From the Indus to the Tigris

by H. W. Bellew

Chaf chaf chafri chafúr, chapi dasti chop haft khumi zar.”

Which, translated into English, runs thus—“Welcome Kol Márút on the very high road and passage. Its water is that of Zamzam (a celebrated well at Mecca), and its earth is all gold. If you desire to enjoy the beauty of the Kába (the square temple at Mecca), go to the mosque of Kol Márút at day-dawn. Chaf chaf chafri chafúr (cant words), on the left of the left hand are seven jars of gold.” On arrival at the ruins, however, nobody could point out the inscription; and after wandering amongst the buildings for some time in a fruitless search of it, we proceeded on our way rather disappointed at our failure, and confirmed in a suspicion that the inscription and the wealth enigmatically alluded to were alike mere myths.

The mosque of Kol Márút is a large building, and still retains some very fairly preserved plaster moulding on the façades of its portal. The designs are in Arabesque, and worked into sentences from the Curán in the ancient Cufic character. Adjoining the mosque are some quadrangular buildings, said to be the remains of colleges. The cloisters were easily traceable; and in one of the vaulted chambers we found, in a recess of the wall, imprinted on the plaster, a masonic design of crossed triangles and stars.

After clearing the ruins we struck on the high road between Hokát and Sistan, and following it in a north-east direction for four or five miles, at half-way came to Khyrabad, where we alighted for breakfast in some ruins hard by.

Khyrabad—the abode of welfare and goodness—is a sad contradiction to the import of its name, for a more dreary, poor, and unhappy place we have not seen in this country. It is the first inhabited spot we have come to since crossing the Sistan boundary at Naizár, and is merely a dilapidated castle containing twenty or thirty houses of Popalzai Afghans. Outside the walls, within gunshot range, are a few fields of corn, irrigated from the small water-cut from the Farráh river, which flows a couple of miles to the north-west of the fort. Around it the plain is thickly dotted with tall ruins, which, on the opposite side of the river, are massed together in the form of a considerable town. These ruins are called Kogháh, and are situated at the foot of a low hill called Koh Ghúch, on which we were told there are the ruins of numberless smelting furnaces and heaps of iron slag. The hill overlooks the pool or hámún of the Farráh river from the north.

The ruins around Khyrabad have a very peculiar appearance. Each house is detached from the others, and stands apart by itself, and all are built on exactly the same model. We examined several of them, and finally took refuge in one of them for breakfast from the keen blasts of the north wind, which swept over the plain with considerable force. Each house consists of two lofty walls strengthened by buttresses, and running north and south parallel to each other at a width of about twenty feet. The front faces the south, and is open; the rear faces the north, and is closed by a high wall connecting the parallel side ones. In its upper half, towards the western side, this rear wall presents a vertical gap two feet wide and about eight feet deep from above downwards.

The open front facing the south presents two stories, formed by a vaulted arch thrown across between the two side walls for their whole length, about thirty feet from north to south. The interior below the arch formed the dwelling-house of the occupants, and was furnished with several little recesses in the sides of the walls. These evidently served the purpose of cupboards and shelves for domestic utensils and stores. The lower surface of the arch was generally found stained with soot, indicating that the fires were burnt on the floor. No means of ventilation or light were traceable except through the open front.

The stage above the arch was unroofed, and, when these buildings were peopled, was occupied by the windmill peculiar to this country, and which has already been described. This explains the reason of the narrow gap in the upper part of the rear wall. These buildings are all built of raw brick, and are in many instances remarkably well preserved, apparently in the actual state of demolition in which they were originally left. The following diagrams represent the front, rear, and side view of these curious buildings.

Front S.