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| The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.2 |
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Citation Information
MARCO POLO PooK Itt,
348
3
c2-muck),* is called in the island of Bali Bela, a term applied also to one kind of female Sati, probably from S. Bali, "a sacrifice." (See Friedrich in Batavian Trans. XXIII.) In the first syllable of the Baldnjar of Mas'udi we have probably the same word. A similar institution is mentioned by Caesar among the Sotiates, a tribe of Aquitania. The Féoilz of the chief were 600 in number and were called Soldurii; they shared all his good things in life, and were bound to share with him in death also. Such also was a custom among the Spanish Iberians, and the name of these Amuki signified "sprinkled for sacrifice." Other generals, says Plutarch, might find a few such among their personal staff and dependents, but Sertorius was followed by many myriads who had thus devoted themselves. Procopius relates of the White Huns that the richer among them used to entertain a circle of friends, some score or more, as perpetual guests and partners of their wealth. But, when the chief died, the whole company were expected to go down alive into the tomb with him. The King of the Russians, in the tenth century, according to Ibn Fozlán, was attended by 400 followers bound by like vows. And according to some writers the same practice was common in Japan, where the friends and vassals who were under the vow committed kara kiri at the death of their patron. The Likaniankwas of the Abyssinian kings, who in battle wear the same dress with their master to mislead the enemy—" Six Richmonds in the field "—form apparently a kindred institution. (Bell. Gall. iii. c. 22 ; Plutarch. in Vit. Sertorii ; Procoj5. De B. Pers. I. 3: Ibn Fozlan by Fraehn, p. 22 ; Sonnerat, I. 97. )
NOTE 6.—However frequent may have been wars between adjoining states, the south of the peninsula appears to have been for ages free from foreign invasion until the Delhi expeditions, which occurred a few years later than our traveller's visit ; and there are many testimonies to the enormous accumulations of treasure. Gold, according to the Masdlak-al-Absd r, had been flowing into India for 3000 years, and had never been exported. Firishta speaks of the enormous spoils carried off by Malik Káfúr, every soldier's share amounting to 25 lbs. of gold ! Some years later Mahomed Tughlak loads 200 elephants and several thousand bullocks with the precious spoil of a single temple. We have quoted a like statement from Wassáf as to the wealth found in the treasury of this very Sundara Pandi Dewar, but the same author goes far beyond this when he tells that Kales Dewar, Raja of Ma'bar about 1309, had accumulated 1200 crores of gold, i.e. 12,000 millions of dinars, enough to girdle the earth with a four-fold belt of bezants ! (N. and E. XIII. 218, 220-221, Bri,,g's Firishta, I. 373-374 ; Hammer's Ilkhans, II. 205. )
NOTE 7.—Of the ports mentioned as exporting horses to India we have already made acquaintance with KAIS and HORMUZ ; of DOFAR and ADEN we shall hear further on ; Soer is SOHÁR, the former capital of Oman, and still a place of some little trade. Edrisi calls it " one of the oldest cities of Oman, and of the richest. Anciently it was frequented by merchants from all parts of the world ; and voyages to China used to be made from it." (I. 152.)
Rashiduddin and Wassáf have identical statements about the horse trade, and so similar to Polo's in this chapter that one almost suspects that he must have been their authority. Wassáf says : " It was a matter of agreement that Malik-ul-Islám Jamáluddin and the merchants should embark every year from the island of KAIS and land at MA'BAR 1400 horses of his own breed. . . . It was also agreed that he should embark as many as he could procure from all the isles of Persia, such as Kátif, Lahsá, Bahrein, Hurmuz, and Kalhátú. The price of each horse was fixed from of old at 220 dinars of red gold, on this condition, that if any horses should happen to die, the value of them should be paid from the royal treasury. It is related by authentic writers that in the reign of Atábek Abu Bakr of (Fars), 1o,o0o horses were annually exported from these places to Ma'bar, Kambáyat, and other ports in their
* Running a-muck in the genuine 1\ialay fashion is not unknown among the Rajpúts ; see two notable instances in Tod, II. 45 and 315. [See HobsonJobson.J
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