bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Coptic conversion to Islam under the Baḥrī mamlūks, 692–755/1293–1354
Authors: Little Donald P.
Published: January 2010

The generalization that it was during the Mamlūk period that the Copts were reduced to a small minority in Egypt is a familiar one which has been frequently repeated since Gaston Wiet broached it some 50 years ago. Using this generalization as a point of departure, I intend to review the evidence in the Arabic sources which touches upon the actual process of conversion which occurred during the period 692–755/1293–1354, attempting to discover, if possible, the extent of conversion during those years and the causes which lay behind it. The dates that I have chosen are not altogether arbitrary since they correspond, as we shall see, to certain demarcations in the history of conversion noted by Mamlūk historians themselves; furthermore, I have deliberately excluded the period of the Crusades from consideration in the belief that this period should be studied separately in order to determine whether the Mamlūks' involvement in the Crusades affected their policy toward the indigenous Christians of Egypt to any appreciable extent. Although my findings in this article tend to support Wiet's generalization, I hope to offer richer, more detailed documentation for it than has been offered heretofore and, in so doing, to contribute to our understanding of Mamlūk social history.
Regional and Social Factors in the Dialect Geography of Southern Iraq and Khūzistān
Authors: Ingham Bruce
Published: January 2010

The following is an attempt to relate the distribution of linguistic variants in the spoken Arabic of southern Iraq and Khūzistān to certain geographical areas on the one hand and to certain demographically isolatable groups on the other. These factors correlate in certain cases with political regions of earlier times. The geographical areas are relatable to communication patterns of preautomobile times and to some extent group around the main waterways of the area, the Tigris, Euphrates, Shaṭṭ al-'Arab, and Kārūn. The demographic groupings involved in particular what may be referred to as degree of sedentari-zation and also degree of contact with the nomad populations in the desert to the west of the Euphrates. It is true that in some cases the social and regional groupings were coextensive; however, the distinction between the two is maintained in the treatment because the linguistic features correlating with demographic groups could be shown to have similar demographic relevance in other areas of Mesopotamia, while the features regarded as primarily of regional relevance were relevant only to the area under investigation.
A Bronze Bowl Excavated at Ghubayrā
Authors: Fehérvári Géza
Published: January 2010

During the first season of excavations in 1971 at the Islamic site of Ghubayrā, in Kirmān province, a complete and richly decorated bronze bowl came to light. It was found on the Citadel Central Mound in a room designated room 1A. Because of the finds recovered from here such as Saljūq white pottery, a small lustre-painted bowl, a minā'ī sherd, and some glass vessels—this room was commonly called by the excavators the ‘Seljūq room’. The excavation of this room, together with its ground-plan and elevation, has already been reported, and the bronze bowl has also been illustrated. As only a few complete Islamic metal objects have been discovered in scholarly excavations, this piece from Ghubayrā deserves a separate study.
A Chinese Eratosthenes of the Flat Earth: A Study of a Fragment of Cosmology in Huai Nan Tzu
Authors: Cullen C.
Published: January 2010

This paper attempts to deal with a short passage found at the end of the third chapter of the Huai Nan tzu book, a compendium of learning assembled in about 120 B.c. under the patronage of the prince Liu An I first became interested in it after reading the tantalizing reference in Needham (SCC, III, 224). (It occurs to me that the preceding sentence or some variant of it is likely to occur in learned journals with a high frequency for the next 50 years at least.) My first efforts to understand the original text led me to the conclusion that it was unique in a number of ways and had points of interest that did not fully appear in the version of Maspero, 1929, 348 ff. Professors A. C. Graham and D. C. Lau both gave very generously of their time in discussions of my first draft. Professor Graham raised the question of possible Mohist influences and brought to my notice a commentary by the Ch'ing scholar Ch'ien T'ang , Huai Nan tzu t'ien wen hsün pu chu c. 1788. I did not feel able to follow Ch'ien in all he wrote, but was relieved to find that we reached the same general conclusions about what the text was saying, although Ch'ien seems to miss much that is important. While there are still some obscurities of language in what appears to be a rather corrupt text, I offer the version given here with a fair degree of conviction that it does not substantially misrepresent the intentions of the unknown author. Any errors that I have obstinately retained despite the helpful advice given to me throughout the time I was engaged on this work are, of course, my responsibility alone.
Bantěn and the Dutch in 1619: Six Early ‘PasarMalay’ Letters
Authors: Ricklefs M. C.
Published: January 2010

While working in the Algemeen Rijksarchief, The Hague, in 1973, this writer had his attention drawn by Dr. G. V. Smith to an envelope in Koloniaal Archief 982 (Overgekomen Brieven en Papieren 1620) which apparently contained several early Javanese letters. Upon investigation these proved to be original correspondence between the dignitaries of Bantěn and the Dutch under Jan Pietersz. Coen after the Dutch conquest of Batavia in 1619. They are written not in Javanese but in Malay, five of the letters employing Javanese script and one Arabic script. The letters are of interest as evidence of the Bantěn opinion of the Dutch (although the reader would be wrong to accept the innocent tone of the letters at face value) and as early examples ofpasarMalay, the lingua franca of maritime South-East Asia.
Southern Bantu Clan-Praises: A Neglected Genre
Authors: Rycroft David K.
Published: January 2010

