Note (5) — 33.—In which countries silk is grown, and of Persia and of other kingdoms.

(5.) “Maragara.”—There are numerous remains of ancient fortifications on the heights around Meragha. In a westerly direction, at a distance of thirteen miles to the south-west of Tabreez, are the foundations of a round tower, believed to have been the celebrated observatory of Khodja Nazr uddin—defensor fidei—the friend of Houlakon, who transferred his residence to Meragha after the capture of Baghdad in 1258. To this day is shown his tomb,1 and that of his wife Dogous or Dokouz Khatoun, the protectress of Christians, but especially of Nestorians, in whose doctrines she had great faith (Hammer, Gesch. der Ilchane, etc., i, 82). Shortly after her death, the patriarch, Iabellasa, agreed to recognise the supremacy of the Pope, the act having been presented to Benedict II. by a Dominican friar named Jacob. Mosheim (Hist. Tartarorum Eccles., 92) pronounces against the authenticity of this document, an opinion shared by Heyd (Die Colon. der Römisch. Kirche, etc., 322), on the grounds that it was signed at Meragha. It may, however, be contended that the patriarch might have resided for a time at Meragha, after the fall of Baghdad to the Mongols, considering that his successors had no fixed residence to 1559, in which year the patriarch Elias definitively established the seat at Mosoul; and that a tradition is preserved amongst the Nestorians or Chaldæans of Kourdistan, to the effect that their ancestors, who had resisted Timour, were domiciled between the lakes Van and Ouroumyeh.