bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
The Problems of Qūmis
Authors: Hansman John
Published: March 2011

During the summer of 330b.c.Alexander the Great pursued the Persian king Darius III through Northern Media, past the Caspian Gates, and eastward into the Achaemenid satrapy of Parthava (Parthia). Upon reaching Darius, Alexander found the king murdered by the usurper Bessus. The Macedonian thereafter advanced east for three more days until he arrived at the wealthy city which was later to be called Hecatompylos. It is the problems of Hecatompylos and the several related questions of its home district, called Comisene by the Greeks, which this paper will consider.
Notes on the Book of Zambasta
Authors: Emmerick R. E.
Published: March 2011

The Book of Zambasta is not without importance in the history of Buddhist studies. We know that Khotan was a major centre of Mahāyāna studies when Fa-hsien visited it about a.d. 400 on his way to India, and it had expanded in this direction when Hsüan-tsang in the 7th century spent several months in Khotan on his way back from India to China. Khotan was, if not the cradle, at any rate the stronghold of the Mahāyānist movement. We know of its importance in the transmission of Buddhist teaching to the East. Even the well-known term Zen represents Sanskrit dhyāna “meditation” only through the intermediacy of a Prakrit form such as the Khotanese loan-word jāna. In the Chinese Tripiṭaka we have translations made by Khotanese missionaries such as Devaprajña, Śikṣānanda, and Śīladharma. In the 5th century a certain marquis of An iang hou journeyed to Khotan in his youth to study the Dhyāna. A Chinese catalogue finished in a.d. 515 tells how eight Chinese monks came to Khotan and there heard the stories that later they made into the well-known collection “The Sūtra of the Wise man and the Fool”. The famous monk Jinagupta, who taught the Turks about Buddhist doctrines in the 6th century, had studied in Khotan for many years.
Excavations at Shahr-I Qūmis, 1967
Authors: Hansman John , Stronach David
Published: March 2011

A glance at any map of excavated sites in Iran will show clearly the relative rarity of controlled excavations north and east of the Tehran region. A cluster of sites in the vicinity of Behshahr, four in the neighbourhood of the Gorgan plain, two from the flat terrain immediately south of the eastern Elburz, and only one near Meshed represent the sum total of those north-eastern settlements that have attracted archaeological expeditions between the years 1930 and 1964. As a consequence, our excavated evidence from this extensive area is astonishingly slight, particularly following the fall of the rich Bronze Age “Gorgan Culture” in the middle of the second millennium b.c.
A Sasanian repository at Shahr-i Qūmis
Authors: Hansman John , Stronach David
Published: March 2011

In offering to Sir Mortimer Wheeler some of the firstfruits of our recent excavations at Shahr-i Qūmis, 32 kilometres west of Damghan, it may not be inappropriate if we enlarge on certain of the details that have been recovered from the only major building with both Parthian and Sasanian associations.
Overlay and p'ing-t'o in T‘ang silverwork
Authors: Watson William
Published: March 2011

The most familiar techniques of the Chinese silversmith in the T‘ang period are chasing, punching, and repoussé. Openwork is not infrequent, but the spherical censers with ajouré ornament over the whole of their surface, the bowl covers and hairpins treated in this fashion, do not belong to the most refined products or the most original designs of the T‘ang masters. The two pieces described in this article use openwork in a different way, as the overlay of a solid ground. The delicacy of the ornament and some of the technical features are exceptional.
The Submarine Mare in the Mythology of Śiva
Authors: O'Flaherty Wendy Doniger
Published: March 2011

Fire and water are natural symbols, individually and in combination, in mythologies throughout the world. They assume a unique meaning in the Indian context, where tradition has attached particular significance to each element. Together, as an apparent conjunction of opposites, fire and water resolve some of the major paradoxes of Indian—especially Śaiva—mythology. The most striking instance of this symbolism is the image of the mare who wanders beneath the ocean, breathing fire.
Religious Change in an Industrial City of South India
Authors: Holmström Mark
Published: March 2011

My subject is the relation between Hindu religion and morality. After some comments on this relation in traditional Indian society, I describe changes in religious thought and practice in a village which has become part of the industrial city of Bangalore; and I use this local example to support general conclusions about the development of values of autonomy in Indian industrial society.
The Vedic Mitra and the Epic Dharma
Authors: Gonda J.
Published: March 2011

In his important bookMythe et épopéeDumézil recently asserted that the god Dharma as he appears in the Māhabhārata is a continuation of the Vedic Mitra. Arguing “la substitution de Dharma à Mitra en tant que père de Yudhiṣṭhira” the French savant is of the opinion that “à l'époque de la rédaction définitive de l'épopée, dharma était certainement le mot le meilleur—ou le moins inadéquat—pour exprimer la substance du Mitra védique et prévédique, substance dont le Mitra épique avait été vidé”. Or, expressing himself briefly, Dharma—one of those so-called abstract figures of the “classical” pantheon which have no counterpart in the Veda—is Mitra “under a rejuvenated name”. Considering myself absolved from the obligation to give an account of the main relevant features of Dumézil's theories, which are well known to every student of Indo-European antiquity and of the comparative history of Indo-European religions, as well as from the necessity to resume my objections to some of his opinions and hypotheses, I shall limit myself here to a discussion of the question as to how far some form of identity of both divine figures can be substantiated or made acceptable.
Spices and Silk: Aspects of World Trade in the First Seven Centuries of the Christian Era
Authors: Loewe Michael
Published: March 2011