Very little reference to clan-praises is to be found in general works on African oral literature or in the documentation dealing specifically with literature from southern Africa. By contrast, considerable attention has been paid to panegyric forms of praise-poetry applying to individual human beings (or to an individual animal or object) among the Southern Bantu peoples. Lestrade, writing in 1933, reported that clan-praises were widely employed in southern Africa, and he briefly outlined their nature and function. Yet virtually no detailed work on clan-praises has so far been published except in the case of the Shona, with a recent series of illuminating articles by Fortune and Hodza. Among the Shona, clan-praises appear to be of greater importance than individual praises. For other Southern Bantu peoples, on the other hand, one might easily gain the impression that clan-praises were non-existent, owing to the overwhelming concentration upon individual praise-poetry in the existing documentation. Returning to Lestrade's article of 1933, however, one finds the noteworthy observation that clan-praises are in fact heard more frequently than individual praises: ‘Clan praise-names are used … on all occasions calling for a certain amount of formality and special politeness of address: at a meeting of a council of tribesmen, in some solemn family conclave, when strangers address each other ceremoniously, clan praise-names are heard. Individual praise-names, together with praise-verses and praise-poems, however, are heard somewhat more rarely: it is only on the occasion of some festival or other ceremonial event, calling for some display of oratory, that these latter are heard’. Nevertheless, despite this observation, it appears that Lestrade himself, and a great number of other scholars too, have paid no further attention to clan-praises. Clearly, the reason for this lies in the great wealth of individual praise-poetry, relating to kings, chiefs, great warriors, and statesmen, that exists among peoples such as the Zulu, Xhosa, Swazi, Sotho, and Tswana, and the fact that this genre is regarded as being their most highly developed form of oral literature. Yet, since clan-praises are more commonly encountered, according to Lestrade, why have they been totally neglected ? The reason would appear to be that Lestrade, Bryant and many other scholars seem to have dismissed them as amounting to no more than short, single ‘praisenames’, which do not attain the stature of ‘praise-verses’ or ‘praise-poems’. Since the short clan-praises constitute a distinctive genre of oral poetic imagery, the matter deserves reappraisal.
Zulu women's bow songs: ruminations on love
Authors: Joseph Rosemary M. F.
Published: January 2010

The existence of a tradition of bow-playing is recorded in some of the earlies written accounts of the Zulu people. Captain Gardiner in 1836 (pp. 104—5 and p1. 1) notes the presence of a gourd-resonated musical bow. It is not, however, clear which of the two Zulu gourd-resonated bows Gardiner encountered. He provides an illustration of a simple bow with undivided string and gourd resonator attached near the centre of the stave but does not note its name. the instrument would seem to be a cross between the Zulu ugubhu, a simple bow with undivided string, but with the gourd resonator attached near the lower end of the stave, and the Zulu umakhweyana, a simple bow with the gourd resonator attached near the centre of the stave, but in which the string is divided by means of a loop which is secured within the centrally-located resonator. Angas (1849:p. 111 and p1. 25) also seems to have confused the two instruments. Plate 25 is an illustration of a young man playing what appears to be the ugubhu (although the gourd resonator is situated higher up the stave than is usual), but the drawing in the text (p. 111) in explanation of plate 25 shows a young man playing the umakhweyana. Thus, while the ugubhu is generally regarded as the older and more authentically Zulu of the two instuments (the umakhweyana being thought to have been borrowed from the Tsonga of Mozambique around the turn of the nineteenth century), it is apparent that, from at least the time of the first documentation of the Zulu, both instruments were in current usage.
An analysis of major tendencies in the development of the bedouin dialects of the north of Israel
Authors: Rosenhouse Judith
Published: January 2010

Modern tendencies in the linguistic development of Arabic, in both its literary and colloquial aspects, has for some time now been the subject of serious scholary study (see, e.g. Blau, 1978, Cantarino, 1974-5, Stekevych, 1970, amont others). Contact between different social groups and thus between different dialects and speech levels, has brought about changes in the actual speech of Arabic-speaking peoples which have been variously called koineization, levelling and classicization (or literarization) (cf. Blanc, 1960). These processes will be the subject of this paper.
A major study on Ottoman architecture in Hungary
Authors: Fehérvári Géza
Published: January 2010

Recent years have witnessed an increasing interest in Turkish art and architecture, an interest that embraces not only the monuments in Turkey proper but also those which were erected in south-eastern Europe during the Ottoman occupation. Thus a few years ago, when in conjunction with the World of Islam Festival a symposium was held in Edinburgh dedicated to Islam in the Balkans, the participants dealt with Islamic monuments in Bulgaria, Rumania, Greece and Yugoslavia. The Ottoman monuments of Hungary are admittedly not as numerous as those of these south-east European countries; nevertheless,they represent the achievements of a period which is justifiably called the ‘classical’ period in Ottoman art.
The religious and philosophical signicance of the ‘Hsiang erh’Lao tzuin the light of theMa-wang-tuisilk manuscripts
Authors: Boltz William G.
Published: January 2010

