'Reconnaissances in Mesopotamia, Kurdistan, North-West Persia, and Luristan from April to October 1888. By Lt F R Maunsell, Intelligence Branch. In Two Volumes. Volume I: narrative report, description of larger towns and routes leading from them. Simla: Intelligence Branch, Quarter Master General's Dept, 1890' [‎127r] (258/312)

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and tli^n takes a straight line here across the hills. The Gavvar plain.
(6.500') is now reached, and gradually opens out to view.
The river winds down the centre in a very sluggish course, looking like a
canal. There are no trees visible, and the plain has the appearance of having
been once the bed of an old lake.
Our track skirts some low undulations by the east side along a broad easy
track ; the ground in the centre near the river looks swampy ; at the edges
the soil is a rich loam growing wheat well.
DiZA.—At 3H miles arrived at Diza, or Dizza as it is also pronounced,
the principal place in the Gavvar district, and the head-quarters of the
Mutaserif and the Turkish troops.
It contains 700 houses built on a spur of rocky soil jutting out into the
plain. The inhabitants are Armenians and Jews for the most part, with a few
Kurds. There are some good houses of sundried brick, but most are huts of
stone and mud, with a few small gardens and poplars round the town.
Fruit and vegetables have to he imported from Urmia gardens. Ice is
stored in pits throughout the summer.
There is one battalion (500 men) of Turkish regular troops and some oO
zaptiyahs quartered here since the Kurdish rebellion of IbSl.
The barracks are a square block of one-storied buildings in a rather tum
bled down condition, situated on a spur overlooking the town. There is a
telegraph office, and the wire from Bashkala does not go beyond this. The
Gavvar plain is 20 miles long and 8 miles wide, and I could only count 12
poor looking villages, generally a collection of mud huts on a low mound.
A few clumsy carts or i( arabas ,J drawn by two buffaloes were seen on the
plain. . . .
Looking west was a splendid panorama of the Jelu mountains, with, peaks >
covered with perpetual snow. The central peak, called dura Daouil, bore
249° from here, and was I 62 miles distant. Measured by sextant, its
altitude above sea level was 17,280 feet, or only about 150 feet lower than
Mount Ararat. It rises 10,780 feet above Gavvar plain.
Bearing 255°, and 13 miles distant, was Tura Bermarghi, another peak m
the same ridge 15,800 feet high ; and another peak 19 miles distant healing
246° and 15,430 feet high. _ oaqo
These form the culminating points of the range. As tar as 200 the sum
mit of the ridge is jagged, and a series of stupendous cliffs with ravines
filled with perpetual snow. . n . . 1 1 i
From 263° to 276° the summit of the range is rounded, with a general level
of 14,500 feet, and thickly covered with snow.
From 276°, northward to the Zab, the range gradually gets lower, and has
only a few patches of snow. .
South of the main peaks from 205° to 236° is a marked dip in the range,
the hill tops being rounded with few patches of snow. A road seen
winding over here, and leading in the direction of Rezan (see Route V 111).
On the other side of these ranges to the west lie the deep narrow valleys 0
Christian districts of Baz and Jelu. _ . . „
From 205° to the southward the range again rises m a series of ridges
with numerous peaks, all thickly covered with snow and with high jagge
summits. And it looks a most impracticable sort of country. Nutcha and
Shamsdin, both elevated districts, lie in this direction. I could hear ot no
road leading through there to Rawanduz. , ,-i . • ±.
The plain runs up in a direction 167° for some 12 miles, and at that point
a narrow valley seems to enter, coming from the direction of bhamsdin