The Rukh

The Chinese traveller Chau Ju-kwa in his work Chu-fan-chï on the Chinese and Arab trade in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, speaking of the country of Pi p’a lo (Berbera), says: “The country brings forth also the (so-called) ‘camel crane’, which measures from the ground to its crown from six to seven feet. It has wings and can fly, but not to any great height.” The translators and commentators Hirth and Rockhill have (p. 129) the following notes: “Quotation from Ling-wai-tai-ta, 3, 6a. The ostrich was first made known to the Chinese in the beginning of the second century of our era, when some were brought to the court of China from Parthia. The Chinese then called them An-si-tsio ‘Parthian bird.’ See Hou Han Shu, 88, and Hirth, China and Roman Orient, 39. In the Weï shu, 102, 12b, no name is given them, they are simply ‘big birds which resemble a camel, which feed on herbs and flesh and are able to eat fire.’ In the T’ang shu, 221, 7a, it is said that this bird is commonly called ‘camel-bird.’ It is seven feet high, black of colour, its feet like those of the camel, it can travel three hundred li a day, and is able to eat iron. The ostrich is called by the Persians ushturmurgh and by the Arabs ṭeir al-djamal, both meaning ‘camel birds.’”

Dr. Bretschneider in his Notes on Chinese Mediæval Travellers to the West (1875), p. 87, n. 132, has a long note with a figure from the Pen ts’ao kang mu on the “camel-bird” (p. 88).

Cf. F. Hirth, Die Länder des Islam, Supp. Vol. V. of T’oung Pao, 1894, p. 54. Tsuboi Kumazo, Actes XIIe Cong. Int. Orient., Rome, 1899, II., p. 120.

XXXIII., p. 421.