean gentleman, and even in regard to wine, which is strong and plentiful, his divines are liberal. “In other parts of Persia you find the scribblings on the walls of Serais to consist of philosophical axioms, texts from the Koran, or abuse of local authorities. From Kermán to Yezd you find only rhymes in praise of fair ladies or good wine.”

(Pottinger’s Travels; Khanik. Mém. 186 seqq., and Notice, p. 21; Major Smith’s Report; Abbott’s MS. Report in F. O.; Notes by Major O. St. John, R.E.)

Note 5.—Parez is famous for its falcons still, and so are the districts of Aktár and Sirján. Both Mr. Abbott and Major Smith were entertained with hawking by Persian hosts in this neighbourhood. The late Sir O. St. John identifies the bird described as the Sháhín (Falco Peregrinator), one variety of which, the Fársi, is abundant in the higher mountains of S. Persia. It is now little used in that region, the Terlán or goshawk being most valued, but a few are caught and sent for sale to the Arabs of Oman. (J. R. G. S. XXV. 50, 63, and Major St. John’s Notes.)

[“The fine falcons, ‘with red breasts and swift of flight,’ come from Páríz. They are, however, very scarce, two or three only being caught every year. A well-trained Páríz falcon costs from 30 to 50 tomans (12l. to 20l.), as much as a good horse.” (Houtum-Schindler, l.c. p. 491.) Major Sykes, Persia, ch. xxiii., writes: “Marco Polo was evidently a keen sportsman, and his description of the Sháhin, as it is termed, cannot be improved upon.” Major Sykes has a list given him by a Khán of seven hawks of the province, all black and white, except the Sháhin, which has yellow eyes, and is the third in the order of size.—H. C.]

Note 6.—We defer geographical remarks till the traveller reaches Hormuz.

CHAPTER XVIII.

After you have ridden down hill those two days, you find yourself in a vast plain, and at the beginning thereof there is a city called Camadi, which formerly was a great and noble place, but now is of little consequence, for the Tartars in their incursions have several times ravaged it. The plain whereof I speak is a very hot region; and the province that we now enter is called Reobarles.

The fruits of the country are dates, pistachioes, and apples of Paradise, with others of the like not found in our cold climate. [There are vast numbers of turtledoves, attracted by the abundance of fruits, but the Saracens never take them, for they hold them in abomination.] And on this plain there is a kind of bird called francolin, but different from the francolin of other countries, for their colour is a mixture of black and white, and the feet and beak are vermilion colour.{1}

The beasts also are peculiar; and first I will tell you of their oxen. These are very large, and all over white as snow; the hair is very short and smooth, which is owing to the heat of the country. The horns are short and thick, not sharp in the point; and between the shoulders they have a round hump some two palms high. There are no handsomer creatures in the world. And when they have to be loaded, they kneel like the camel; once the load is adjusted, they rise. Their load is a heavy one, for they are very strong animals. Then there are sheep here as big as asses; and their tails are so large and fat, that one tail shall weigh some 30 lbs. They are fine fat beasts, and afford capital mutton.{2}

In this plain there are a number of villages and towns which have lofty walls of mud, made as a defence against the banditti,{3} who are very numerous, and are called Caraonas. This name is given them because they are the sons of Indian mothers by Tartar fathers. And you must know that when these Caraonas wish to make a plundering incursion, they have certain devilish enchantments whereby they do bring darkness over the face of day, insomuch that you can scarcely discern your comrade riding beside you; and this darkness they will cause to extend over a space of seven days’ journey. They know the country thoroughly, and ride abreast, keeping near one another, sometimes to the number of 10,000, at other times more or fewer. In this way they extend across the whole plain that they are going to harry, and catch every living thing that is found outside of the towns and villages; man, woman, or beast, nothing can escape them! The old men whom they take in this way they butcher; the young men and the women they sell for slaves in other countries; thus the whole land is ruined, and has become well-nigh a desert.