Among the many texts and manuscripts that Sir Aurel Stein brought to London from the Grottoes of the Thousand Buddhas at Tun-huang early in this century was a text of the first half of theLao tzu(chapters 1–37 of the standard, received version of the text) with a commentary known as theHsiang erh chu(Stein MS 6825 in the British Museum). This document has attracted considerable scholarly interest because of its ostensible connexion with the origins and early history of Celestial Master (t'ien shih) Taoism in the Later Han dynasty. Lu Te-ming (c. 550–c. 630) listed theHsiang erh chuas a commentary to theLao tzu in his Ching tien shih wen, and said that accordingto one tradition it was written by Chang Lu(d. 216). This is the earliest known suggestion that theHsiang erh chuis a text of the Celestial Master school.
Kukotay and Bok Murun: a comparison of two related heroic poems of the kirgiz—I
Authors: Hatto A. T.
Published: January 2010

The Smert' Kukotay-khana i ego pominki (henceforth K) recorded by Chokan Valikhanov in 1856 and translated by him Russian Between 1861 and 1865, and Bok Murun (BM) recorded by V.V. Radlov in 1862 are two poems of remarkably ‘heroic’ temper that derive from a common source. The deal with the funeral feast of Kökötöy-kan, which is proverbial in Kirgiz as Kökötöydün aši, than which there was no greater funeral repast. Of the two poems, the former is apparently the more archaic, yet the latter too has archaic features. Regrettably, the Kirgiz original of K is lost but for some three couplets cited by Valikhanov in separate essays. Nevertheless, Valikanov evidently translated closely, since it is possible to recognize not only the ‘parallelistic’ structure of lines in various passages but also traditional epic formulae, including epithets, that occur in other Kirgiz heroic poems, including BM. The translation seems to be so close that if a Kirgiz bard, a good scholar, and a cryptographer could ever be brought together, it should prove possible to reconstruct much of the text of the lost K. Even this translation, alas, is unfinished. To supplement it very barely indeed there is in Valikhanov's published works a prose résumé of the Manas cycle, including the Kukotay (Kökötöy) episode. The latter does not entirely agree with K. It will be referred to here below as ‘the Résumé’. Radlov's Kirgiz text of BM is accompanied by a German verse-translation in another volume. Both require a word of assessment.
‘A Booth Like the Booth of Moses …’ A Study of an Early Ḥadīth
Authors: Kister M. J. , Hiskett M.
Published: January 2010

The chapter about innovations in mosques in al-TurtŪshī's Kitāb al-hawādith wa-'l-bida‘ contains a remarkable tradition about the building of the mosque of the Prophet in Medina which deserves special attention. This tradition, not included in the orthodox collections of hadith, is of considerable importance: it seems to belong to a large body of early traditions omitted by later collectors of hadīth, and it may throw some light on an attitude of the Prophet which was later ignored by Muslim scholars. This tradition may help us to understand the views and opinions of the early Muslim scholars.
‘The wealth of kings‘ and the end of the Zāguē dynasty
Authors: Huntingford G. W. B.
Published: January 2010

In the Dark Ages there was a break in the ruling dynasty of Ethiopia, and the kingdom fell into the hands of a line called Zāguē, of Agaw origin from Beguenā. (Bugnā), which made its capital at Roha in Lāstā. There is much that is obscure about the events that led to the Zaguē usurpation; the orthodox Ethiopian view, as expressed in the Be'ela nagaśtāt, was that God was angry with the House of David (the dynasty which they believe to be descended from Menilek son of Solomon and the ‘Queen of Sheba’) and gave the kingdom to the Zāguē. According to a document at Dabra Libānos in Šimezana, 2 a woman called Terde'a Gabaz transferred the kingdom to the Zāguē after the reign of Ḥezba Nañ, ‘and they reigned for 133 years, 700 years from the bringing of the Faith to Ethiopia’ (= A.D. 1033). This suggests that Terde'a Gabaz was the daughter of Ḥezba Nañ and married the first Zāguē king, thereby establishing him on the throne. These Zāguē, being Agaw, are referred to in the Chronicles as ‘not Israelites’, as in the Paris Chronicle, f. 2: ‘Anbasa Wedem begot Delna'ād, from whom the throne was taken3 and given to others who were not Israelites’. The end of the Zāguē line came in 1268, when ‘Takla Hāymānot restored the kingdom to Yekuno Amlāk’ (Paris Chron., f. 3), a descendant of the last king before the Zāguē. That there was a break and a restoration cannot be doubted, but the manner of the restoration is not clear and the evidence is conflicting, as well as of late date.
Mahādibbamanta: a paritta manuscript from Cambodia
Authors: Jaini Padmanabh S.
Published: January 2010

In 1961, while on a visit to Cambodia, I first came to know of this work from the chief Abbot of Vat Unālom of Phnom Penh. I was informed by the learned Abbot of the existence of a ‘Mahāyānist’ work known as Dibbamanta.The work was not available there but subsequently a palm-leaf MS of this work was found in the National Museum of Bangkok, a microfilm copy of which was made available to me through the courtesy of the curator of that Museum. The MS consists of 48 folios1, written in Cambodian characters. It is not dated and does not carry any information regarding the author or the scribe. As it was a common practice in Siam to copy Buddhist texts in Cambodian script, and as the work is not in use at the present day either in Siam or in Cambodia, it is hard to locate the original place of this MS. But on the basis of certain internal evidence which will be noted below I am inclined to believe that it could be of Cambodian origin.
Haribhadra
Authors: Williams R.
Published: January 2010

In another place I have suggested that some of the works ascribed to Haribhadra contradict each other so sharply on matters of doctrine and usage that it is scarcely credible that they can have been written by the same author.
The revolution of Fās in 869/1465 and the death of Sultan ‘Abd al-ḥaqq al-Marīnī
Authors: García-Arenal Mercedes
Published: January 2010

If our present knowledge of the history of the Muslim Maghrib is in general unsatisfactory, few periods remain as obscure as the fifteenth century.

