This page needs to be proofread.
RASHI′DU-D DI′N, FROM AL BI′RU′NI′.
71
They puncture their hands, and colour them with indigo. They eradicate their beards, so that they have not a sign of hair on their faces. They are all subject to the Ká-án. This country is bounded on one side by the sea, afterwards comes the country of Ráhán, the people of which eat carrion and the flesh of men,—they likewise are subject to the Ká-án.[1] Thence you arrive at the borders of Tibet, where they eat raw meat and worship images, and have no shame respecting their wives. The air is so impure that if they eat their dinner after noon they would all die. They boil tea and eat winnowed barley.
There is another country called Deogir, adjoining M’abar inland, the king of which is at constant enmity with the Dewar of M’abar. Its capital is Dúrú Samundúr [Dwára Samudra.]
Another large country is called Kandahár, which the Moghals call Karájáng. These people spring from Khitai and Hind. In the time[2] of Kúbilá Ká-án,[3]it was subdued by the Moghals. One of its borders adjoins Tibet, another adjoins Khitá, and another adjoins Hind.
Philosophers have said that there are three countries celebrated for certain peculiarities; Hind is celebrated for its armies, Kandahar for its elephants, and the Turks for their horses.
- ↑ [This passage was not in the first edition, and it is not in the MS. A.; but the other MSS. and Binákití have it.]
- ↑ [The Arabic says, “Towards the end of the reign.”]
- ↑ This is also mentioned in the Mongol work called Bodimer. See Pallas, Sammlungen historischer Nachrichten, T. I. p. 19.
The country of Karájáng and its borders are again noticed by our author in his account of China, and its position is laid down by M. Quatremère, Hist. des Mongols p. xcIv.
wherein we knew man's flesh to be eaten by certain people which live in the mountains, called Bacas, who use to gild their teeth.” Ant. Galvano’s Disc. of the World in Hakluyt, IV. 422. See also Purchas His Pilgrimage p. 457. Mursden's M. Polo, p. 429, 434.]
