Makran facts for kids

Makran (Urdu: مکران) is a partly-desert coastal strip in the south of Balochistan, in Iran and Pakistan. It is along the coast of the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman. The Persian phrase Mahi khoran, fish-eaters (Mahi = fish + khor = eat) is believed to be the origin of the modern word Makran.

Macran

The narrow coastal plain rises very rapidly into several mountain ranges. The coastline is 1,000 km, 750 km of this is in Pakistan. The climate is very dry with very little rainfall.

History

According to the book Documents on the Persian Gulf's name " and ENCYCLOPEDIA Iranika [1] Makran also Mekran and Mokrān historically in persian and Arabic text was a vast area from Hormuz strait to the Sind River some mentioned as far as gujarat region.also the body of water in that region was called Macran Sea.The name Makrān has found a popular etymology in māhi-ḵᵛorān “fish eaters,” but more probable is a connection with the name Magan,or Maka of the Old Persian. Until the early Islamic period, eastern Makrān at least must have been within the sphere of Indian religion and culture. On his way homewards from the Far East in 1290, Marco Polo (II, pp. 334-35) sailed along the Makrān coast, calling it KisMacoran (i.e. Tiz Makrān), considering it as the last province of India and attributing to it a ruler of its own. In the early 14th century, Ebn Baṭṭuṭa (II, pp. 341-2) records that, after the death of the Il-Khanid sultan (i.e. after 736/1335), a certain Malek Dinār took power in Makrān. It was during these centuries that Makrān was colonized by Baluch tribesmen moving southeastwards from Persia, so that it is today mostly Baluch-speaking. The boundary between Persian Makrān and that part coming within the British Indian province of Baluchistan (the easternmost part forming the Native State of Las Bela) and after 1947 within Pakistan, was demarcated by an Anglo-Persian Boundary Commission in 1870-72.[2]

Images for kids

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  The central Makran range in Pakistan and Iran

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  Parthian version of the Shapur I inscription at Ka'ba-ye Zartosht.

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  Paths that Alexander the Great took

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  Central Makran range

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  Map of the Baluchistan Agency

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  Makran.makoran pars1744 Amesterdam

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  Gwadar beach in Makran region-today the economy of Makrani Baloch is largely based on use of the ocean.

See also

In Spanish: Makrán para niños