"دليل بلاد فارس. مجلد I" [و‎‎٣‎٣‎٠] (٨٢٠/٦٧٨)

RUM— Lat. 33° 27' 80"; Long. 59° 6' 0"; Elev. 5,700'.
A village, situated in a valley about three-quarters of a mile wide, on the
road between Birjand and Kain, 46 miles from the former and 25 miles
from the latter. It consists of 110 houses, built on the bank of a stream, which
is generally dry during the summer months. The annual production of
wheat and barley in ordinary years (§ wheat, § barley) is about 900 Indian
maunds, and the inhabitants possess 100 cattle and 1,200 sheep and goats.
There is a water-mill, which was not in use in August 1903, but is said*
to work in the cold weather when water is abundant. Camel-grazing is
plentiful, but there is no fuel except dried camel-thorn. The water-supply
from the Ictiriz is brackish, but a limited supply of good water is obtainable
from a spring called ’All Asghar Husain, about 3 miles north-east of the
village.— (Wanliss, August 1903; Mac'pherson, 1905.)
RUNlZ TAPPER or NAURlZ TAPPER or NtJZAR TAPPER or
NAURUZ TAPPER—
About a mile to the north of the Safiabad village in the Bam-Safiabad
district of Khorasan lies a long, low, narrow hill, called by the people Runlz
Tappeh or Tappeh-i-Nauriz or Runlz, a corruption from Nuzar, which is
said to be the proper word, Nuzar having been one of the last of the Pish-
dadian kings who ruled Persia prior to the KaianI dynasty, who came to
power in B. C. 708. To the east of this mound are the ruins of a caravan-
serai, strongly built in stone and mortar, a rare thing in these parts.
“ The mound, which is some 500 yards in length by 50 or 60 in breadth
and some 50 feet high, was tunnelled throughout its entire length. This
, tunnel had been run through the harden d mud immediately "under the
fiat conglomerate rock, and apparently in olden times was of sufficient
height for a man to walk upright. Now, the hardened mud has mostly
fallen in and has blocked up the floor, and it is only possible to creep along
and at places the opening is only big enough for a man to crawl through!
One of my men went in for a distance of some 250 yards. Apparently!
the tunnel consists of a main street with little rooms at each side; each
room had a small well in it; atpiesent they are tenanted solely by hyaenas
and porcupines, which apparently abound in the place. One entrance
was under the old gateway of the city about a third of the way down
from the northern end, the other two were near the southern end, all on
the western side. A fourth entrance we found at the northern end
on the eastern side. All these entrances apparently communicated
with each other in olden times. Inside the entrance, under the old gate
way, is a well now only 20 feet deep, but the old Saiyid declared
that he remembered it very deep with running water at the bottom and
that only lately had it got filled up.
In the middle of the mound the men told me they found what seemed to
have been a water mill and a wall, that had been built up with burnt bricks
on one side of the tunnel. From the well a narrow passage runs down to
the north, and this apparently led underground to a low hill beyond which
the Saiyid declared, there were also rooms exacavated inside. ^ He pointed*
oat where the entrance was that he had found, under a grave and now
blocked up. Night was falling, and I had no time to open it up, although