'Travels in Beloochistan and Sinde; accompanied by a geographical and historical account of those countries, with a map.' [‎277] (319/476)

HISTORY OF BELOOCHISTAN. 277
orighially Abyssinians and he was considered the lineal descend
ant ol a famous Peer or saint, who worked many miracles in his
time. This gave Kumbur and his adherents a weight and respecta
bility among their countrymen, to which neither the numbers of the
latter, nor the hereditary possession of the former, gave them any
claim, for his paternal property was very trifling indeed, and lay in
the district of Punjgoor in Mukran.
On their first ascending the lofty mountains of Jhalawan and Sa-
rawan, these auxiliaries were allowed by Sehwa a very small pit
tance, on which they could scarcely support life; but in a few years,
having either extirpated or quelled the robbers against whom they
had been called in, and finding themselves and their adherents the
only military tribe in the country, and consequently masters of it,
Kumbur formally deposed the Rajah, and assuming the government
himself, forced numbers of the Hindoos to become Moosulmans, and
put others, under the cloak of religious zeal, to death.
Sehwa, the Rajah, with a trifling portion of the population, fled
towards Zuhree, where his son Sungeen was still in power ; but their
new enemies daily acquired fresh strength by the enrollment of other
tribes under their banners, and at length succeeded in driving them
from that retreat, whence they repaired to the cities of Shikarpoor,
Rhukor, and Mooltan, and obtained an asylum among the inhabi
tants, who were principally of their own persuasion.
Sehwa is said to have died during the latter part of this rebellion,
and his son Sungeen, being made a prisoner, abjured his faith, and
embraced Islamism, which example was adopted by a good number
of his followers, who still retain evidence of their former religion in
the name of their tribe, being Gooruwanee f. These are now set
tled in Kutch Gundava, and are reputed to be a quiet laborious
* The word Kumbur in the Belooche language signifies an Abyssinian, thence Kum-
buranee, the name of the tribe to which Muhmood Khan belongs.
f Gooruwanee, disciples of a Gooroo or Hindoo priest.