The name Bolor is very old, occurring in Hiuen Tsang's Travels (7th
century), and in still older Chinese works of like character.
General
Cunningham has told us that Balti is still termed Balor by the Dards of
Gilghit; and Mr. Shaw, that Palor is an old name still sometimes used by
the Kirghiz for the upper part of Chitral. The indications of Hiuen Tsang
are in accordance with General Cunningham's information; and the fact that
Chitral is described under the name of Bolor in Chinese works of the last
century entirely justifies that of Mr. Shaw. A Pushtu poem of the 17th
century, translated by Major Raverty, assigns the mountains of
Bilaur-istan, as the northern boundary of Swat. The collation of these
indications shows that the term Bolor must have been applied somewhat
extensively to the high regions adjoining the southern margin of Pamir.
And a passage in the Tarikh Rashidi, written at Kashgar in the 16th
century by a cousin of the great Baber, affords us a definition of the
tract to which, in its larger sense, the name was thus applied: "Malaur
(i.e. Balaur or Bolor) ... is a country with few level spots. It has a
circuit of four months' march. The eastern frontier borders on Kashgar and
Yarkand; it has Badakhshan to the north, Kabul to the west, and Kashmir to
the south." The writer was thoroughly acquainted with his subject, and the
region which he so defines must have embraced Sirikol and all the wild
country south of Yarkand, Balti, Gilghit, Yasin, Chitral, and perhaps
Kafiristan.
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