The earliest steps that led to the exchange of ideas, skills, and material goods between the cultures of the East and the West will probably never be more than a matter of surmise; but the literary and archaeological sources of information that start as a slender trickle at the beginning of the Christian era soon develop into a mighty stream and disclose a tale of human endeavour and ingenuity which few historians can fail to find fascinating and stimulating. During the last half-century or so dedicated scholars such as Pelliot have devoted their major research efforts to the meticulous consideration of the minutiae involved in the subject; and, more recently, Joseph Needham has contrived both to continue the work of such predecessors and to draw some of the major conclusions that are the fruits of basic research conducted in several disciplines. Probably the full story of these exchanges can never be told; for the evidence is sadly deficient; balanced inferences that rely on information gathered from both East and West are rarely possible; and, maddeningly enough, the political restrictions of the 20th century now prevent the application of the modern techniques of archaeology, geography, and anthropology in areas where they are most likely to be successful.
Licchavi-Dauhitra
Authors: Trautmann Thomas R.
Published: March 2011

The theory that Samudra Gupta inherited the kingdom of his maternal grandfather as well as that of his father is unsupported by the lawbooks, for if he were his maternal grandfather's heir he could also inherit his paternal estate only if his father had no other sons, which we know was not the case. Reference to the mother's patrilineage in this and other cases is made (1) to distinguish one's descent from that of half-brothers, (2) because of the political support a mother's family may provide, and (3) to emphasize the special purity or illustriousness of one's descent. The use of metronymics and other practices illustrates a built-in ambiguity in Indo-Aryan kinship: the wife assumes the clan and lineage of her husband upon marriage in theory, but in fact she never fully relinquishes her affiliation to her natal clan and lineage.
The sKar-Cung Inscription
Authors: Richardson H. E.
Published: March 2011

Copies of early inscriptions from the collection of the Lama Rig-'dzin Tshe-dbang Nor-bu (RT) have been the basis of articles in JRAS, 1969 and 1972. Another of his texts, described as “from the rdo-rings at sKar-cung rgyal-sde itself”, is the inscription on a stone pillar at Ra-ma-sgang near Lhasa which I edited with some remarks on its site and history in JRASB, 1949. It was included also by Professor G. Tucci in Tombs of the Tibetan kings, Rome, 1950 (TTK), where it was brought more fully into relation with a connected edict (bka'-tshigs) of Khri lDe-srong-brtsan recorded in vol. ja of the Chos-'byung of dPa'-bo gTsug-lag Phreng-ba (PT).
Excavations at Ghubayrā, 1971: First Interim Report
Authors: Bivar A. D. H. , Fehérvári G.
Published: March 2011

The first season of excavations at the medieval Islamic site of Ghubayrā in Kirmān Province took place between late March and the end of May 1971. The excavations were made possible by the kind permission of the Ministry of Art and Culture, and the Iranian Archaeological and Folkloric Services. The excavators record their sincere gratitude to H.E. Mr. Mehrdad Pahlbod, Minister of Art and Culture, and to Mr. A. Pourmand, Director-General of the Iranian Archaeological and Folkloric Services; to Mr. Khurramābādī and Dr. Na‘īmī of that service; and to Mr. Enayatullah Emirloo, who came to Ghubayrā as our Representative. We render thanks too to the local office of the Department of Ferhang va Honar at Kirmān, and especially to its Director, Mr. Mehdi Zamānī. To Mr. Muḥammad Sādeq Dānesh, District Commissioner of Bardsīr, our special acknowledgements are due for his constant thoughtfulness, and his readiness to give assistance in all moments of need.
Politics and Society in Viet-Nam during the Early Nguyen Period (1802–62)
Authors: Smith R. B.
Published: March 2011

Professor A. B. Woodside's recent study of Vietnamese government and society in the first half of the nineteenth century is likely to become immediately a standard work for the teaching of South-East Asian history, as well as a point of departure for further research. It is the first attempt by a Western scholar to analyse the institutional developments of a period in which Viêt-Nam attained its greatest measure of “Confucianization” and also its greatest territorial extent as a unified country. The “Đại-Nam” of the later years of Minh-Mang (1820–41) included not only the whole of present-day Viêt-Nam, united for the first time in 1802, but also (after 1836) a large part of Cambodia as well as a portion of eastern Laos. The institutional changes of his reign included the reinvigoration of the examination system, the creation of new organs of central government, and a thorough overhaul of the machinery of provincial administration. In terms of its own previous history, it was by no means a weak or declining Viêt-Nam which found itself face to face with European power in the 1850's and 1860's. By offering a study of government and society in this period, Professor Woodside has gone some of the way towards filling a major gap in Western-language literature on Vietnamese history.
Judaica in St Mark
Authors: Derrett J. Duncan M.
Published: March 2011

