41. To the gulf of +Barakê+ succeeds that of +Barugaza+ and the mainland of +Ariakê+, a district which forms the frontier of the kingdom of +Mombaros+ and of all India. The interior part of it which borders on +Skythia+ is called +Aberia+, and its sea-board +Surastrênê+. It is a region which produces abundantly corn and rice and the oil of sesamum, butter, muslins and the coarser fabrics which are manufactured from Indian cotton. It has also numerous herds of cattle. The natives are men of large stature and coloured black. The metropolis of the district is +Minnagar+, from which cotton cloth is exported in great quantity to +Barugaza+. In this part of the country there are preserved even to this very day memorials of the expedition of Alexander, old temples, foundations of camps, and large wells. The extent of this coast, reckoned from +Barbarikon+ to the promontory called +Papikê+, near +Astakapra+, which is opposite +Barugaza+, is 3,000 stadia.
(41) To +Barakê+ succeeds the Gulf of +Barugaza+ (Gulf of +Khambhât+) and the sea-board of the region called +Ariakê+. The reading of the MS. here ἡ πρἡὸς Ἀραβικῆς χώρας is considered corrupt. Müller substitutes ἡ ἤπειρος τῆς Ἀριακῆς χώρας, though Mannert and others prefer Λαρικῆς χώρας, relying on Ptolemy, who places +Ariakê+ to the south of +Larikê+, and says that +Larikê+ comprehends the peninsula (of Gujarât) Barugaza and the parts adjacent. As +Ariakê+ was however previously mentioned in the _Periplûs_ (sec. 14) in connexion with Barugaza, and is afterwards mentioned (sec. 54) as trading with Muziris, it must no doubt have been mentioned by the author in its proper place, which is here. [Bhagvanlâl Indraji Pandit has shewn reasons however for correcting the readings into Αβαρατικη, the Prakrit form of +Aparântikâ+, an old name of the western sea board of India.—_Ind. Ant._ vol. VII., pp. 259, 263.] Regarding the name +Larikê+, Yule has the following note (_Travels of M. Polo_ vol. II., p. 353):—“+Lâr-Deśa+, the country of Lar,” properly Lât-deśa, was an early name for the territory of Gujrat and the northern Konkan, embracing Saimur (the modern Chaul as I believe) Thaṇa, and Bharoch. It appears in Ptolemy in the form +Larikê+. The sea to the west of that coast was in the early Muhammadan times called the sea of Lâr, and the language spoken on its shores is called by +Mas’udi+, +Lâri+. Abulfeda’s authority, Ibn Said, speaks of Lâr and Gujarât as identical.