The extant sources are very scarce. Contemporary Maghribī historical writings are practically non-existent and, with few exceptions, this is still an epoch for which Christian chronicles are not yet really relevant. Only fragmentary and partial information can be extracted from the contemporary Spanish and Portuguese documents. Therefore, we have to rely for our knowledge on the so-calledmanāqibliterature or hagiographic dictionaries which proliferated in Morocco during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. These volumes—many of which were lithographed in Fās during the nineteenth century—cannot be considered a first-rate source. They are posterior to the period dealt with and appear as versions of a traditional history composed over the years by agglomeration, repetition, and revision from a series of original stories which may be doubtful, even though they are hallowed by time and usage, and fortified by the weight of respectability. Committed to writing, they have acquired the seal of authority and have seldom been challenged.
Approaches to the Persian loans in the Ādi Granth
Authors: Shackle C.
Published: January 2010

One of the chief fascinations exercised by words—especially by loan-words—derives from their dual function as markers of both linguistic and cultural change. For those interested in words from this historical view-point perhaps nothing is more tantalizing than the difficulty of reproducing, in the study of words as cultural markers, those types of clear and comprehensive classification which have been so successfully developed for the analysis of words in their formal aspects.
The origins of chinese puppetry
Authors: Dolby William
Published: January 2010

Puppetry in China has a long history. The modern remnants of a rich tradition testify to the wealth that was, and the art is being revived in various ways, and given new forms. Although there is more early literature and specific comment in ancient books on ancient Chinese puppets than there is for any other kind of puppetry in its early days, it is not absolutely clear when they originated. The words nearly always used to refer to puppets are mu-ou-hsi ‘wooden doll plays’ and k'uei-lei-tzu, k'u-lei-tzu, k'uei-lei, or k'uei-lei-hsi. The original meaning of the latter terms is tantalizingly elusive, but the k'u might possibly suggest a hole or aperture within which they were performed. These are historically the most common words used. The earliest mention of any of the terms is found in Feng-su t'ung by Ying Shao (fl. c.a.d. 178), but the origins of puppetry may either lie much before or after that book.
The Nominal System of Awngi (Southern Agaw)
Authors: Hetzron Robert
Published: January 2010

Awngi is a central Cushitic language, the southernmost representative of the Agaw group. It is spoken in the Provinces of Agawmǝdǝr and Mätäkkäl, Governorate General of Gojjam, Ethiopia, by at least 50,000 persons. This dialect group has been called by Conti Rossini ‘Awiya’. This is a misnomer; the word awíya means ‘Agaw man’ (literally: ‘son of Agaw’, see §3.4). The language itself is called by its speakers awῃi, with the derivative -ῃi (Amharic -iñña) used for languages. In my earlier publications, I simply called it Southern Agaw, but following the preference of several of my colleagues, I adopted the self-denomination ‘Awngi’.
Syrian Urban Politics In The Tanzimat Period Between 1840 And 1861
Authors: Maoz Moshe
Published: January 2010

One of the major political and social results of the Ottoman Tanzimat in Syria and Palestine during the nineteenth century was the transformation whichit wrought upon the form of rule in the towns. The era of Turkish reform notonly gave a new shape and a different content to the struggle for authorityin the Syrian city between the Ottoman government and the local forces; italso contributed largely to the crystallization and consolidation of the urbanleadership of ‘ulamā’ and a'yan, by the establishment of local councils (Majlis)in the towns, which formed the main basis of future municipal life and autonomyin the area. The internal strife in the Syrian town, although acquiring a differentcharacter during the Tanzimat period, had its roots in the pre-reform era, whena fierce contest for power took place in many cities between various forces, of which the Turkish Pasha was only one. In the eighteenth century feudsoccurred in the big cities, either between the rival Janissary units, or betweenthem and the Ashrāf militia, the descendants of the Prophet. The Pashas withtheir own forces also took part in this struggle, usually siding with one factionand seeking to establish their control.1 Involved also in this struggle were thelocal ‘iulamā’, in whose hands was the administration of justice, and the a'yān, who controlled the civil administration in the towns.2
Ching-Tê Chên And The Problem Of The ‘Imperial Kilns’
Authors: Medley Margaret
Published: January 2010

It was in the year 1856, with the publication of Stanislas Julien's partial translation of the then fairly recently published T'ao-lu of 1815, that Europe and America first became aware of the possible existence of an ‘imperial kiln’ or group of kilns at Ching-te Chen Nor was this all, for according to Julien's translation such an ‘imperial kiln’ was established in the year 1369, the second year of the Hung-wu period. In view of Julien's standing in his own time, it is not unnatural that the facts as recorded by him with regard to this important event should have remained virtually unchallenged for the better part of a century. Jacquemart, in his monumental Histoire de la cÉramiqite, from which so many terms for wares and techniques have survived to become common currency, is heavily dependent upon his predecessor in the field.
Materials Relating to the Cowry Currency of the Western Sudan—II
Authors: Hiskett M.
Published: January 2010

The cowry

‘Parmi tant de coquilles que le flot des mers rejette sur les plages, il n'en est pas que les homines aient recherchÉes, recueillies, portÉes plus que les cauris.’

