A R A B I A 517 at the same time five catapults by sea for the purpose of reducing Portuguese adventurer made use of Arab pilots in his voyages of Debal. He passed through Makran from west to east, destroying the discovery. With the rise of schismatics and the birth of those Buddhist city of Armail (Las Bela) en route, and finally captured heresies which, under the name of Khariji, Khesaja, Shariite, Debal on the 1st May 712. From that point his onward progress Ismailite, Karmatian, &c., spread their roots afar from Syria to was triumphant. He enlisted Meds and Jats into his army, and Mecca and from Mecca to the Indus, the power of the Arab in the by the time he had reduced Sadusan (Haidarabad) and reached East rapidly waned. Chief amongst these sects were the Karmatians. Multan he had 50,000 men under him. He extended his conquests We hear of them first in the days when the power of the Calinorthward to the borders of Kashmir, and established an Arab phate was declining, ere the reign of A1 Muktadar (908-932), by dynasty in Sind which lasted for three centuries. The Caliph which time the Turks were already aggressive. By then the Walid died in 715 (after substituting Arabic for Greek as the Karmatian heretics had brought themselves into prominence by language of the Indus provinces), and the tragic end of Mahommed plundering Kufa, Basra, and Samara, and even carried off the Kasim is one of the epics of Arab history. These three centuries sacred stone from Mecca. They are not mentioned by Ibn Haukel of Arab occupation of the Indus valley mark the zenith of Arab as being in the Indus valley in the 10th century, but it could ascendency in Asia. In 770 the governor of Sind became governor not have been long afterwards that they appeared as refugees from of Africa, and again in 800 there was a similar transfer. Amran Bahrein and El Hasa. About 985 they founded new settlements was perhaps the most famous governor. His control of Sind on the Indus, and shortly afterwards were in possession of Multan lasted from 833 to 841. Before the ond of the 9th century and Mansura. Mahmud of Ghazni captured Mansura, about 1036, Arab rule had commenced to decline ; and then arose the cities of on his return from Somnat, being already in possession of Multan and Mansura. Khozdar (Kalat) and Multan, and thus practically closed the era Throughout these centuries Sind maintained regular commercial of Arab ascendency in Sind. He restored the old mosque at communication with the rest of the Mahommedan empire ; with Multan, built by the Ummayide Caliphs and destroyed by the the regions of the upper Oxus by way of Kabul and Bamian ; Karmatians. There is a peculiar interest attaching to these with the Central Asian khanates through Zabulistan, Kanda- “people of the veil,” for they were in close communication with har, and Herat; with Persia and Syria and Europe through the medieval schismatics of Syria, the Hashashin, the IsmailMakran : and a host of Arab geographers arose who have partly ites, the Druses, and others of those mystical sects who were recounted their own experiences as travellers, and partly (as in the indebted to the East for their philosophy and theology and those case of the best known of them, Edrisi) acted as geographical mystic creeds which ended in pure atheism. The Ghazni rule did compilers. From them we learn the enormous extent of that vast not last long. It was soon replaced by the Sumra dynasty of network of commercial routes which was then spread over the face Mahommedan Rajputs, which lasted for three centuries. One of of Asia—a system of roads, caravanserais, and mercantile centres the Sumra rajahs at least was a Karmatian. Pure-bred Arabs had which has left its traces plainly written in spite of the sweeping almost disappeared from Sind ere the rise of the Karmatians. It waves of destruction poured across it by Moghul and Tatar. The is said that the first Ghaznivide governor of Multan found but very skeletons of ancient towns and the dry channels of great irriga- few Arab families remaining; but Baluchistan still continued to tion works in the valley of the Helmund and the plains of Sistan attract them, and although the Arabic tongue has disappeared witness to the former wealth of these regions under Arab rule ; and from the regions east of Persia, there is not a tribesman who boasts from Quetta to Herat, and from Herat through Badghis and the title of “asl” or “pure” Baluch, who does not claim Arab Afghan Turkestan to the Oxus, there are still to be encountered descent and associate his ancestry with the tribe of Khoreish. In evidences of Arab occupation in acres of ancient ruins. many cases this claim is obviously without foundation, but there One or two of their more famous cities may be mentioned. Tiz, is still a powerful confederation of tribes calling themselves Rind, now a heap of ruins and a waste of graveyards on Chahbar whose appearance, manners, and traditions are undoubtedly bay, was once a great port of debarkation on the Makran Semitic. They exist in the lower parts of the Kej valley of Makran, coast for India. It is well situated so as to avoid the full blast separated by the country of the Brahui from the Indus border of the monsoon winds across the Arabian