The King of these scoundrels is called Nogodar. This Nogodar had gone to the Court of Chagatai, who was own brother to the Great Kaan, with some 10,000 horsemen of his, and abode with him; for Chagatai was his uncle. And whilst there this Nogodar devised a most audacious enterprise, and I will tell you what it was. He left his uncle who was then in Greater Armenia, and fled with a great body of horsemen, cruel unscrupulous fellows, first through Badashan, and then through another province called Pashai-Dir, and then through another called Ariora-Keshemur. There he lost a great number of his people and of his horses, for the roads were very narrow and perilous. And when he had conquered all those provinces, he entered India at the extremity of a province called Dalivar. He established himself in that city and government, which he took from the King of the country, Asedin Soldan by name, a man of great power and wealth. And there abideth Nogodar with his army, afraid of nobody, and waging war with all the Tartars in his neighbourhood.{4}

Now that I have told you of those scoundrels and their history, I must add the fact that Messer Marco himself was all but caught by their bands in such a darkness as that I have told you of; but, as it pleased God, he got off and threw himself into a village that was hard by, called Conosalmi. Howbeit he lost his whole company except seven persons who escaped along with him. The rest were caught, and some of them sold, some put to death.{5}

Note 1.—Ramusio has “Adam’s apple” for apples of Paradise. This was some kind of Citrus, though Lindley thinks it impossible to say precisely what. According to Jacques de Vitry it was a beautiful fruit of the Citron kind, in which the bite of human teeth was plainly discernible. (Note to Vulgar Errors, II. 211; Bongars, I. 1099.) Mr. Abbott speaks of this tract as “the districts (of Kermán) lying towards the South, which are termed the Ghermseer or Hot Region, where the temperature of winter resembles that of a charming spring, and where the palm, orange, and lemon-tree flourish.” (MS. Report; see also J. R. G. S. XXV. 56.)

[“Marco Polo’s apples of Paradise are more probably the fruits of the Konár tree. There are no plantains in that part of the country. Turtle doves, now as then, are plentiful, and as they are seldom shot, and are said by the people to be unwholesome food, we can understand Marco Polo’s saying that the people do not eat them.” (Houtum-Schindler, l.c. pp. 492–493.)—H. C.]

The Francolin here spoken of is, as Major Smith tells me, the Darráj of the Persians, the Black Partridge of English sportsmen, sometimes called the Red-legged Francolin. The Darráj is found in some parts of Egypt, where its peculiar call is interpreted by the peasantry into certain Arabic words, meaning “Sweet are the corn-ears! Praised be the Lord!” In India, Baber tells us, the call of the Black Partridge was (less piously) rendered “Shír dáram shakrak,” “I’ve got milk and sugar!” The bird seems to be the ἀτταγὰς of Athenaeus, a fowl “speckled like the partridge, but larger,” found in Egypt and Lydia. The Greek version of its cry is the best of all: “τρìς τοῖς κακούργοις κακά” (“Threefold ills to the ill-doers!”). This is really like the call of the black partridge in India as I recollect it. [Tetrao francolinus.—H. C.]

(Chrestomathie Arabe, II. 295; Baber, 320; Yonge’s Atken. IX. 39.)

Note 2.—Abbott mentions the humped (though small) oxen in this part of Persia, and that in some of the neighbouring districts they are taught to kneel to receive the load, an accomplishment which seems to have struck Mas’udi (III. 27), who says he saw it exhibited by oxen at Rai (near modern Tehran). The Aín Akbari also ascribes it to a very fine breed in Bengal. The whimsical name Zebu, given to the humped or Indian ox in books of Zoology, was taken by Buffon from the exhibitors of such a beast at a French Fair, who probably invented it. That the humped breeds of oxen existed in this part of Asia in ancient times is shown by sculptures at Kouyunjik. (See cut below.)

A letter from Agassiz, printed in the Proc. As. Soc. Bengal (1865), refers to wild “zebus,” and calls the species a small one. There is no wild “zebu,” and some of the breeds are of enormous size.

