'CXX PRELIMINARY ESSAY.
wards the west. One portion was directed against Armenia, Georgia, and Asia Minor, whilst another great host under Batu, the nephew of the Great Khan, conquered the countries north of Caucasus, overran Russia making it tributary, and still continued to carry fire and slaughter westward. One great detachment under a lieutenant of Batu's entered Poland, burned Cracow, found Breslaw in ashes and abandoned by its people, and defeated with great slaughter at Wahlstadt near Lignitz (April 12th, 1241) the troops of Poland, Moravia, and Silesia, who had gathered under Duke Henry of the latter province to make'head against this astounding flood of heathen. Batu himself with the main body of his army was ravaging Hungary. The king had been very slack in bis preparations, and when eventually he made a stand against the enemy his army was defeated with great loss, and he escaped with difficulty. Pesth was now taken and burnt, and all its people put to the sword.
The rumours of the Tartars and their frightful devastations had scattered fear. through Europe, which the defeat at Lignitz raised to a climax. Indeed weak and disunited Christendom seemed to lie at the foot of the barbarians. The Pope to be sure proclaimed crusade, and wrote circular letters, but the enmity between him and the Emperor Frederic II was allowed to prevent any co-operation, and neither of them responded by anything better than words to the earnest calls for help which came from the King of Hungary. No human aid merited thanks when Europe was relieved by hearing that the Tartar host had suddenly retreated eastward. The Great Khan Okkodai was dead in the depths of Asia, and a courier had come to recal the army from Europe.
Kartag (Abulghazi), Khanzi and Manzi (Rashid), Iran and Turan, Crit and Mecrit (Rubruquis), Sondor and Condor (d larco Polo), etc. (See Quatremère's Rashid, pp. 243-246; D'Avezac, p. 534; Prairies d'Or, i, p. 399).
The name of Achill in Sumatra appears to have been twisted in this spirit by the 1VIahomedan mariners as a rhyme to Machin; the real name is Atcheh.
In India, such rhyming doublets are not confined to proper names ; to a certain extent they may be made colloquially at will upon a variety of substantives. Thus chauki-anki means "chairs" simply (chauki), or, at
most, "chatiirs and tables"; «sticks and stakes". In some
IIIF Color HighRes
