Volume II Part 65 (1/2)
Esher is a great city lying in a north-westerly direction from the last, and 400 miles distant from the Port of Aden. It has a king, who is subject to the Soldan of Aden. He has a number of towns and villages under him, and administers his territory well and justly.
The people are Saracens. The place has a very good haven, wherefore many s.h.i.+ps from India come thither with various cargoes; and they export many good chargers thence to India.[NOTE 1]
A great deal of white incense grows in this country, and brings in a great revenue to the Prince; for no one dares sell it to any one else; and whilst he takes it from the people at 10 livres of gold for the hundredweight, he sells it to the merchants at 60 livres, so his profit is immense.[NOTE 2]
Dates also grow very abundantly here. The people have no corn but rice, and very little of that; but plenty is brought from abroad, for it sells here at a good profit. They have fish in great profusion, and notably plenty of tunny of large size; so plentiful indeed that you may buy two big ones for a Venice groat of silver. The natives live on meat and rice and fish. They have no wine of the vine, but they make good wine from sugar, from rice, and from dates also.
And I must tell you another very strange thing. You must know that their sheep have no ears, but where the ear ought to be they have a little horn!
They are pretty little beasts.[NOTE 3]
And I must not omit to tell you that all their cattle, including horses, oxen, and camels, live upon small fish and nought besides, for 'tis all they get to eat. You see in all this country there is no gra.s.s or forage of any kind; it is the driest country on the face of the earth. The fish which are given to the cattle are very small, and during March, April, and May, are caught in such quant.i.ties as would astonish you. They are then dried and stored, and the beasts are fed on them from year's end to year's end. The cattle will also readily eat these fish all alive and just out of the water.[NOTE 4]
The people here have likewise many other kinds of fish of large size and good quality, exceedingly cheap; these they cut in pieces of about a pound each, and dry them in the sun, and then store them, and eat them all the year through, like so much biscuit.[NOTE 5]
NOTE 1.--_s.h.i.+hr_ or _Shehr_, with the article, ES-SHEHR, still exists on the Arabian coast, as a town and district about 330 m. east of Aden. In 1839 Captain Haines described the modern town as extending in a scattered manner for a mile along the sh.o.r.e, the population about 6000, and the trade considerable, producing duties to the amount of 5000_l._ a year. It was then the residence of the Sultan of the Hamum tribe of Arabs. There is only an open roadstead for anchorage. Perhaps, however, the old city is to be looked for about ten miles to the westward, where there is another place bearing the same name, ”once a thriving town, but now a desolate group of houses with an old fort, formerly the residence of the chief of the _Kasaidi_ tribe.” (_J.R.G.S._ IX. 151-152.) Shehr is spoken of by Barbosa (_Xaer_ in Lisbon ed.; _Pecher_ in Ramusio; _Xeher_ in Stanley; in the two last misplaced to the east of Dhofar): ”It is a very large place, and there is a great traffic in goods imported by the Moors of Cambaia, Chaul, Dabul, Batticala, and the cities of Malabar, such as cotton-stuffs ... strings of garnets, and many other stones of inferior value; also much rice and sugar, and spices of all sorts, with coco-nuts; ... their money they invest in horses for India, which are here very large and good. Every one of them is worth in India 500 or 600 ducats.” (_Ram._ f. 292.) The name Shehr in some of the Oriental geographies, includes the whole coast up to Oman.
NOTE 2.--The hills of the Shehr and Dhafar districts were the great source of produce of the Arabian frankincense. Barbosa says of Shehr: ”They carry away much incense, which is produced at this place and in the interior; ...
it is exported hence all over the world, and here it is used to pay s.h.i.+ps with, for on the spot it is worth only 150 farthings the hundredweight.”
See note 2, ch. xxvii. supra; and next chapter, note 2.
NOTE 3.--This was no doubt a breed of four-horned sheep, and Polo, or his informant, took the lower pair of horns for abnormal ears. Probably the breed exists, but we have little information on details in reference to this coast. The Rev. G.P. Badger, D.C.L., writes: ”There are sheep on the eastern coast of Arabia, and as high up as Mohammerah on the Shatt-al-Arab, _with very small ears indeed;_ so small as to be almost imperceptible at first sight near the projecting horns. I saw one at Mohammerah having _six_ horns.” And another friend, Mr. Arthur Grote, tells me he had for some time at Calcutta a 4-horned sheep from Aden.