[“White oxen, with short thick horns and a round hump between the shoulders, are now very rare between Kermán and Bender ’Abbás. They are, however, still to be found towards Belúchistán and Mekrán, and they kneel to be loaded like camels. The sheep which I saw had fine large tails; I did not, however, hear of any having so high a weight as thirty pounds.” (Houtum-Schindler, l.c. p. 493.)—H. C.]

The fat-tailed sheep is well known in many parts of Asia and part of Africa. It is mentioned by Ctesias, and by Ælian, who says the shepherds used to extract the tallow from the live animal, sewing up the tail again; exactly the same story is told by the Chinese Pliny, Ma Twan-lin. Marco’s statements as to size do not surpass those of the admirable Kämpfer: “In size they so much surpass the common sheep that it is not unusual to see them as tall as a donkey, whilst all are much more than three feet; and as to the tail I shall not exceed the truth, though I may exceed belief, if I say that it sometimes reaches 40 lbs. in weight.” Captain Hutton was assured by an Afghan sheep-master that tails had occurred in his flocks weighing 12 Tabriz mans, upwards of 76 lbs.! The Afghans use the fat as an aperient, swallowing a dose of 4 to 6 lbs! Captain Hutton’s friend testified that trucks to bear the sheep-tails were sometimes used among the Taimúnis (north of Herat). This may help to locate that ancient and slippery story. Josafat Barbaro says he had seen the thing, but is vague as to place. (Ælian Nat. An. III. 3, IV. 32; Amoen. Exoticae; Ferrier, H. of Afghans, p. 294; J. A. S. B. XV. 160.)

Humped Oxen from the Assyrian Sculptures at Koyunjik.

[Rabelais says (Bk. I. ch. xvi.): “Si de ce vous efmerveillez, efmerveillez vous d’advantage de la queue des béliers de la Scythie, qui pesait plus de trente livres; et des moutons de Surie, esquels fault (si Tenaud, dict vray) affuster une charrette au cul, pour la porter tant qu’elle est longue et pesante.” (See G. Capus, A travers le roy. de Tamerlan, pp. 21–23, on the fat sheep.)—H. C.]

Note 3.—The word rendered banditti is in Pauthier Carans, in G. Text Caraunes, in the Latin “a scaranis et malandrinis.” The last is no doubt correct, standing for the old Italian Scherani, bandits. (See Cathay, p. 287, note.)

Note 4.—This is a knotty subject, and needs a long note.

The Ḳaraunahs are mentioned often in the histories of the Mongol regime in Persia, first as a Mongol tribe forming a Tuman, i.e. a division or corps of 10,000 in the Mongol army (and I suspect it was the phrase the Tuman of the Ḳaraunahs in Marco’s mind that suggested his repeated use of the number 10,000 in speaking of them); and afterwards as daring and savage freebooters, scouring the Persian provinces, and having their headquarters on the Eastern frontiers of Persia. They are described as having had their original seats on the mountains north of the Chinese wall near Ḳaraún Jidun or Khidun; and their special accomplishment in war was the use of Naphtha Fire. Rashiduddin mentions the Ḳaránut as a branch of the great Mongol tribe of the Kunguráts, who certainly had their seat in the vicinity named, so these may possibly be connected with the Ḳaraunahs. The same author says that the Tuman of the Ḳaraunahs formed the Injú or peculium of Arghún Khan.

Wassáf calls them “a kind of goblins rather than human beings, the most daring of all the Mongols”; and Mirkhond speaks in like terms.