The purpose of this study is to investigate the cowry in the Western Sudan. But it is impossible to study any aspect of cowry diffusion and use in isolation, and some understanding of the complex and fascinating global history of the shell is essential to our knowledge of its history in this area.
Arya
Authors: Bailey H. W.
Published: January 2010

In the following 15 condensed analyses are published some of the many problems arising when the full Indo-Iranian field is considered. Only when all the Iranian evidence is studied together with the Old Indian will it be possible to survey Indo-Iranian as a whole, an indispensable preliminary to the history of the Indo-Iranian vocabulary, and the texts behind. The constant necessity of quoting elementary data indicates how little has yet been garnered into convenient reference books. The workers (and they, too, usually distracted by other tasks) have hitherto been very few.
The Hsien-Fêng Inflation
Authors: Ch'ên Jerome
Published: January 2010

Three details of the background ought to be explained before we come to discuss the subject itself: (1) the bimetallism of the Ch'ing currency; (2) the rigidity of the Ch'ing fiscal system; and (3) the financial stringency at the end of the Tao-kuang period.
Tāmbraliṅga
Authors: Wolters O. W.
Published: January 2010

In this essay an attempt will be made, with the assistance of Chinese sources, to define the political status of Tāmbraliṅga in South East Asian history from the end of the tenth century until the early thirteenth century. This subject has been bedevilled by a textual error in theSung shihin connexion with an embassy from Tāmbraliṅga to China in 1001, with the name for Tāmbraliṅga rendered as ‘Tan-mei-liu’; the transliteration should have been ‘Tan-liu-mei’ The error was a minor one, but unfortunately it has had consequences out of proportion to its size. In particular, it seems to have been indirectly responsible for an exaggerated estimate of the extent of Śrīvijayan influence in the Malay Peninsula during a considerable part of that empire's history.
Ibn Sīnās ‘Essay on the Secret Of Destiny’
Authors: Houkani George F.
Published: January 2010

On several occasions in his writings Ibn Sīnā discusses the problem of destiny (al-qadar), by which he means primarily the problem of reconciling the divine determination of human acts and characters with the rewards and punishments of the after-life, in such a way as to safeguard God's justice to man. This aspect of the problem of theodicy had arisen long before his time out of statements of the Qur'ān and Traditions, and had been settled in their own fashions by Mu'tazilite and predestinarian theologians. Ibn Slna as a philosopher could hardly avoid offering a solution, if only to satisfy the doubts of his Muslim public; but he goes beyond a perfunctory answer, and seems to show a genuine interest in finding an intellectually convincing solution consistent with his own philosophy.
Seljūqid Ziyārats of Sar-i pul (Afghanistan)
Authors: Bivar A. D. H.
Published: January 2010

The story of Yạhyā b. Zayd (in full, Yahyā b. Zayd b. 'Alī b. al-Husayn b. 'Alī b. Abī Ṭalīb) forms a well-known episode in the history of the closing years of the Umayyad Caliphate. The insurrection of Yaḥyā was in many respects a forerunner of the final rising under the 'Abbāsid emissary Abū Muslim, by which Umayyad government in Khurāsān was overthrown. The fullest early description of this episode is that given by the historian al-Ṭabarī in his account of the events of the year 125/742-3. After the rebellion and death of his father Zayd at Kūfa in 122/739–40, the young Yaḥyā had fled from Iraq with a few companions to Khurāsān. At Balkh he lived concealed under the protection of a man named al-ḥuraysh b. 'Amr. Eventually 'Uqayl b. Ma'qil, the prefect of the town for the Umayyad government, received instructions to track down the fugitive.
Some Notes on the Dev

sh

irme
Authors: Ménage V. L.
Published: January 2010

No Ottoman institution has aroused more bitter criticism than the devshirme the ‘tribute of blood’, especially—and naturally—among those Christian peoples whose forebears were subjected to it; and at the same time none touches on so many fundamental problems. Dr. Basilike Papoulia, bringing together the Western and oriental sources and submitting them to a close and careful analysis, has now presented the first full discussion of its origin and its character. The scope of her study appears already in the definition with which she begins and ends it, that the devshirme devshirme was ‘the forcible removal, in the form of a tribute, of children of the Christian subjects from their ethnic, religious, and cultural environment and their transplantation into the Turkish-Islamic environment with the aim of employing them in the service of the Palace, the army, and the state, whereby they were on the one hand to serve the Sulṭān as slaves and freedmen and on the other to form the ruling class of the State’.
Dvārā Matīnām
Authors: Bailey H.W.
Published: January 2010

As one reads through the Rigveda the āyú- stand out challenging attention. They are vīprās (8.12.13) and belong to the antiquity of the poets (9.10.6; 9.23.2 prtnasa āyávaḥ). Their activities are clearly to some extent identical with those of the kārú- officials. They even share one verse with these in RV 9.10.6
āpa dvrā matīnm pratn ṛṇvanti kārávaḥ
hárasa āyávaḥ ‘the ancient kārú- officiants (and) the āyú- officiants have opened the gates of the formulae for the heat of the bull (soma)’. Both these types of officials thus assist in the production of mantras.
Bharath's Experiment with the Two Vīṇā
Authors: Bake A.A.
Published: January 2010

