IX. 203, and J. R. A. S. N.S. V. 103, 278.)
The route of which Marco had heard must almost certainly have been one of
those leading by the high Valley of Zebak, and by the Dorah or the Nuksan
Pass, over the watershed of Hindu-Kush into Chitral, and so to Dir, as
already noticed. The difficulty remains as to how he came to apply the
name Pashai to the country south-east of Badakhshan. I cannot tell. But
it is at least possible that the name of the Pashai tribe (of which the
branches even now are spread over a considerable extent of country) may
have once had a wide application over the southern spurs of the Hindu-
Kush.[2] Our Author, moreover, is speaking here from hearsay, and hearsay
geography without maps is much given to generalising. I apprehend that,
along with characteristics specially referable to the Tibetan and Mongol
traditions of Udyana, the term Pashai, as Polo uses it, vaguely covers the
whole tract from the southern boundary of Badakhshan to the Indus and the
Kabul River.
But even by extending its limits to Attok, we shall not get within seven
marches of Kashmir. It is 234 miles by road from Attok to Srinagar; more
than twice seven marches. And, according to Polo's usual system, the
marches should be counted from Chitral, or some point thereabouts.
Sir H. Rawlinson, in his Monograph on the Oxus, has indicated the
probability that the name Pashai may have been originally connected with
Aprasin or Paresin, the Zendavestian name for the Indian Caucasus, and
which occurs in the Babylonian version of the Behistun Inscription as the
equivalent of Gaddra in the Persian, i.e. Gandhara, there applied to the
whole country between Bactria and the Indus. (See J. R. G. S. XLII.
502.) Some such traditional application of the term Pashai might have
survived.
[1] The Kafir dialect of which Mr. Trumpp collected some particulars shows
in the present tense of the substantive verb these remarkable forms: -
Ei sum, Tu sis, siga se; Ima simis, Wi sik, Sige sin.
[2] In the Tabakat-i-Nasiri (Elliot, II. 317) we find mention of the
Highlands of Pasha-Afroz, but nothing to define their position.
CHAPTER XXXI.
OF THE PROVINCE OF KESHIMUR.
Keshimur also is a Province inhabited by a people who are Idolaters and
have a language of their own.[NOTE 1] They have an astonishing
acquaintance with the devilries of enchantment; insomuch that they make
their idols to speak. They can also by their sorceries bring on changes of
weather and produce darkness, and do a number of things so extraordinary
that no one without seeing them would believe them.[NOTE 2] Indeed, this
country is the very original source from which Idolatry has spread
abroad.[NOTE 3]
In this direction you can proceed further till you come to the Sea of
India.
The men are brown and lean, but the women, taking them as brunettes, are
very beautiful.
