Chapter XXX: Concerning the Kingdom of Kesmacoran

Kesmacoran is a kingdom having a king of its own and a peculiar language. [Some of] the people are Idolaters, [but the most part are Saracens]. They live by merchandize and industry, for they are professed traders, and carry on much traffic by sea and land in all directions. Their food is rice [and corn], flesh and milk, of which they have great store. There is no more to be said about them.{1}

And you must know that this kingdom of Kesmacoran is the last in India as you go towards the west and north-west. You see, from Maabar on, this province is what is called the GREATER INDIA, and it is the best of all the Indies. I have now detailed to you all the kingdoms and provinces and (chief) cities of this India the Greater, that are upon the seaboard; but of those that lie in the interior I have said nothing, because that would make too long a story.{2}

And so now let us proceed, and I will tell you of some of the Indian Islands. And I will begin by two Islands which are called Male and Female.

NOTE 1.—Though M. Pauthier has imagined objections there is no
room for doubt that _Kesmacoran_ is the province of MEKRAN, known
habitually all over the East as KIJ-MAKRÁN, from the combination
with the name of the country of that of its chief town, just as we
lately met with a converse combination in _Konkan-tana_. This was
pointed out to Marsden by his illustrious friend Major Rennell. We
find the term _Kij Makrán_ used by Ibn Batuta (III. 47); by the
Turkish Admiral Sidi ’Ali (_J. As._, sér. I. tom. ix. 72; and _J.
A. S. B._ V. 463); by Sharifuddin (_P. de la Croix_, I. 379, II.
417–418); in the famous Sindian Romeo-and-Juliet tale of Sassi and
Pannún (_Elliot_, I. 333); by Pietro della Valle (I. 724, II. 358);
by Sir F. Goldsmid (_J. R. A. S._, N.S., I. 38); and see for other
examples, _J. A. S. B._ VII. 298, 305, 308; VIII. 764; XIV. 158;
XVII. pt. ii. 559: XX. 262, 263.

The argument that Mekrán was not a province of India only amounts
to saying that Polo has made a mistake. But the fact is that it
often _was_ reckoned to belong to India, from ancient down to
comparatively modern times. Pliny says: “Many indeed do not reckon
the Indus to be the western boundary of India, but include in that
term also four satrapies on this side the river, the Gedrosi,
the Arachoti, the Arii, and the Parapomisadae (_i.e._ Mekrán,
Kandahar, Herat, and Kabul) ... whilst others class all these
together under the name of Ariana” (VI. 23). Arachosia, according
to Isidore of Charax, was termed by the Parthians “White India.”
Aelian calls Gedrosia a part of India. (_Hist. Animal._ XVII.
6.) In the 6th century the Nestorian Patriarch Jesujabus, as we
have seen (_supra_, ch. xxii. note 1), considered all to be India
from the coast of Persia, _i.e._ of Fars, beginning from near the
Gulf. According to Ibn Khordâdhbeh, the boundary between Persia
and India was seven days’ sail from Hormuz and eight from Daibul,
or less than half-way from the mouth of the Gulf to the Indus.
(_J. As._ sér. VI. tom. v. 283.) Beladhori speaks of the Arabs in
early expeditions as invading Indian territory about the Lake of
Sijistan; and Istakhri represents this latter country as bounded
on the north and _partly on the west_ by portions of India. Kabul
was still reckoned in India. Chach, the last Hindu king of Sind
but one, is related to have marched through Mekrán to a river
which formed the limit between Mekrán and Kermán. On its banks he
planted date-trees, and set up a monument which bore: _“This was
the boundary of_ HIND in the time of Chach, the son of Síláij, the
son of Basábas.” In the Geography of Bakui we find it stated that
“Hind is a great country which begins at the province of Mekrán.”
(_N. and E._ II. 54.) In the map of Marino Sanuto India begins from
Hormuz; and it is plain from what Polo says in quitting that city
that he considered the next step from it south-eastward would have
taken him to India (_supra_, i. p. 110).

[“The name Mekran has been commonly, but erroneously, derived from
Mahi Khoran, _i.e._ the fish-eaters, or _ichthyophagi_, which was
the title given to the inhabitants of the Beluchi coast-fringe by
Arrian. But the word is a Dravidian name, and appears as Makara
in the _Bṛhat Sanhita_ of Varaha Mihira in a list of the tribes
contiguous to India on the west. It is also the Μακαρήνη of Stephen
of Byzantium, and the Makuran of Tabari, and Moses of Chorene. Even
were it not a Dravidian name, in no old Aryan dialect could it
signify fish-eaters.” (_Curzon, Persia_, II. p. 261, note.)

