'The lands of the Eastern Caliphate Mesopotamia, Persia, and Central Asia from the Moslem conquest to the time of Timur' [‎202] (239/586)

202
JIBAL.
I CHAP.
khwast, from which it was counted 30 leagues to (Great) Lur—
that is to say the plains lying north of Dizful which will be
noticed later in Chapter XVI. Mukaddasi adds that from SaMr-
khwast to Karaj of Abu Dulaf was four marches, it being the
same from Saburkhwast to Lur 1 .
To the west of Little Lur, and on the frontier of Arabian
'Irak, lay the two districts of Masabadhan and Mihrajankudhak,
of which the chief towns were, respectively, Sirawan and Saymarah.
The ruins of both towns still exist, and Masabadhan is in use as
the name of the region to the south of the Mayidasht plain.
Sirawan (or As-Sirawan) was, according to Ibn Hawkal, a small
town, its houses built of mortared stone, not unlike Mosul. It
produced the fruits of both hot and cold regions, especially nuts
and melons, the latter of the celebrated kind known as Dastabilyah;
moreover the date palm, as already said, flourished here. Kazvini
refers to mines of salt, sulphur, vitriol, and borax as being found
in the Masabadhan district. Situated some fifty miles to the
eastward, Saymarah was not unlike Sirawan, and it remained
a populous town to a later date than the latter, its position being
better chosen. The Mihrajankudhak district lying round it was
celebrated in the 4th (10th) century for great fertility; and
Mukaddasi refers to its numerous population. < Dates and
olives, nuts and snow are all found here abundantly,' YakM
writes, and on the road between Saymarah and the neighbouring
hamlet of Tarhan was a wonderful bridge, f twice as great as the
bridge between Hulwan and Khanikin.' When Mustawfi wrote
in the 8th (14th) century Saymarah, though already falling to ruin,
was still a fine town, and the surrounding country was celebrated
for its date-groves 2 .
At the south-eastern corner of the Jibal province, and not far
distant from the borders of the Great Desert, stands Isfahan (the
I. H. 259, 264. Muk. 401. Yak. li. 572; iii. 4,82, 225. Ibn-al-Athir,
ix. 174 ; x. 274. Mst. 151, 195 ; also Guzidah (Gantin), I. 622, and MS. f. 159^,
giving the paragraph on Lesser Lur, at the end of section xi of chapter IV,
immediately preceding the section treating of the Mongols. The name is
variously spelt Saburkhwast, Shaburkhast, and Shapurkhwast. The exact
site of the ruins has not been identified.
2 I. H. 263, 264. Muk. 394. Ykb. 269. Kaz. ii. 172. Yak. iii. 443,
525. Mst. 151.