A difficulty has arisen in exegesis of the gospels. Allowing for variations, scholars figure in two main classes, the first largely introverted, the specialists, and the second “outsiders” who attempt to collaborate with them. The first, far the more numerous, comprises those who examine internally the New Testament, using Qumran and other intertestamental material, and Old Testament texts where they are cited or quoted in the New Testament, to enable the gospels to comment upon themselves and each other, employing in this procedure skills adequately described as “literary-historical”. One may refer to these scholars as “the critics”. Fashion gives great credence to “redaction-criticism”, heir to “source-criticism” and “form-criticism”. National traits tend to emerge, as is not surprising since subjective criteria are bound to operate in an estimate of what the evangelists were about, and national traits easily escape notice amongst their victims. In fact no one knows who the evangelists were or how they worked. Internal evidence alone leads to unending contradictions. Scepticism continues to play a role, and passages (such as one to which we come) which are not internally “corroborated” are more or less confidently dismissed as fabrications. The history, the archaeology of the New Testament is, at its most sensitive and useful point, at the mercy of skills that are principally literary and unashamedly academic. What is literary is of enormous value, but in no other field would it claim to exclude parallel sources of information.
Aśoka and Capital Punishment: Notes on a Portion of Aśoka's Fourth Pillar Edict, with an Appendix on the Accusative Absolute Construction
Authors: Norman K. R.
Published: March 2011

It will not have escaped the notice of anyone reading the Aśokan inscriptions that the emperor's attitude towards the killing of animals, including human beings, was not entirely consistent. In RE I(B) we read hiddā no kichi jive ālabhitu pajohitaviye (in the version at K), “Here no living being must be killed and sacrificed.” In RE III(D) we find pānānaṃ anālaṃbhe sādhu, “Abstention from killing animals is meritorious.” In RE IV(C) we read vaḍhite … anālaṃbhe pānānaṃ avihisā bhūtānaṃ, “There are now promoted … abstention from killing animals, abstention from hurting living beings.” In RE XI(C) pānānaṃ anālaṃbhe occurs again. PE V contains a long list of animals which Aśoka had made inviolable (avadhiyāni) and not to be killed (no haṃtaviyāni). In PE VII(NN) we read dhaṃmavaḍhi vaḍhitā avihiṃsāye bhūtānaṃ anālaṃbhāye pānānaṃ, “The progress of morality has been promoted (because it leads) to abstention from hurting living beings (and) to abstention from killing animals.” With specific regard to men, Aśoka expresses his regret about the number of persons killed in, or as a consequence of, the war in Kaliṅga (RE XIII(E)), and states his hope that the forest dwellers will repent so that they may not be killed (avatrapeyu na ca haṃñeyasu, in the reading of Sh at RE XIII(N)). It appears, however, from PE IV that men could be sentenced to death in Aśoka's empire.
Maṟaimalai Aṭikaḷ: a London Bibliography
Authors: Arooran K. Nambi
Published: March 2011

The aim of this article is to present a complete bibliography of the works of Cuvāmi Vētācalam (popularly known as Maṟaimalai Aṭikaḷ, 1876–1950) which are available at the British Museum (Department of Oriental Printed Books and Manuscripts), the India Office Library, and the Library of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. This may be of some help to students of Tamil language and literature and also to persons dealing with the history of the Madras Presidency in the first half of this century. Also included at the end is a list of works of Aṭikaḷ that are not available in London.
Methods of Decipherment
Authors: Gelb I. J. , Whiting R. M.
Published: March 2011

There are many stories connected with the decipherment of ancient writings and the recovery of forgotten languages, but these stories need not be retold here. Furthermore, they usually deal only with the discovery of the key, that brief moment of insight when some datum is arrived at, which when inserted causes the rest of the puzzle to fall into place. But what we are interested in here is the tremendous amount of work, routine but necessary, which precedes that moment and makes the decipherment possible, and the even more tremendous amount of work which follows that moment and results in the recovery of the language.
Problems and Methods in the Decipherment of Linear A
Authors: Hooker J. T.
Published: March 2011

In one form or another, the so-called Linear script of Class A was used in parts of Minoan Crete from the 20th to the middle of the 15th century B.C. It is closely related to two other Cretan scripts, with both of which it overlaps to some extent: an earlier (known as Hieroglyphic or, better, as Pictographic) and a later (known as the Linear script of class B). The precise nature of the interrelationship of these three scripts is not clear. They do not, apparently, descend from one another by a simple process of development. Rather, both Linear A and Linear B seem to have selected elements from a common source, which is either the Pictographic script itself or a system of writing allied to it. The closest similarity between the two classes of Linear script is evident in their external character, that is to say, in the shapes of individual signs: even so, only about half of the signs in the Linear A system have the same shape as those in Linear B. There is much less resemblance in internal character (the structure and function of the scripts). For example, although we find in Linear A many single signs (apparently ideographic or determinative in function) and also sign-groups (which, by reason of the small number employed in all and also by analogy with Linear B practice, are almost certainly phonetic), ideograms are very rarely juxtaposed with phonetic groups, as constantly happens in Linear B. Linear A offers only two certain examples of such juxtaposition, namely in HT 15:1 and 88:4, and even there the order is the reverse of that in Linear B, where the phonetic group regularly precedes the ideogram.
Maulānā Raḥmat Allāh Kairānawī and Muslim-Christian Controversy in India in the Mid-19th Century
Authors: Powell A. A.
Published: March 2011

