bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
XIX. A Nepalese Vajra
Authors: de la Vallée Poussin L. , Thomas F. W.
Published: March 2011

The three texts deciphered below appear on a vajra, the property of Mr. G. D. Sofoulis of Shanghai, a photograph of which has been lent to the Egyptian and Oriental Society of Manchester by Mr. F. Evans.

According to the description received the vajra is 37 inches long and from 1¾ to 2 inches wide. It weighs about 5 lb. The blade is made of steel, which is 28½ inches long and is pointed and sharpened on both sides. The inscriptions and the handle are made of pure Chinese or Indian gold and with twenty-four pieces of red and blue stones (corals and others), some of which are lost.
IX. A Biography of Shay

kh

Aḥmad-i-Jâm
Authors: Ivanow W.
Published: March 2011

In the autumn of 1915 I found at Buârâ a few leaves of a Persian MS. forming part of an unknown work devoted to the biography of the famous saint Shay Aḥmad-i-Jâm, surnamed Zindah-Fîl. There were only thirteen leaves, 23 by 18 and 16 by 13·5 cm., written on old Oriental paper, eighteen or nineteen lines in a page, in a comparatively elegant old character (like that of MSS. copied at Herât). This MS. was copied apparently in the tenth or eleventh century a.h. (The first page is written perhaps with a different qalam, but the hand seems to be the same as in the other parts.)
XIV. The Confusion between Hamīda Bāno Bēgam (Maryam - Makānī), Akbar's Mother, and Hīji Bēgam or Bēga Bēgam, The Senior Widow of Humāyūn: Humāyūn's Tomb
Authors: Smith Vincent A.
Published: March 2011

Humāyūn married Hājī, alias Bēga Bēgam, about 1527. Fourteen years later, in 1541, he married Hamīda Bāno Bēgam, who became the mother of Akbar in 1542, and was known by the honorific style of Maryam Makānī, “dwelling with Mary,” that is to say the Virgin Mary, after her death. On the face of it no confusion between the two ladies should be possible. Nevertheless, they have been frequently confounded, and the error can be traced back as early as 1612, only seven years after Akbar's death. The common error is explained by the fact that Akbar treated Hājī Bēgam, the elder lady, as a second mother, so that many people believed him to be her son.
XVII. The most ancient Goddess Cybele
Authors: Legge F.
Published: March 2011

In the year 204, exactly two centuries before the date generally accepted as that of the birth of Christ, the Roman State had passed through an experience much like that of our great Ally across the Channel in the autumn of 1914. Hannibal, the lifelong enemy of Rome, had surmounted obstacles thought to be insurmountable, had swept into Italy like a whirlwind, and in a few pitched battles had destroyed six consular armies. After one of these victories, his Moorish cavalry had raided right up to the walls of Rome, then only defended by old men and boys, and the Eternal City seemed to be at his mercy. Yet at the last moment he turned aside, as did von Kluck in our day, and pushed into the rich province which was afterwards Naples, whence it took all the nibbling strategy of Fabius to dislodge him. When Capua at last fell, he still kept his grip on the Calabrian coast, where he waited for reinforcements which never reached him, to again attack Rome. So long as he was on Italian soil, there could be no rest nor peace of mind for those Romans who, like the elder Cato, had seen the fierce African spearmen galloping through the Campagna, firing the thatched huts and driving off the cattle which formed all the wealth of the peasant farmers, then the backbone of the Republic. During all this time, too, the Roman populace behaved beautifully. Even after Cannæ they had not despaired of the Republic; they had suspended their long quarrel with the patricians; and, after a few very unsuccessful experiments with mobappointed generals, had left the conduct of the war in the more capable hands of the Senate. But when a shower of stones—probably lapilli from some volcano on the coast—fell upon the city, they were seized with one of the superstitious panics to which they were prone. They cried out that the gods were angry with them, and, as the unknown is sometimes more terrible than the known, there was more fear of their weakening before this menace than before Hannibal.
XX. An Early Mention of the Nahr Malka
Authors: Pinches T. G.
Published: March 2011

This tablet, which is in Mrs. Pinches's collection, seems to have come from Jokha. It is of baked clay, and measures 44.5 mm. high by 39 mm. wide. The amount of text with which it is inscribed is 10 short lines, divided equally between the obverse and the reverse. Both sides have impressions of a cylinder-seal, by which the written characters are slightly obliterated. The principal impression appears in the space between lines 7 and 8 (reverse).
VII. Further Arabic Inscriptions on Textiles
Authors: Guest A. R.
Published: March 2011

In the Journal for 1906 there were published some Arabic inscriptions on textiles in the South Kensington Museum. Two more Arabic inscriptionś on textiles may now be brought to notice. One of them is taken from a Russian publication; the other is from a piece of stuff in the Museum. Mr. A. F. Kendrick, of the Museum, has drawn attention to these specimens, and, as before, has kindly supplied the descriptions of the stuffs. The objects are:—

1. From Wladimir Bock. Coptic Art: Coptic Figured Textiles [Text in Russian]. Moscow, 1897.
III. The Society of Biblical Archæology
Authors: Legge F.
Published: March 2011

