us permission to enter the port, and this we did. At last we landed at the city, which is one of the greatest in the world, and differs from all the other cities of China in having no gardens inside the walls ; they are all outside, as in other countries. The city or quarter in which the emperor resides stands in the middle like a citadel, as we shall tell hereafter. I took up my quarters with the shaikh Burhânuddin of Sagharj, the individual to whom the Sultan of India sent 40,000 dinars, with an invitation to go to his dominions. He took the money indeed; and paid his debts with it, but declined to go the King of Dehli, and directed his course towards China. The Kan put him at the head of all the Musulmans in his empire, with the title of Sadr-ul-Jihdn, or Chief of the World.'
The word Han (Q,r m) among the Chinese is a generic term for any one governing the empire ; in fact, for the kings of their country, just as the lords of the Lûr country are called Atdbeh. The proper name of this sultan is Pdshhi, and there is not among the infidels on the whole face of the earth so great an empire as his.2
I As Ibn Batuta relates elsewhere (iii, 255) this celebrated preacher gave as his reason for refusing to visit India : " I will not go to the court of a king who makes philosophers stand in his presence." Curiously enough the story is also told in the lllasdlak ul Abscir, of which extracts have been translated by Quatremère, According to that work, Burh6nuddin of Sagharj was Shaikh of Samarkand, and Sultan Mahomed of Dehli, hearing much of his fame, sent him 40,000 tankahs (we here see corroboration that the Indian dinar of Ibn Batuta is the Tankah of other authors) with an invitation to his court. The messenger on his arrival at Samarkand found the Shaikh had set out for China, so he gave the money to a young slave-girl of his, desiring her to let her master know that his presence was vehemently desired by the King of Dehli (Notices et Extraits, xiii, 196 ) .
2 Atabek was the title borne by various powerful Amirs at the court of the Seljucidle, which they retained after becoming independent in different provinces of Irak, Azarbijan, etc. The title is said to mean " The Prince's Father." It was also held at the Court of Dehli under the translated form Shan Baba (Elph. Hist. of India, ii, 216). Ibn Batuta had visited one of the Atabeks, Afrasiab, in Luristan, on his way from Baghdad to Ispahan. By Pcishcti, I suspect he only means the Persian P!dshdh.
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