The Old Indian Geographical Lists, Such As Are
Preserved In The Puranas, And In Pliny's Extracts From Megasthenes, Are,
In The Main, Lists Of Peoples, Not Of Provinces, And Even Where The Real
Name Seems To Be Local A Gentile Form Is Often Given.
So also Tochari
and Sogdi are replaced by Tokharistan and Sughd; the Veneti and
Taurini by Venice and Turin;
The Remi and the Parisii, by Rheims and
Paris; East-Saxons and South-Saxons by Essex and Sussex; not to
mention the countless -ings that mark the tribal settlement of the
Saxons in Britain.
Abulfeda, speaking of this territory, uses exactly Polo's phrase, saying
that the districts in question are properly called Kil-o-Kilan, but by
the Arabs Jil-o-Jilan. Teixeira gives the Persian name of the sea as
Darya Ghilani. (See Abulf. in Buesching, v. 329.)
[The province of Gil (Gilan), which is situated between the mountains and
the Caspian Sea, and between the provinces of Azerbaijan and Mazanderan
(H. C.)], gave name to the silk for which it was and is still famous,
mentioned as Ghelle (Gili) at the end of this chapter. This Seta
Ghella is mentioned also by Pegolotti (pp. 212, 238, 301), and by Uzzano,
with an odd transposition, as Seta Leggi, along with Seta Masandroni,
i.e. from the adjoining province of Mazanderan (p. 192). May not the
Spanish Geliz, "a silk-dealer," which seems to have been a puzzle to
etymologists, be connected with this? (See Dosy and Engelmann, 2nd ed.
p. 275.) [Prof.
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