Dr. Bird of Bombay, in discussing some of the Indo-Scythic coins which bear the word Korano attached to the prince’s name, asserts this to stand for the name of the Ḳaraunah, “who were a Græco-Indo-Scythic tribe of robbers in the Punjab, who are mentioned by Marco Polo,” a somewhat hasty conclusion which Pauthier adopts. There is, Quatremère observes, no mention of the Ḳaraunahs before the Mongol invasion, and this he regards as the great obstacle to any supposition of their having been a people previously settled in Persia. Reiske, indeed, with no reference to the present subject, quotes a passage from Hamza of Ispahan, a writer of the 10th century, in which mention is made of certain troops called Ḳaráunahs. But it seems certain that in this and other like cases the real reading was Kazáwinah, people of Kazvin. (See Reiske’s Constant. Porphyrog. Bonn. ed. II. 674; Gottwaldt’s Hamza Ispahanensis, p. 161; and Quatremère in J. A. sér. V. tom. xv. 173.) Ibn Batuta only once mentions the name, saying that Tughlak Sháh of Dehli was “one of those Turks called Ḳaráunas who dwell in the mountains between Sind and Turkestan.” Hammer has suggested the derivation of the word Carbine from Karáwinah (as he writes), and a link in such an etymology is perhaps furnished by the fact that in the 16th century the word Carbine was used for some kind of irregular horseman.

(Gold. Horde, 214; Ilch. I. 17, 344, etc.; Erdmann, 168, 199, etc.; J. A. S. B. X. 96; Q. R. 130; Not. et Ext. XIV. 282; I. B. III. 201; Ed. Webbe, his Travailes, p. 17, 1590. Reprinted 1868.)

As regards the account given by Marco of the origin of the Caraonas, it seems almost necessarily a mistaken one. As Khanikoff remarks, he might have confounded them with the Biluchis, whose Turanian aspect (at least as regards the Brahuis) shows a strong infusion of Turki blood, and who might be rudely described as a cross between Tartars and Indians. It is indeed an odd fact that the word Karáni (vulgo Cranny) is commonly applied in India at this day to the mixed race sprung from European fathers and Native mothers, and this might be cited in corroboration of Marsden’s reference to the Sanskrit Karana, but I suspect the coincidence arises in another way. Karana is the name applied to a particular class of mixt blood, whose special occupation was writing and accounts. But the prior sense of the word seems to have been “clever, skilled,” and hence a writer or scribe. In this sense we find Karáni applied in Ibn Batuta’s day to a ship’s clerk, and it is used in the same sense in the Aín Akbari. Clerkship is also the predominant occupation of the East-Indians, and hence the term Karáni is applied to them from their business, and not from their mixt blood. We shall see hereafter that there is a Tartar term Arghún, applied to fair children born of a Mongol mother and white father; it is possible that there may have been a correlative word like Ḳaráun (from Ḳará, black) applied to dark children born of Mongol father and black mother, and that this led Marco to a false theory.

[Major Sykes (Persia) devotes a chapter (xxiv.) to The Karwán Expedition in which he says: “Is it not possible that the Karwánis are the Caraonas of Marco Polo? They are distinct from the surrounding Baluchis, and pay no tribute.”—H. C.]

Portrait of a Hazára.

Let us turn now to the name of Nogodar. Contemporaneously with the Ḳaraunahs we have frequent mention of predatory bands known as Nigúdaris, who seem to be distinguished from the Ḳaraunahs, but had a like character for truculence. Their headquarters were about Sijistán, and Quatremère seems disposed to look upon them as a tribe indigenous in that quarter. Hammer says they were originally the troops of Prince Nigudar, grandson of Chaghatai, and that they were a rabble of all sorts, Mongols, Turkmans, Kurds, Shúls, and what not. We hear of their revolts and disorders down to 1319, under which date Mirkhond says that there had been one-and-twenty fights with them in four years. Again we hear of them in 1336 about Herat, whilst in Baber’s time they turn up as Nukdari, fairly established as tribes in the mountainous tracts of Karnúd and Ghúr, west of Kabul, and coupled with the Hazáras, who still survive both in name and character. “Among both,” says Baber, “there are some who speak the Mongol language.” Hazáras and Takdaris (read Nukdaris) again occur coupled in the History of Sind. (See Elliot, I. 303–304.) [On the struggle against Timur of Toumen, veteran chief of the Nikoudrians (1383–84), see Major David Price’s Mahommedan History, London, 1821, vol. iii. pp. 47–49, H. C.] In maps of the 17th century, as of Hondius and Blaeuw, we find the mountains north of Kabul termed Nochdarizari, in which we cannot miss the combination Nigudar-Hazárah, whencesoever it was got. The Hazáras are eminently Mongol in feature to this day, and it is very probable that they or some part of them are the descendants of the Ḳaráunahs or the Nigudaris, or of both, and that the origination of the bands so called, from the scum of the Mongol inundation, is thus in degree confirmed. The Hazáras generally are said to speak an old dialect of Persian. But one tribe in Western Afghanistan retains both the name of Mongols and a language of which six-sevenths (judging from a vocabulary published by Major Leech) appear to be Mongol. Leech says, too, that the Hazáras generally are termed Moghals by the Ghilzais. It is worthy of notice that Abu’l Fázl, who also mentions the Nukdaris among the nomad tribes of Kabul, says the Hazáras were the remains of the Chaghataian army which Mangu Kaan sent to the aid of Hulaku, under the command of Nigudar Oghlan. (Not. et Ext. XIV. 284; Ilch. I. 284, 309, etc,; Baber, 134, 136, 140; J. As. sér. IV. tom. iv. 98; Ayeen Akbery, II. 192–193.)