Ever since the West began to take an interest in the music of India, the great affinity of the Indian system with that of Greece has been one of the first characteristics to attract notice. As early as 1782 Sir William Jones remarked on it at length in what is perhaps the first detailed article on the subject written in any European language, entitled ‘On the musical modes of the Hindus’. Originally this was published by the Asiatic Society of Bengal, but subsequently it was incorporated in a delightful collection published by Sourendro Mohun Tagore called Hindu music from various authors.
Some Notes on Hindi Poetry in the Punjab
Authors: Barnett L.D.
Published: January 2010

Long ago it was recognized by color che sanno that the Ādi Granth of the Sikhs, the Bible of the Panjab, began with the Western Hindi hymns and prose preachings of Guru Nānak (1469–1538), and thence grew to its present vast proportions by the accretion of his successors' utterances, in which the language gradually changed to Panjabi. On the other hand, the Dasam Gurugranth SĀhib of Gobind Singh, the tenth Sikh pontiff, which is not included in the Ādi Granth, is composed in more or less standard Western Hindi.
Quantitative Equivalence Between Pieces of Speech—with Special Reference to Verse Translation, and Particularly from Japanese into English
Authors: Daniels F.J.
Published: January 2010

General hypothesis. The (more or less subjective) quantity of a piece of speech, or the (more or less objective) minimum amount of time needed to enunciate it, is directly proportional to the square root of the product of the
number of its syllables and the number of its phones. [Certain conventions are needed about the counting of the phones; and also about the counting of the syllables, though the area of possible doubt here is likely to be smaller.]
Prohibition and Nullity: Indian Struggles with a Jurisprudential Lacuna
Authors: Derrett J. Duncan M.
Published: January 2010

Every legal system requires a mass of prohibitions, and it may be a source of confusion to some of the lay public (who tend to think of law rather in terms of ‘must nots’ than ‘musts’) that it has this feature in common with a concurrent system of ethics. The confusion will be worsened if a great many prohibitions appear, perhaps in slightly different guises, in both. The human mind is quick, however, to discover ‘what you can get away with’, and in practice the distinction in modern times between a legal and a moral or ethical prohibition is well understood. There is indeed scope for holding quod fieri non debuit, factum valet.
Dawn Songs
Authors: Pe Hla
Published: January 2010

The lithic inscriptions of Burma from the thirteenth to the fourteenth century are interspersed with poetry. They are the earliest Burmese poems extant. The motif in the inscriptions is regal-religious; yet the verses are not devoid of expressions of personal emotions. Nature and love, as themes of Burmese poetry, did not emerge into prominence until the fifteenth century when ‘book literature’ written on palm-leaf superseded the lithic inscriptions.

The book literature of Burma originated under the auspices of Buddhist monarchs and flourished in manuscript from the fifteenth century till after printing became widespread in Burma in the second half of the nineteenth century. The authors were Buddhist monks or men who had spent many years in the monastery, and some talented Court-ladies.
On Some Arthālankāras in the Bhaṭṭikāvya X
Authors: Hooykaas C.
Published: January 2010

The mahākāvya Rāvanavadha by Bhaṭṭi, known as the Bhaṭṭikāvya, differs from the other mahākāvyas by its ‘flowers’ embroidered on the underlying theme of the Rāmāyana: the main purpose of the poem is to illustrate examples from Sanskrit grammar, and halfway through it the poet/grammarian, now becoming a poet/, devotes some sargas to a systematic disquisition
on poetics: (anuprāsa and yamaka), (circa 40 of them), and some guṇa and rasa (mādhurya and bhāvikatva).
The Muslim Discovery of Europe
Authors: Lewis Bernard
Published: January 2010

I suppose that most textbooks of European history or of world history—which in European textbooks is much the same thing—contain a chapter called ‘The Age of the Discoveries’, or something of the kind, which deals with the period from the fifteenth century onwards when Western Europe set about discovering the rest of the world. My subject to-day is another and earlier discovery, in which the West European was not the explorer going forth to discover the barbarian, but the barbarian discovered by the explorer—the Muslim explorer. My purpose is to outline, very briefly, the sources, nature, and stages of growth of Muslim knowledge concerning Western Europe, first in the obscure centuries before the Crusades, then during that great offensive of Western Christendom against Islam, of which the expeditions to Palestine were the easternmost expression.
‘Mushroom’ and ‘Toadstool’ in Indo-Iranian
Authors: Morgenstierne George
Published: January 2010

In their learned and sumptuously illustrated work Mushrooms, Russia and history, Valentina Pavlovna Wasson and K. Gordon Wasson have given a comprehensive and fascinating survey of mushroom lore. All kinds of traditions and conceits connected with fungi have here been discussed, together with the often picturesque and fanciful, sometimes unsavoury names denoting them in many diverse languages. The etymologies are frequently quite clear, and give a good clue to the understanding of the strikingly parallel reactions evoked everywhere by ‘the rich world of mushrooms and toadstools’. Other words are of uncertain origin, and in some cases we come across resemblances between words from unrelated and unconnected languages, which the philologist may be inclined to ascribe to ‘mirages linguistiques’.
Études Véiques
Authors: Renou Par Louis
Published: January 2010

