balochracehistor00damerich

24 THE BALOCH RACE
Gul-phad/i (Flowerfeet), a clan of the Drlshaks.
Gandagwalagh (the small red ant), a clan of the
Durkanl.
Syah-laf (Blackbellies), all the Mazaris, with the
exception of the Balachani.
Kalphur (an aromatic plant, Glinas lotoides), a clan of
the Bughtis.
The tribal names Hot (hero) and Mazari (sons of tigers)
are examples of epithets of another kind.
Bozdar means goatherds.
The Balochi is, as is well known, an Iranian idiom,
nearly related to modern Persian, but at the same time
showing many points of resemblance to the Zend, or Old
Bactrian, rather than to the Old Persian. 1 The vocabulary
has borrowed a large number of words from the neigh-
bouring settled races speaking Modern Persian on one side,
or the Indian idioms Sindhi and Jatki on the other.
Brahoi has furnished a few words, and has itself borrowed
extensively from Balochi. The Arabic element is not
very extensive, and mainly consists* of such religious and
abstract terms as are common to all Muhammadan nations.
Most of these have been introduced through the medium
of Modern Persian. Had the Arab element been an im-
portant or ruling one, we should expect to find the words
relating to government, tribal organization, war, weapons,
horses, and other matters in which the ruling caste of a
nomad race mainly concerns itself, largely derived from
the Arabic, much as in English the corresponding class of
words is derived from Norman-French. But hardly a
single word of this class comes from Arabic, though Sindhi
has been drawn on to some extent. Most words of this
class belong to the original Iranian element ; a few are
Turkish.
Certain indications as to origin may also be deduced from
1 'Die Sprache der Bahitschen,' by W. Geiger, No. VI., in the
• Grundriss der Iranischen Philologie,' gives a full summary of the
literature of the subject.