So far, excepting as to the doubtful point of the relation between Ḳaráunahs and Nigudaris, and as to the origin of the former, we have a general accordance with Polo’s representations. But it is not very easy to identify with certainty the inroad on India to which he alludes, or the person intended by Nogodar, nephew of Chaghatai. It seems as if two persons of that name had each contributed something to Marco’s history.

We find in Hammer and D’Ohsson that one of the causes which led to the war between Barka Khan and Hulaku in 1262 (see above, Prologue, ch. ii.) was the violent end that had befallen three princes of the House of Juji, who had accompanied Hulaku to Persia in command of the contingent of that House. When war actually broke out, the contingent made their escape from Persia. One party gained Kipchak by way of Derbend; another, in greater force, led by Nigudar and Onguja, escaped to Khorasan, pursued by the troops of Hulaku, and thence eastward, where they seized upon Ghazni and other districts bordering on India.

But again: Nigudar Aghul, or Oghlan, son of (the younger) Juji, son of Chaghatai, was the leader of the Chaghataian contingent in Hulaku’s expedition, and was still attached to the Mongol-Persian army in 1269, when Borrak Khan, of the House of Chaghatai, was meditating war against his kinsman, Abaka of Persia. Borrak sent to the latter an ambassador, who was the bearer of a secret message to Prince Nigudar, begging him not to serve against the head of his own House. Nigudar, upon this, made a pretext of retiring to his own headquarters in Georgia, hoping to reach Borrak’s camp by way of Derbend. He was, however, intercepted, and lost many of his people. With 1000 horse he took refuge in Georgia, but was refused an asylum, and was eventually captured by Abaka’s commander on that frontier. His officers were executed, his troops dispersed among Abaka’s army, and his own life spared under surveillance. I find no more about him. In 1278 Hammer speaks of him as dead, and of the Nigudarian bands as having been formed out of his troops. But authority is not given.

The second Nigudar is evidently the one to whom Abu’l Fázl alludes. Khanikoff assumes that the Nigudar who went off towards India about 1260 (he puts the date earlier) was Nigudar, the grandson of Chaghatai, but he takes no notice of the second story just quoted.

In the former story we have bands under Nigudar going off by Ghazni, and conquering country on the Indian frontier. In the latter we have Nigudar, a descendant of Chaghatai, trying to escape from his camp on the frontier of Great Armenia. Supposing the Persian historians to be correct, it looks as if Marco had rolled two stories into one.