The Society of Biblical Archæology was born at a meeting held on November 18, 1870, at the rooms of Mr. Joseph Bonomi, Curator of the Soane Museum in Lincoln's Inn Fields. Its ruling spirit was from the first Dr. Samuel Birch, the then Keeper of the Assyrian and Egyptian Antiquities at the British Museum, at whose instance the meeting was convened. It was attended by some eighteen gentlemen, of whom Sir Henry Rawlinson, Mr. Fox Talbot, Mr. J. W. Bosanquet, and Canon Cook were perhaps those best known to fame, and in the result decided to form itself into a Society “for the investigation of the Archæology, Chronology, Geography, and History of Ancient and Modern Assyria, Arabia, Egypt, Palestine, and other Biblical Lands, the promotion of the study of the Antiquities of those countries, and the preservation of a continuous record of discoveries now or hereafter to be in progress”. With this view an association with Mr. William Cooper as Secretary was instituted, which by March 21 in the following year had received a sufficient number of adherents to hold monthly meetings, at which papers were read, to be afterwards printed and circulated either at the author's expense or at that of one or two of the richer members. In his Inaugural Address to the first of these gatherings, Dr. Birch, who had been unanimously elected President, gave a summary, still well worth reading, on the then state of Oriental Archæology and the discovery of its principal monuments, and struck the note which has been sustained throughout the Society's history by the announcement that “Archæology and not Theology” was its aim, and that “it must be attractive to all who are interested in the primitive and early history of mankind”. Early in 1872 it had progressed sufficiently to take rooms at 9 Conduit Street, Regent Street, to formulate a set of Rules, afterwards embodied in the Memorandum and Articles of Association, and to publish the first volume of Transactions, together with a list of 166 members, which included Mr. Tyssen Amherst (afterwards Lord Amherst of Hackney), Mr. Arthur Cates (of H.M. Office of Works), Canon T. K. Cheyne, Dr. Currey (Master of the Charterhouse), Mr. Gladstone, Count Gleichen, Mr. (afterwards Sir) Henry Howorth, Canon Lightfoot, Professor Mahaffy, Mr. Walter Morrison, Canon George Rawlinson, Professor Sayce, and Captain (afterwards Sir Charles) Wilson, R.E.—names which show how widely the net had been thrown. Of the papers published, many were of high merit, and included a study of the Early History of Babylonia by the late George Smith, another on the Origin of Semitic Civilization by Professor Sayce, and several on the then newly-found Cypriote Inscriptions, by their discoverer, Mr. R. Hamilton Lang (H.M. Consul at Cyprus), George Smith, and Dr. Birch.
IX. A “Manichæan” Fragment from Egypt
Authors: Crum W. E.
Published: March 2011

The parchment fragment reproduced on Plate I was acquired some twenty years since by the British Museum, where it is numbered Or. 6201 C (1). It lay among a large quantity of Coptic papyrus and parchment MSS., the dialect, scripts, and incidental names of which confirm the seller's statement that all were bought together at Ashmunain. The ages of these manuscripts vary greatly; some of the parchment uncials should belong to the 5th or 6th century, others and some of the papyri to the 9th or 10th. The large majority of the latter are, however, of the 7th or 8th century. Obviously, from such facts none but the vaguest conclusions can be drawn.
XIV. Portrait of Gosāīṅ Jadrūp
Authors: Coomaraswamy Ananda K.
Published: March 2011

The accompanying reproduction of a picture of a seated Yogī was shown to me by the owner, a resident of Ajmere, but of whose name, unfortunately, I made no note, at Allahabad in 1911. It is of considerable interest, not only as a Mughal portrait of the very finest quality, but as an evidently authentic likeness of a famous Sādhu— the Gosāīṅ Jadrūp—referred to at some length in the Memoirs of Jahāngīr and elsewhere.
The Origins of Arabic Poetry
Authors: Margoliouth D. S.
Published: March 2011

The existence of poets in Arabia before the rise of Islam is certified by the Qur'an, which contains one Surah named after them, and occasionally alludes to them elsewhere. Among the descriptions of the Prophet given by his opponents there was “ a Jinn-ridden poet” (xxxvii, 35), to which he replies that he has brought the truth. In another passage (lii, 29) the suggestions that he was a kāhin, a jinn-ridden man, and a poet are offered as alternatives. Since those who described him as a poet said they would wait to see what would happen to him (lii, 30) it might be inferred that poets were in the habit of foretelling the future. Elsewhere he asserts that his language is not that of a poet, but rather of an honourable messenger (lxix, 41), and that God had not taught him poetry, which would have been of no use to him (xxxvi, 69); his utterances were “ statement and clear lesson ”, whence we should infer that poetry was obscure. These hints about the poets are summarized in the Surah that bears their name (xxvi, 224, foll.), where we are told that they are followed by the misguided, rave in every valley, and say what they do not do. The sequel might seem to except certain pious bards from this condemnation, but the style of the Qur'an renders it uncertain whether this exception really applies to bards.
A Note on the Sanskrit Monologue-Play (Bhana), with special reference to the Caturbhani
Authors: De S. K.
Published: March 2011

Popular and (as attested by theory) undoubtedly old as the bhāṇa must have been, the specimens of this form of composition which have been hitherto known to exist belong to comparatively recent times. Considerable importance, therefore, attaches to the discovery and publication (1922) of four bhāṇas. under the title Caturbhāṇī, by M. Ramakrishna Kavi and S. K. Ramanatha Sastri from Śivapurī, for which great antiquity is claimed by the editors and which, whatever might be their date, are certainly older than any of the late existing specimens. The Caturbhāṇī consists of Ubhayâbhisārikā (Ubh), Padma-prābhṛtaka (Pp), Dhūrtaviṭa-saṃvāda (Dvs) and Pāda-tāḍitaka (Pt), ascribed respectively, on the authority chiefly of a traditional verse, to Vararuci. Śūdraka, Īśvaradatta and Śyāmilaka. Professor Keith, in his recently published Sanskrit Drama (p. 185, fn. 3), throws doubt on the first two ascriptions, and declares rather dogmatically that “ none of these plays need be older than a.d. 1000”.
Islam and the Protected Religions
Authors: Tritton A. S.
Published: March 2011