“It is to be noted that Kesmacoran is a combination of Kech or Kej
and Makrán, and the term is even to-day occasionally used.” (_Major
P. M. Sykes, Persia_, p. 102.)—H. C.]

We may add a Romance definition of India from _King Alisaunder_:—

“Lordynges, also I fynde,
_At Mede so bigynneth Ynde:_
Forsothe ich woot, it stretcheth ferest
Of alle the Londes in the Est,
And oth the South half sikerlyk,
To the cee taketh of Affryk;
And the north half to a Mountayne,
That is yclepèd Caucasayne.”—L 4824–4831.

It is probable that Polo merely coasted Mekrán; he seems to know
nothing of the Indus, and what he says of Mekrán is vague.

NOTE 2.—As Marco now winds up his detail of the Indian coast, it
is proper to try to throw some light on his partial derangement of
its geography. In the following columns the first shows the _real_
geographical order from east to west of the Indian provinces as
named by Polo, and the second shows the order as _he_ puts them.
The Italic names are brief and general identifications.

_Real order_. _Polo’s order_.

1. Mutfili (_Telingana_). 1. Mutfili.

{ 2. St. Thomas’s (_Madras_). 2. St. Thomas’s
MAABAR, { 3. Maabar Proper, Kingdom of (Lar, west of do.).
including { Sonder Bandi (_Tanjore_). 3. Maabar proper, or Soli.
{ 4. Cail (_Tinnevelly_). 4. Cail.

5. Comari (_C. Comorin_). 5. Coilum.

MELIBAR, { 6. Coilum (_Travancore_). 6. Comari.
including { 7. Eli (_Cananore_). 7. Eli.

GUZERAT, { 8. Tana (_Bombay_). 8. (MELIBAR).
or LAR, { 9. Canbaet (_Cambay_). 9. (GOZURAT).
including {10. Semenat (_Somnath_). 10. Tana.

11. Kesmacoran (_Mekran_). 11. Canbaet.
12. Semenat.
13. Kesmacoran.

It is difficult to suppose that the fleet carrying the bride of
Arghun went out of its way to Maabar, St. Thomas’s, and Telingana.
And on the other hand, what is said in chapter xxiii. on Comari,
about the North Star not having been visible since they approached
the Lesser Java, would have been grossly inaccurate if in the
interval the travellers had been north as far as Madras and
Motupalle. That passage suggests to me strongly that Comari was
the first Indian land made by the fleet on arriving from the
Archipelago (exclusive _perhaps_ of Ceylon). Note then that the
position of Eli is marked by its distance of 300 miles from Comari,
evidently indicating that this was a run made by the traveller _on
some occasion_ without an intermediate stoppage. Tana, Cambay,
Somnath, would follow naturally as points of call.

In Polo’s order, again, the positions of Comari and Coilum are
transposed, whilst Melibar is introduced as if it were a country
_westward_ (as Polo views it, northward we should say)[1] of Coilum
and Eli, instead of including them, and Gozurat is introduced as a
country lying _eastward_ (or southward, as we should say) of Tana,
Cambaet, and Semenat, instead of including them, or at least the
two latter. Moreover, he names no cities in connection with those
two countries.

The following hypothesis, really not a complex one, is the most
probable that I can suggest to account for these confusions.

I conceive, then, that Cape Comorin (Comari) was the first Indian
land made by the fleet on the homeward voyage, and that Hili, Tana,
Cambay, Somnath, were touched at successively as it proceeded
towards Persia.

I conceive that in a former voyage to India on the Great Kaan’s
business Marco had visited Maabar and Kaulam, and gained partly
from actual visits and partly from information the substance of the
notices he gives us of Telingana and St. Thomas’s on the one side
and of Malabar and Guzerat on the other, and that in combining into
one series the results of the information acquired on two different
voyages he failed rightly to co-ordinate the material, and thus
those dislocations which we have noticed occurred, as they very
easily might, in days when maps had practically no existence; to
say nothing of the accidents of dictation.

The expression in this passage for “the cities that lie in the
interior,” is in the G. T. “_celz qe sunt_ en fra terres”; see I.
43. Pauthier’s text has “_celles qui sont_ en ferme terre,” which
is nonsense here.

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] Abulfeda’s orientation is the same as Polo’s.