Some other passages may be cited before quitting this part of the subject. A chronicle of Herat, translated by Barbier de Meynard, says, under 1298: “The King Fakhruddin (of Herat) had the imprudence to authorise the Amir Nigudar to establish himself in a quarter of the city, with 300 adventurers from ’Irák. This little troop made frequent raids in Kuhistan, Sijistan, Farrah, etc., spreading terror. Khodabanda, at the request of his brother Ghazan Khan, came from Mazanderan to demand the immediate surrender of these brigands,” etc. And in the account of the tremendous foray of the Chaghataian Prince Kotlogh Shah, on the east and south of Persia in 1299, we find one of his captains called Nigudar Bahadur. (Gold. Horde, 146, 157, 164; D’Ohsson, IV. 378 seqq., 433 seqq., 513 seqq.; Ilch. I. 216, 261, 284; II. 104; J. A. sér. V. tom. xvii. 455–456, 507; Khan. Notice, 31.)

As regards the route taken by Prince Nogodar in his incursion into India, we have no difficulty with Badakhshan. Pashai-Dir is a copulate name; the former part, as we shall see reason to believe hereafter, representing the country between the Hindu Kush and the Kabul River (see infra, ch. xxx.); the latter (as Pauthier already has pointed out), Dir, the chief town of Panjkora, in the hill country north of Peshawar. In Ariora-Keshemur the first portion only is perplexing. I will mention the most probable of the solutions that have occurred to me, and a second, due to that eminent archæologist, General A. Cunningham. (1) Ariora may be some corrupt or Mongol form of Aryavartta, a sacred name applied to the Holy Lands of Indian Buddhism, of which Kashmir was eminently one to the Northern Buddhists. Oron, in Mongol, is a Region or Realm, and may have taken the place of Vartta, giving Aryoron or Ariora. (2) “Ariora,” General Cunningham writes, “I take to be the Harhaura of Sanscrit—i.e. the Western Panjáb. Harhaura was the North-Western Division of the Nava-Khanda, or Nine Divisions of Ancient India. It is mentioned between Sindhu-Sauvira in the west (i.e. Sind), and Madra in the north (i.e. the Eastern Panjáb, which is still called Madar-Des). The name of Harhaura is, I think, preserved in the Haro River. Now, the Sind-Sagor Doab formed a portion of the kingdom of Kashmir, and the joint names, like those of Sindhu-Sauvira, describe only one State.” The names of the Nine Divisions in question are given by the celebrated astronomer, Varaha Mihira, who lived in the beginning of the 6th century, and are repeated by Al Biruni. (See Reinaud, Mém. sur l’Inde, p. 116.) The only objection to this happy solution seems to lie in Al Biruni’s remark, that the names in question were in general no longer used even in his time (A.D. 1030).

There can be no doubt that Asidin Soldan is, as Khanikoff has said, Ghaiassuddin Balban, Sultan of Delhi from 1266 to 1286, and for years before that a man of great power in India, and especially in the Panjáb, of which he had in the reign of Ruknuddin (1236) held independent possession.

Firishta records several inroads of Mongols in the Panjáb during the reign of Ghaiassuddin, in withstanding one of which that King’s eldest son was slain; and there are constant indications of their presence in Sind till the end of the century. But we find in that historian no hint of the chief circumstances of this part of the story, viz., the conquest of Kashmir and the occupation of Dalivar or Dilivar (G. T.), evidently (whatever its identity) in the plains of India. I do find, however, in the history of Kashmir, as given by Lassen (III. 1138), that in the end of 1259, Lakshamana Deva, King of Kashmir, was killed in a campaign against the Turushka (Turks or Tartars), and that their leader, who is called Kajjala, got hold of the country and held it till 1287.[1] It is difficult not to connect this both with Polo’s story and with the escapade of Nigudar about 1260, noting also that this occupation of Kashmir extended through the whole reign of Ghaiassuddin.

We seem to have a memory of Polo’s story preserved in one of Elliot’s extracts from Wassáf, which states that in 708 (A.D. 1308), after a great defeat of a Mongol inroad which had passed the Ganges, Sultan Ala’uddin Khilji ordered a pillar of Mongol heads to be raised before the Badáun gate, “as was done with the Nigudari Moghuls” (III. 48).

