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| The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.2 |
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Citation Information
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MARCO POLO Boos. III.
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and held St. Thomas in great veneration. The hashíses married, but were very abstemious. They had two Lents, and then fasted strictly from meat, milk, and fish.
The last vestiges of Christianity in Socotra, so far as we know, are those traced by P. Vincenzo, the Carmelite, who visited the island after the middle of the 17th century. The people still retained a profession of Christianity, but without any knowledge, and with a strange jumble of rites ; sacrificing to the moon ; circumcising ; abominating wine and pork. They had churches which they called Moguame (Ar. Makánz, " Locus, Statio " ?), dark, low, and dirty, daily anointed with butter. On the altar was a cross and a candle. The cross was regarded with ignorant reverence, and carried in processions. They assembled in their churches three times in the day, and three times in the night, and in their worship burned much incense, etc. The priests were called Odambo, elected and consecrated by the people, and changed every year. Of baptism and other sacraments they had no knowledge.
There were two races : one, black with crisp hair ; the other, less black, of better aspect, and with straight hair. Each family had a cave in which they deposited their dead. They cultivated a few palms, and kept flocks ; had no money, no writing, and kept tale of their flocks by bags of stones. They often committed suicide in age, sickness, or defeat. When rain failed they selected a victim by lot, and placing him within a circle, addressed prayers to the moon. If without success they cut off the poor wretch's hands. They had many who practised sorcery. The women were all called Maria, which the author regarded as a relic of Christianity ; this De Barros also notices a century earlier.
Now, not a trace of former Christianity can be discovered—unless it be in the name of one of the villages on the coast, Colesseeah, which looks as if it faintly commemorated both the ancient religion and the ancient language VKKÄ rLa). The remains of one building, traditionally a place of worship, were shown to Wellsted ; he could find nothing to connect it with Christianity.
The social state of the people is much as Father Vincenzo described it ; lower it could scarcely be. Mahomedanism is now the universal profession. The people of the interior are still of distinct race, with curly hair, Indian complexion, regular features. The coast people are a mongrel body, of Arab and other descent. Probably in old times the case was similar, and the civilisation and Greek may have been confined to the littoral foreigners. (Miiller's Geog. Gr. Minores, I. pp. 28o-281 ; Relations, I. 139-14o ; Cathay, clxxi., ccxlv. 169 ; Conti, 20 ; Maffei, lib. III. ; Biiscliing, IV. 278 ; Faria, I. 117-118 ; Ram. I. f. 181 v. and 292 ; Jarric, Thes. Rer. Indic. I. 108-109 ; P. Vinc. 132, 442 ; J. R. G. S. V. 129 seqq.)
NOTE 3.—As far back as the loth century Socotra was a noted haunt of pirates. Mas'udi says : " Socotra is one of the stations frequented by the Indian corsairs called Bawárij, which chase the Arab ships bound for India and China, just as the Greek galleys chase the Mussulmans in the sea of Rúm along the coasts of Syria and Egypt " (III. 37). The Bawárij were corsairs of hach'h and Guzerat, so called from using a kind of war-vessel called Bárja. (Elliot, I. 65.) Ibn Batuta tells a story of a friend of his, the Shaikh Sa'íd, superior of a convent at Mecca, who had been to India and got large presents at the court of Delhi. With a comrade called Hajji Washl, who '% as also carrying a large sum to buy horses, " when they arrived at the island of Socotra . . . . they were attacked by Indian corsairs with a great number of vessels. . . . The corsairs took everything out of the ship, and then left it to the crew with its tackle, so that they were able to reach Aden." Ibn Batuta's remark on this illustrates what Polo has said of the Malabar pirates, in ch. xxv. supra: " The custom of these pirates is not to kill or drown anybody when the actual fighting is over. They take all the property of the passengers, and then let them go whither they will with their vessel" (I. 362-363).
NOTE 4.—We have seen that P. Vincenzo alludes to the sorceries of the people ; and De Barros also speaks of the feiticeria or witchcraft by which the women drew ships to the island, and did other marvels (u. s.).
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