In Muslim countries adherents of the protected religions had to put up with certain restrictions on their public life. It was held that this was sanctioned by the Ḳur'ān, “Until they pay tribute out of hand, and they be humbled.” This humiliation is often mentioned in the early treaties.
Pictographic Reconnaissances. Part IX and Index
Authors: Hopkins L. C.
Published: March 2011

All things must come to an end, and this series of papers, now running for ten years, is herewith concluded. This final instalment consists of an index, enabling a reader to find at once any character discussed in the series, with the year of the Journal and the page in the latter where the character appears. Naturally the years cannot pass without disclosing much that could be added or improved or qualified. But remembering that he who begins by revising may end by rewriting, I have left these studies as they were published in the Journal.
Ibn Khurdādhbih on Musical Instruments
Authors: Farmer Henry George
Published: March 2011

In an article written in 1926 on “Byzantine Musical Instruments in the Ninth Century” I mentioned that one of the earliest extant accounts in Arabic of the musical instruments of the Arabs and their neighbours is contained in an oration delivered by Ibn Khurdādhbih before Al-Mu'tamid (870–93). The narration appears in the Murūj al-dhahab of Al-Mas'ūdī (d. c. 956). Both of these writers were competent, to some extent, to deal with the question in its general aspect, and for that reason the recital has an added interest. Ibn Khurdādhbih had been taught music by the famous Isḥāq al-Mauṣilī (767–850), who was his father's personal friend. By his books, and by other means, some historical details of music and musicians were preserved, and they have been cited by later writers. Some of this information has, however, been challenged more than once by the author of the Kitāb al-aghānī, who censures Ibn Khurdādhbih for his mere conjectures, and for making statements without sufficient authority. Yet it may be presumed that the details given by Al-Mas'ūdī on the authority of Ibn Khurdādhbih may be trusted. The former, who had the highest opinion of the latter, would scarcely have quoted him at such length without reservations had he not approved. Al-Mas'ūdī was a great traveller and observer, and he had himself dealt with the music and musical instruments of the Arabs, Greeks, Byzantines, Syrians, Nabatseans, Indians, Persians, and others in his various works. If Ibn Khurdādhbih had erred, “the Imām of the historians,” as Ibn Khaldūn has called Al-Mas'ūdī, would assuredly have corrected him.
The Honan Relics: a New Investigator and some Results
Authors: Hopkins L. C.
Published: March 2011

It is a genuine pleasure to report the accession of another Chinese critic and investigator of the Shang dynasty writing, in the person of Mr. Wang Kuo-wei of Hai-ning Chou , in the Central Chinese Province of Chehkiang.

I propose to lay before the readers of the Journal one or two of the more interesting results of his decipherments, together with a few notes of my own upon these.
A Short Anthology of Guran Poetry
Authors: Soane E. B.
Published: March 2011

The Anthology is a manuscript furnished by Dr. Sa'iīd, of Sina, to the British Museum, numbered Or. 6444; the writer is working from a photographic reproduction made for him in 1908 by order of Mr. A. G. Ellis.

The distance from the Oriental Department of the British Museum and absence of sufficient books of reference—this article is being written in Sulaimania, South Kurdistan—is a handicap on adequate comparison of words.
Cerebralization in Sindhi
Authors: Turner R. L.
Published: March 2011

One of the striking differences between the phonetic systems of Indo-Aryan and its parent Indo-European is the existence in the former of the cerebral series of sounds as well as the dental. These appear among the stops, the nasals, the sibilants, and later among the liquids also. Thus opposed to Indo-European t th d dh, n, s z, l r we find in the various Indo-Aryan languages the two series—

t th d dh, n, s *z, l r

ṭ ṭh ḍ ḍh, ṇ, ṣ *ẓ, ḷ ṛ ṛh.

Of these, *z *ẓ belong to the prehistoric and ṛ ṛh to the modern period.
The Identification of the Chinese Phoenix
Authors: Hachisuka M. U.
Published: March 2011

All those acquainted with Chinese art and literature are familiar with two fabulous birds, known in Chinese as Fêng-huang and Luan and in Japanese as Ho-ow and Luan respectively. Not very appropriately the name Phœnix has been given to the former in Western nomenclature.
The Mahmal of the Moslem Pilgrimage
Authors: Robinson Arthur E.
Published: March 2011

It is very improbable that the Mahmal, which formed such a prominent object in the procession of the “Kiswat en Nebi” at Cairo and the pilgrim caravans from Egypt and Syria, will be seen in the Hejaz again.

