History
Other than being a small fishing village, the town does not figure much in history. Alexander the Great is said to have stopped at Pasni (called 'Cysa' in Arrian's treatise Indica) while unsuccessfully trying to rendezvous with his admiral, Nearchus, during a disastrous exodus via Makran after the Indian Campaign (325 BC). According to one theory, Admiral Nearchus' well-stocked fleet was supposed to have continuously provisioned Alexander's army as the latter marched West along the barren coast towards Persia. In the event, a major portion of Alexander's route through Makran (Bela-Averan-Hoshab-Turbat and then south to Pasni-Gwadar) turned out to be much further inland than expected, apparently due to faulty knowledge of the terrain.
An unexplored Harappan-era settlement known as Sokhta Koh is tucked away in the low hills, about 25 km north of Pasni. It is conjectured that this was an ancient Harappan outpost which traded luxury wares with Mesopotamia and Persian Gulf settlements.
The town of Pasni, along with Gwadar, were burned by the Portuguese in 1581, having had some violent encounters with the Kalmatis in the area. The town was attacked again, by Baloch rebels during the 1898 Baloch uprising; the town was looted, and the telegraph lines running to Gwadar severed.
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Famous quotes containing the word history:
“A country grows in history not only because of the heroism of its troops on the field of battle, it grows also when it turns to justice and to right for the conservation of its interests.”
—Aristide Briand (1862–1932)
“What has history to do with me? Mine is the first and only world! I want to report how I find the world. What others have told me about the world is a very small and incidental part of my experience. I have to judge the world, to measure things.”
—Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951)
“I am ashamed to see what a shallow village tale our so-called History is. How many times must we say Rome, and Paris, and Constantinople! What does Rome know of rat and lizard? What are Olympiads and Consulates to these neighboring systems of being? Nay, what food or experience or succor have they for the Esquimaux seal-hunter, or the Kanaka in his canoe, for the fisherman, the stevedore, the porter?”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)