The Rashīdī History 7.5.1

7.5.1

Perhaps the most noteworthy feature of this land of the Six Cities, and the one that has chiefly struck the imagination of both ancient and modern writers, is the central desert with its moving sands and buried towns. It is referred to in Chinese writings of more than 2000 years old, by travellers who gave the region the name of Liu Sha, or "Moving Sands," from its chief characteristic and most obvious peculiarity; and it was made known to Europeans through the graphic accounts of it which Marco Polo left on record. The phenomenon of the shifting sands could hardly have escaped Mirza Haidar, and the story he tells of the overwhelming of Katak, with its mosque and minaret, is one of the best pieces of description in his book. It is almost an exact counterpart of that told by Hiuen Tsang in the eighth century, of a town between Khotan and Pima (Pain?) which was said to have been overwhelmed by the same agency, some hundreds of years previously. In this case, neglect in the proper worship of a Buddhist idol was the cause, while in the later one the Musulmans detected the wrath of God. The earlier calamity too, is said to have been predicted by a pious Arhat seven days before it occurred. At first a great storm of wind arose, which carried sand and soil before it, while "on the seventh day," continues the narrative, "in the evening, just after the division of the night, it rained sand and earth and filled the city .... The town of Ho-lo-lo-kia is now a great sand mound.