There are very strong political and religious reasons against its introduction into the ceremonies at Mecca. As the practice of sending a Mahmal to Mecca was adopted by an Indian Prince and the late Sultan of Darfur, it might be of use to trace the origin and purport of this very curious custom in Islam.
X. The Ḥisba Jurisdiction in the Aḥkām Sultaniyya of Māwardi
Authors: Amedroz H. F.
Published: March 2011

The general injunction in the Ḳurān to “eschew evil and do good” was held sufficiently definite to be the basis of a jurisdiction distinct both from that of the Ḳaḍi and of the police (shurṭa). Māwardi contrasts its powers with those of the Ḳaḍi's court and of the Maẓālim tribunal; but it may be that in practice the distinction was of small account, for I have found no trace of the Muḥtasib's authority ever being called in question, nor indeed much definite trace of its exercise. The wide and minute range of its duties should have made it an important factor in commercial life, but perhaps in this, as in other fields, Māwardi's work includes theory unsupported by much practice.
The Genius: A Study in Indo-European Psychology
Authors: Barnett L. D.
Published: March 2011

“The Genius knows, that companion who controls our natal star, the god of man's nature attached to each human being's head, changeful in aspect, white and black.” With every person, family, and social group and place was connected a tutelary deity who from birth onwards controlled the destinies of the person or thing that lay under his sway, I dispensing either happiness or trouble. The word genius probably means “natal, connected by birth”, γεεθλιος, and to the Italian mind signified “the personality, the character, abstracted from the man and made into a god” (Roscher, Ausf. Lex. d. gr. u. röm. Myth., col. 1615, s.v.). These Genii were regarded as forming the proletariat or commons of the Italian gods (Seneca, Ep. 110), and the month of December was sacred to them (Ovid, Fasti III. 58). There are some traces in Italy of evil genii corresponding to these good spirits; the idea of this dualism is at bottom IE., though the rigid schematic application of it is perhaps due to later developments. In art the Genius was represented as a young man with a snake, or a snake alone. The former combination is really a kind of compound hieroglyph, in which the man's figure signifies youth or vitality and the snake stands for eternity, so that the combination means an eternal divine person, who was the guardian sprit or divine counterpart of a human being or place, quite distinct from the Manes or soul, which never could attain to divinity, and was liable to suffering after death.
Ibn Baṭṭū;ṭa's Journey to Bulghàr: Is it a Fabrication?
Authors: Janicsek Stephen
Published: March 2011

The Moorish traveller Ibn Baṭṭūṭa occupies a peculiar place in medieval geography, not only because his journeys were so extensive, exceeding in length even those of Marco Polo, but because the record of them contains such a fantastic mixture of items of information, some valuable or precise, others worthless or vague in the extreme, regarding the different cities, provinces, and distinguished men that he had seen. Everyone who has traced out his journey step by step must agree that there are serious arguments against the trustworthiness of his statements regarding several of the cities which he claimed to have visited. On the other hand, it is exceedingly difficult to substantiate the suspicions thus aroused. He was a skilful narrator, and did not himself, as is well known, write down the record of his journeys; consequently the existence of one or two errors in his account of a city or a district does not prove anything against him, since it must be allowed that his memory occasionally played him false. Besides, Ibn Battuta was a typical son of the medieval East, a fact which explains certain systematic faults in his narrative. For example, he is very inconsequent; sometimes he speaks at length of a small village, and sometimes devotes no more than one or two words to a celebrated city. Sometimes, but not always, he gives an impression of sincerity, saving frankly that he was badly treated by so-and-so, or that he was told about such and such a city or country, but did not himself visit it. For this reason one is naturally inclined to accept his word when he says that he personally visited a place.
The Legend of Telibinus
Authors: Sayce A. H.
Published: March 2011

In the “Yuzgat” Tablet we read: “and the dirges for Telibinus are finished” (Telibinuss-a mugauwas qati). The word I have rendered “dirges” is translated by the Assyrian tazimtu and includes the legends which were repeated in the celebration of what may be termed the death and resurrection of the Hittite god Telibinus. Telibinus, “the son of Teli,” like Khatebinus “the child of Khate”, was one of the deified kings of the primitive Hittites and is accordingly coupled with Zidkhariyas, another early hero, and Khebe the goddess of Kizzuwadna. In Greek mythology he was known as Telephus, King of Mysia. In the treaty of Subbiluliuma with Simassara he is called the god of Turmitta, which is identified by Professor Garstang with Derende.
The Date of the Yoga-sūtras
Authors: Prasad Jwala
Published: March 2011

Considering the fact that the Mīmāṃsā, the Vedānta, the Sāṃkhya, and the Yoga schools owe their origin directly to the Vedas, the Brāhmaṇas, and the Upaniṣads, it may be expected that the doctrines of these would have been systematized and put together into the form of the Sūtras earlier than those of the Vaiśeṣika and the Nyāya schools, the essential tenets of which had their beginnings in a later and different kind of literature. This expectation, however, seems to be belied by the fact that the present Sāṃkhya-sūtras have been proved to belong to a very late period, as late as the fourteenth century a.d.; and the Yoga-sūtras are now believed by a number of scholars, following Professors Jacobi and Woods, to be as late as the fourth or fifth century a.d. Now, while the gap of an early systematic work on the Sāṃkhya is filled up by the Sāṃkhya-kārikā, or it may be explained by the surmise that there was an early Sūtra work, either a shorter form of the present one or altogether different from it, which is lost, the Yoga-sūtras are all that we have as a systematic exposition of the Yoga doctrines, and there is no reason to believe that they were preceded by another work of a similar nature. • The question, then, is whether the systematization of such an early school of thought as the Yoga would have been postponed until as late as the fourth or fifth century a.d., and until after the systematization of the doctrines of even the Vaiśeṣika and the Nyāya schools, which began later on, and the Sūtras of which definitely contain a reference to the Yoga doctrines of mystic intuition and concentration.
The account of the Isma'ili doctrines in the Jami' al-Tawarikh of Rashid al-Din Fadlallah
Authors: Levy Reuben
Published: March 2011

