Dans la tradition religieuse de l'Iran mazdéen, la région dénommée airyanәm υaēǰõ en avestique, Ērān-υēž en pehlevi, jouit, au long des siècles, d'une notoriété consacrée par de nombreuses légendes. C'est la première des régions qu'Ahuxa Mazda a créées et destinées à l'établissement des Iraniens (Vd. i, 2); le dieu suprême y fait apparaître le premier couple animal (Bd. xiv, 3; Zāt-spr. ix, 8), et Yama y a établison paradis (Vd. ii, 21 sq.), après qu'Ahura Mazda lui a dicté les mesures qui assureront la subsistance des êtres devenus trop nombreux sur une terre trop étroite. Zarathuštra y est né (Bd. xx, 32); c'est de là qu'est parti son message (Bd. xxxii, 3); c'est là qu'il sacrifie aux dieux (Yt v, 104; ix, 14, 25; xvii, 45), et que la tentation l'a assailli (Vd. xix, 4, 11).

The beginnings of the novel as a literary art in Egypt are so recent that the student of contemporary Arabic literature might well be excused for seeking to trace some genetic connection between its development and the earlier productions of the Syrian school of writers. But except for the possibility that the success of the Syrian novelists (whose works have been admirably described by Professor Kratchkowsky in the study frequently quoted in the previous articles of this series, and now available in a German translation) may have encouraged the Egyptian writers to produce a class of works which would appeal to the same public, the literary movement which forms the subject of the present article has remained in general entirely independent of the Syrian historical novel. Western influences, which are very marked in the later stages, have been exercised directly, but Egyptian recreational literature continued for a long time to lean rather on classical and conventional models. It is only very slowly and hesitatingly that it has emancipated itself, and its progress in this direction has been sporadic and individual rather than the result of a steady evolution.

Kha, cf. Greek , is generally “cavity”; and in the Ṛg Veda, particularly, “the hole in the nave of a wheel through which the axle runs” (Monier-Williams). In Journ. U.P. Hist. Soc., vii, 44–5 and 62, Mr. A. N. Singh shows conclusively that in Indian mathematiqal usage, current during the earlier centuries of the Christian era, kha means “zero”; Sūryadeva, commenting on Aryabhaṭa, says “the khas refer to voids (khāni śūnyā upa lakṣitdāi) … thus khadwnake means the eighteen places denoted by zeros”.

Im Jahre 1928 erschien bei Luzac in London ein Buch unter dem Titel Munda–Magyar–Maori. An Indian link between the Antipodes. New Tracks of Hungarian Origins. Der Verfasser dieses Buches, Herr W. F. von Hevesy, der sich hier unter dem Pseudonym F. A. Uxbond verbarg, verehrte mir ein Exemplar (15. 1. 29) mit seiner persönlichenx Widmung und bat mich, darüber eine Besprechung zu veröffentlichen. Obwohl ich die schöne Alliteration des Titels “Munda-Magyar-Maori” und den grossen Mut, den der Verfasser bei der Konstruktion seiner Theorie zeigte, anerkennen musste, konnte ich mich doch nicht entschliessen, der Sache näher zu treten.

The publication of the first volume of M. René Groussef's history of the Crusades, which is review'ed elsewhere in this issue, brings out again, and all the more vividly because of its wealth of detail and effort to present a complete and rounded-off picture, the very serious gaps in Orientalist research on this period. Whereas the study of the Western and Greek sources has progressed to a point at which it may be said that little more remains to be done, research on the Oriental sources is incredibly backward.

“It is so published that injury that comes upon the fruits lies upon the holder of the pledge, that which comes upon the stock, lies upon the farmer.”

For the interpretation of graβakāndār, bar and bun, one may refer to Bartholomae, MM., 1, 14.