During the 1850's a prolonged encounter took place in the city of Agra between a Muslim ‘ālim, Maulānā Raḥmat Alläh Kairānawī, and a German evangelical missionary, the Reverend K. G. Pfander. The early Mughal emperors had developed Agra as the capital of their expanding empire, and even after the transfer of the court in 1648 to nearby Delhi, the city had retained some importance as a centre of Muslim culture and learning. But the period of the decline of the Mughal fortunes in the 18th century culminated in the capture of Agra in 1803 by the forces of the East India Company, and the next half-century saw the transformation of the city into a key administrative centre in the expansion of British control over north India. In 1836 Agra was made the headquarters of a new unit of administration—the North-Western Provinces. Hence the phase of active religious encounter which began shortly after that date should be examined in terms of the impact which British rule, Western culture, and the Christian religion had effected on the people of the province since its annexation. Indeed in the eyes of missionary as well as ‘ālim, the generating force behind the new confrontation was a fear that the beginning of Christian preaching activity in Agra was a threat to the hold of Islam on the uneducated Muslims of the city and the surrounding region.
New Light on the Story of Banū Qurayẓa and the Jews of Medina
Authors: Arafat W. N.
Published: March 2011

It is well known that at the advent of Islam there were three Jewish tribes who lived in Yathrib (later Medina), as well as other Jewish settlements further to the north, the most important of which were Khaybar and Fadak. It is also generally accepted that at first the Prophet Muḥammad hoped that the Jews of Yathrib, as followers of a divine religion, would show understanding of the new monotheistic religion, Islam. However, as soon as these tribes realized that Islam was being firmly established and gaining power, they adopted an actively hostile attitude, and the final result of the struggle was the disappearance of these Jewish communities from Arabia proper.
Vijñaptimātratā of Vasubandhu
Authors: Yamada Isshi
Published: March 2011

The Yogācāra or Vijñānavāda doctrine, which appeared in such Mahāyāna sūtras as the Sandhinirmocana, has already been expounded by such scholars as Maitreyanātha (c. A.D. 270–350) in his voluminous Yogācārabhūmi, Mahāyānasūtrālaṅkāra, Madhyāntavibhāga, etc., and Asariga (c. A.D. 310–90) in his Mahāyānasaṅgraha, Mahāyānābhidharmasamuccaya, etc. The Triṃśikāvijñaptikārikā of Vasubandhu (c. A.D. 320–400) is a systematic and most concise exposition of this doctrine.
Modern European and Muslim explanations of conversion to Islam in South Asia: A preliminary survey of the literature
Authors: Hardy P.
Published: March 2011

Even among Muslims, the growth of Muslim population in South Asia excited little attention before the later 19th century when the British—Indian administration began to number the population of the Indian Empire according to declared or imputed religious allegiance. In medieval times, Muslim rulers and their aides, Muslim historians and literati, although often mindful that in “South Asia” they lived among a predominantly non-Muslim population, did not conceive the stability of Muslim dynastic rule or the continuation of political and financial advantages for Muslim élites, to be related to or dependent upon the size of the aggregate of those who would deem themselves as, and be regarded by others to be, Muslims. The very few references, over a period of 500 or 600 years, in the religious literature to “conversions” suggest in their contexts and perhaps in their very rarity, that the Muslim religious did not postulate the quality and strength of man's response in South Asia to the call of Islam to be proportionate to the numbers of those calling themselves, or called by others, Muslims.
Two Kharoṣṭhī casket inscriptions from Avaca
Authors: Bailey H. W.
Published: March 2011

These two caskets, relic bowls, with Kharoṣṭhī inscriptions in North-western Prakrit (Gandhārī) are in the collection of Professor Samuel Eilenberg. The larger casket (Plates I–IV) of dark grey steatite is in height 10.8 cm. with seven inscribed lines, the smaller casket (Plate V) of lighter grey steatite, 7 cm. with three lines. They are of Buddhist origin and similar to the Bajaur casket published by N. G. Majumdar in Epigraphia Indica, XXIV, 1937, 1–8, and commented upon by Sten Konow in Epigraphia Indica, XXVII, 1940, 52–8.
A mosque attributed to ‘Umar b. al-Khaṭṭāb in Dūmat al-Jandal in Al-Jawf, Saudi Arabia
Authors: King Geoffrey
Published: March 2011

The al-Jawf oasis lies at the northern extremity of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and although closer to ‘Ammān than to al-Riyāḍ, it is nevertheless reckoned by some to be a part of geographical Najd. Within the oasis is the settlement known as al-Jawf or Jawf 'Amīr, which is the ancient town of Dūmat al-Jandal, famous in early Islamic history. In the district, the town of al-Jawf is still referred to by the local people as Dūmat al-Jandal. Dūmat al-Jandal is no longer the main town of the area, having declined when Sakāka to the north-east became the seat of the amīrate. Today much of Dūmat al-Jandal appears to be deserted and the houses ruined, although it was clearly formerly a large settlement whose extensive farms and gardens are still cultivated (Plate I). The whole al-Jawf oasis and Wādī Sirḥān to the north are rich in pre-Islamic monuments and inscriptions which have been documented to some extent and standing on the acropolis of Dūmat al-Jandal is the largest of all these monuments, Qaṣr al-Mārid, dated to the 3rd century A.D., but with later additions (Plate II).
A re-examination of al-Mahdī's letter to the Yemenites on the genealogy of the Fatimid caliphs
Authors: Hamdani Abbas , de Blois François
Published: March 2011

