Chapter XXXII: Concerning the Island of Scotra

When you leave those two Islands and go about 500 miles further towards the south, then you come to an Island called SCOTRA. The people are all baptized Christians; and they have an Archbishop. They have a great deal of ambergris; and plenty also of cotton stuffs and other merchandize; especially great quantities of salt fish of a large and excellent kind. They also eat flesh and milk and rice, for that is their only kind of corn; and they all go naked like the other Indians.

[The ambergris comes from the stomach of the whale, and as it is a great object of trade, the people contrive to take the whales with barbed iron darts, which, once they are fixed in the body, cannot come out again. A long cord is attached to this end, to that a small buoy which floats on the surface, so that when the whale dies they know where to find it. They then draw the body ashore and extract the ambergris from the stomach and the oil from the head.{1}]

There is a great deal of trade there, for many ships come from all quarters with goods to sell to the natives. The merchants also purchase gold there, by which they make a great profit; and all the vessels bound for Aden touch at this Island.

Their Archbishop has nothing to do with the Pope of Rome, but is subject to the great Archbishop who lives at Baudas. He rules over the Bishop of that Island, and over many other Bishops in those regions of the world, just as our Pope does in these.{2}

A multitude of corsairs frequent the Island; they come there and encamp and put up their plunder to sale; and this they do to good profit, for the Christians of the Island purchase it, knowing well that it is Saracen or Pagan gear.{3}

And you must know that in this Island there are the best enchanters in the world. It is true that their Archbishop forbids the practice to the best of his ability; but ’tis all to no purpose, for they insist that their forefathers followed it, and so must they also. I will give you a sample of their enchantments. Thus, if a ship be sailing past with a fair wind and a strong, they will raise a contrary wind and compel her to turn back. In fact they make the wind blow as they list, and produce great tempests and disasters; and other such sorceries they perform, which it will be better to say nothing about in our Book.{4}

NOTE 1.—Mr. Blyth appears to consider that the only whale met with
nowadays in the Indian Sea _north of the line_ is a great Rorqual
or _Balaenoptera_, to which he gives the specific name of _Indica_.
(See _J. A. S. B._ XXVIII. 481.) The text, however (from Ramusio),
clearly points to the Spermaceti whale; and Maury’s Whale-Chart
consists with this.

“The best ambergris,” says Mas’udi, “is found on the islands and
coasts of the Sea of Zinj (Eastern Africa); it is round, of a pale
blue, and sometimes as big as an ostrich egg.... These are morsels
which have been swallowed by the fish called _Awál_. When the sea
is much agitated it casts up fragments of amber almost like lumps
of rock, and the fish swallowing these is choked thereby, and
floats on the surface. The men of Zinj, or wherever it be, then
come in their canoes, and fall on the creature with harpoons and
cables, draw it ashore, cut it up, and extract the ambergris” (I.
134).

Kazwini speaks of whales as often imprisoned by the ebb tide in the
channels about Basra. The people harpooned them, and got much oil
_out of the brain_, which they used for lamps, and smearing their
ships. This also is clearly the sperm whale. (_Ethé_, p. 268.)

After having been long doubted, scientific opinion seems to have
come back to the opinion that ambergris is an excretion from the
whale. “Ambergris is a morbid secretion in the intestines of the
cachalot, deriving its origin either from the stomach or biliary
ducts, and allied in its nature to gall-stones, ... whilst the
masses found floating on the sea are those that have been voided
by the whale, or liberated from the dead animal by the process of
putrefaction.” (_Bennett, Whaling Voyage Round the Globe_, 1840,
II. 326.)

[“The _Pen ts’ao_, ch. xliii. fol. 5, mentions ambergris under
the name _lung sien hiang_ (dragon’s saliva perfume), and
describes it as a sweet-scented product, which is obtained from
the south-western sea. It is greasy, and at first yellowish
white; when dry, it forms pieces of a yellowish black colour. In
spring whole herds of dragons swim in that sea, and vomit it out.
Others say that it is found in the belly of a large fish. This
description also doubtless points to ambergris, which in reality is
a pathological secretion of the intestines of the spermaceti whale
(_Physeter macrocephalus_), a large cetaceous animal. The best
ambergris is collected on the Arabian coast. In the _Ming shi_ (ch.
cccxxvi.) _lung sien hiang_ is mentioned as a product of _Bu-la-wa_
(_Brava_, on the east coast of Africa), and _an-ba-rh_ (evidently
also ambergris) amongst the products of _Dsu-fa-rh_ (_Dsahfar_, on
the south coast of Arabia).” (_Bretschneider, Med. Res._ I. p. 152,
note.)—H. C.]

NOTE 2.—_Scotra_ probably represented the usual pronunciation
of the name SOCOTRA, which has been hypothetically traced to a
Sanskrit original, _Dvípa-Sukhádhára_, “the Island Abode of Bliss,”
from which (contracted _Diuskadra_) the Greeks made “the island of
_Dioscorides_.”

So much painful interest attaches to the history of a people once
Christian, but now degenerated almost to savagery, that some detail
maybe permitted on this subject.

