

BASHKIRS. 



BASIUCATA. 



The Spaniards were induced to take possession of them islands in 

 1788, from observing that the inhabitants were accustomed to wear 

 thick golden wire M an ornament The gold is washed down from 

 the mountains by the torrents in the rainy season. 



The governor resides with a small establishment of soldiers and 

 ecclesiastics on Orafton Island, on the western side of which is a good 

 achoring-ground. The islands are plentifully supplied with water, 

 and produce sugar-canes, plantains, yams, and other vegetables. They 

 likewise contain numerous flocks of goats and a great abundance of hogs. 



(Dampier'a Voyage* ; Heares's Voy age to tfootka Sound ; Hamilton's 

 Eatt India Gazetteer.) 



BASHKIRS, or more correctly BASHKURS. The province of 

 Orenburg, which lies between the provinces of Tobolsk, Perm, Vjatka, 

 Kasan, Ssimbirsk, Ssaratoff, and Astrakhan, and adjoins the territory 

 of the Cossacks of the Ural, which also forma part of the province 

 of Orenburg, and is bordered by the Caspian, is separated from the 

 steppe of the Kirghiz-Cossacka by the Ural, I'i, and Oby, and is 

 principally inhabited by what are termed military tribes. The 

 Orenburg line extends 2000 vents (about 1S26 miles) from Sverino- 

 golovsk to Ourjew, meeting the boundary of Siberia in the north and 

 the banks of the Caspian in the south. This line by which the 

 Russian provinces are separated from the Kirghiz-Cossack territory, 

 describes at the same time a zigzag of which 8verinogolov.sk, Orsk, 

 and Ourjew form the prominent points on the Kirghiz side. [OREN- 

 BURG.] The occupation and maintenance of this line is the principal 

 duty assigned to the inhabitants of the adjoining provinces, the 

 Coesacks of Orenburg and the Ural, the Bashkirs^Meshtshuses, and 

 Teptars, in conjunction with twelve battalions of infantry, a portion 

 of whom are settled as colonists in these regions. The colonies of 

 Coisacks are placed at intervals along the line and the communication 

 between them is kept up by means of piquets and patroles, stationed 

 about two or three miles from each other at signal posts covered with 

 straw. Independently of a few tracts held by the crown, or by 

 fnsssrVn. nobles, manufacturers, or private persona, the whole of the 

 province of Orenburg and some portions of the adjacent provinces 

 belong to the Bashkirs ; setting aside the political subdivision of their 

 territory into circles, it is distributed into cantons, clanships, jurtcs, 

 and villages. The cantons are twelve in number, of these the three 

 first and smallest lie within the province of Perm, and an inconsider- 

 able portion of the eleventh within that of Vjatka. Each canton, so 

 far as concerns the duties which its inhabitants have to discharge in 

 the field, is subject to a Bashkir elder, but in all other respects they 

 are under the regular civil authorities. It is difficult to say from 

 what source the Bashkirs derive their descent ; they are Mohammedan 

 Sunnites, speak the Tartar dialect, call themselves Baahkurs, shave 

 their heads, wear a small vest terminating in a point behind, a high 

 flat-crowned cap, an outer garment like an Asiatic sleeping-robe with 

 a girdle, and carry a pike and bow and quiver ; those who are able 

 to obtain a sabre wear it, but fire-arms are a rarity among them, 

 although one-half of such as are upon active service are required to 

 provide themselves with them. Little is known of the history of these 

 people, for we have scarcely any record of them before the date of their 

 subjection by the Czar John the Terrible. There exists however a tradi- 

 tion among them, that they are descendantsof the Buriates, a Mongolian 

 race who live about the bank* of the Irkutsk, and that their ancestors 

 were driven out by invaders from the south, and taking a south- 

 westerly course across the Ural Mountains settled in the vicinity of 

 thaw mountains. The received opinion however is that they are a 

 remnant of the Nogay -Tartars, and some consider them to 'be the 

 ' Bash-urn,' great thieves or good-for-nothing fellows, who remained 

 behind when the Nogays abandoned the neighbourhood of the Ural 

 Mountains and settled farther in Ada. Physically and psychologically 

 the Bashkirs form a race between the Fins and Turks : the Fin indeed 

 ha* a decided Mongolian cast of features, and it is not impossible that 

 the Bashkirs after all are of Turco-Mongolian origin. The amount of 

 the Bashkir male population appear*, according to Riitachkau, to have 

 been 100,176 in 1754, but no very accurate enumeration then existed, 

 nor doe* there now. The Bashkirs do not pay any tax, but they are 

 bound to provide pout-horses, supply men for the frontier-cordons, 

 and hold themselves ready for any foreign service. Their liability to 

 acre begins at the age of seventeen, and closes with that of forty-five. 



The majority of this people subsist by rearing cattle and a few by 

 agriculture. They pass the winter in villages, living in clean v 

 cabins ; but in summer all are abroad with their herds in the open 

 field, dwelling under tenU of felt Prepared hones' milk nnd ' knit,' 



kind of cheese as hard as stone, form their principal food ; and they 

 never fail to take a stock of the latter with them, which they steep 

 in water when they go upon service. It serves them for a length of 

 time instead of bread or other food. Some of them are great sports- 

 own, for they have game in superabundance ; and the use of the 

 Mean is common among them. 



Thnr customs and habit* are of Tartar origin, with the c\ 

 iale dress, which is evidently Finnic: their liir 

 Midas at Ufa; they have no longer any military chieftain*, but for 



MDtury part have shown themselves good subjects of the Russian 



In disposition they are faithful, docile, and ready to oblige ; 

 traveller may range across the country with a* much security 

 M along th safest road in Europe. 