Although references to the subject of Ismā'īlī doctrine have been frequent enough in the text-books and learned journals, the earliest source quoted in nearly all of them is the Ta'rīkh-i Jahān-Gushā of Juwaynī. By a comparison of that work with the corresponding section of the Jāmi' al-Tawārīkh of Rashīd al-Dīn it is evident that the latter is the source from which Juwaynī drew most of his materials, and that for his compilation he used such sections of it as suited his purposes, omitting and transposing passages as he thought fit. In certain instances his omissions from the text have caused obscurities which the original version of Rashīd al-Dīn does not contain, and quite often the borrowings have been incorporated without any great effort to make them fit snugly into their context. Since the Ta'rīkh-i Jahān-Gushā is fairly well known I shall confine myself here to the work of Rashīd al-Dīn, which seems destined for some time longer to remain in the obscurity of manuscript.
The Origin of the Arabian Lute and Rebec
Authors: Farmer Henry George
Published: March 2011

Among the instruments of Mediaeval Europe that contributed most to the progress of the art of music the lute and rebec stand pre-eminent. That they were introduced into Western Europe by the Arabs is generally admitted, and for that reason the question of their original adoption by the Arabs themselves is of some importance, especially in view of the statements of Miss Schlesinger; not only in the above extract, but in the works to which she refers us.
The Kumzari Dialect of the Shihuh Tribe, Arabia, and a Vocabulary
Authors: Thomas Bertram
Published: March 2011

Kumzāri is a dialect spoken exclusively by certain coastal elements of the Shiḥuḥ tribe, the Kumāzara section, who occupy Kumzār at the head of the Musandam Peninsula of Oman, and are found at Dibah, Khasab, the coastal villages of Elphinstone and Malcolm Inlets and at Larek Island.
Excavation at Ur, 1929–30
Authors: Woolley C. Leonard
Published: March 2011

Mr. Woolley said that the eighth season which they had just finished at Ur had been the most interesting historically and in some ways the most exciting season they had yet had: it was also undoubtedly the most varied. They were able to get plans of buildings, antiquities, etc., illustrating practically every phase in the history of the town of Ur from the 6th century b.c. back to a period which we cannot date, but which we call pictorially the Period of the Flood. Their programme when they started consisted of three principal objects—the first to clear up the plan of the city, tracing out its walls and fortifications which they knew to belong for the most part to the period of 2000 b.c., roughly speaking the period of Abraham. Then they had to go on with the great cemetery which in previous seasons had paid them so richly; and thirdly, they had to enlarge upon the work done in the season before when a trial pit brought to light material evidence of the flood and of a civilization older than the flood and following on after it. Dealing with the town defences he said he could not yet show them a complete plan, but could show a section of the wall and explain the character of what had been found. The whole circuit of the wall is nearly two and a half miles; they followed it all along. The defences consist for the most part of great ramparts of mud brick, solidly built throughout, to a height of 26 ft.
Some Notes on Modern Babylonia
Authors: Thompson R. Campbell
Published: March 2011

The following paper is based on notes which I made during my three years of war service in Mesopotamia (1915–18) and a year (1904–5) at Mosul, and I venture to publish them in the hope that such piecemeal may be of use to those interested in comparing ancient Assyria with modern Mesopotamia.
The Early History of the Ba

gh

dād Boil
Authors: Elgood C.
Published: March 2011

The last few years have seen a great and almost universal interest in the history of medicine. It is strange that, in spite of the researches that have been made in the epidemics and diseases of ancient times, none of the writers who have worked on the various aspects of Cutaneous Leishmaniasis, as the Baghdād Boil is called in medical languagehas been able to trace the history of the disease before the nineteenth century. It is not as though it were a disease that could have escaped the notice of the ancients. Cutaneous Leishmaniasis is characterized by a superficial ulcer, sometimes as large as the top of a coffee cup, which runs a slow and protracted course. It is not as though it were a disease confined to some distant and uncivilized part of the globe. It is found in South America, North Africa, and all over the Middle and Near East. Why, then, is there no history of the disease ? Where did it start ? Who can claim the honour of introducing the Bouton de Biskra into Moroccothe Baghdād Boil into 'Irāq, the Delhi Boil into India, and the Tropical Sore into non-tropical Persia ?
“Bird Script” on Ancient Chinese Swords
Authors: Yetts W. Perceval
Published: March 2011

Hsü Shên in his postface to the Shuo wên gives a list of eight styles of script practised in the Ch'in period. The fourth of these is called ch'ung shu and a note is added by Hsü Ch'ieh one of the editors of the revised text which was published in a.d. 986 at the emperor's command. He remarks that the term is equivalent to niao shu “bird script”, so called because the tops of the characters represent bird forms. There is, however, tangible evidence that this fanciful variety of writing was in vogue earlier than the Ch'in period.
On Certain Alternations between Dental Finals in Tibetan and Chinese
Authors: Wolfenden Stuart N.
Published: March 2011

