[45] "Gibbon;" edited by Dr. W. Smith. London, 1862, page 296. Here it is justly remarked, "The Œzbegs are the most altered from their primitive manners. 1st.,—by the profession of the Mohammedan religion; and, 2nd.,—by the possession of the cities and harvests of Great Bucharia.
[46] Radloff also confirms the same in his Report upon the Acad. Imp. of Sciences of St. Petersb. See the bulletin of the society named, vol. vi., p. 418.
[47] Ritter, West Asia. Vol. ii. p. 86.
[48] "The Ethnographical Position of the Iranian tribes." Ausland, 1866, No. 36, p. 853.
[49] Khanikoff's "Memoire sur l'Ethnographie de la Perse." Paris, 1866, page 45.
[50] Above cited work, page 47.
[51] Aimak is a Mongolian word, and signifies a people.
[52] Khanikoff seems to be in error when he considers the Hezareh, as formerly Œzbegs; viz., as the Berlas tribe. "Memoire sur la Patrie Meridionale de l'Asie Centrale." Paris, 1842, pp. 112, 138. I must against this cite the following arguments:—1st. Their own assertion,—that they were the remainder of the army of Djingis, and, moreover, from the statement of Abul Fazl of a troop of Mangu Khan. 2ndly. That a portion, now named the Gvbi Hezareh, which retired into the hills in the neighbourhood of Herat, and has been spared by the Persian elements, speaks a Mongolian dialect, as is proved by Von der Gabelenz, in a periodical of the German Asiatic Society,—vol. xx. p. 326.; and Baber affirms that in his time many Hezareh spoke Mongolian. 3rd. There is nowhere among the Œzbegs such a decided Mongolian type to be found as among the Hezareh, which is the more striking, because the first remain near their old home in more compact masses, while the latter have dwelt under a foreign climate and foreign elements.
[53] From Vah (the river Vah), as the Oxus is called in Bendehesh, may also be derived the modern name, Vachan, Vacks-as-ird, and Vas-ab.
[54] During my sojourn in Kerki I lived with ten Feizabadis (Feizabad is the capital of Bedakhshan) many days in one and the same house. It was a deputation returning from Bokhara, where they wished to raise the Emir to the place of their lately-banished prince.