Ever since the establishment of the Fatimid empire in the early part of the 10th century of the Christian era the origin of its rulers has been the subject of incessant discussion and polemics. This was, for the people of the time, no idle academic question, but one of immediate political importance. The defenders of the declining Abbasid state went to great lengths to discredit the rulers of the dynamic rival caliphate in the West, denouncing them not only as rebels and heretics, but also as impudent swindlers falsely claiming to belong to the house of the Prophet, while they were in reality the offspring of one Maymūn al-Qaddāḥ. The Fatimid rulers, for their part, maintained all along that they did indeed belong to the family of Muḥammad, and traced their lineage, at least from the middle of the 10th century onwards, to Ismā‘īl, the second son and, it was claimed, only legitimate successor of the famous Shi‘ite leader Ja‘far al-Ṣādiq, the great-grandson of ‘All and of Fāṭimah, the Prophet's daughter. The Ismaili descent of these rulers became a matter of faith for their partisans, who survive to the present day, in various branches, proudly identifying themselves precisely as “Ismailis”. Historians, whether in the Muslim world or, later, in the West, have taken sides in this ancient dispute, which flares up again from time to time, often with astonishing ferocity.
Saracen and Crusader heraldry in Joinville's history of Saint Louis
Authors: Leaf William
Published: March 2011

Heraldry — that is the systematic use of hereditary charges based upon the shield — had not come into being by 1095, the year of the Council of Clermont, but by 1300 the new science of Armory, as it is more correctly called, was in use throughout most of Christendom. The authors of the Chansons de Geste and historians such as Ambroise certainly mention heraldic devices on the banners and shields of both Western knights and Saracen amīrs, but their confused statements, although extremely illuminating as to Western views of Muslims, do not add a great deal to our study of contemporary heraldic practice. Their lowly position in the Crusading armies did not offer them many chances for really accurate observation. However, Jean, Sire de Joinville, who is dictating in about 1305/6 his account of events he had not only witnessed but in which he had played an important part in his youth, had been very close to the King and lived during the very period when Heraldry in the West became formalized on strictly controlled principles. He is a reliable historical observer, and it may well be that by examining specific statements he makes about both Western, and more importantly Muslim, heraldic practice we can further our knowledge of developments in the two systems.
White and Black Jews at Cochin, the story of a controversy
Authors: Segal J. B.
Published: March 2011

The controversy between White and Black Jews at Cochin still aroused bitter passion and partisanship a generation ago; now it belongs to history. Today fewer than fifty Jews and Jewesses remain in Kerala, scattered between Cochin itself and Mattancherry, Ernakulam and Parur. The rest of this historic and influential community have emigrated from India, most of them to Israel. It may, then, be not inopportune to offer a fresh analysis of this celebrated affair. In its principal features it was, I hope to establish, peculiar to India. Nowhere else could hereditary distinctions between the two sections of a single Jewish community have been rigidly maintained for centuries, including tabus on intermarriage and on free association on religious and social occasions. Now the old antipathies between White and Black have abated, as their protagonists are divorced from India. The sources and progress of the dispute may be analysed withour rancour.
Mesha and Ataroth
Authors: Beeston A. F. L.
Published: March 2011

In the famous ‘Moabite stone’ incription, Mesha king of Moab records how, after a long series of defeats inflicted on Moab by Israel, the tide turned and Israel was (according to Mesha's over-optimistic estimate) ‘utterly destroyed’, ʼbd ʼbd ʿ lm. The passage concerning the town of Ataroth runs,

10 … w'š gd yšb b'rṣ ʿ ṭrt mʿ lm wybn Ih mlk y11 šr'l 't ʿ ṭrt w'ltḥm bqr w'ḥzh w'hrg kl hʿm[.]12 hqr ryt Ikmš wlm'b w'šb mšm ʼt ʼrʼl dwdh wʼ[.]13 ḥbh Ipny kmš bqryt wʼšb bh ʼt ʼš šrn wʼtʼ[š]

“Now the folk of Gad had dwelt in the territory of Ataroth from of old, and the king of Israel had built for himself Ataroth; and I made war on the town and captured it and slew all the people of the town, arytfor Chemosh and for Moab, and I brought thence 'r'l dwdhand dragged it/him before the face of Chemosh in Qryt; and I caused the men of ŠRN to dwell therein, and the men (etc)”.
The Jew, the Gipsy and El-Islam: an examination of Richard Burton's consulship in Damascus and his premature recall, 1868–1871
Authors: Vincent Andrew
Published: March 2011

In choosing a title for this paper I have incorporated the name of a book which contains an anti-Semitic essay written by Richard Burton in 1872, shortly after his return from Damascus. The essay was destined to remain unpublished until long after its author's death, and although when it finally appeared in 1898 as part ofThe Jew, The Gipsy and El-Islamit omitted the most offensively anti-Jewish portions, it has nevertheless “always been an embarrassment to Burton biographers, who usually skirt the issue of his anti-Semitism”.
Three Aramaic seals of the Achaemenid period
Authors: Shaked S. , Naveh J.
Published: March 2011