Comparison of the vocabularies of Tibetan and Chinese, although attempted in the past, cannot be said as yet to have been undertaken along lines likely to produce outstanding results. All too frequently single words have been singled out for comparison, or a single member of a known family has been selected from the one language and placed beside a single word, seemingly related, likewise torn loose from a known group in the other. Or, again, an entire series of comparisons seems to rest on identity of meanings no matter how widely dissimilar the words which carry them may be in the two languages. The dangers of such methods are obvious. We are not only very probably selecting the wrong members on one side, or on both, but are detaching the words so used entirely from their semantic backgrounds.
Maurya Symbols
Authors: Jayaswal K. P.
Published: March 2011

In the course of my lecture on “Some Coins of the Mauryas and Śungas”, delivered before the Royal Asiatic Society in June, 1935, I emphasized two symbols found on the signed coins as being essentially Mauryan, namely, the “moon-on-hill” and the hollow cross. What seems a clinching piece of evidence on the question has since become available to me from theRāmpurwä copper bolt of Aśoka, now in the Indian Museum, Calcutta, through the kindness of my friend, Mr. Durga Prasad, who examined the bolt and found the marks. A rubbing of these on tissue paper given to him by Mr. N. G. Majumdar, Superintendent in charge of the Archæological Section of the Museum, is reproduced on Plate II. The symbols (written from right to left) are arranged in columns as below (Pl. II (a)):—
Two Royal Titles of the Early Sinhalese, and the Origin of Kingship in Ancient Ceylon.
Authors: Paranavitana S.
Published: March 2011

Among the royal titles used by the early Sinhalese kings there are two which, as royal titles, were not adopted by any of the dynasties known to us in India, and were therefore peculiar to Ceylon. An investigation into the history of these two titles is likely to throw some light on the origin of kingship in ancient Ceylon, and I therefore propose in this paper to pursue this line of study so far as the material available at present allows us to do so. The conclusions at which I have arrived by a study of the available data on this may not, in the present state of our knowledge, be taken as definitely established; but they might, nevertheless, be worthy of consideration by scholars interested in the early history of the Sinhalese people.
Early References to Music in the Western Sūdān
Authors: Farmer Henry George
Published: March 2011

A Glance at the recently publishedAfrican Native Music: An Annotated Bibliography(London, 1936), will reveal the fact that early references to the music of negro and negroid peoples are rare. Indeed, in this very useful bibliography no work earlier than the seventeenth century is quoted. The truth is that many early references have been neglected. It may be admitted that these neglected references occur in Arabic works, but most of these have been translated into European languages, so that they are available to the general musicographer.
Tibetan Documents concerning Chinese Turkestan. VII: Government and Social Conditions
Authors: Thomas F. W.
Published: March 2011

1. M.I. viii, 90 (wood, c. 16 × 1·5–2cm., complete; hole for string at r.; 1.1 of cursive dbu-can script).
XV. The Rummindei Inscription and the Conversion of Asoka to Buddhism
Authors: Fleet J. F.
Published: March 2011

The text of the Rummindēī inscription, styled at first “the Aśōka edict of Paḍariā,” appears to have been first published by Professor Bühler, in the Anzeiger for the 7th January, 1897, of the Philosophical and Historical Section of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, Vienna. A translation of it was given by M. Barth in the Journal des Savants, 1897. 73. The record was fully edited by Professor Bühler, with an excellent facsimile, in the Epigraphia Indica, 5. 1 ff.
XVII. The Coinage of Nepal
Authors: Walsh E. H.
Published: March 2011

The coins which are dealt with in the present paper fall under three divisions. First, the coins of the Early Licchavi Sūryavaṁśī dynasty, whose capital was at Mānagṛha, the present Kāṭhmāṇḍū, and those of the Ṭhākurī dynasty who were ruling at the same time over the western portion of Nepal, with their palace at Kailāśa-kūṬabhavana, situated in another part of the same city. Second, the coins of the three Newār Malla dynasties, who reigned contemporaneously over the three kingdoms of Bhātgāon, KāṬhmāṇḍū, and Pātan, or Lalitāpur.
Babylonian and Hebrew Demonology with reference to the supposed borrowing of Persian Dualism in Judaism and Christianity
Authors: Langdon S.
Published: March 2011

Dualism is a term introduced into modern theology by the Englishman, Thomas Hyde, in 1700, and was first used to describe sthe fundamental principle of Persian Zoroastrism, namely the independent existence of good and evil. Ormazd the good god and Ahriman the evil god in the theology of the Persians represent an absolute dualism. For them Ahriman, corresponding to Satan of Judaism and Christianity, is entirely independent of the creator god. Good and evil, God and the Devil, are primeval supreme powers. Now I wish to trace the history of Satan or the Devil in Christianity back through Judaism, Hebrew, and Babylonian religion to its origin among the Sumerians. I shall endeavour to prove this Persian dualism, which admits that God did not create the Devil, to be totally foreign to Sumerian, Babylonian, and Hebrew speculation; and I shall then briefly examine the evidence on which modern scholars admit dualism to have been held by the Jews of the Apocalyptic period and by early Christianity as set forth in the New Testament. It is my conviction that Persian religion never had any influence upon Judaism or early Christianity. Satan, the Devil (diabolus), is traceable directly to Babylonian theology; there he is the creation of the gods.
The Self: an overlooked Buddhist Simile
Authors: Davids C. A. F. Rhys
Published: March 2011

