ASIA. CHAP. 1V. Herodotus's account. Bactria a ment. the Bactri Bactria, according to Herodotus, was the usual place of banishment for enslaved nations. Thus the Persian generals threatened the Ionians that they would make eunuchs of their sons and carry their penal settle- virgins to Bactria; and the enslaved Barcaeans from Libya were also carried there, and built a village which they named Barca, and which still existed in the Bactrian territory in the time of HeroCostume of dotus.2 The Bactrians in the army of Xerxes wore turbans on their heads very much like those worn by the Medes; they also carried short spears, and bows made of a cane, which was peculiar to their country. They would seem to be the most important people in this part of Asia; and we find that many of the surrounding nations wore the same equipments, viz. the Parthians, Chorasmians, Sogdians, Gandarians, Dadicae, and Arians; only the latter carried a bow which bore more resemblance to the Median. ans. Acglae, probably 3 Of the Aeglae nothing is known for certain. RenThe Ghiljies, nell would place them in the eastern extremity of Bactria, where he says that the most remote province is named Kil, Gil, or Kilan.1 We would rather identify them with the Ghiljies, who were in former times the most celebrated of the Afghan tribes, and are to be found in the neighbourhood of Cabul, and along the valley of the Cabul river as far as Jellallabad." VII. GAN- Gandarii, 6 VII. GANDARA, or the seventh satrapy, comprised prising the the Sattagydae, Gandarii, Dadicae, and Aparytae. Sattayde, It paid 170 talents. Herodotus says nothing furDadicae, ther about these people, excepting that the Gandarii and Dadicae wore the same accoutrements as the named by Bactrians." and Apary tac. Merely Probably Herodotus. The name of Gandara is applied by later oriental answered to writers to Candahar, and we have therefore thought 4 In Stephen of Byzantium we find Αἴγηλοι ἔθνος Μηδικόν, to which some commentators refer. Billerbeck, quoted by Baehr, for Aiyλwv would read 'Apɛiwv. See Bachr's note on Herod. iii. 92. Elphinstone, Account of Caubul, vol. ii. 6 iii. 91. 7 vii. 66. CHAP. IV. eastern Af Gandarii people of proper for the sake of clearness to use it as a general ASIA. name for the country of the Gandarii and other nations included in the present satrapy. This collective territory is to be identified with eastern ghanistan. Afghanistan. Strabo places the Gandarii to the identified east of the Indus, but Hecataeus fixes them on the with the western bank of that river, and this latter statement Candahar. seems most in accordance with the arrangement of Herodotus. The Dadicae were probably the Tad- Dadicae jiks, a people of ancient Persian race, who are now Tadjiks. widely scattered throughout the countries east of Persia. The Aparytae we cannot identify. The Sattagydae Sattagydae have been identified by Colonel Raw- with the linson with the modern Zhats of Candahar.' with the MANIA, in XIV. CARMANIA, the modern Kerman, seems to XIV. CARhave been included in the fourteenth satrapy, though cluding not named. This government comprised the Sagar- Sagartii, Sarangees, tii, Sarangees, Thamanaei, Utii, and Myci, together Thamanaci, with the islands in the Erythraean, to which the Myci, and king used to transplant those individuals whom he the isles of condemned to banishment. It paid a tribute of 600 thracan. talents.2 The Sarangees and the Erythraean islanders are the only people whose localities can be at all identified, but we may regard these as forming two of the extremities of the satrapy. The Sarangees were apparently the people of Zarang or Sehestan, a rich alluvial tract in the western part of Afghanistan, and lying to the south of Lake Zurrah, or Aria Palus, and the river Helmund. The other tribes mentioned 1 Rennell places the Gandarii in Margiana, because he finds in Isidore the towns of Gadar and Apabartica between the towns of Nisaea, which he takes for the country of Naisabour, and Antiochia of Margiana, which he takes for the country of Meru. Hence he concludes that the Gandarii occupied the country of Gadar, and the Aparytae that of Apabartica, especially as he says Herodotus (vii. 66) gives the name of Gardarians to those whom he had elsewhere called Gandarians. Larcher has however pointed out Rennell's mistake. All the MSS. consulted by Larcher and Wesseling have Gandarians, and never Gardarians, to say nothing of the weighty testimony of Strabo and Hecataeus quoted above. Baehr has a long note upon Herod. iii. 91, in which he quotes the opinions of different geographers, but without expressing any very decided opinion of his own. 2 iii. 93. Utii, and the Ery Sarangees identified with the people of Zarang or Sehestan. ASIA. may be placed in the region between Sehestan and CHAP. IV. the coast opposite the Erythrean isles, thus answering to the modern provinces of Kerman and Laristan. None of these isles are of great extent excepting Kishm. Herodotus's account. fighting The Sagartii were nomades' of Persian extraction Costume of and speaking the Persian language; they wore a the Sagartii. costume of a fashion half Persian and half Pactyan. They furnished eight thousand horse to Xerxes, and carried no arms either of brass or iron excepting daggers, but were provided with lassos made of Mode of twisted thongs. Their mode of fighting was by with lassos. throwing the lasso, which had a noose at the end, over an enemy, and then dragging down either horse or man, and despatching with daggers all that they could Thamanaci thus entangle.2 The Thamanaeans are unknown. unknown. The Sarangees, or Sarangae, were distinguished the Saran- for their beautifully coloured garments, and wore and Myci. buskins reaching up to the knee, and carried bows and Medic javelins.