sea. From Tiz to the Rinds, who occupy the highlands south and east of Quetta under fertile valley of Kiz (or Kej), and from Kej to Kanazbun (Panjgur), the name of Marris, Bugtis, Bozdars, &c. The Arab tribes (or Armail (Las Bela), Manhabari (Manja, or Mugger, Pir), and Debal, tribes of Arab extraction) on the Baluch borderland include the the ancient Indus port (the ruins of which are now far inland), best and finest amongst the many peoples of varied origin who the most frequented of these trade routes extended its length. occupy positions of independence in the frontier hills. Kiz and Kanazbun are described as large cities—as large as There is but little to record of evidences in stone and brick of Multan; and the merchants of Kanazbun were famous for their the Arab conquest of Sind. Long lines of tombs, stone-built and wealth and their fair dealing. In the Indus valley such cities as massive, are to be seen at Tatta, all of which are of Mahommedan Sadusan, Mansura, and Brahmanabad outrivalled the glories of design, but probably of later date than the days of Mansura and any of our modern Indus towns. Brahmanabad. The best known and the most interesting relics It was doubtless during these three centuries that the Arabs are the curious double-chambered tombs (the two chambers forming developed their genius for shipbuilding and acquired that command a double storey), richly ornamented with geometric designs, and Arabia as ^le eastern seas which was followed by the complete decorated with the true Saracenic arch, which exist in groups throughout southern Sind and the Las Bela borderland. They a naval races domination of the Mediterranean. As traders, tlieir own on t e seas the Semitic always exist apart from the visible remains of destroyed cities, being power. ^ theyfrom earliest dawn of history, and although fell before the themselves often in a remarkable state of preservation, and connaval power of Rome, they reasserted themselves in full force, as spicuous objects in the landscape by reason of the elevated sites Saracens, during the Middle Ages, even in the West. In the East which have been selected for their building. These are attributed they struggled long for supremacy with the Turks and finally lost it, to an Arab race called Kalmati, who are said to have originally but they were the first sea-power on the Indian Ocean and in the migrated through Makran from Oman and who, in the course of Persian Gulf. The lines they originally laid down for the con- their migration, settled on the shores of the Kalmat Khaur, one struction of their sea-going vessels may be as distinctly traced in of the harbours of the southern coast near Pasni. The name the early ocean sailing ships of Portugal, Spain, Holland, and Kalmat is so old as to be recognized as the “ Kalama ” of Nearkos ; England, as their nautical terms and astronomical nomenclature may so that it is probable that the comparatively recent tribe of be found in the mouth of the modern sailor. Many naval terms southern Arabian origin who, under that name, formed a powerful and nearly all the astronomical divisions of the heavens are of community in southern Sind within historic times, and have left Arab origin. During the sovereignty of the early Caliphs an behind them by far the most perfect Arab monuments to be found immense impetus was given in the Baghdad schools to the study of on the borders of India west of the Indus, adopted the name of mathematics and the exact sciences. Borrowing their numerals their temporary resting-place in Makran. Scattered remnants of from India and the compass (as well as gunpowder) from China, the tribe are said still to be found in Sind. the Arabs had evolved for themselves systems of navigation and Turkish sovereignty is now paramount through all instruments for determining the value of latitude and longitude, before the close of the 12th century. About the time that Roger, Western Arabia, from Palestine to the strait of Babking of Sicily, employed the geographer Edrisi in the compilation el-Mandeb, as well as through Eastern Arabia, of a geographical map of the world, Abdul Hassan Ali of Morocco from Basra, on the Euphrates, to the boundaries ^cent St ry wrote a treatise on astronomy which included a detailed account of Oman. The cultivated districts of the southern ° ' of the use of instruments already well known and in the hands of Arab navigators. Amongst them was that ingenious instrument coast are divided between British occupation and that of the astrolabe, by means of which observations for latitude could independent tribes; the central deserts are still the home be obtained. Longitude was determined then, as now, by the of the Beduin; and the highlands of Nejd are divided differences between clock and sun time. It seems, indeed, almost between two independent chiefships, each of which is incredible that the route to India via the Cape of Good Hope should have been left to Portuguese navigators to discover ; for the of doubtful territorial extent, but considerable political Arabs certainly knew how to traverse the Indian Ocean centuries significance. before the arrival of Yasco de Gama. It is possible that that great The condition of Arabia about the middle of the 19th century,