I am not referring to the simile (and its fate) of the Jetawood and the faggots. That at least I have not overlooked, nor have others. Charles Eliot once wrote to us, that it seemed to imply the existence of a self that was other and more than body and mind (as the wood was there, and other, and more than the faggots). I remarked, Was it not a curious way of teaching the existence of a something (about which there might be a doubt), merely by implication ? I was then blind to two things: the tremendous emphasis on the immanence of Deity as ‘Self’ current in the lifetime of the ‘Buddha’ (rendering any assertion of It unnecessary); the decline in that emphasis by the time the Suttas came to be finally worded and canonized. To very few was awareness of this earlier and later constantly present. ‘Was?’ It is still true of most.
Assyrian Prescriptions for Diseases of the Feet
Authors: Thompson R. Campbell
Published: March 2011

If a man is sick of a swelling, the colour of his sickness being black, thou shalt [pound] (and) strain the tops (juice) of oleander (?), mix in fine-ground flour, mash in rose-water (I), bind on; (or) tops (juice) of tamarisk.
Two Questions in Moslem Art
Authors: Martinovitch Nicholas N.
Published: March 2011

According to a tradition it was believed that a Greek, Christodulos by name, was the builder of the old Fatih mosque at Constantinople. Dr. Mehmet Aga-Oglu has explained in his two articles that the ancient belief was without foundation. In the first one he stated that a Turk, Sinan al-'Atīq by name, was the architect of the old mosque; in the second article, he said that the shape of the first, earliest construction of this mosque was in the purely Turkish style, like some of the old buildings of the Seljuq and Ottoman period in Asia Minor, and that it showed no Byzantine influence. The author's knowledge of the special literature on this subject is deep and complete. Nevertheless, our solution of the problem will be dissimilar to that of Dr. Aga-Oglu.
Recent Finds near An-yang
Authors: Yetts W. Perceval
Published: March 2011

Two years ago an attempt was made in these pages to give a general survey of archæological events since 1899 at An-yang, in the north of Ho-nan province. Though excavation was still in progress, and investigation of results far from ended, the great interest taken by Western students called for an interim statement. This was specially needed because most of the literature of the subject is written in Chinese. Besides the clandestine activities of treasureseekers and the earlier, less organized digging by the peasants, scientific exploration had been carried out since 1928 by the National Research Institute of History and Philology of the Academia Sinica, which had published three parts ofPreliminary Reports of Excavations at Anyangunder the editorship of Dr. Li Chi. The main purpose of the present article is to take account of part iv, which appeared in 1933 after my former article was written, and includes the results of excavation during 1931 and 1932.
Some Additions to Professor Jeffery's Foreign Vocabulary of the Qur'an
Authors: Margoliouth D. S.
Published: March 2011

In the 38th section of his Itqān the polygraph Suyūṭī furnishes a summary of a monograph called al-Muhadhdhab fī mā waqa‘a fi'l-Qur'ān min al-mu‘arrab, in which he dealt with the question whether the Qur'an contained any foreign words, and if so, to what language they belonged. The orthodox felt some difficulty about admitting the existence of such an element in the language of the Sacred Book, which claims to be in perspicuous Arabic; it was, however, difficult to maintain that the proper names which occur in the volume were all of Arabic origin, and certain other words have an obviously foreign appearance. Suyūtī himself compromises by admitting in such cases the foreign etymology, but maintaining that the words had received Arabic naturalization.
Balāḏurī and Ḥamza Iṣfahānī on the Migration of the Parsees
Authors: Inostrantsev C.
Published: March 2011

In my examination of the tradition relating to the migration of the Parsees to India, in connection with the condition of the Muslim world in the middle of the seventh century, I have noted the account given by Balāḏurī (ed. De Goeje, 392), who states in his narrative of the conquest of Kirmān by the Arabs that a number of the Parsees sailed away in ships over the sea, i.e. in the direction of India. My point of view on this subject, as generally on all the materials which we possess relative to this question, I have formulated before: here I would merely reiterate that this account consists of two words only, unaccompanied by further explanations, of which one may be said to be obscure. Similar accounts in an expanded form exist in Arabic literature, and I think that it may be useful to give the following extract from an Arabic writer of recognized authority, albeit of later date—Yāqūt, who, in his famous Geographical Dictionary (ed. Wüstenfeld, iii, 31), has the following under Subuḏān:—

“Subuḏān. Ḥamza ibn al-Ḥasan relates the following. Four farsakhs from Baṣra is the town Ubulla on the shore of the Crooked Tigris (sc. Shaṭṭ al-'Arab); the inhabitants of this town were Persians, labouring on the sea. When the Arabs came near them, they loaded 400 ships with as much of their possessions as possible, and with provisions, and sailed away.
The Beauty of Indian Sculpture
Authors: Gordine Dora
Published: March 2011

My appreciation of Indian sculpture is not that of an art historian but of a living sculptor. I shall not therefore attempt to say anything about historical developments or to compare and criticize the characteristics of different periods, but I shall concentrate instead on trying to show some of the great and timeless qualities of Asiatic sculpture which make it as alive and significant for us to-day as it was to its unknown creators.
Music: The Priceless Jewel
Authors: Farmer Henry George
Published: March 2011