It seems an odd coincidence that within the last three years there should have appeared four different studies devoted to the work of Ibn Khaldūn, considering that in the half-century following the issue of de Slane's translation of the Muqaddima, apart from von Kremer's study and a few short articles drawing the attention of a wider circle of students in various countries to its significance, it was not until 1917 that the first monograph on the subject was published by Dr. Ṭāhā Ḥusain. This work, like most of the earlier articles, dealt primarily with the sociological aspects of Ibn Khaldūn's historical theory, and the same interest predominates in all but one of the three or four articles published since 1917. Of the latest studies it may be said that, though still giving prominence to the social aspect,they cover as a whole a rather wider ground. Dr. Gaston Bouthoul, indeed, limits himself in his title to Ibn Khaldun's “Social Philosophy”, but the contents of his essay overleap these bounds, especially the first thirty pages, devoted to a very suggestive analysis of the personality and intellectual outlook of the historian. Professor Schmidt's tractate is in the nature of a survey of the field ; he assembles and examines the views of earlier writers on different aspects of Ibn Khaldun's work, but does not put forward any synthesis of his own. Lastly, the two recent German works of Drs. Kamil Ayad and Erwin Rosenthal mark a return towards the more strictly

The land of Baltistan lies in Kashmir State territory beyond the Himalayan range and to the north of the province of Ladakh. It is occasionally called Little Tibet, but nowadays it is usually referred to by the State as that part of Ladakh which comes under the jurisdiction of the Skardu Tehsil. Some hundred thousand people speak the Balti language, which in some instances would appear to resemble more the written Tibetan than any spoken dialect of that language.

Corresponding to Av. anra-, angra-, the Pahlavi has the word (occurring also with the doubledotted ). Numerous explanations had already been proposed when Bartholomae, Zur Kenntnis der mitteliranischen Mundarten, i, 1916, 18 ff., discussed the word more fully than had till then been done. He concluded that the Pāzand ganā was ùntrustworthy, rejected Spiegel's explanation of gan- as equivalent to zan-, equally Darmesteter's zanāk, his own earlier reading zūrāk, and Andreas's druvāk, to suggest a new interpretation dawāk ‘deceiving’.

The School of Oriental Studies has bought a small collection of Ismaili books which were the property of a Bohra mullah in India. He died about three years ago, and some of his books went to his son who had become a Christian. Having no interest in Ismaili theology he arranged with a missionary to sell them outside India. It looks as if the library had been divided in a way typical of India, one heir getting the first volume of a work and another the second.

From the point of view of causality, Urdu verbs may be divided theoretically into four classes, according to their form: In trans., Trans., First Causal, Second Causal. In this note I have kept before myself the difference between the form and the meaning of a verb; but, though fully cognizant of what some grammarians say about “verbs used transitively or intransitively”, I find it more convenient in practice to say simprv “intr. verb” and “trans, verb”.

The main object of this article is to explain the circumstances which induced James I to write to Sultan Ahmad the letter which is here reproduced. These circumstances cannot fail to be of interest to students of Oriental history, constituting as they do a kind of footnote to the relations existing between England and Turkey at the beginning of the seventeenth century. I cannot here recount in detail the many adventures of Sir Thomas Sherley, for they would occupy far too much space in the Bulletin; but I shall confine myself to an outline of the events which culminated in his falling into the hands of the Turks, who held him prisoner for a period of nearly three years (January, 1602, to December, 1605), and the correspondence that passed between Constantinople and London regarding his captivity.

Aύana has been referred to Skt. āpana, but there is nothing to suggest that it means “market” or “bazaar”. On the contrary, it is clear from the documents that it means “village”, “parish”, or “local township”, i.e. the small country towns or villages administratively dependent on Caota, the capital of the province. Further, -ύ- (= w) almost always occurs, not -v- which we would have expected out of an original -p-. It is possible, of course, that āpana might have been used in an extended sense “market-town”, but it can be explained perhaps easier out of Iranian. O.P. āvahana, Arm. lw. avan, both meaning “village”.

A jhate (i.e. azate) may be connected with the Avestan dzdta noble of noble birth Cf. also ztchin the Sogdian letters free-born (Reichelt, Sogd. Handschriftenreste, ii, p. 3)Although the documents do not furnish enough material for defining with certainty the meaning of the word, this explanation suits all the passages where it occurs. It is used mosj; frequently as an introductory term in giving lists of witnesses, e.g. 593 tatra saclii ajhade jamna cojhbo Dhamena Sugi Kuleya There the witnesses are people of high rank (or free-born), the cojhbo Dhamena, Sugi, Kuleya, etc. Similarly in 507, 588. It is worth while noticing that khula putre is used in a similar formula in 415, though not in exactly the same position, tatra sacJii janati sramamna Parvati livira Buddha rachida, vasu Kolfisa, khula putre Lfatga There witnesses know this the monk Parvati, the scribe Buddharachida, the vasu Kolpisa, and Lpatga, son of a good family.

