Kishm, and then to that of Jerún, on which last was built the city of New Hormuz, afterwards so famous. This is Teixeira's account from Thuran Shah, so far as we are concerned with it. As regards the transfer of the city it agrees substantially with Abulfeda's, which we have already quoted (supra, note 1).

Hammer's account from Wassáf is frightfully confused, chiefly I should suppose from Hammer's own fault; for among other things he assumes that Hormuz was always on an island, and he distinguishes between the Island of Hormuz and the Island of Jerun! We gather, however, that Hormuz before the Mongol time formed a government subordinate to the Salghur Atabegs of Fars (see note 1, chap. xv.), and when the power of that dynasty was falling, the governor Mahmúd Kalháti, established himself as Prince of Hormuz, and became the founder of a petty dynasty, being evidently identical with Teixeira's Ruknuddin. Mahmud above-named, who is represented as reigning from 1246 to 1277. In Wassáf we find, as in Teixeira, Mahmud's son Masa'ud killing his brother Nazrat, and Bahauddin expelling Masa'ud. It is true that Hammer's surprising muddle makes Nazrat kill Masa’ud; however as a few lines lower we find Masa'ud alive and Nazrat dead, we may safely venture on this correction. But we find also that Masa'ud appears as Ruknuddin Masa'ud, and that Bahauddin does not assume the princely authority himself, but proclaims that of Fakhruddin Ahmed Ben Ibrahim At-Thaibi, a personage who does not appear in Teixeira at all. A MS. history, quoted by Ouseley, does mention Fakhruddin, and ascribes to him the transfer to Jerun. Wassáf seems to allude to Bahauddin as a sort of Sea Rover, occupying the islands of Larek and Jerun, whilst Fakhruddin reigned at Hormuz. It is difficult to understand the relation between the two.

It is possible that Polo's memory made some confusion between the names of RUKNUDDIN Masa'ud and Fakhruddin AHMED, but I incline to think the latter is his RuOMEDAN AHMED. For Teixeira tells us that Masa'ud took refuge at the court of Kerman, and Wassáf represents him as supported in his claims by the Atabeg of that province, whilst we see that Polo seems to represent Ruomedan Acomat as in hostility with that prince. To add to the imbroglio I find in a passage of Wassáf Malik Fakhruddin Ahmed at-Thaibi sent by Ghazan Khan in 1297 as ambassador to Khanbalig, staying there some years, and dying off the Coromandel coast on his return in 1305. (Elliot, iii. pp. 45-47.)

Masa'ud's seeking help from Kerman to reinstate him is not the first case of the same kind that occurs in Teixeira's chronicle, so there may have been some kind of colour for Marco's representation of the Prince of Hormuz as the vassal of the Atabeg of Kerman ("l'homme de cest roy de Creman" see Prologue, chap. xiv. note 2). M. Khanikoff denies the possibility of the existence of any royal dynasty at Hormuz at this period. That there was a dynasty of Maliks of Hormuz, however, at this period we must believe on the concurring testimony of Marco, of Wassáf, and

of Thuran Shah. There was also, it would seem, another quasi-independent principality in the Island of Kais. (Hammer's Ilch. II. 50, 51; Teixeira, Relacion de los Reyes de Hormuz; Khan. Notice, p. 34.)

The ravages of the Tartars which drove the people of Hormuz from their city may have begun with the incursions of the Nigudaris and Caraunahs, but they probably came to a climax in the great raid in 1299 of the Chaghataian Prince Kotlogh Shah, son of Dua Khan, a part of whose bands besieged the city itself, though they are said to have been repulsed by Bahauddin Ayas.

NOTE 7.-The indications of this alternative route to Kerman are very vague, but it may probably have been that through Finn, Tarum, and the Sirjan district, passing out of the plain of Hormuz by the eastern flank of the Ginao mountain. This road would pass near the hot springs at the base of the said mountain, Sarga, Khurkhu, and Ginao, which are described by Kämpfer. Being more or less sulphureous they are likely to be useful in skin-diseases; indeed, Hamilton speaks of their efficacy in these (I. 95). The salt-streams are numerous on this line, and dates are abundant. The bitterness of the bread was however more probably due to another cause, as Major Smith has kindly pointed out to me: "Throughout the mountains in the south of Persia, which are generally covered with dwarf oak, the people are in the habit of making bread of the acorns, or of the acorns mixed with wheat or barley. It is dark in colour, and very hard, bitter, and unpalatable.”

Major St. John also noticed the bitterness of the bread in Kerman, but his servants attributed it to the presence in the wheat-fields of a bitter leguminous plant, with a yellowish white flower, which the Kermánis were too lazy to separate, so that much remained in the thrashing, and imparted its bitter flavour to the grain (surely the Tare of our Lord's Parable !).

CHAPTER XX.

OF THE WEARISOME AND DESERT ROAD THAT HAS NOW TO BE

TRAVELLED.

ON departing from the city of Kerman you find the road for seven days most wearisome; and I will tell you how this is. The first three days you meet with no water, or And what little you do meet with is bitter green stuff, so salt that no one can drink it; and in fact

next to none.

if

you drink a drop of it, it will set you purging ten times at least by the way. It is the same with the salt which is made from those streams; no one dares to make use of it, because of the excessive purging which it occasions. Hence it is necessary to carry water for the people to last these three days; as for the cattle, they must needs drink of the bad water I have mentioned, as there is no help for it, and their great thirst makes them do so. But it scours them to such a degree that sometimes they die of it. In all those three days you meet with no human habitation; it is all desert, and the extremity of drought. Even of wild beasts there are none, for there is nothing for them to eat.'