The _Periplus_ calls the island very large, but desolate; ... the
inhabitants were few, and dwelt on the north side. They were of
foreign origin, being a mixture of Arabs, Indians, and Greeks, who
had come thither in search of gain.... The island was under the
king of the Incense Country.... Traders came from _Muza_ (near
Mocha) and sometimes from _Limyrica_ and _Barygaza_ (Malabar and
Guzerat), bringing rice, wheat, and Indian muslins, with female
slaves, which had a ready sale. Cosmas (6th century) says there
was in the island a bishop, appointed from Persia. The inhabitants
spoke Greek, having been originally settled there by the Ptolemies.
“There are clergy there also, ordained and sent from Persia to
minister among the people of the island, and a multitude of
Christians. We sailed past the island, but did not land. I met,
however, with people from it who were on their way to Ethiopia, and
they spoke Greek.”

The ecclesiastical historian Nicephorus Callistus seems to allude
to the people of Socotra, when he says that among the nations
visited by the missionary Theophilus, in the time of Constantius,
were “the Assyrians on the verge of the outer ocean towards the
East ... whom Alexander the Great, after driving them from Syria,
sent thither to settle, and to this day they keep their mother
tongue, though all of the blackest, through the power of the sun’s
rays.” The Arab voyagers of the 9th century say that the island was
colonised with Greeks by Alexander the Great, in order to promote
the culture of the Socotrine aloes; when the other Greeks adopted
Christianity these did likewise, and they had continued to retain
their profession of it. The colonising by Alexander is probably a
fable, but invented to account for facts.

[Edrisi says (_Jaubert’s transl._ pp. 47, _seqq._) that the chief
produce of Socotra is aloes, and that most of the inhabitants
of this island are Christians; for this reason: when Alexander
had subjugated Porus, his master Aristotle gave him the advice
to seek after the island producing aloes; after his conquest of
India, Alexander remembered the advice, and on his return journey
from the Sea of India to the Sea of Oman, he stopped at Socotra,
which he greatly admired for its fertility and the pleasantness
of its climate. Acting on the advice of Aristotle, Alexander
removed the inhabitants from their island, and established in
their place a colony of Ionians, to whom he entrusted the care of
cultivating aloes. These Greeks were converted when the Christian
religion was preached to them, and their descendants have remained
Christians.—H. C.]

In the list of the metropolitan Sees of the Nestorian Church
we find one called _Kotrobah_, which is supposed to stand for
Socotra. According to Edrisi, Kotrobah was an island inhabited by
Christians; he speaks of Socotra separately, but no island suits
his description of Kotrobah but Socotra itself; and I suspect that
we have here geography in duplicate, no uncommon circumstance.
There is an epistle extant from the Nestorian Patriarch Jesujabus
(A.D. 650–660), _ad Episcopos Catarensium_, which Assemani
interprets of the Christians in Socotra and the adjacent coasts
of Arabia (III. 133).[1] Abulfeda says the people of Socotra were
Nestorian Christians and pirates. Nicolo Conti, in the first half
of the 15th century, spent two months on the island (_Sechutera_).
He says it was for the most part inhabited by Nestorian Christians.

[Professor W. R. Smith, in a letter to Sir H. Yule, dated
Cambridge, 15th June, 1886, writes: “The authorities for Kotrobah
seem to be (1) Edrisi, (2) the list of Nestorian Bishops in
Assemani. There is no trace of such a name anywhere else that I
can find. But there is a place called Ḳaṭar about which most of
the Arab Geographers know very little, but which is mentioned in
poetry. Bekri, who seems best informed, says that it lay between
Bahrain and Oman.... Iṣṭakhri and Ibn Ḥaukal speak of the Ḳaṭar
pirates. Their collective name is the Ḳaṭaríya.”]

Some indications point rather to a connection of the island’s
Christianity with the Jacobite or Abyssinian Church. Thus they
practised circumcision, as mentioned by Maffei in noticing the
proceedings of Alboquerque at Socotra. De Barros calls them
Jacobite Christians of the Abyssinian stock. Barbosa speaks of them
as an olive-coloured people, Christian only in name, having neither
baptism nor Christian knowledge, and having for many years lost all
acquaintance with the Gospel. Andrea Corsali calls them Christian
shepherds of Ethiopian race, like Abyssinians. They lived on dates,
milk, and butter; some rice was imported. They had churches like
mosques, but with altars in Christian fashion.

When Francis Xavier visited the island there were still distinct
traces of the Church. The people reverenced the cross, placing it
on their altars, and hanging it round their necks. Every village
had its minister, whom they called _Kashís_ (_Ar._ for a Christian
Presbyter), to whom they paid tithe. No man could read. The Kashís
repeated prayers antiphonetically in a forgotten tongue, which De
Barros calls Chaldee, frequently scattering incense; a word like
_Alleluia_ often recurred. For bells they used wooden rattles.
They assembled in their churches four times a day, and held St.
Thomas in great veneration. The Kashíses 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 _Moquame_ (_Ar. Maḳám_, “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 (ἐκκλησία). 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. (_Müller’s Geog.
Gr. Minores_, I. pp. 280–281; _Relations_, I. 139–140; _Cathay_,
clxxi., ccxlv., 169; _Conti_, 20; _Maffei_, lib. III.; _Büsching_,
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 10th 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 Kach’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 was 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.).

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] [Assemani, in his corrections (III. p. 362), gives up _Socotra_ in favour of _Bactria_.]