balochracehistor00damerich

32 THE BALOCH RACK
been Shias, and that er-Kohinl had some grudge against
them. Yakut also quotes el-Bishari as classifying the
mountains of Karman into those of the Koch, the Baloch,
and the Qaran, which corresponds with the description of
Istakhri. He says that the Koch (Qufs) are tall, slender
people, who call themselves Arabs, given to all sorts of
wickedness, barbarous and cruel, and living by plunder.
The Bulus were formerly the most terrible of the marauding
tribes, but were destroyed by Adad-u'd-daula, 1 who
also slew a great number of the Qufs. They call them-
selves Musalmans (this apparently refers to the Qufs), but
are more bitter against Musalmans than are the Greeks
and Turks.
Yakut speaks of the Baloch under a separate heading
(u^)> and gives a more favourable account of them. He says
they resemble the Kurds, live between Fars and Karman,
and are dreaded by the savage Qufs, who fear no one else.
The Baloch, he says, are richer and more civilized than
their neighbours, live in goatskin tents, and do not plunder
and fight like the Qufs.
In addition to Adadu'd-daula Dailami, his uncle Mu iz-
zu'd-daula, who died a.h. 356, also came into collision with
the wild tribes of Karman, called by some Kurds and by
others Koch and Baloch. He lost his left hand and the
fingers of the right in conflict with them, and was thence
known as Aqta* (^» l
), or maimed. 2
The Baloch, no doubt, possessed horses and raided far
afield, as their descendants have done ever since. They
crossed the desert into Khorasan and Slstan, and the
fact that two of the provinces of Slstan were already in
Istakhri' s time known as Baloch country shows that they
had begun to establish themselves there. During the reign
of Mahmud Ghaznawi they roused the wrath of that
monarch by robbing his ambassador on the way to Karman,
between Tabbas and Khabis. Mahmud sent his son
1 The Dailami (Buwaihl), who reigned a.h. 338-372 (a.d. 949-982).
2 Tarikh-I-Yafai, quoted by Baverty, ' Tabakat-i-N&sirl,' i. 60 (note).