Note 213 — ARAB REFERENCES.1

Rahma or Ruhmi.Rahma or Ruhmi, according to the merchant Sulaimán (a.d. 851) borders the land of the Balháras, the Juzr, and Táfán. The king who was not much respected was at war with both the Juzr and the Balhára. He had the most numerous army in India and a following of 50,000 elephants when he took the field. Sulaimán notices a cotton fabric made in Rahma, so delicate that a dress of it could pass through a signet-ring. The medium of exchange was cowries Cypræa moneta shell money. The country produced gold silver and aloes and the whisk of the sámara or yák Bos poëphagus the bushy-tailed ox. Ibni Khurdádbah213 (a.d. 912) places Rahmi as the sixth kingdom. He apparently identified it with Al Rahmi or north Sumátra as he notes that between it and the other kingdoms communication is kept up by ships. He notices that the ruler had five thousand elephants and that cotton cloth and aloes probably the well-known Kumári Appendix V. Arab References, a.d. 851–1350. Kings. Rahma or Ruhmi. or Cambodian aloes, were the staple produce. Al Masúdi (a.d. 943) after stating that former accounts of Rahma’s214 elephants, troops and horses were probably exaggerated, adds that the kingdom of Rahma extends both along the sea and the continent and that it is bounded by an inland state called Káman (probably Kámarup that is Assam). He describes the inhabitants as fair and handsome and notices that both men and women had their ears pierced. This description of the people still more the extension of the country both along the sea and along the continent suggests that Masúdi’s Al Rahmi is a combination of Burma which by dropping the B he has mixed with Al Rahma. Lane identifies Rahmi215 with Sumátra on the authority of an Account of India and China by two Muhammadan Travellers of the Ninth Century. This identification is supported by Al Masúdi’s216 mention of Rámi as one of the islands of the Java group, the kingdom of the Indian Mihráj. The absence of reference to Bengal in these accounts agrees with the view that during the ninth century Bengal was under Tibet.