We still have to account for the occupation and locality of Dalivar; Marsden supposed it to be Lahore; Khanikoff considers it to be Diráwal, the ancient desert capital of the Bhattis, properly (according to Tod) Deoráwal, but by a transposition common in India, as it is in Italy, sometimes called Diláwar, in the modern State of Bháwalpúr. But General Cunningham suggests a more probable locality in Diláwar on the west bank of the Jelam, close to Dárápúr, and opposite to Mung. These two sites, Diláwar-Dárápúr on the west bank, and Mung on the east, are identified by General Cunningham (I believe justly) with Alexander’s Bucephala and Nicaea. The spot, which is just opposite the battlefield of Chiliánwála, was visited (15th December, 1868) at my request, by my friend Colonel R. Maclagan, R.E. He writes: “The present village of Diláwar stands a little above the town of Dárápúr (I mean on higher ground), looking down on Dárápúr and on the river, and on the cultivated and wooded plain along the river bank. The remains of the Old Diláwar, in the form of quantities of large bricks, cover the low round-backed spurs and knolls of the broken rocky hills around the present village, but principally on the land side. They cover a large area of very irregular character, and may clearly be held to represent a very considerable town. There are no indications of the form of buildings, ... but simply large quantities of large bricks, which for a long time have been carried away and used for modern buildings.... After rain coins are found on the surface.... There can be no doubt of a very large extent of ground, of very irregular and uninviting character, having been covered at some time with buildings. The position on the Jelam would answer well for the Diláwar which the Mongol invaders took and held.... The strange thing is that the name should not be mentioned (I believe it is not) by any of the well-known Mahomedan historians of India. So much for Diláwar.... The people have no traditions. But there are the remains; and there is the name, borne by the existing village on part of the old site.” I had come to the conclusion that this was almost certainly Polo’s Dalivar, and had mapped it as such, before I read certain passages in the History of Zíyáuddín Barni, which have been translated by Professor Dowson for the third volume of Elliot’s India. When the comrades of Ghaiassuddin Balban urged him to conquests, the Sultan pointed to the constant danger from the Mongols,[2] saying: “These accursed wretches have heard of the wealth and condition of Hindustan, and have set their hearts upon conquering and plundering it. They have taken and plundered Lahor within my territories, and no year passes that they do not come here and plunder the villages.... They even talk about the conquest and sack of Delhi.” And under a later date the historian says: “The Sultan ... marched to Lahor, and ordered the rebuilding of the fort which the Mughals had destroyed in the reigns of the sons of Shamsuddin. The towns and villages of Lahor which the Mughals had devastated and laid waste he repeopled.” Considering these passages, and the fact that Polo had no personal knowledge of Upper India, I now think it probable that Marsden was right, and that Dilivar is really a misunderstanding of “Città di Livar” for Lahàwar or Lahore.

The Magical darkness which Marco ascribes to the evil arts of the Karaunas is explained by Khanikoff from the phenomenon of Dry Fog, which he has often experienced in Khorasan, combined with the Dust Storm with which we are familiar in Upper India. In Sind these phenomena often produce a great degree of darkness. During a battle fought between the armies of Sindh and Kachh in 1762, such a fog came on, obscuring the light of day for some six hours, during which the armies were intermixed with one another and fighting desperately. When the darkness dispersed they separated, and the consternation of both parties was so great at the events of the day that both made a precipitate retreat. In 1844 this battle was still spoken of with wonder. (J. Bomb. Br. R. A. S. I. 423.)

Major St. John has given a note on his own experience of these curious Kermán fogs (see Ocean Highways, 1872, p. 286): “Not a breath of air was stirring, and the whole effect was most curious, and utterly unlike any other fog I have seen. No deposit of dust followed, and the feeling of the air was decidedly damp. I unfortunately could not get my hygrometer till the fog had cleared away.”

