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IKTKODUCTION. 1
. P^). Then going north-west for two days, one comes to the country of Pa-yu^
(^ Ji!)- Then going ten days, and passing by (|5) the western frontier of
T'i6n-chu (^ ^ i. e., India) (and) five small countries, one comes to the
country of Ti-yu2(|^ ]^\ in which country is the great river Mi-lan
^ (M M)' also called (— ^) the Sin-t'ou {^)^ fl|) river. It comes from the
mountains of P'o-lun* ('^^ ^) in the north and flows westward; on arriving
north of the country of Ti-yu it empties into the sea.
"Again going westward from the kingdom of Ti-yii twenty days and
passing more that twenty little countries, one comes to the country of Ti-lo-
10 lu-ho (^ ^ Jl# ^), also called the country of Lo-ho-i {^ ^U ^). The
people of this country have set up ornamented pillars (^ |^) in the sea, on
which at night they place torches (^g) so that people travelling on board
ships at night shall not go astray. ^
1) Presumably some port on the coast of the Guzerat peninsula, the Balahhi or Vala-
15 bhadra kingdom of the sixth and seventh centuries. The name suggests the island of Dlu, an
important port in mediaeval times, but I do not know whether it existed in the eighth century.
2) This seems to be the Taiz (i^") of mediaeval Arab geographers. According to Abulfeda
(II. Pt. 2, 111, Eeinaud's transl.) Taiz was the port on the Indus for the Mekran and adjacent
countries. It was on the banks of the Indus, to the west, near the canal which left the river not
20 far from Mansurah (Brahmanabad). Ti-yfi may, however, represent Daibul, which was on the
Indus at its mouth, and which was the principal port of Sindh in mediaeval times.
3) The Arabs called the Indus Nahr Mihran. Since the time of Fa-hien the Chinese had
known of the Indus under its Indian name of Sindhu.
4) It appears probable that P'o-lun is the same country as Huan-tsang's Po-Iu-lo (^|fc
25 ^^ jjt^) or Bolor, the modern Balti, the Palow of Marco.Polo. It is possible, however, that
we should read K'un-lun ( s '^)! foi' Liang-shu, 54,i6 says that the great river called Sin-t'au
($fj" [^ Sindhu) has its source in the K'un-lun mountains.
5) Ti-lo-lu-ho, or Lo-ho-i does not occur in any other Chinese work I have seen. I am
inclined to look for this country on the Mekran coast, about a day's sailing S. E. of Cape
so Mesandum. Geo. Phillips (J. R. A. S., 1896, 525) thinks the beacons referred to in our text were
near Al-UbuUah on the Tigris estuary, and he mentions passages in Masudi and Abulfeda to the
effect that marks are said to have been erected in the sea near Al-Ubullah (^JjV^), see Masudi,
Prairies d'or, I, 230;Lee's Travels ofJbnBatuta, 36note, andlstakhri (Mordtmann's transl.,
18). If the indication given in the text as to the distance between the mouth of the Indus and the
.35 point on the coast where the beacons were is anyway near correct— 20 days, it is quite impossible
that Al-Ubullah can be referred to, we must look for them not farther than the mouth of the Persian
Gulf. The most natural identification of the place where the beacons were erected seems to be
with Cape Mesandum on the Oman coast. The Arab Eolations of the ninth century (Reinaud,
Relations, 1, 14) state that on the coast of Oman there was a place called Aldordur, a very narrow
40 passage between two mountains which small boats passed through, but in which the China ships
could not enter. There were two rocks called Kossayr and Uayr; only a small portion of the rocks
was seen above water. See also Masudi, Op. cit., 1, 240. These rocks are, I take it, the huge basalt
rocks seen some miles out afsea beyond Cape Mesandum. See W. G. Palgrave, Central and
Eastern Arabia, II, 317.
45 Marco Polo speaking of Kalhat, which stood near Cape Mesandum, says «This city of
Calatu stands at the mouth of the Gulf, so that no ship can enter or go forth without the will
3«