Aucune notion dans le Ṛgveda n'a été davantage reprise et sans cesse répétée que celle de ‘donner’. En dépit des fortes tendances formulaires qui caractérisent la Samhitā, les auteurs se sont ingéniés à. en varier l'expression. La racine dā- fournit le lot de formes le plus important, et sur cette racine, un éventail de noms d'action, dont nous allons tenter de preciser les emplois et les limites respectives.
Sīgiri Graffiti and Sinhalese Phonology
Authors: Reynolds C.H.B.
Published: January 2010

In his recently published Sīgiri graffiti (London, etc., Oxford University Press, 1956), Dr. S. Paranavitana, the Archaeological Commissioner of Ceylon, includes a long introductory section (Vol. I, pp. xxxii-clxxi) entitled ‘Grammar’, wherein he makes a large number of alterations to the previously held theories on the Sinhalese language which are principally to be found in the late Professor W. Geiger's Grammar of the Sinhalese language (Colombo, 1938).
Two Syriac Inscriptions from Harran
Authors: Segal J.B.
Published: January 2010

It is remarkable that no Syriac inscriptions have been discovered hitherto at Harran or in its immediate vicinity. Cuneiform tablets have been unearthed, and these reflect the prominence of the city in ancient times.But written records in Syriac have been strangely absent. And yet we know that for more than a millennium—certainly until the eleventh century—the indigenous inhabitants of Harran spoke Syriac. Lying only about 30 kilometres south of Edessa, the home of classical Syriac, Harran was nevertheless able to maintain jealously its distinctive character and traditions.
Angulmāla and Liberation
Authors: Stede W.
Published: January 2010

Angulimāla (Finger-garland, nickname from the chain of fingers which he wore), the fierce bandit, occurs at many places in the Pali Canon. One of the best-known episodes in which he figures and which has caused a good deal of comment is that of his conversion, told in the Angulimāla-sutta of the Majjhima Nikāya (no. 86; PTS, II, 97 sq.). For his legendary biography see Malalasekera's Dictionary of Pāli proper names, s.v.

Here we see him following the Buddha in murderous intention trying to catch up to him as he walks on in his usual, natural step (Pakatiyā). But he soon realizes that his is unable to do so: the nearer he gets the more distant the Buddha is. He wonders: Although he is of great strength and can race elephants, horses, and deer: here must be a superman who can move at will.
Philology and Africa
Authors: Tucker A.N.
Published: January 2010

Philological studies in Africa are inevitably bound up with the vexed question of the classification of its languages. Many authorities have attempted this classification. Some, like Oust, Drexel, Delafosse, van Bulck, rely on evidence which is as much ethnological as linguistic, while others, like Müller, Meinhof, Westermann, Werner, Sir Harry Johnston, Guthrie, Homburger, Greenberg, and the various authors of the ‘Handbook of African Languages’, have tried to confine themselves to linguistic criteria. It is the purpose of this article to discuss the sort of linguistic data these investigators have consulted, and their methods of using it.
Chinese-Mongol Hybrid Songs
Authors: Waley Arthur
Published: January 2010

As Mongol dynasty plays were written partly for Mongol patrons one would expect a certain amount of Mongol vocabulary to creep into them. But in the ‘Hundred Plays’, which despite recent discoveries still remains the most extensive collection that we possess, not more than two or three Mongol words occur. This may be partly due to the fact that they were edited in late Ming times, when such words were no longer intelligible and may well have been replaced by the editor with Chinese words. Two words which remain are hala- (ala-) ‘to smite’, ‘kill’, and darasun ‘wine’. It appears that both of these were so well embedded in Chinese vocabulary that they were not recognized as foreign words.
A note on ke wu
Authors: Lau D. C.
Published: January 2010

Ever since the Ta hsüeh was extracted from the Li chi to form part of the ‘Four books’, the term ke wu which appears in the sentence in the opening passage: ‘The furtherance of knowledge lies in ke wu’, has exercised the ingenuity of commentators. I do not propose here to review the vast literature on the subject, but before going on to deal with the meaning of the term a brief look at the two best-known commentaries may prove instructive. Cheng Hsiian £ comments as follows
A note on the Tunhuang fragments of the T'ang Regulations (ko)
Authors: Twitchett D. C.
Published: January 2010

The study of codified law under the T'ang dynasty is greatly complicated by the fact that, of the four main categories of laws only the penal Code (lü ) is preserved in full. The chief secondary category of law, the administrative Statutes (ling) have been painstakingly reconstructed on the basis of their Japanese adaptations, by reassembling the very large number of quotations which are preserved in T'ang sources, and we have a tolerably complete picture of their form and content. The other two categories of centrally codified law, the Regulations (ko) which codified the major amendments to and supplements to the Code and Statutes which had been promulgated from time to time in imperial Edicts, and the Ordinances (shih) which provided detailed rules for the local implementation of the other categories of law, have disappeared almost completely, and virtually the sole substantial surviving fragments are included among the Tunhuang manuscripts.
Political groups in Tosa, 1858–68
Authors: Beasley W. G.
Published: January 2010