[General Houtum-Schindler, l.c. p. 493, writes: “The magical darkness might, as Colonel Yule supposes, be explained by the curious dry fogs or dust storms, often occurring in the neighbourhood of Kermán, but it must be remarked that Marco Polo was caught in one of these storms down in Jíruft, where, according to the people I questioned, such storms now never occur. On the 29th of September, 1879, at Kermán, a high wind began to blow from S.S.W. at about 5 P.M. First there came thick heavy clouds of dust with a few drops of rain. The heavy dust then settled down, the lighter particles remained in the air, forming a dry fog of such density that large objects, like houses, trees, etc., could not even faintly be distinguished at a distance of a hundred paces. The barometers suffered no change, the three I had with me remained in statu quo.” “The heat is over by the middle of September, and after the autumnal equinox, there are a few days of what is best described as a dense dry fog. This was undoubtedly the haze referred to by Marco Polo.” (Major Sykes, ch. iv.)—H. C.]

Richthofen’s remarkable exposition of the phenomena of the löss in North China, and of the sub-aerial deposits of the steppes and of Central Asia throws some light on this. But this hardly applies to St John’s experience of “no deposit of dust.” (See Richthofen, China, pp. 96–97 s. MS. Note, H. Y.)

The belief that such opportune phenomena were produced by enchantment was a thoroughly Tartar one. D’Herbelot relates (art. Giagathai) that in an action with a rebel called Mahomed Tarabi, the Mongols were encompassed by a dust storm which they attributed to enchantment on the part of the enemy, and it so discouraged them that they took to flight.

Note 5.—The specification that only seven were saved from Marco’s company is peculiar to Pauthier’s Text, not appearing in the G. T.

Several names compounded of Salm or Salmi occur on the dry lands on the borders of Kermán. Edrisi, however (I. p. 428), names a place called Ḳanát-ul-Shám as the first march in going from Jíruft to Walashjird. Walashjird is, I imagine, represented by Galashkird, Major R. Smith’s third march from Jíruft (see my Map of Routes from Kermán to Hormuz); and as such an indication agrees with the view taken below of Polo’s route, I am strongly disposed to identify Ḳanát-ul-Shám with his castello or walled village of Canosalmi.

[“Marco Polo’s Conosalmi, where he was attacked by robbers and lost the greater part of his men, is perhaps the ruined town or village Kamasal (Kahn-i-asal = the honey canal), near Kahnúj-i-pancheh and Vakílábád in Jíruft. It lies on the direct road between Shehr-i-Daqíánús (Camadi) and the Nevergún Pass. The road goes in an almost due southerly direction. The Nevergún Pass accords with Marco Polo’s description of it; it is very difficult, on account of the many great blocks of sandstone scattered upon it. Its proximity to the Bashakird mountains and Mekrán easily accounts for the prevalence of robbers, who infested the place in Marco Polo’s time. At the end of the Pass lies the large village Shamíl, with an old fort; the distance thence to the site of Hormúz or Bender ’Abbás (lying more to the west) is 52 miles, two days’ march. The climate of Bender ’Abbás is very bad, strangers speedily fall sick, two of my men died there, all the others were seriously ill.” (Houtum-Schindler, l.c. pp. 495–496.) Major Sykes (ch. xxiii.) says: “Two marches from Camadi was Kahn-i-Panchur, and a stage beyond it lay the ruins of Fariáb or Pariáb, which was once a great city, and was destroyed by a flood, according to local legend. It may have been Alexander’s Salmous, as it is about the right distance from the coast, and if so, could not have been Marco’s Cono Salmi. Continuing on, Galashkird mentioned by Edrisi, is the next stage.”—H. C.]

The raids of the Mekranis and Biluchis long preceded those of the Karaunas, for they were notable even in the time of Mahmud of Ghazni, and they have continued to our own day to be prosecuted nearly on the same stage and in the same manner. About 1721, 4000 horsemen of this description plundered the town of Bander Abbási, whilst Captain Alex. Hamilton was in the port; and Abbott, in 1850, found the dread of Bilúch robbers to extend almost to the gates of Ispahan. A striking account of the Bilúch robbers and their characteristics is given by General Ferrier. (See Hamilton, I. 109; J. R. G. S. XXV.; Khanikoff’s Mémoire; Macd. Kinneir, 196; Caravan Journeys, p. 437 seq.)