HAS 1 1. 1 1 'ATA, a province of the kingdom of the Two S: 

 which nearly coincides with ancient Lucania, is bounded \V. l.y thu 

 Gulf of Policastro and the province of Principato Citra, N.\V. 

 by 1'rincipato Ultra, the Capitanata, aiid the Terra di B.-M 

 E. by the Terra d'Otranto and the Gulf of Toronto, and a by the 

 province of Calabria Citra. It lies between 89" 56' and 41 8' N. lat, 

 15 22' and 16 49' E. long. The province is in shape an irregular 

 quadrilateral with two of its angles resting on the Ofanto, and the 

 other two lying respectively at the mouth of the Noce hi the < : 

 Policastro and the mouth of the Bradano in the Gulf >' T.U-UI' . IN 

 greatest length extends from north-west to south-cast, in v 

 turn it measures between the great northern bend of the Ofanto to the 

 north of Melfi and Monte Pollino on the southern border a length of 

 90 miles. The breadth of the province at its touthern , 

 about 66 miles ; at its northern extremity along the Ofanto, where the 

 width is least, about 35 miles. The whole area is 4145 square miles : 

 the population in 1845 amounted to 481,288. 



Basilicata occupies the greater part of ancient Lucania, the remainder 

 of which is included in the province of Principato Citra. It lie* 

 almost wholly on the eastern side of the main ridge of the Apennines, 

 and its principal rivers flow into the Gulf of Taranto, or the I 

 Sea, as the Italians call it The main ridge of the Apennines between 

 the sources of the Ofanto on one side and those of the Sele on the 

 other forms a largo mass above Conza, whence two lateral branches 

 project, one eastward towards the peninsula of Otranto and another 

 westward to Cape Campanella ; while the main ridge entering ISaailicata 

 north of the town of Muro bends almost due east to 1 1 

 of Avigliano and Acerenza, and gives rise to the Bradano on its eastern 

 and the Fiume Bianco on its south-western slope [APKXNINES.] ."- 

 of the source of the Bradano the main range sends oil another branch 

 due east, which forms the watershed between the Bradano and the 

 Bosiento. In this projection is the high summit called Monte Acuto, 

 and on its southern slope are the sources of the Basiento and the town 

 of Potenza. From this point the main ridge runs due south by M 

 Nuovo, between the sources of the Agri, which flows eastward, and 

 those of the Negro, the ancient Tanager, which flows towards the 

 north-north-west to meet the Sele. The main Apennine chain then 

 approaches the coast of the Mediterranean Sea, near Lagonegro, above 

 which is the lofty group called Monti Sirini, in the deep gloomy val- 

 leys on the eastern side of which the Sins, now called Sinno, has its 

 source. To the west of Lagonegro is the secondary chain called Monte 

 Cocuzzo, which projects from the main chain between the sources of 

 the Galore or Negro and the Trecchina or Noce, and running south- 

 ward along the right bank of the latter forms part of the lioundary 

 towards Principato Citra. Farther south the ridge sweep.* round the 

 source of the Lao and enters Calabria east of Rotonda, above which 

 towns it forms the lofty summit called Monte Pollino (Mom Apol- 

 lineus), which is the highest point in the southern part of the kin 

 being above 7000 feet above the sea. From Monte Pollino two lateral 

 ridges spring, one northward between the two h, the 



Sinno and another north-eastward, the crest of which from M..nto 

 Pollino to the neighbourhood of Kocca Imperialc form* the principal 

 part of the southern boundary. 



A small part of the province lies west of the main ridge of the 

 Apennines and between it and the Gulf of Policastro, exten 

 10 miles along the coast northward from the mouth o(' the Trccchina. 

 The Trecchina, which is also called Noce, rices in the angle between 

 the Monte Cocuzzo and the main ridge of the Apennines and nuin 

 nearly due south, partly through a deep glen, into which s< 

 gloomy rrvines open, to its month in the full'. In the lower part of 

 its course, below the town of Trccchina, it runs through a small plain 

 of great fertility. In this part of the province are the towns of Lago- 

 negro, Lauria, and Maratea. In the first inv;i -.dy by 

 the French in 1806 the valley of the Noce witnessed the defeat of the 

 Neapolitan army near Lagonegro. 



i th another small portion of Rapilicata lies on the i\ 

 slope of the Apennines round the town of Muro and forms part of the 

 basin of the Sele, a tributary of the Gulf of Salerno. It is drain. .! l.y 

 the Platano and the Bianco, which unite )>c!o\v Victri niul form a 

 feeder of the Sele. The Bianco and above the junction the Platano, 

 to the north of Vietri, form a considerable portion of the western 

 boundary of Basilicata. 



The most northern part of the province belongs to flu* ba^in of the 

 Ofanto and contains the volcanic region of Mount Vultur, th. 

 volcanic district on the eastern side of the Apennines. 



The Qfemin rises in the Apennines in the pro- 



vince of Principato Ultra, about 15 miles west from ' r San 



Angelo dei Lombard!. It flows at first eastward, and a little below 

 Conza becomes the dividing line between Basilicata and 1'rin. 

 Ultra. Thence It winds round to the northward and flows am.. 

 mountains in a deep narrow glen as far as the mountainous proj> 

 to tl. north of Melfi and Mount Vultur, and thence it, divid. 



..f Cnpitanata from those of Basilicata . its month 



\driatic, 5 miles north-west of Barletta. Like most It 

 rivers it is subject to floods in winter, and after heavy rains on the 

 mountains it then becomes an impetuous torrent, the. roar of 

 which is heard a long way off, amply justifying the epithet 'longe 

 Ronantcm,' given to it by Horace ('Carm. iv. 9). In summer h- 



