Note {4} — Chapter IX

Note 4.—Basma, as Valentyn indicated, seems to be the Pasei of the Malays, which the Arabs probably called Basam or the like, for the Portuguese wrote it Pacem. [Mr. J. T. Thomson writes (Proc. R. G. S. XX. p. 221) that of its actual position there can be no doubt, it being the Passier of modern charts.—H. C.] Pasei is mentioned in the Malay Chronicle as founded by Malik al-Ṣálih, the first Mussulman sovereign of Samudra, the next of Marco’s kingdoms. He assigned one of these states to each of his two sons, Malik al-Dháhir and Malik al-Mansúr; the former of whom was reigning at Samudra, and apparently over the whole coast, when Ibn Batuta was there (about 1346–47). There is also a Malay History of the Kings of Pasei to which reference has already been made.