c. 1330.—"In the neighbourhood of that realm is a great island, Java by name, which hath a compass of a good 3000 miles. Now this island is populous exceedingly, and is the second best of all islands that exist.... The King of this island hath a palace which is truly marvellous.... Now the great Khan of Cathay many a time engaged in war with this King; but this King always vanquished and got the better of him."—Friar Odoric, in Cathay, &c., 87-89.
c. 1349.—"She clandestinely gave birth to a daughter, whom she made when grown up Queen of the finest island in the world, Saba by name...."—John de' Marignolli, ibid. 391.
c. 1444.—"Sunt insulae duae in interiori India, e pene extremis orbis finibus, ambae Java nomine, quarum altera tribus, altera duobus millibus milliarum protenditur orientem versus; sed Majoris, Minorisque cognomine discernuntur."—N. Conti, in Poggius, De Var. Fortunae.
1503.—The Syrian Bishops Thomas, Jaballaha, Jacob, and Denha, sent on a mission to India in 1503 by the (Nestorian) Patriarch Elias, were ordained to go "to the land of the Indians and the islands of the seas which are between Dabag and Sin and Masin (see [MACHEEN])."—Assemani, III. Pt. i. 592. This Dabag is probably a relic of the Zābaj of the Relation, of Maṣ'ūdī, and of Al-birūnī.
1516.—"Further on ... there are many islands, small and great, amongst which is one very large which they call Java the Great.... They say that this island is the most abundant country in the world.... There grow pepper, cinnamon, ginger, bamboos, cubebs, and gold...."—Barbosa, 197.
Referring to Sumatra, or the Archipelago in general.
Saka, 578, i.e. A.D. 656.—"The Prince Adityadharma is the Deva of the First Java Land (prathama Yava-bhū). May he be great! Written in the year of Saka, 578. May it be great!"—From a Sanskrit Inscription from Pager-Ruyong, in Menang Karbau (Sumatra), publd. by Friedrich, in the Batavian Transactions, vol. xxiii.
1224.—"[Ma'bar] (q.v.) is the last part of India; then comes the country of China (Ṣín), the first part of which is Jāwa, reached by a difficult and fatal sea."—Yāḳūt, i. 516.
" "This is some account of remotest Ṣín, which I record without vouching for its truth ... for in sooth it is a far off land. I have seen no one who had gone to it and penetrated far into it; only the merchants seek its outlying parts, to wit the country known as Jāwa on the sea-coast, like to India; from it are brought Aloeswood ('ūd), camphor, and nard (sunbul), and clove, and mace (basbāsa), and China drugs, and vessels of china-ware."—Ibid. iii. 445.
Kazwīnī speaks in almost the same words of Jāwa. He often copies Yāḳūt, but perhaps he really means his own time (for he uses different words) when he says: "Up to this time the merchants came no further into China than to this country (Jāwa) on account of the distance and difference of religion."—ii. 18.