This seal, of unknown provenance, has an Aramaic inscription which is engraved on a scaraboid hematite pierced lengthwise. It measures 17×13 mm, with 9 mm of thickness. The oval surface, which is slightly damaged at one point, is divided by a double line into two registers. Six letters are engraved in the upper, and five in the lower register, giving the following reading:

The letters are fairly large and fill the whole space. All the letters in the upper register stand at the same height on the double line. Normally, however, lamed is higher than the ceiling line of the other letters, while nun and taw are usually drawn with a stroke which goes below the bottom line formed by the other letters. In the lower register the taw and the two nuns seem to go farther down than the alef and the dalet.
Asiatic colonization of the East African coast: the Manda evidence
Authors: Horton Mark
Published: March 2011

The history of early settlement of the East African coast is currently interpreted in widely differing ways. One view takes as its premise the idea that the coast was first colonized from Asia. This hypothesis, which has its roots in the work of XlXth century historians suggests that there was substantial settlement by non-Africans who established trading and religious communities. These colonies formed the basis of what has come to be known as the Swahili Culture. At first defensible peninsulas and offshore islands were chosen as safe refuges from the African tribes of the interior. Eventually contact was established between these new communities and the African coastal peoples, to the benefit of both parties. Raw materials were obtained from the hinterland of these trading outposts, which were traded and taken across the Western Indian Ocean on the seasonal monsoons. The foreign merchants married local African women and an Afro-Arab culture developed, building stone towns, mosques, and tombs, that still remain today along the coastline from Somalia to Mozambique.
Arthur Wellesley as political agent: 1803
Authors: Bennell A. S.
Published: March 2011

Political as well as military experience in India, was the making of Arthur Wellesley. In 1797 he landed at Fort William, Calcutta, an unknown Colonel of twenty-seven, a rank achieved by aristocratic connection and by purchase. In March 1805 he sailed from Fort St George, Madras, a Major General and a KCB. The battle of Assaye in September 1803 with other military events of that year had laid the foundation of British paramountcy in India. The story of the Assaye campaign has been told many times; the attempt is here made to highlight some political interactions that flowed from a major delegation of authority to Arthur Wellesley by his brother Richard.
The relevance of religion and the response to it: a study of religious perceptions in early Islam
Authors: Zaman Muhammad Qasim
Published: March 2011

What did the Muslim citizen of the classical Islamic world mean by Islam? In what sense was it operative in his life? To what extent did an Islamic slogan signify religious commitment? The difficulty in treating these questions consists in the fact of the variety, not the dearth of answers to them. Rather than develop alternative perspectives, however, we would, in what follows, focus our study on one aspect of the life of the Muslim Umma. This is the problem of the dynamics underlying revolt, rebellion, social protest and revolution in early Islam; with reference to this aspect we would ask our basic questions. In a sense, the three questions could be resolved into one: to what extent, in what sense, and why, was Islam a factor in Muslim revolts during the first centuries? Two propositions would help treat this question, and in the course of the study, we would see if a third may also be legitimately articulated. They are as follows: first, it is possible that the disaffected Muslims in classical and medieval Islam may have tended to translate their mundane grievances into religous terms so that, for instance, the perceived threat to a particular dispensation, or the actual destruction of such a dispensation may have been interpreted as a threat to religion itself; and second, Islam may have been interpreted as the best form of propriety and justice so that those whofeltthemselves deprived considered it incumbent to fight for such justice, not necessarily because it would benefit them but because this was what Islam was, it being considered obligatory to strengthen, save, or reestablish Islam.
Ming observers of Ming decline: some Chinese views on the “seventeenth century crisis” in comparative perspective
Authors: Atwell William S.
Published: March 2011

Most students of Middle Eastern history in the West will probably recognize the title of this paper as an allusion to Bernard Lewis's well-known article “Ottoman observers of Ottoman decline”. The allusion is meant to be more than a mere play on words, however, for Professor Lewis's discussion of the reactions of Ottoman statesmen to the crises that rocked their society in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries contains much that is relevant to an understanding of Chinese reactions to similar crises in the Ming (1368–1644) empire at about the same time. Indeed, whether or not one accepts the still controversial notion that there was a “general crisis” in seventeenth-century world economic and political history, it has become increasingly clear in recent years that during the period from approximately 1550 to 1680, a revolution in world monetary history, sharp fluctuations in the levels of international and domestic trade, dramatic increases in governmental expenditure, significant changes in the growth rates and geographical distribution of population, deteriorating climatic conditions, and outbreaks of epidemic disease affected many economies, including those of the Ming, Ottoman, and Spanish empires, in ways that rulers, officials, clerics, and political commentators from London to Edo found deeply disturbing.
Confucianism and Christianity in Meiji Japan: the case of Kozaki Hiromichi
Authors: Ballhatchet Helen
Published: March 2011