NOTE 4.--This custom holds more or less on all the Arabian coast from Shehr to the Persian Gulf, and on the coast east of the Gulf also. Edrisi mentions it at Shehr (printed _Shajr_, I. 152), and the Admiral Sidi 'Ali says: ”On the coast of Shehr, men and animals all live on fish” (_J.A.S.B._ V. 461). Ibn Batuta tells the same of Dhafar, the subject of next chapter: ”The fish consist for the most part of sardines, which are here of the fattest. The surprising thing is that all kinds of cattle are fed on these sardines, and sheep likewise. I have never seen anything like that elsewhere” (II. 197). Compare Strabo's account of the Ichthyophagi on the coast of Mekran (XV. 11), and the like account in the life of Apollonius of Tyana (III. 56).
[Burton, quoted by Yule, says (_Sind Revisited_, 1877, I. p. 33): ”The whole of the coast, including that of Mekran, the land of the _Mahi Kharan_ or Ichthyophagi.” Yule adds: ”I have seen this suggested also elsewhere. It seems a highly probable etymology.” See note, p. 402.
--H.C.]
NOTE 5.--At Hasik, east of Dhafar, Ibn Batuta says: ”The people here live on a kind of fish called _Al-Lukham_, resembling that called the sea-dog.
They cut it in slices and strips, dry it in the sun, salt it, and feed on it. Their houses are made with fish-bones, and their roofs with camel-hides” (II. 214).
CHAPTER x.x.xVIII.
CONCERNING THE CITY OF DUFAR.
Dufar is a great and n.o.ble and fine city, and lies 500 miles to the north-west of Esher. The people are Saracens, and have a Count for their chief, who is subject to the Soldan of Aden; for this city still belongs to the Province of Aden. It stands upon the sea and has a very good haven, so that there is a great traffic of s.h.i.+pping between this and India; and the merchants take hence great numbers of Arab horses to that market, making great profits thereby. This city has under it many other towns and villages.[NOTE 1]
Much white incense is produced here, and I will tell you how it grows. The trees are like small fir-trees; these are notched with a knife in several places, and from these notches the incense is exuded. Sometimes also it flows from the tree without any notch; this is by reason of the great heat of the sun there.[NOTE 2]
NOTE 1.--_Dufar_. The name [Arabic] is variously p.r.o.nounced Dhafar, DHOFAR, Zhafar, and survives attached to a well-watered and fertile plain district opening on the sea, nearly 400 miles east of Shehr, though according to Haines there is now no _town_ of the name. Ibn Batuta speaks of the city as situated at the extremity of Yemen (”the province of Aden”), and mentions its horse-trade, its unequalled dirt, stench, and flies, and consequent diseases. (See II. 196 seqq.) What he says of the desert character of the tract round the town is not in accordance with modern descriptions of the plain of Dhafar, nor seemingly with his own statements of the splendid bananas grown there, as well as other Indian products, betel, and coco-nut. His account of the Sultan of Zhafar in his time corroborates Polo's, for he says that prince was the son of a cousin of the King of Yemen, who had _been chief of Zhafar under the suzerainete of that King and tributary to him_. The only ruins mentioned by Haines are extensive ones near Haffer, towards the _western_ part of the plain; and this Fresnel considers to be the site of the former city. A lake which exists here, on the landward side of the ruins, was, he says, formerly a gulf, and formed the port, ”the very good haven,” of which our author speaks.
A quotation in the next note however indicates Merbat, which is at the eastern extremity of the plain, as having been the port of Dhafar in the Middle Ages. Professor Sprenger is of opinion that the city itself was in the eastern part of the plain. The matter evidently needs further examination.
This Dhafar, or the bold mountain above it, is supposed to be the _Sephar_ of Genesis (x. 30). But it does not seem to be the _Sapphara metropolis_ of Ptolemy, which is rather an inland city of the same name: ”Dhafar was the name of _two_ cities of Yemen, one of which was near Sana'a ... it was the residence of the Himyarite Princes; some authors allege that it is identical with Sana'a” (_Marasid-al-Ittila_', in Reinaud's Abulfeda, I. p.
124).
_Dofar_ is noted by Camoens for its fragrant incense. It was believed in Malabar that the famous King Cheram Perumal, converted to Islam, died on the pilgrimage to Mecca and was buried at Dhafar, where his tomb was much visited for its sanct.i.ty.
The place is mentioned (_Tsafarh_) in the Ming Annals of China as a Mahomedan country lying, with a fair wind, 10 days N.W. of _Kuli_ (supra, p. 440). Ostriches were found there, and among the products are named drugs which Dr. Bretschneider renders as _Olibanum_, _Storax liquida_, _Myrrh_, _Catechu_(?), _Dragon's blood_. This state sent an emba.s.sy (so-called) to China in 1422. (_Haines_ in _J.R.G.S._ XV. 116 seqq.; _Playfair's Yemen_, p. 31; _Fresnel_ in _J. As._ ser. 3, tom. V.