The Salars are one of the minority peoples of China, and they live mainlyat Hsün-hua, south of Sining, in the mountainous district of the Ch'ing-hai Provinee, on the south bank of the Huang-ho (the Yellow River), and some liveat Hua-lung north of the Huang-ho and at Ling-hsia (or Ho-chou) in theKansu Province. In Chinese sources the Salars are firstly reported in theearly eighteenth century (in 1707)bu t the Tâ 'rikh-i Rashidi of Mırzâ HaidarDüghlât (compiled in 1547) already mentions of the Ho-chou Salars 2. According to G. N. POTANIN3 and W. W. ROCKHILL4, who visited the Salardistrict to investigate their language and ethnographical features at the endof the ninteenth century, the Ch'ing-hai Salars were reported for the firsttime as Turkic-speaking Muslims.