CHAPTER XVI.

CONCERNING THE GREAT CITY OF YASDI.

Yasdi also is properly in Persia; it is a good and noble city, and has

a great amount of trade. They weave there quantities of a certain silk

tissue known as _Yasdi_, which merchants carry into many quarters to

dispose of. The people are worshippers of Mahommet.{1}

When you leave this city to travel further, you ride for seven days

over great plains, finding harbour to receive you at three places only.

There are many fine woods [producing dates] upon the way, such as one

can easily ride through; and in them there is great sport to be had in

hunting and hawking, there being partridges and quails and abundance

of other game, so that the merchants who pass that way have plenty of

diversion. There are also wild asses, handsome creatures. At the end of

those seven marches over the plain you come to a fine kingdom which is

called Kerman.{2}

NOTE 1.—YEZD, an ancient city, supposed by D’Anville to be the

_Isatichae_ of Ptolemy, is not called by Marco a kingdom, though

having a better title to the distinction than some which he classes

as such. The atabegs of Yezd dated from the middle of the 11th

century, and their Dynasty was permitted by the Mongols to continue

till the end of the 13th, when it was extinguished by Ghazan, and

the administration made over to the Mongol Diwan.

Yezd, in pre-Mahomedan times, was a great sanctuary of the Gueber

worship, though now it is a seat of fanatical Mahomedanism. It is,

however, one of the few places where the old religion lingers.

In 1859 there were reckoned 850 families of Guebers in Yezd and

fifteen adjoining villages, but they diminish rapidly.

[Heyd (_Com. du Levant_, II. p. 109) says the inhabitants of Yezd

wove the finest silk of Taberistan.—H. C.] The silk manufactures

still continue, and, with other weaving, employ a large part of

the population. The _Yazdi_, which Polo mentions, finds a place

in the Persian dictionaries, and is spoken of by D’Herbelot as

_Ḳumásh-i-Yezdi_, “Yezd stuff.” [“He [Nadir Shah] bestowed upon the

ambassador [Hakeem Ataleek, the prime minister of Abulfiez Khan,

King of Bokhara] a donation of a thousand mohurs of Hindostan,

twenty-five pieces of _Yezdy_ brocade, a rich dress, and a horse

with silver harness....” (_Memoirs of Khojah Abdulkurreem, a

Cashmerian of distinction ... transl. from the original Persian_,

by Francis Gladwin ... Calcutta, 1788, 8vo, p. 36.)—H. C.]

Yezd is still a place of important trade, and carries on a thriving

commerce with India by Bandar Abbási. A visitor in the end of 1865

says: “The external trade appears to be very considerable, and the

merchants of Yezd are reputed to be amongst the most enterprising

and respectable of their class in Persia. Some of their agents have

lately gone, not only to Bombay, but to the Mauritius, Java, and

China.”

(_Ilch._ I. 67–68; _Khanikoff, Mém._ p. 202; _Report by Major R. M.

Smith_, R.E.)

Friar Odoric, who visited Yezd, calls it the third best city of

the Persian Emperor, and says (_Cathay_, I. p. 52): “There is very

great store of victuals and all other good things that you can

mention; but especially is found there great plenty of figs; and

raisins also, green as grass and very small, are found there in

richer profusion than in any other part of the world.” [He also

gives from the smaller version of Ramusio’s an awful description of

the Sea of Sand, one day distant from Yezd. (Cf. Tavernier, 1679,

I. p. 116.)—H. C.]

NOTE 2.—I believe Della Valle correctly generalises when he says

of Persian travelling that “you always travel in a plain, but you

always have mountains on either hand” (I. 462). [Compare Macgregor,

I. 254: “I really cannot describe the road. Every road in Persia as

yet seems to me to be exactly alike, so ... my readers will take

it for granted that the road went over a waste, with barren rugged

hills in the distance, or near; no water, no houses, no people

passed.”—H. C.] The distance from Yezd to Kermán is, according to

Khanikoff’s survey, 314 _kilomètres_, or about 195 miles. Ramusio

makes the time eight days, which is probably the better reading,

giving a little over 24 miles a day. Westergaard in 1844, and

Khanikoff in 1859, took _ten_ days; Colonel Goldsmid and Major

Smith in 1865 _twelve_. [“The distance from Yezd to Kermán by the

present high road, 229 miles, is by caravans, generally made in

nine stages; persons travelling with all comforts do it in twelve

stages; travellers whose time is of some value do it easily in

_seven_ days.” (_Houtum-Schindler_, _l.c._ pp. 490–491.)—H. C.]

Khanikoff observes on this chapter: “This notice of woods easy to

ride through, covering the plain of Yezd, is very curious. Now

you find it a plain of great extent indeed from N.W. to S.E., but

narrow and arid; indeed I saw in it only thirteen inhabited spots,

counting two caravanserais. Water for the inhabitants is brought

from a great distance by subterraneous conduits, a practice which

may have tended to desiccate the soil, for every trace of wood has

completely disappeared.”

Abbott travelled from Yezd to Kermán in 1849, by a road through

Báfk, _east_ of the usual road, which Khanikoff followed,

and parallel to it; and it is worthy of note that he found

circumstances more accordant with Marco’s description. Before

getting to Báfk he says of the plain that it “extends to a great

distance north and south, and is probably 20 miles in breadth;”

whilst Báfk “is remarkable for its _groves of date-trees_, in the

midst of which it stands, and which occupy a considerable space.”

Further on he speaks of “wild tufts and bushes growing abundantly,”

and then of “thickets of the _Ghez_ tree.” He heard of the wild

asses, but did not see any. In his report to the Foreign Office,

alluding to Marco Polo’s account, he says: “It is still true that

wild asses and other game are found in the _wooded spots_ on the

road.” The ass is the _Asinus Onager_, the _Gor Khar_ of Persia,

or _Kulan_ of the Tartars. (_Khan. Mém._ p. 200; _Id. sur Marco

Polo_, p. 21; _J. R. G. S._ XXV. 20–29; _Mr. Abbott’s MS. Report in

Foreign office_.) [The difficulty has now been explained by General

Houtum-Schindler in a valuable paper published in the _Jour. Roy.

As. Soc._ N.S. XIII., October, 1881, p. 490. He says: “Marco Polo

travelled from Yazd to Kermán _viâ_ Báfk. His description of the

road, seven days over great plains, harbour at three places only,

is perfectly exact. The fine woods, producing dates, are at Báfk

itself. (The place is generally called Báft.) Partridges and quails

still abound; wild asses I saw several on the western road, and I

was told that there were a great many on the Báfk road. Travellers

and caravans now always go by the eastern road _viâ_ Anár and

Bahrámábád. Before the Sefavíehs (_i.e._ before A.D. 1500) the

Anár road was hardly, if ever, used; travellers always took the

Báfk road. The country from Yazd to Anár, 97 miles, seems to have

been totally uninhabited before the Sefavíehs. Anár, as late as

A.D. 1340, is mentioned as the frontier place of Kermán to the

north, on the confines of the Yazd desert. When Sháh Abbás had

caravanserais built at three places between Yazd and Anár (Zein

ud-dín, Kermán-sháhán, and Shamsh), the eastern road began to be

neglected.” (Cf. Major Sykes’ _Persia_, ch. xxiii.)—H. C.]