Marco Polo's Voyage to Indian Seas: 34: Isle of Scotra [1]

About 500 miles south from these isles you find that of Scotra, the people of which are baptised Christians and have an Archbishop.  Ambergris is very plentiful, being voided from the entails of whales, which are pursued most actively, in order to obtain this precious articles.  They strike into the animal a barbed iron so firmly that it cannot be drawn out.  A long line attached enables them to discover them the place where the dead fish lies, and drag it to the shore, when they extract from its belly, this ambergis and from its head several casks of oil. Fine cotton cloth is made and abundance of good salt fish prepared.  The people subsist on rice, milk and flesh, and go naked, after the manner of idolaterous Indians. To this island come many ships and merchants, and all those destined for Aden touch here.  The Archbishop has no connection with the sea of Rome, but is subject to a primate resident at Bagdad, who appoints him, as well as send mandates to bishops and prelates in other quarters of the world.  Hither, too repairs, many Corsairs, with their 

ships, to sell their booty, and find a ready market, because the Christians, knowing it to have been abstracted from idolaters and Saracens, scruple not to purchase.

I can tell you, moreover that these Christians are the most skilful enchanters in the world.  The archbishop, indeed forbids and even punishes this practice, but without any avail; for their ancestors, they say, followed it for them, and they will continue.  For instance, if a ship is proceeding full sail, with a favourable wind, they raise a contrary one, and oblige it return.  They can make it flow from any quarter they please, and cause either a dead calm or a violent tempest.  They perform many other marvellous enchantments, which it would be wrong to relate; they would excite such amazement.  We shall therefore leave them and describe the island of Madagascar.

Notes:- 

1. Socotra Island: Scotra referred to in this chapter is Socotra island, now under the control of Yemen. The Greeks called it Discordia.  The crescent shaped island 340 kilometres southeast of Yemen and east of the Horn of Africa is an eerie landscape.  Commerce brought Indians around the first century to this island. It was an important halt in the marine trading route from Bharuch to Muza, now known as Al mukha.

Cave inscriptions of different times were unearthed by researchers; on the Hoq cave. These inscriptions are in Brahmi, Aksumite, Nabataen, Early Arabic, Palmyrean and  Bactrian languages. Most of them had been authored by sailors on their way to and from Bharuch and Muza.

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