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1,28-29 OMAN . — ISLAKD OF KISH. 133
28.
OMAN.
Yung (or W6ng-)man (^ ^).
The country of Yung-man resembles Wu-pa as regards inhabitants and
5 the products of the soil. The chief of the country wears a turban, wrap&
himself in light silk, but wears no garments and goes barefooted. His servants
wear no headdress and go barefooted, but they wrap themselves in sarongs
(|§)
so that the body is covered. They live on meal cakes, mutton, sheep's
milk, fish and vegetables. The soil produces dates in large quantities. Along
10 the coast pearls are found, and in the mountains horse raising is carried on
on a large scale. The other countries which trade here purchase horses,
pearls and dates which they get in exchange for cloves, cardamom seeds and
camphor.
Note.
15 In the list of Arab states given in a previous chapter (supra, p. 117) the name of this
country is erroneously written Wong-li. According to the Arab relations of the ninth century
(Keinaud, Relations, I, 13—15) the products of Oman and other countries were brought to
Siraf on the Fars coast and there loaded on ships which sailed to India. These ships touched at
Maskat in Oman for water and provisions, but apparently Maskat carried on no important direct
20 trade with the East at that time. A century later Masudi, op. cit., I, 281, speaks of the ships
of Siraf aud Oman which sailed the seas of China, India, Sind, of the Zendj (ZangueLar), the
Yemen, of Kolzum and of Abyssinia, — but down to the twelfth century the centre of the Indian
and Chinese trade of the Persian Gulf was at Siraf, though it was already suffering at that time
from the pirates of Kish, who in the thirteenth centuiy brought about its complete ruin. Then Ormuz
25 began its great career, and Aden took much of the trade of the Persian Gulf.
In a subsequent chapter (infra, p. 137) our author states that Wong -man and Kish
traded regularly with Basra.
Ibn Batuta, op. cit., II, 374 says that the fleetest horses brought to India came from
the Yemen, Oman and Fars, and that Oman supplied the neighbouring countries with dates.
30 Marco Polo (II, 324) mentions SohAr (Soer) in Omanas one of the principal points from which
35
horses were brought to India. See also He yd. Hist, du Commerce, II, 135.
Masudi, op. cit., I, 328 says pearls were only found in the sea of Abyssinia, in Kharek,
Kotor, Oman, and Serendib. See infra, Pt. II, Ch. XXXIV.
29.
ISLAND OF KISH.
Ki-shi (IE M)-
The country of Ki-shi is on a small island {^)
in the sea, in sight of
the Ta-shi (coast), which is distant from it a half day's journey i. There are