After those three days of desert [you arrive at a stream of fresh water running underground, but along which there are holes broken in here and there, perhaps undermined by the stream, at which you can get sight of it. It has an abundant supply, and travellers, worn with the hardships of the desert, here rest and refresh themselves and their beasts.] 2

You then enter another desert which extends for four days; it is very much like the former except that you do see some wild asses. And at the termination of these four days of desert the kingdom of Kerman comes to an end, and you find another city which is called Cobinan.

NOTE 1. This description of the Desert of Kerman, says Mr. Khanikoff, "is very correct. As the only place in the Desert of Lút where water is found is the dirty, salt, bitter, and green water of the rivulet called Shor-Rúd (the Salt River), we can have no doubt of the direction of Marco Polo's route from Kerman so far." Nevertheless I do not agree with Khanikoff that the route lay N.E. in the direction of Ambar and Kain, for a reason which will appear under the next chapter. I imagine the route to have been nearly due north from Kerman, in the direction of Tabbas or of Tún. And even such a route would, according to Khanikoff's own map, pass the Shor-Rúd, though at a higher point.

"In propor

I extract a few lines from that gentleman's narrative: tion as we got deeper into the desert, the soil became more and more arid; at daybreak I could still discover a few withered plants of

Caligonum and Salsola, and not far from the same spot I saw a lark and another bird of a whitish colour, the last living things that we beheld in this dismal solitude. . . . . The desert had now completely assumed the character of a land accursed, as the natives call it. Not the smallest blade of grass, no indication of animal life vivified the prospect; no sound but such as came from our own caravan broke the dreary silence of the void." (Mém. p. 176.)

NOTE 2.-I can have no doubt of the genuineness of this passage from Ramusio. Indeed some such passage is necessary; otherwise why distinguish between three days of desert and four days more of desert? The underground stream was probably a subterraneous canal (called Kanát or Kárez), such as is common in Persia; often conducted from a great distance. Here it may have been a relic of abandoned cultivation. Khanikoff, on the road between Kerman and Yezd, not far west of that which I suppose Marco to be travelling, says: "At the fifteen inhabited spots marked upon the map, they have water which has been brought from a great distance, and at considerable cost, by means of subterranean galleries to which you descend by large and deep wells. Although the water flows at some depth, its course is tracked upon the surface by a line of more abundant vegetation" (Ib. p. 200). Elphinstone says he has heard of such subterranean conduits thirty-six miles in length (I. 398). Polybius speaks of them: "There is no sign of water on the surface; but there are many underground channels, and these supply tanks in the desert, that are known only to the initiated.

. . . At the time when the Persians got the upper hand in Asia, they used to concede to such persons as brought spring-water to places previously destitute of irrigation, the usufruct for five generations. And Taurus being rife with springs, they incurred all the expense and trouble that was needed to form these underground channels to great distances, insomuch that in these days even the people who make use of the water don't know where the channels begin, or whence the water comes' (X. 28).

CHAPTER XXI.

CONCERNING THE CITY OF COBINAN AND THE THINGS THAT ARE

MADE THERE.

COBINAN is a large town.
There is much Iron and

The people worship Mahommet.
Steel and Ondanique, and they

make steel mirrors of great size and beauty. They also

prepare both Tutia (a thing very good for the eyes) and Spodium; and I will tell

process.

you the They have a vein of a certain earth which has the required quality, and this they put into a great flaming furnace, whilst over the furnace there is an iron grating. The smoke and moisture, expelled from the earth of which I speak, adhere to the iron grating, and thus form Tutia, whilst the slag that is left after burning is the Spodium?

NOTE 1.-KUH-BANÁN is mentioned by Mokaddasi (A.D. 985) as one of the cities of Bardesír, the most northerly of the five circles into which he divides Kerman (see Sprenger, Post- und Reise-Route des Orients, P. 77). It is the subject of an article in the Geog. Dictionary of Yákút, though it has been there mistranscribed into Kubiyán and Kukiyán (see Leipzig ed. 1869, iv. p. 316, and Barbier de Meynard, Dict. de la Perse, p. 498). And it is also indicated by Mr. Abbott (J. R. G. S. XXV. 25) as the name of a district of Kerman, lying some distance to the east of his route when somewhat less than halfway between Yezd and Kerman. It would thus, I apprehend, be on or near the route between Kerman and Tabbas; one which I believe has been traced by no modern traveller. We may be certain that there is now no place at Kuh-Banan deserving the title of une cité grant, nor is it easy to believe that there was in Polo's time; he applies such terms too profusely. The meaning of the name is perhaps "Hill of the Terebinths, or Wild Pistachioes," "a tree which grows abundantly in the recesses of bleak, stony, and desert mountains, e.g. about Shamákhi, about Shiraz, and in the deserts of Luristan and Lar." (Kämpfer, 409, 413.)

melons.

I had thought my identification of Cobinan original, but a communication from Mr. Abbott, and the opportunity which this procured me of seeing his MS. Report already referred to, showed that he had anticipated me many years ago. The following is an extract: "Districts of Kerman *** Kooh Benan. This is a hilly district abounding in fruits, such as grapes, peaches, pomegranates, sinjid (sweet-willow), walnuts, A great deal of madder and some assafœtida is produced there. This is no doubt the country alluded to by Marco Polo, under the name of Cobinam, as producing iron, brass, and tutty, and which is still said to produce iron, copper, and tootea." There appear to be lead mines also in the district, as well as asbestos and sulphur. Mr. Abbott adds the names of nine villages, which he was not able to verify by comparison. These are Púz, Tarz, Gújard, Aspaj, Kuh-i-Gabr, Dahnah, Búghín, Bassab, Radk. The position of Kuh Banán is stated to lie between Bahabád (a place also mentioned by Yákút as producing Tutia) and Ráví, but this does not help us, and for approximate position

VOL. I.

K