"The exact meaning of the Arabic rendering of Indian terms is ambiguous, starting with the meaning of budh/budd/but. As the Buddhists had been the first big producers of ornate sculptures for veneration, viz. Buddha statues, the word but became the standard Persian term for "idol", so an idol-worshipper was called But-parast, and an idol-breaker But-shikan, even when the idol was not a Buddha statue. Al-Baladhuri says that "the Indians give in general the name of budd to anything considered with their worship or which forms the object of their veneration. So, an idol is called budd.' (...) In the circumstances, is it likely that the freshly arrived Arab chronicler could distinguish a category of "Buddhists" in the general population of Hindus?... At that stage, the Arab-Muslim newcomers simply couldn't distinguish between Brahmins and Buddhist monks, all But-parasts, "idol-worshippers"."