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To avoid the danger of separation, the travellers in the desert keep close together, and hang bells about the necks of their beasts; and if any one stays behind, they set up marks in the route, that they may know how to follow. Having crossed the desert of Lop, we come to the city of Sachion or Sachiou, which is subject to the great khan, and is situated in the great country of Tangut.
The country of the Ouighurs, the district around the modern Turfan or Tangut. Yu-teen is better known as Khoten. Dr.
Of the Province of Chamil and several other Countries on the road from thence to the City of Ezina; and of another great Desert. The province of Chamil, which abounds in all the necessaries of life, is situated in the wide country of Tangut, and is subject to the great khan.
Here they met with some obstacle and turned from Hormuz, and traversed successively Kerman and Khorassan, Balkh, and Badakhshan, by the way of the upper Oxus, to the plateau of Pamir; thence crossing the steppes of Pamir, the three travellers descended upon Kashgar, whence they proceeded by Yarkand and Khotan to the vicinity of Lake Lob; and, crossing the desert of Gobi, they reached the province of Tangut in the extreme northwestern corner of China, or Cathay.
After eight days farther travel to the east, we come to the district of Egrigaia , which is still in the kingdom of Tangut, and subject to the great khan; it contains many cities and castles, Calacia being the principal city, which is inhabited by idolaters, though the Nestorian Christians have three churches.
We were following a clear, well-trodden path, along which a herd of yaks had recently been driven. After a while we came up with a party of Tangut pilgrims, with fifty yaks, two horses, and three dogs. The Tanguts are a nomadic people in northeastern Tibet, and almost every second Tangut is also a robber.
Forster conjectures that the original words of Rubruquis are here corrupted, and that this passage ought to have been "beyond Tangut," instead of beyond Tebet or Thibet; in which case, the countries of Langa and Solanga, may refer to that of the Lamuts and Solonians, the ancestors of the Mantschus or Mundschurians. Voy. and Disc. 108.
It is worthy of remark, that nearly all the Jews, whom he represents as very numerous in Thebes, Constantinople, Samarcand, &c., were dyers of wool: in Thebes alone, there were 2000 workers in scarlet and purple. After the conquest of the northern part of China by Genghis Khan, the city of Campion in Tangut seems to have been fixed upon by him as the seat of a great inland trade.
The people of Tangut are tall lusty men of a brown complexion. The Jugurs are of middle stature like ourselves, and their language is the root or origin of the Turkish and Comanian languages. Beyond Tebet, are the people of Langa and Solanga , whose messengers I saw in the court of Mangu-khan, who had along with them more than ten great carts, each drawn by six oxen.
During the tranquillity that had now prevailed for more than a generation a new power had arisen on the Chinese frontier in the principality of Tangut or Hia. This state occupied the modern province of Kansuh, with some of the adjacent districts of Koko Nor and the Gobi Desert.
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