The path followed by Protestant Christianity in Meiji Japan (1868–1912) has frequently been viewed as an index to the general process of Japanese development up to World War II. The beginnings seemed promising. According to the accepted picture, the early converts included a significant number of young ex-samurai whose clan had not supported the winning side in the Meiji Restoration. The new regime dismantled the feudal order which had given their lives purpose and meaning, and they felt alienated and rejected as a result. They first came into contact with Christianity from a desire to study Western learning and thus make a new start in life; they were indifferent, or even hostile, to the Western religion itself. The early missionaries and foreign teachers who led them to Christianity in spite of such initial attitudes seem to have been, if not men with actual military experience, people of strong personality and puritanical ideals. Matching samurai stereotypes of courage and single-minded determination as they therefore did, they attracted the admiration and loyalty of their lordless pupils, who pledged themselves, through their teachers, to Christ. Conversion was often accompanied by the discovery of a new purpose in life, the task of spreading the new religion. This was a restatement of the samurai obligation to set a spiritual example to others, and also represented a patriotic mission to save the nation both morally and materially, through providing the proper basis for the adoption of Western civilization.
Art. II.—On the Rock-Cut Temples of India
Authors: Fergusson James
Published: March 2011

There are few objects of antiquarian research that have attracted more attention from the learned in Europe, than the history and purposes of the Cave Temples of India, but if we except the still unexplained antiquities of Mexico, I know none regarding which so little that is satisfactory has been elicited, or about which so many, and such discordant opinions exist: and while the age of every building of Greece and Rome is known with the utmost precision, and the dates of even the Egyptian monuments ascertained with almost as much certainty as those of mediæval cathedrals, still all in India is darkness and uncertainty, and there is scarcely a work on architecture published, or lecture read, which does not commence by a comparison between the styles of India and Egypt, and after pointing out a similarity which seems to be an established point of faith in Europe, though in reality no two styles are more discordant, the author generally proceeds to doubt which is the more ancient of the two, and in most cases ascribes the palm of antiquity to the Indian as the prototype. Yet, in truth, Egypt had ceased to be a Nation before the earliest of the cave temples was excavated, and if we except the copies of earlier structures erected by the Ptolemies and Cæsars, there is nothing on the banks of the Nile which does not belong to a different and far more ancient epoch than anything in India.
Art. XXV.—Extracts from a Report on Chota Nagpore
Authors: Cuthbert S. T.
Published: March 2011

The pergunnah of Chota Nagpore is about ninety-five miles long and eighty broad, and is bounded on the north by the pergunnah of Ramghur, to the south by Gangpore and Singbhoom, to the east by the zillah of Jungle Mehauls, and to the west by Sirgooja. A large portion of the pergunnah is uncultivated, and its aspect hilly and jungle; but there are parts highly productive and well peopled, such as Loadugga, Pitonia, Burkaghur, Govindpore, Tamar, &c., &c., the soil of which places is extremely rich and fertile; and owing to the rain which frequently falls in these parts, and the general humidity of the atmosphere, the ground produces the most abundant crops without the fostering aid of irrigation, and often in seasons when they fail altogether in the neighbouring pergunnahs. The climate, from the setting in of the rains until about the middle of December, is extremely unhealthy; indeed, to the inhabitants of other parts of the couutry who may be compelled by business to journey into and sojourn in the pergunnah at that season, it may be accounted deadly.
Art. VI.—The Pehlví Coins of the early Mohammedan Arabs
Authors: Thomas Edward
Published: March 2011

It but rarely occurs amid the often dry details of Numismatic inquiries that we meet with a subject combining such varied claims upon the attention of so many distinct classes of archæologists, as that now about to be brought under the notice of the Royal Asiatic Society.
Art. XII.—The Buddhist Sources of the (Old Slav.) Legend of the Twelve Dreams of Shahaïsh
Authors: D'Oldenburg Serge
Published: March 2011

The Old Russian literature took up the theme of the king, who gets the explanation of some miraculous dreams from a wise man, in two different versions. In the first of these versions, the dreams concern events in the king's life, and this version enters into the complex of Stephanit and Ichnelat, showing itself thus a pretty correct reproduction of the Indian original through the Pehlevi, Arab, and Greek over-workings. In the second version the dreams have an eschatological character, and this version appears as an independent tale, known as ‘Word (=legend) of the dreams of king Mamer,’ ‘Word of the twelve dreams of Shahaïsh,’ etc.: the nearest sources of this legend are yet unknown.
Art. XIV.—Kumbha Jātaka or the Hermit Varuṇa Sūra and the Hunter
Authors: St. John R. F. St. Andrew
Published: March 2011

In times long past, when Brahraadatta reigned in Benares, a certain hunter, who dwelt in the land of Kási, went one day to the Himavanta forest in search of elephant tusks, yák tails, etc. Now in a certain part of the forest, it happened that there was a tree, in which there was a hollow place like a large pot, which became full of water during the rains, and round about it grew a number of fruit trees, the fruit of which dropped into this water when they were ripe. The birds also dropped grains of rice into it when they were eating in the branches of the tree, and the whole becoming fermented by the summer heat, produced a red liquor which was pleasant to the taste. When the birds drank this liquor they became intoxicated and fell to the ground, but when they had slept off the effects, they flew away singing sweetly. The hunter chancing to pass by this tree, saw the birds and monkeys lying about, and thought they had died of poison, but when he saw them get up, after a little time, and go away he felt reassured, and had the curiosity to drink the water in the hollow of the tree. Finding that it had a pleasant taste, and that it also made him feel very merry, he stayed there for some days, eating the birds which he picked up there, and amusing himself by dancing. Not far from that spot there dwelt a hermit, whose acquaintance he had made, so the hunter determined to go and tell him of his wonderful discovery and get him to try the water too; having filled a bamboo bottle with it, and taking some roast birds, he proceeded to the hermit's cell, and presented them to his friend.
Art. I.—Jodhpur Inscription of the Pratihāra Bāuka
Authors: Debiprasād Munshi
Published: March 2011