Hardly ever has Islam survived a more disastrous and more mournful event than the destruction of Baghdād by the Mongols of Hūlāghū Khān in the middle of the month of al-Muharram of the year 656/January, 1258. The Mongol conqueror, after having subdued the Assassins, turned against the capital of the ‘Abbāsids and captured it without any resistance. The fall of the ‘Abbāsid caliphate was followed by a veritable reign of terror which lasted for forty days. Baghdad was plundered during this dismal period, its entire population was massacred mercilessly with the exception of the Christians, the co-religionists of Hūlāghū Khān's wife and father. The Caliph al-Musta'ṣim and his sons fell victims to the fury of the enraged conqueror, who put them to death. And to complete the disaster, a great conflagration destroyed many parts of the city.

In the archives of the Da'wat of the Yemen and India a collection of royal letters and decrees (sijillāt) issued by the Fātimid Khalīfa al-Mustanṣir bi'llāh (denoted in the following pages by the letter M.) (died A.H. 487 = A.D. 1094) to the Sulaihids of the Yemen has been preserved, and a manuscript containing this collection of documents has now been acquired by the Library of the School of Oriental Studies, London. The MS. is a modern copy, which belonged to an Ismā'īlī priest in India. I have searched in vain for other copies, but it is quite likely that we might find others in the collections of the Ismā'īlī in the Yemen and India. I give in the following pages a synopsis of the historical matter contained in these documents. Apart from their interesting literary style the letters furnish us with some useful historical data and contemporary evidence for the period covered by them, viz. the forty-four years from A.H. 445 = A.D. 1053 to A.H. 489 = A.D. 1095.

38. das Palmblatt-MS. zu nennen, welches de Zoysa in seinem Catalogue of Páli, Sinhalese, and Sanskrit MSS. in the Temple Libraries of Ceylon (Colombo, 1885), p. 9, als „common“ bezeichnet. Es enthält 178 Blätter, 17 Zoll lang, 9 Zeilen auf der Seite.

39. Bentotte, Tempel von (Bentoṇa Vanavāsa Vihāra): 5 MSS. des M. und 1 sannē.

The present is perhaps a good time to recall some of the vicissitudes of the Maltese tongue. Close on a century ago G. P. Badger wrote: “As a dialect of Arabic, the present Maltese spoken at Gozo and the casals of Malta is nearly as good as that of any other Arabic country, and it is sad to observe how little it is appreciated by the people. With a little cultivation the Maltese might possess a written language which would yield to none in the beauty of its phrases and the extent of its vocabulary.” Of the few then existing schools he remarks: “All instruction being communicated in the Italian the Maltese child cannot begin his studies on a par with the children of other countries, because he must first learn a language entirely different from his own as a means of acquiring the knowledge he seeks after”.

It has often been said that the Persian language written and spoken in India does not possess that flavour which is generally found in the writings of the Iranian authors. There is an element of truth in the foregoing charge so far as the literature produced in India during the later period of Muslim rule is concerned. But the Persian literature produced in India from the middle of the thirteenth to the middle of the fifteenth century may be favourably compared with the writings of many an indigenous Iranian scholar. The works of Amīr Khusrau and Hasan of Dihli and Badr-i-Chāch, who flourished during this period, are highly esteemed by Iranian scholars and are placed next to Sa'dī and Jalāl ul-Dīn Rūmī. The early immigrants who made India their permanent home retained the purity of their tongue in a much larger measure than their successors. But with the growing influence of the Hindu scholars who began to study Persian to qualify themselves for the service of the State, the difference in the style of India and Persia proper became more marked.

A thorough and scientific treatment of the historiography of the African Muslim peoples and institutions south of the Zambesi is a long-felt and eminent want. As yet, this particular field of research has hardly been explored, and its results, if collected and evaluated, would add tangibly to our contemporary knowledge of Oriental penetration in lands where Europeans have founded new homes and fostered a vitalist conception of Occidental civilization.