Man and His Migrations

by R. G. Latham

They may also be said, in the same way, to divide the Indian tongues from the monosyllabic.

On the north side of this range, languages undoubtedly, monosyllabic are spoken as far westwards as Little Tibet. On the south there are Hindu characteristics both numerous and undoubted as far in the same direction as Cashmír.

Then comes a change. To the north and west of Cashmír is a Kohistan, or mountain-country, which will soon require being described in detail. The line, however, which we are at present engaged upon is that of the northern boundary of the Valley of the Kabúl River, the mountains between Cabul and Herat, and the continuation of the same ridge from Herat to the south-eastern corner of the Caspian. North of this we have—roughly speaking—the Uzbek and Turcoman Turks; south of it, the Afghans and Persians Proper. Bokhara, however, is Persian, and the Kohistan in question is not Turk—whatever else it may be.

To proceed—this line runs nearly parallel to the southern shore of the Caspian. Of the provinces to the north of it, Asterabad is partly Turk and partly Persian; Mazenderan and Ghilan, Persian. From Ghilan northwards and westwards, the valleys of the Cyrus and Araxes form the chief exception—but, saving these, all is mountain and mountaineership. Indeed, it is Ararat and Armenia which lie on our left, and the vast and vague Caucasus which rears itself in front.

The simplest ethnology of the parts between this range, the Semitic area, and the sea, is that of the Persian province of Khorasan. With Persia we are so much in the habit of connecting ideas of Eastern pomp and luxury, that we are scarcely able to give it its true geographical conditions of general sterility. Yet it is really a desert with oases—a desert with oases for the far greater part of its area. And of all its provinces few are more truly so than Khorasan. Here we have a great elevated central table-land; pre-eminently destitute of rivers; and with but few towns. Of these Yezd is the chief in interest: the head-quarters of remains of the old fire-worship: Yezd the city of the Parsees, more numerous there than in all the others in Persia besides. Perhaps, too, it is the ethnological centre of the Persian stock; since in a westerly direction they extend to Kurdistan, and in a north-eastern one as far as Badukshan and Durwaz on the source of the Oxus.

The northern frontier is Turcoman, where the pastoral robbers of the parts between Bokhara and the Caspian encroach, and have encroached.

As far south as Shurukhs they are to be found; and east of Shurukhs they are succeeded by the Hazarehs—probably wholly, certainly partially, of Mongolian blood.

Abbasabad on the north-west is a Georgian colony. On the line between Meshed and Herat are several Kurd colonies. In Seistan we have Persians; but further south there are Biluch and Brahúi. Due east the Afghans come in.

Kerman is also Persian; and that to a greater degree than Khorasan. Fars is the same; yet west of Fars the population changes, and Arabian elements occur. They increase in Khuzistan; and in Irak Arabi we, at one and the same time, reach the rich alluvia of the Tigris and Euphrates and a doubtful frontier. Whether this was originally Arab or Persian is a matter of doubt.

From Irak we must subtract Laristan, and the Baktyari Mountains, as well as the whole north-western half. Hamadan is the ancient Ecbatana; the ancient Ecbatana was Median—but that the Medes and Persians were as closely allied in blood as we suppose them to have been in their unalterable laws, is by no means a safe assumption. The existence of a third language in the arrow-headed inscriptions yet awaits a satisfactory explanation.