EARLY ARAB GEOGRAPHERS.
I.
SALSILATU-T TAWÁRÍKH
OF THE
MERCHANT SULAIMA′N,
WITH ADDITIONS BY
ABƯ ZAIDU-L HASAN, OF SI′RA′F.
The earliest information which Europe derived from the writings of the Arabs upon India and the lands adjacent, was that which the Abbé Renaudot published, in the year 1718, under the title “Anciennes Relations des Indes et de la Chine de deux voyageurs Mahométans qui y allerent dans le ix siècle de notre ère.” By a curious coincidence the work so translated happened to be the earliest work extant of the Arab geographers relating to India. So novel and unexpected was the light thus thrown upon the farther East, that the translator was accused of all sorts of literary crimes. Some asserted his inaccuracy, and pointed out the discrepancies between the statements of his work and the accounts of the Jesuit missionaries in China. He had given no precise account of his manuscripts, hence some did not hesitate to accuse him of downright forgery. Time has shown the emptiness of most of these charges. From error he certainly was not exempt, but his faults and mistakes were those of a man who had to deal with a difficult subject, one which, even a century later, long deterred M. Reinaud from grappling with it.