The stone which bears this inscription was discovered, about two years ago, in the wall which, surrounds the city of Jodhpur, near the Merta gate. It was probably brought from the neighbourhood, when the fortifications of Jodhpur were completed, during the reign of Bakht Singh, about the middle of last century. As is shown by the fact that in the present position of the stone the lower lines of the writing are uppermost, little or no notice was then taken of the inscription which it contains.
Art. VIII.—The Geography of Ráma's Exile
Authors: Pargiter F. E.
Published: March 2011

The story of Ráma is one that has fascinated all generations of Hindus, and is full of interest for us. Apart, however, from its charm as a story, it presents a picture of ancient India, which is in many respects unique, and suggests perplexing questions of history, mythology, social life, topography, etc. Many of those questions permit of endless debate and little solid result, for there is no firm ground to rest upon, but the geographical questions are in a better position. India has been surveyed most accurately and completely, and we know that what it is now, it was in ancient times, except that changes have occurred in the courses of some rivers in the plains of North India; and these changes may often be detected. There is plenty of the fabulous in Hindu geography, but it is confined, as a rule, to outside lands, and the allusions to purely Indian topography are generally sober. The main features of the country were adequately known in very early times. The Aryans were well acquainted with all North India as far as the confines of Bengal proper, and the chief mountains and rivers of South India were known. Wars and caravans (of which we have a graphic instance in the story of Nala), helped greatly in opening out new territories as in all lands and ages, but it was the religious ascetics who were the pioneers in discovery, and who appear to have contributed most to a knowledge of the country.
Art. XXIII.—The Raṭṭhapāla Sutta
Authors: Lupton Walter
Published: March 2011

The Sutta of which the Pāli text, together with a translation, is here given is No. 82 of the Majjhima Nikāya. I have availed myself throughout of Buddhaghosa's Commentary, the Papañca-Sūdanī; but only so much of it is here reproduced, in the form of extracts, as I thought was necessary either to support a rendering, or to illustrate a point, of the text. Such extracts are marked ‘Pap. Sūd.’ I have added, at the end of the text, a few further references of general interest.
Art. I.—The King of Siam's Edition of the Pāli Tipiṭaka
Authors: Chalmers Robert
Published: March 2011

Though four years have passed since the publication, at Bangkok, of thirty-nine volumes of the Pāli Canon, under the auspices of His Majesty the King of Siam, it was not till a more recent date that, thanks to His Majesty's munificence, copies of this monumental work reached the Royal Asiatic Society, and other libraries in Europe, and so became available for study by Western scholars. The recent visit of the King to this country gave me an opportunity of discussing the genesis and circumstances of the edition with H.R.H. Prince Sommot; and I now desire to communicate to the Royal Asiatic Society the information which I owe to the Prince's scholarship and courtesy. The value of that information will be recognized when it is stated that Prince Sommot is Private Secretary to the King, served on the Editing Committee, and is brother to the Priest-Prince Vajirañāṇavarorasa, who has edited eleven out of the thirty-nine volumes already published.
Art. III.—The Jātakas and Sanskrit Grammarians
Authors: Kielhorn F.
Published: March 2011

The charming volumes which we owe to the distinguished “guild of Jātaka translators” have allured me to peruse the stories of the Buddha's former births in the original. In the course of this reading, the Pali text has reminded me of certain passages and phrases in the Mabābhāşya. Occasionally, too, Pāṇini's own rules have suggested an interpretation which differs from that of the Pāli commentary. Not being a Pali scholar, I should hardly venture to submit the following observations of mine to the Society, were I not encouraged to do so by my friend Professor Cowell.
Art. V.—A Contemporary Account of the Great Storm at Calcutta in 1737
Authors: Wilson C. R.
Published: March 2011

The great storm of 1737 is one of the few events still remembered in the early history of Calcutta. The traditional account of the matter is that given by “Asiaticus,” which he professes to have derived from the Gentleman's Magazine. It is as follows:—“In the night of the 11th October, 1737, there happened a furious hurricane at the mouth of the Ganges, which reached sixty leagues up the river. There was at the same time a violent earthquake, which threw down a great many houses along the river side; in Golgota (i.e. Calcutta) alone, a port belonging to the English, two hundred houses were thrown down, and the high and magnificent steeple of the English Church sunk into the ground without breaking. It is computed that twenty thousand ships, barques, sloops, boats, canoes, etc., have been cast away; of nine English ships then in the Ganges, eight were lost, and most of the crews drowned. Barques of sixty tons were blown two leagues up into land over the tops of high trees; of four Dutch ships in the river, three were lost, with their men and cargoes; 300,000 souls are said to have perished. The water rose forty feet higher than usual in the Ganges.” Then follows the story of the voracious crocodile in the hold of the stranded ship.