Much of the recent work done in Japan on the political and social background to the Meiji Restoration has concentrated on analysing the manifestations of unrest in Japanese society, which arose from its failure to adjust quickly enough to economic change. Writers point to the growing wealth of merchants, accompanied by the impoverishment of samurai, to the increasing differentiation between ‘rich’ and ‘poor’ farmers in the village; and they relate the consequent discontent to samurai reform movements within the great domains (han) and to the rising incidence of peasant revolt. These factors in turn are fitted into general—and often widely differing—explanations of the overthrow of the Tokugawa Bakufu and the nature of Meiji political institutions.
On the Theory of Two Vasubandhus
Authors: Jaini Padmababh S.
Published: January 2010

Since the publication of Professor J. Takakusu's ‘Life of Vasubandhu by Paramārtha’ in the year 1904, several scholars have made attempts to determine the date and works of Vasubandhu. The problem is beset with several difficulties. Tradition gives three dates (A.N. 900, 1000, and 1100) based on different reckonings of the Nirvana era. Vasubandhu, himself a Sautrāntika, is the author of the celebrated Vaibhāsika work, viz., the Abhidharma-kox015B;a (and its Bhāṣya), and is at the same time credited with the authorship of several major works of the Vijñānavāda school. The problem is rendered more complex by the mention in Yaśoṁitra's Sphuṭārthā Abhidharma-
kośa-vyākhyā of an elder (Vṛdāhacārya) Vasubandhu, leading to a recent theory of two Vasubandhus advocated by Professor E. Frauwallner.
Kuttā: A Class of Land-Tenures in South India
Authors: Derrett J. Duncan M.
Published: January 2010

One of the most important problems faced by the administration in the early days of British rule in India was how to ascertain and distinguish the different types of land-tenure prevalent there. It was obvious that a great variety of rights existed by custom in respect of land, and when the government proposed to collect revenue it was essential to know from which party or parties it could be expected and in what manner and proportions it should be levied. The task was completed by elaborate local inquiries, but very little help was anticipated or received from legal textbooks in Sanskrit, which might have been expected to provide information upon so obviously fundamental a subject. But here and there details which throw light upon medieval practices are to be found in the books, and these seem to connect tolerably well with the results of the inquiries made during the nineteenth century. An instance of this seems worthy of quoting, not merely for its comparative rarity and for the juristic skill exhibited by the author, but chiefly because of the intrinsic interest of one of the tenures in question, which has a high curiosity-value and is probably of a species confined to India.
The Classification of Verbs in Tiv
Authors: Arnott D.W.
Published: January 2010

R. C. Abraham's The principles of Tiv, though a teaching grammar which designedly avoids technical terms, contains the most careful and systematic treatment of the Tiv verbal system that has been published, and this and his other books are the only works on Tiv giving tonal details. But his classification of verbs, though based appropriately on their structure and tonal behaviour, is not entirely consistent, nor the most convenient basis for a clear and concise description of the whole verbal system. The present study is based on an analysis of the material provided in Abraham's books—particularly his excellent dictionary—checked and supplemented by several years' practical experience of the language in the field, and more recent detailed research with various informants in London.
Sayings of the ỌkọŊkọ Society of the Igbo-Speaking People
Authors: Green M.M.
Published: January 2010

In a previous article I quoted two or three sayings of the ỌkọŊkọ society of the Igbo people of south-eastern Nigeria and very briefly outlined some of the main features of the cultural setting of Igbo unwritten literature. I also suggested that we needed not so much odd specimens of this literature as considerable collections of the various genres in their social environment.
Origin and Character of Al-Madrasah
Authors: Tibawi A. L.
Published: January 2010

THE scholarly article entitled ‘Muslim institutions of learning in eleventhcentury Baghdad’ by Dr. George Makdisi deserves careful study. It is much more than a mosaic of notices of institutions and men of learning; it has a thesis running through its course, which seeks to elucidate the character of the madrasah in general and that founded by Niẓām al-Mulk in Baghdad in particular.
Vīs-u Rāmīn (IV)
Authors: Minorsky V.
Published: January 2010

IN the second half of the nineteenth century, the general upsurge of nationalism in Europe exerted an influence on the Jewish population as well. This influence was particularly strong in Eastern Europe, where there occurred a formidable Jewish nationalistic renaissance, some features of which were: the revival of Hebrew as a spoken language; the widespread use of Jewish folk-lore in the works of Jewish writers, painters, and musicians; and the rebuilding and resettling of Palestine by small groups of Jewish pioneers. The new settlers in Palestine soon adapted Hebrew (which had indeed remained very much alive through the centuries as a literary tongue) to the requirements of daily existence, and it became the language of instruction in most of their schools. At present, practically the entire Israeli population (about two million) speaks Hebrew.
The Vita of Ahmad-I Jām
Authors: Arberry A. J.
Published: January 2010

The admirable dissertation on the biography of the Persian mystic and wonder-worker Aḥmad-i Jām by Dr. Heshmat Moayyed has now been followed by an edition of the chief text furnishing the basis for the biography. The learned editor knew of only one complete manuscript of this work, contained in MS Nafid Pasha 339, together with a fragment in Berlin Oct. 3784. The purpose of this paper is to bring to notice the existence of a second complete copy, the collation of which is essential for the establishment of a definitive text.