Note 177 — XI. HERE FOLLOWETH CONCERNING THE LAND OF MOGAN.[176]

One of the best accounts of Baku is in the Travels of George Forster, of the Bengal Civil Service, who came overland from India by the Caspian in 1784. There were at that time a considerable number of Multán Hindus at Baku, where they had long been established, and were the chief merchants of Shirwán. The Átish-gáh, or Place of Fire, was a square of about thirty yards, surrounded by a low wall, and containing many apartments, in each of which was a small jet of sulphureous fire issuing through a furnace or funnel, “constructed in the form of a Hindu altar.” The fire was used for worship, cookery, and warmth. On closing the funnel the fire was extinguished, when a hollow sound was heard, accompanied by a strong and cold current of air. Exclusive of these there was a large jet from a natural cleft, and many small jets outside the wall, one of which was used by the Hindus for burning the dead.

The whole country round Baku has at times, according to Kinneir, the appearance of being enveloped in flame, and during moonlight nights in November and December a bright blue light is observed to cover the whole western range. My friend Colonel Patrick Stewart, who was lately for some days at Baku, tells me that it is often possible to “set the sea on fire”, i.e., the gaseous exhalations on the surface. He says the Hindus are now only two or three, one of whom, a very old man, had lost the power of speaking his native tongue.

The quantity of naphtha procured in the plain near the city is enormous. Some of the wells are computed to give from 1000 to 1500 pounds a day. It is discriminated as black and white. The white naphtha appears to be used chiefly as a remedy for allaying pains and inflammations. The flat roofs of Baku are covered with the black naphtha, and it is made into balls with sand as a fuel. (See Forster’s Journey from Bengal to England, London, 1798; and Macdonald Kinneir’s Geog. Memoir of the Persian Empire, p. 359.)

From Haxthausen we learn that the Átish-gáh or Átish-jáh has been altered since Forster’s time. The flame now issues from a central opening, and from four circumjacent hollow pillars within the temple, which is a building of a triangular form, and of about one hundred and ninety paces to the side, erected by a Hindu merchant in the present century. The flame is described as being about four feet high, bright, and “waving heavily to and fro against the dark sky, a truly marvellous and spectral sight.” The Átish-gáh of Baku appears to be the “Castle of the Fire-worshippers” spoken of by Polo (ii. 9). He says they revere the fire “as a god, and use it for burning all their sacrifices; and when at any time it goes out, they repair to that well, where the fire is never extinguished, and from it bring a fresh supply.”