[11]. The Khokhar is most probably the Ghakkar. Babur writes the name Gakar, a singular race, and decidedly Scythic in their habits even in his day. [The Khokhar and Ghakkar tribes are often confused (Rose ii. 554).]
[12]. Of the Judis and Johyas we have already spoken as inhabiting the range called in the native annals Jadu-ka-dang, and by Babur “the hill of Jud,” skirting the Behat. The position of Bahara is laid down in that monument of genius and industry, the Memoir of Rennel (who calls it Bheera), in 32° N. and 72° 10´ E.; and by Elphinstone in 32° 10´, but a whole degree further to the east, or 73° 15´. This city, so often mentioned in the Yadu-Bhatti annals as one of their intermediate places of repose, on their expulsion from India and migration to Central Asia, has its position minutely pointed out by the Emperor Babur (p. 259), who, in his attack on the hill tribes of Jats, Gujars, Ghakkars, etc., adjoining Kashmir, “expelled Hati Guker from Behreh, on the Behut River, near the cave temples of Gar-kotri at Bikrum,” of which the able annotator remarks, that as well as those of But Bamian, they were probably Buddhist. Babur (p. 294) also found the Jats masters of Sialkot, most likely the Salpur of the Inscription (p. 916 above), conquered from a Jat prince in the twelfth century by the Patan prince, and presumed to be the Salbahanpur founded by the fugitive Yadu prince of Gajni [see p. [1183] above].
[13]. Butaban, probably from vana, pronounced in the dialect ban, the ‘wild’ or ‘forest’ of Buta.
[14]. Illegitimate children can never overcome this natural defect amongst the Rajputs. Thus we find among all classes of artisans in India, some of royal but spurious descent. [This is a good instance of high-caste blood in artisan castes; see Russell, Tribes and Castes of Central Provinces, ii. 200.]
[15]. These towns and lakes are well known, but have been seized by Bikaner. See Map. [Bīkampur, 95 miles N.E. of Jaisalmer city.]
[16]. [The Rabāris say that they were created by Siva to take care of the first camel which Pārvati formed for her amusement (Census Report, Mārwār, 1891, ii. 157). Rose (Glossary, iii. 269) writes Rahbāri, probably Persian rahwār, ‘active.’]
[17]. The Oswal is the richest and most numerous of the eighty-four mercantile tribes of India, and is said to amount to one hundred thousand families. They are called ‘Oswal’ from their first settlement, the town of Osian. They are all of pure Rajput birth, of no single tribe, but chiefly Puars, Solankis, and Bhattis. All profess the Jain tenets, and it is a curious fact, though little known, that the pontiffs of that faith must be selected from the youth of Osian. The wealthy bankers and merchants of these regions scattered throughout India, are all known under one denomination, Marwari, which is erroneously supposed to apply to the Jodhpur territory, whereas, in fact, it means belonging to the desert. It is singular that the wealth of India should centre in this region of comparative sterility.
[19]. [Such tales are common, and generally imply a flaw in the pedigree.]
[20]. This deception practised by the Bhatti chief to obtain land on which to erect a fortress is not unknown in other parts of India, and in more remote regions. Bhatner owes its name to this expedient, from the division (bantna) of the hide. The etymology of Calcutta is the same, but should be written Khalkata, from the cuttings of the hide (khal). Byrsa, the castle of Carthage, originates from the same story. If there existed any affinity between the ancient Pali languages of India and the Punic or Phoenician (as the names of its princes and their adjuncts of bal would indicate), and the letters B and Ch were as little dissimilar in Punic as in Sanskrit, then Byrsa would become charsa, ‘hide’ or ‘skin,’ which might have originated the capital of the African Mauritania, as of the Indian Maruthan. Thus Marocco may be from Maruka, of or belonging to Maru, the desert, also probably the origin of the Merv of Iran. The term Moor may likewise be corrupted from Mauri, an inhabitant of Maruka, while the Sahariya of our Indian desert is the brother in name and profession of the Saracen of Arabia, from Sahra, a desert, and zadan, to assault. The Nomadic princes of Mauritania might therefore be the Pali or shepherd kings of Maruthan, the great African desert. And who were these Philita or Pali kings of Barbary and Egypt? It is well known that the Berbers who inhabited Abyssinia and the south coast of the Red Sea, migrated to the northern coast, not only occupying it, as well as Mount Atlas, but pushing their tribes far into the grand sahra, or desert. To those colonists, that coast owes its name of Barbary. From the days of Solomon and his contemporary Shishak, an intimate communication subsisted between the eastern coast of Africa and India; and I have already hazarded the opinion, that we must look to this coast of Aethiopia and Abyssinia for the Lanka of the Rameses (Rameswar) of India; and from the former country the most skilful archaeologists assert that Egypt had her mythology, and more especially that mystery—the prominent feature of both systems—the Phallic rites, or worship of the lingam. Berber, according to Bruce, means a shepherd, and as ber is a sheep in the language of India, Berber is a shepherd in the most literal sense, and consequently the synonym of Pali. It has been asserted that this race colonized these coasts of Africa from India about the time of Amenophis, and that they are the Hyksos, or ‘shepherd-kings,’ who subjugated Egypt. On this account a comparison of the ancient architectural remains of Abyssinia and Aethiopia with those of the ancient Hindus is most desirable. It is asserted, and with appearance of truth, that the architecture of the Pyramids is distinct from the Pharaonic, and that they are at once Astronomic and Phallic. In India, the symbolic pinnacle surmounting the temples of the sun-god are always pyramidal. If the forthcoming history of the Berbers should reveal the mystery of their first settlements in Abyssinia, a great object would be attained; and if search were made in the old cave-temples of that coast, some remains of the characters they used might aid in tracing their analogy to the ancient Pali of the East; an idea suggested by an examination of the few characters found in the grand desert inhabited by the Tuaregs, which have a certain resemblance to the Punic, and to the unknown characters attributed to the Indo-Scythic tribes of India, as on their coins and cave-temples. Wide asunder as are these regions, the mind that will strive to lessen the historical separation may one day be successful, when the connexion between Aethiopia (qu. from aditya and contracted ait, the Sun?) and Surashtra, ‘the land of the Sun,’ or Syria of India, may become more tangible. Ferishta (vide Briggs’ translation, vol. iv. p. 402), quoting original authorities, says, “the inhabitants of Selandip, or the island of Ceylon, were accustomed to send vessels to the coast of Africa, to the Red Sea, and Persian Gulf, from the earliest ages, and Hindu pilgrims resorted to Mecca and Egypt for the purpose of paying adoration to the idols. It is related also that this people trading from Ceylon became converts to the true faith at so early a period as the first caliphs”; all which confirms the fact of early intercourse between Egypt and India.—See Vol. II. p. [702]. [It is unnecessary to criticize in detail the etymologies suggested in this note, a good instance of the Author’s manner. The etymology of Calcutta is unknown, the most recent suggestion being that it is Khālkata, ‘a place where a flood cut a creek’ (Yule, Hobson-Jobson, 2nd ed. 146; Hoernle, JASB, 1898, p. 48 f.; K. Blechynden, Calcutta Past and Present, 1905, p. 5). Bhatner means ‘city of the Bhattis.’ Berber is either Greek βάρβαροι, or a tribal term, Barabara; that of Aethiopia is unknown (EB, 11th ed. iii. 764, ix. 845). The story of fixing the limits of a territory by riding round it or by encircling it with strips of hide, as in the story of Carthage, is common in India (Bradley-Birt, Chota Nagpore, 16 f.; Brett, Chhattisgarh Gazetteer, i. 192; BG, xiii. Part i. 169, and many others).[others).]]