284 RAWLINSON ON SOUTHERN PERSIA. [Feb. 9, 1857. 



Granis soon rose into importance, as the port from which all the 

 supplies of merchandise came into the country.* At the time of 

 Alexander's eastern campaign, we find mention made of Mesambria, 

 which is probably Bushir, and of the river Ehogonis, which is the 

 same as the Genava.f There were emporia probably at both of 

 these spots. In later times, the time of the Mahommedan conquest, 

 the great place was Siraf. This place, Siraf, continued to be the 

 emporium of the Gulf for a long period, — indeed, probably four or 

 five hundred years, — but the site has been improperly laid down in 

 the maps.f Then, the emporium was moved to the island of Keis or 

 Kenn. After Keis was ruined, the great emporium was at Ormuz 

 on the main land ; and when that was destroyed, it was removed to 

 the island of Ormuz. This place, the island Ormuz, was taken 

 possession of by the Portuguese in 1519, and for above 100 years 

 it was the entrepot of all the commerce between the east and 

 west. § In 1625, the East India Company sent three officers, 

 Captains Bligh, Weddell, and Monoxe, with a considerable fleet to 

 assist Shah Abbas in driving out the Portuguese. It was during 

 this expedition that the famous navigator Baffin, the discoverer of 

 Baffin Bay, was killed at the bombardment or siege of a place on 

 the neighbouring island, the town of Kishm, from which the island 



♦ The name of the city at the mouth of the Granis is not given by Arrian ; but 

 Tct'ox-n is mentioned some way up the stream, as the site of one of the royal palaces ; 

 and both Strabo and Ptolemy confirm this statement. Now Taoke is of course the 



Toug or Touj ( c-S J» ^^ ;?• J ) ^^ ^^® Arabic geographers, immediately at the foot 



of the mountains on the road fi om Shiraz to Genava ; thus exactly answering to 

 tiie position of the modern Ddlaki,^ and leading to the inevitable inference, that the 

 mound on which the present fort is built, covers the ruins of the old Achsemeniau 

 palace. The Ddlaki river, or Granis, formed of two arms, which unite before it 

 leaves the mountains, again bifurcates as it approaches the sea, one arm falling 

 in at Bohilla Point, and the other at Bunder-Rig. There are extensive ruins at 

 both of these places, probably of the vEthiopian period ; but it is at Bunder-Rig, 

 I think, that we must look for the Shiniz of Yacut, a very ancient site south of 

 Genava. 



f Aru-gtma (t. e. Vuyuvii) in Hamite Chaldee, and Gundva in old Persian, signify 

 the same thing, " the river of Guna." The Arab geographers usually write the 



name ^j1,i„^ Jenaheh; but the old pronunciation of Gonava is now alone known in 



the country. It is just opposite to the island of Kharg, or Karrack. 



X The error of placing Sirdf to the south, near Cape Sertes, originated with Sir 

 W. Ouseley, who confounded the name with that of Shinds. The real Sirdf is now 

 called Skilau (an older form of the same name, probably meaning *' a torrent" or 

 " full stream") and is close to Taurie (properly Tdhiri, from its founder Tdhir), 

 and not many miles from Congoon. Morier describes the antiquities of the 

 place, and its cuneiform bricks, on the authority of a naval officer who had visited 

 the ruins. It should be well examined during the present expedition. 



§ The 'Opftovtriu. of Arrian is Ormuz, on the mainland. The island he calls 

 'Ooydvu, which is probably the same as Germ, altered by the Arabs to Jerun 



