Traders came from Muza Lemyrica (Canara) and Barggaza (Gujerat).
Ibn Batuta gives an account of a certain Sheikh Said of Maskat being seized by Sokotran pirates, who sent him off empty-handed to Aden.
Marco Polo describes the catching of whales for ambergris. El Masoudi[14] says the best ambergris comes from the sea of Zinj in East Africa: 'The men of Zinj come in canoes and fall upon the creature with harpoons and cables, and draw it ashore and extract the ambergris.'
In the inscription of the Nakhtshe Rustam, near Persepolis, which we saw when in Persia in 1889, thirty countries are named which were conquered by Darius, the Akhemenid, amongst them Iskuduru, i.e. Sokotra.
Though it is Arabian politically, Sokotra geographically is African. This is the last and largest of a series of islands and islets stretching out into the Indian ocean, including the little group of Abdul Kerim. Some of these are white with guano.
Darzi, Kal Farun, Sambeh, and Samboyia are the names of some of the smaller ones. Sokotra itself is situated about 240 miles from Cape Guardafui, and is about 500 miles from Aden.
The latitude of the island is between 12° 19' and 12° 42', and the longitude between 53° 20' and 54° 30'. It is 72 miles long from east to west, and 22 miles wide from north to south. There is a coral reef nearly all the way from Africa to beyond Ras Momi.
According to the Admiralty charts the water between the islands and the mainland is 500 fathoms deep, but among the islands nowhere is it deeper than 200 fathoms.
It is an island that seems to be very much in the way as far as navigation is concerned, and many shipwrecks have been occasioned by its being confused with the mainland, one being taken for the other. The wreck of the Aden, and the great loss of life resulting from it, which took place so soon after we were there, is still fresh in our memories.
Our party consisted of Mr. Bennett, who was new to Eastern life, our old Greek servant, Matthaios, and two young Somali, Mahmoud and Hashi. They could talk a little English, but generally talked Arabic to us and Matthaios. We were told before starting that Mahri, or Mehri, was the language most in use, and we nearly committed the serious error of taking a Mahri man from Arabia, who could also speak Arabic, as an interpreter, but fortunately we did not do so, as he would have been quite useless, unless he could also have talked Sokoteriote.
