IIIF Color HighRes
National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
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| IIIF Color HighRes |
| Southern Tibet : vol.7 |
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Citation Information
MIRZA HAIDAR.
6
Bash; proceeding yet further, one arrives in the land of Tibet. Badakhshân is in the direction of summer sunset (tabast2ni) from Yarkand, as stated above, and Kashmir is in the direction of winter sunset (zamistr~, ni) from Yarkand. That same range runs between Yarkand and Kashmir, and is here called Balti; this [district] belongs to the province of Tibet. There is, in these parts, a mountain wider than the Alai or the Pamir. The width in Bâlti is twenty days' journey. — The pass ascending from Yarkand, is the pass of Sânju, and the pass descending on the side of Kåshmir, is the pass of Askârdu [From the Sânju pass to the Askârdu pass] is twenty days' journey. In the direction of winter sunset from Khotan, are some of the cities of Hind, such as Låhur, Sultânpur, and Bâjwâra, and the afore-mentioned mountain range lies between. Between Khotan and the towns of Hind above-named, are situated Arduk (Rudok), Guga (Guge), and Aspati (Spiti), which belong to Tibet; and it must be supposed that those mountains extend into Khitâi. On the west and south of the range, lies Hindustan; while Bhira, Låhur and Bangâla are all on the skirts of it. All the rivers of Hind flow down from these hills, and their sources are in the country of Tibet .... All the streams which flow down from the mountains of Tibet, in a westerly and southerly direction , become rivers of Hind ....: all the streams which flow in an easterly and northerly direction from the mountains of Tibet .... empty themselves into the Kuk Naur .... I From these details it will be clear that Tibet is a very highlying country, since its waters run in all directions. Any one wishing to enter Tibet, must first ascend lofty passes, which do not slope downward on the other side, for on the top the land is level; in a few cases only, the passes have slight declivities [on the far side].2
In his above-mentioned article, R. B. Shaw proves that this description is per-
fectly in accordance with the real state of things. He places Raskam and Taghdumbash on »the Central Asian versant of the Murtak (sometimes, though improperly to my mind, called Karakorum) Range, in the corner between it and Pâmir.» Shaw is right in saying that Mirza Haidar possessed a faculty rare among Orientals, namely to rise above details and conceive a general idea. Everybody who in the interior of Asia has asked the natives for the name of a mountain range, will agree with Shaw in this respect. But, as shall be seen in connection with our discussion of Shaw's own journey, he had a curious conception of the orography of the Kara-korum and Kwen-lun, to which he, however, finds a certain support in Mirza Haidar's geography. »The account of the mountain region sweeping round the north, west, and south of Kâshgharia, and thus enclosing that country on three sides, is the simplest and truest that can be given.» And he agrees with the Oriental writer when he regards everything between Yarkand and India as one great mountain mass.
To Mirza Haidar's hydrography, when he makes the rivers flow in different directions from the mountains between Yarkand and India, Shaw adds the reflection:
r
NI
I Lop-nor. According to Mirza Haidar the »Kara Murån of Khitåi» issues from »Kuk Nauro. Cp. VIGNE, who says that the Kash ar-daria afterassin Kash gar, is joined by the river of Yarkand,
»whence it still flows easterly, and joins, as well as I could collect, , the great Chinese river of Hoang-Ho,
which is crossed in the way to Pekin. But information from natives is not much to be depended
upon.» Travels in Kashmir, Ladak, Iskardo, etc. Vol. II, London 1844, P. 369. 2 Op. cit., p. 404 et seq.
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