* The Utii and Myci were equipped like the Pactyes." Costume of gees, Utii, XVII. with the 56 3 XVII. ASIATIC AETHIOPIA, or the seventeenth saAETHIOPIA trapy, seems to answer to the country between CarParicanii. mania and the Indus. It comprised the Paricanii and the Aethiopians of Asia, and paid 400 talents." The Paricanii were armed like the Pactyes. The of Paricanii, eastern Aethiopians, or those from the sun-rise, as Herodotus's account. 1 i. 125. 8 2 vii. 85. The Csikos in the late Hungarian war were said to have fought with lassos having an iron bullet at the end, and as there seemed some strange similarity between their name and that of the Sargatii, I made some inquiry concerning them. I find, however, that Csiko merely means a colt; that the Csikos are simply herdsmen belonging to no nationality whatever; and that the story that they formed a corps in the Hungarian army was a mere invention of the German papers. I have not, however, been able to learn whether they preserve any traces of having formed an hereditary caste. 3 Kerman still produces the finest wool; and Kerman, the metropolis, is celebrated throughout all Asia for its manufacture of shawls, which are as fine, but not so soft, as those of Cashmere. Heeren, Asiat. Nat. vol. i. 6 Bobrik thinks that the Pactyes were also probably included in this satrapy, and that their name was omitted because the Utians and Mycians dwelt in Pactyica. Geog. des Herodot. § 76. 7 iii. 94. • vii. 68. ASIA. CHAP. IV. Herodotus calls them, were marshalled with the Indians, and differed from the Libyan Aethiopians only in their language and their hair, which was straight, Aethiopians whilst that of the Libyan Aethiopians was curly. trasted with These Asiatics were accoutred like the Indians, ex- those of cepting that they wore on their heads skins like Libya. masks which had been stripped from the heads of head-dress. horses with the ears and mane; and these horses' ears were fixed so as to stand erect, whilst the mane served for a crest. For defensive armour they used the skins of cranes instead of shields.' Strange tion of Aethiopia The region inhabited by these Aethiopians seems Identificato be identical with Gedrosia, and therefore to have Asiatic included Mekran and other provinces in that quarter, with Gedrowhich now bear the general name of Beloochistan. sia or BelooThe Paricanii, however, cannot be identified at all.2 chistan. NORTHERN XX. NORTHERN INDIA, which formed the twentieth xx. satrapy, comprised what may be called the tributary INDIA, OF Indians, to distinguish them from those tribes who Punjab. were independent of the Persian power. They were the most numerous people known to Herodotus, and paid a tribute proportionably large, viz. 360 talents of gold-dust; which, reckoned at thirteen times the value of the usual silver talent, were equal to 4680 talents.* 3 the satrapy. Herodotus describes these tributary Indians as Extent of being settled to the north of the other Indian tribes, and on the borders of the city of Caspatyrus and country of Pactyica; and we may infer that their country was not far from that of the Bactrians, whom they resembled in their mode of life. In their neighbourhood was a sandy desert. We have already identified Caspatyrus and the country of Pactyica with the modern territory of Cabul, and the desert here alluded to is no doubt that of Gobi or Shamo. We have therefore no hesitation in extend 1 vii. 70. 5 2 Rennell thinks it possible that they may have lived in the neighbourhood of the Purah of the historians of Alexander, which he identifies with the town of Paraj or Fahraj. This however is pure conjecture. 3 iii. 94, 102. 5 iii. 102. 4 iii. 95. See page 199. ASIA. ing this satrapy in a north-easterly direction from CHAP. IV. the confines of Gandaria and Bactria towards the desert of Shamo, thus approximating to the country now called the Punjab. Herodotus's the people. ants. The Indians of this satrapy were the most warlike account of of all the Indian nations. The desert abounded in Enormous ants, rather less than dogs, but larger than foxes, of which the king of Persia possessed some specimens.' These ants formed their habitations under ground, and heaped up the sand in a similar manner to the ants of Hellas, which they much resembled in shape. Ant-hills of The sand thus heaped up was mixed with gold, which sand and gold-dust. Mode of carrying off the gold. Identifica people with the Rajpoots of the Punjab. was thus obtained by the Indians. Each man took with him three camels, viz. a male on each side to carry the gold, and a female in the centre on which he sat; and he took care that the latter should be one that had recently foaled. During the hottest part of the day the ants burrowed themselves in their subterranean dwellings, and accordingly the Indians chose this time for carrying off the gold. On reaching the spot they filled their sacks and hastened away with all possible despatch; for the ants would discover them by their smell, and being the swiftest of animals, would overtake and destroy them, unless the gold-stealers had got a good start. It was thus, according to the Persians, that the Indians obtained the greatest part of their gold; at the same time the metal was found, though in less quantities, in mines and rivers. S Herodotus's remark already quoted, that the Intion of the dians comprised in this satrapy were the most warlike of all the Indian nations, at once leads us to identify them with the warrior-caste of Hindostan, the ancestors of the Rajpoots, of whom the Mahrattas and Sikhs are branches. The upper class of the inhabitants of the Punjab still consists of Rajpoots, who are stout and handsome, with aquiline noses 1 Marco Paulo relates that the Indians sent stuffed monsters into foreign countries to give countenance to the stories respecting them. If this fraud was practised in the time of Darius, it will account for the stuffed ants in the museum at Susa. |