People disagree about [the propriety of] singing (ghinā). And most of the people of Al-Ḥijāz permit it, whilst most of the people of Al-'Irāq abhor it. And one argument of those who permit it is that it has its origin in poetry, [an art] which the Prophet (May Allāh bless him and give him peace) commended; he incited to it, and urged his Companions to it, and found help in it against the unbelievers. And he said to Ḥassān [ibn Thabit, d. 674], “Pour out [an incitement to] the raid upon the Banū 'Abd Manāf for, by Allāh, your poetry is more potent against them than the falling of arrows in the utter darkness of the late night.” And it [i.e. poetry], is the register (dīwān) of the Arabs, and declares their precepts, and is the witness of their noble actions.
Prehistory in Malaya
Authors: Tweedie M. W. F.
Published: March 2011

Until 1918 only a small amount of desultory work had been done on the prehistory of the Malay Peninsula. Systematic excavating, collecting, and recording was started in that year by Mr. I. H. N. Evans, Curator of the Perak Museum at Taiping, and continued until his retirement in 1932.
Art. V.—Supplementary Contributions to the Series of the Coins of the Kings of Ghazní
Authors: Thomas Edward
Published: March 2011

In the volume of the Journal of the Royal Asiatio Society for the year 1848, is to be found a paper descriptive of such coins of the Sultáns of Ghazní as chanced to form part of the varied numismatic accumulations of Mr. Masson, gleaned, under his personal superintendence, chiefly to the northward of the metropolitan province from which the dynasty takes its name.
Art. XV.—Description of an Arabic Quardrant
Authors: Morley William H.
Published: March 2011

Considerable attention has been attracted of late years to the astronomical instruments of the people of Asia. Many of these instruments, though far from modern, are remarkable for accuracy and beauty of workmanship, and not a few present admirable specimens of delicate engraving, inlaying, and ornament. The Sedillots, father and son, and others, have done much to elucidate the subject; but it is still far from exhausted, and every addition to our present materials for its illustration cannot fail to be of interest.
Art. XVII.—On the Cotton Trade of India
Authors: Mann J. A.
Published: March 2011

The great and increasing importance attaching to the question of Cotton supply renders any remarks which may throw light on the subject, of peculiar interest; the fact that the value of our cotton manufacture now exceeds sixty million pounds sterling annually— consuming therein upwards of four hundred thousand tons of the simple fibre—employing nearly one hundred million pounds sterling of capital—and giving employment directly and indirectly to about four millions of our countrymen, is alone so startling and withal so colossal as almost to defy comprehension. That a fibre so simple, and with us but a century since so little known and appreciated, should now give rise to such wealth and comfort, almost partakes of fiction; and one knows not how sufficiently to praise the ingenuity of Wyatt, Kay, Hargreaves, Arkwright, and Crompton, who led the way to raise the manufacture in little more than a century to its present prodigious proportions. But the extension, not to say the sustenance, of this trade, is primarily dependent upon the supply of the raw material: upon this, the one hundred millions of our capital, and the livelihood of near four millions of our countrymen is dependent, a matter so serious and of such magnitude, as to make the question one of the State; the appalling result only contemplated of one year's stoppage of the supply, is sufficient to force a dread of the slender basis upon which the magnificent fabric depends. Our legislators are however now fully alive to its importance, and it is pleasing to mark the attention the matter receives amid the turmoil of our immense governmental affairs.
The Pictures, etc., of the Royal Asiatic Society
Authors: Foster W.
Published: March 2011

It is perhaps not unfitting that the recent centenary festivities should be supplemented by a brief survey of the various objects of interest which the Society has accumulated during the hundred years of its existence. Apart from the intrinsic value of many of the items, the collection includes portraits of most of the scholars who were prominent during that period in Oriental research—amongst them many of the Society's office-bearers. It also testifies to the liberality of our members in the past; and it seems a mere act of justice that, after commemorating those who have benefited the Society in other ways, we should spare a little attention for those who have presented the artistic treasures that decorate its premises.
The Chola Invasion of Bengal
Authors: Aiyangar S. Krishnaswami
Published: March 2011

Under this heading Mr. A. C. Banerji discusses in pages 655–666 of the JRAS. for 1935 the northern invasion of Rājēndra, the Gangaikoṇḍa-Chola, on which subject I made a contribution long ago to the late Sir Asutosh Mukerjee Commemoration Volumes, which article appeared in a slightly revised form in the Journal of Indian History, volume ii, pp. 317–369, more than a decade since. There are some points in the discussion which seem to admit of a few remarks in criticism—perhaps even correction—pending publication of a typical historical document of the great Chola, and attaining to a correct version of the details of the invasion.
Demetrias in Sind
Authors: Tarn W. W.
Published: March 2011

In April, 1939, Professor E. H. Johnston published an article in this Journal in which he argued that there never was a Demetrias in Sind, and it is advisable to see what his evidence comes to. The new critical edition of the Mahābhārata which he cites shows that the name Dattāmitra in the epic is not that of the Yavana king, and it seems to follow that the existence of this Demetrias is no longer the certainty which historians have for some time taken it to be. But it is a long step from this to an assertion that Demetrias never existed; between absolute positive and absolute negative in history there often lie various degrees of probability, and in this case they require to be examined.
Indian Fables in Islamic Art
Authors: Buchthal Hugo
Published: March 2011

Seldom has a work had such world-wide success and been translated into so many languages as the Indian stories and animal fables known as the Panchatantra. In the sixth century of our era they were translated from Sanskrit into Pehlevi. Thence they passed into Arabic; and from the Arabic text, called by Muhammadans the Fables of Bidpai or the Book of Kalila wa Diṁna, were made all those different versions through which these stories were transmitted to the countries of Europe.