JOURNAL 



OP 



THE ASIATIC SOCIETY. 



No. 74.— February, 1838. 



I. — Account of tlie expedition of Chach (Chacha) extracted from 

 the Chach N&meh, and extracts from the Tohfat ul Khwdn. By 

 Ensign Postans. 



The original Chach Nameh, from which the following is taken, is 

 the only known history of Sindh, authentic or otherwise, which affords 

 any information on the state of that country, previous to its conquest by 

 Muhammad Bin Ca'sim, under the Khalif Wallid, in the year of 

 the Haj. 92. It exists in the form of a Persian translation from the 

 Arabic, in which it was originally written, by Ali bin Ahmed 

 bin Abu-bakr Ku'fie, a resident of Ooch; but it is so defective, 

 that much on the following, and other interesting subjects connected 

 with the state of the country at that period, has been lost ; the succeed- 

 ing account, is all that can be given of an expedition led by the brahman 

 Chach when he usurped the sovereignty of Sindh, about the year 20 

 of the Hejira. 



Chach being firmly seated upon the throne of Sindh, and having 

 appointed his brother as his deputy, inquired of Bu'dhema'n, the minis- 

 ter of the late king, as to the divisions and extent of the empire, seeing 

 that it was his intention to make a tour of his dominions, for the pur- 

 pose of forming still stronger alliances with those chiefs who were 

 friendly to his rule ; whilst he punished, and subdued to his obedience, 

 the discontented and seditious. Bu'dhema'n informed him, that for- 

 merly the country had been divided into four great divisions, each 

 having its ruler who acknowledged the supremacy of the sovereign ; in 

 which state it came to Sa'hars bin Diwaij*, who was overthrown, 



* Diwaij seems a corruption of dwija, 'the brahman :' and Sahurs resembles 

 much the genitive nahaaa of our Sauraslitra coins, of whom the first is a swimi 

 putra or son of a brahman; but the date seems too recent. See Vol. VI. p. 

 385.— Ed. 



