Page:From Constantinople to the home of Omar Khayyam.djvu/279

 ing the news that Darius had been seized. ^ The site of this encampment — ' the Parthian village Thara ' it was called by Justin — we could not yet have reached ; for, as explained else- where,^ it must have been situated somewhat beyond the flour- ishing town of Semnan, which we were now approaching after a drive of two hours across a rough and stony stretch of road with a slight descent towards the last.

Semnan (Samnan, or Simnan) is a place of high antiquity, being mentioned by Ptolemy as Semina^^ and appearing in the Oriental geographers as a town noteworthy because of the rivulets of water running through its streets, its manufacture of soft stuffs for handkerchiefs, and especially for its sweet paste made from almonds and figs.* The natives themselves pro- nounce the name of the town as 'Semnoon'; and although this pronunciation is not especially peculiar, as -un for -an is com- mon in other parts of Persia, their speech has as marked an individuality as has the vernacular at Lasgird.^

In situation Semnan lies somewhat low, being reached on either side by a long descending gravelly plain, brown and barren, and backed on the north by mountains not a dozen miles away, though the range on the south is more distant.^ The appearance of the town, as one draws near to it, is pic- turesque and attractive because of the cultivation and the abundant presence of green contrasting with the arid waste. A high minaret peers out from a mass of verdure, and near it

1 Arrian, Anabasis, 3. 21. 3, and an allusion to the celebrated 'tea- Curtius, History of Alexander, 5. 13. 6. cakes ' is contained in this reference

2 See Jackson, Caspiae Portae, to the paste.

where Justin (11. 15. 1) will be found s ^ paragraph by Geiger on the

quoted with the various other author- Semnan dialect, with a full list of

ities on the subject. writers who have discussed the subject

' Ptolemy, Geography, 6. 5. 3, Si}- in detail, will be found in Geiger and

fiiva (ed. Nobbe, 2. 95, Leipzig, 1887). Kuhn, Grundr. iran. Philol. 1.2. 346-

^ See Yakut (who visited Semnan 348. See also below, p. 149.

about 1220 a.d.) and Ahmad Razi, both « On the location of Semnan see

quoted in Barbier de Meynard, Diet. Fraser, Narrative, p. 300, and Curzon,

geog. p. 317 ; and compare Le Strange, Persia, 1. 290. Eastern Caliphate, p. 368. Perhaps

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