The Periplus Marts Erythræ describes the seaports below Barygaza in the following way according to Schoff's translation: “The market-towns of this region are, in order, after Barygaza: Suppara, and the city of Calliena, which in the time of the elder Saraganus became a lawful market-town; but since it came into the possession of Sandares [an unjustified conjecture for the text's Sandanes] the port is much obstructed, and Greek ships landing there may chance to be taken to Barygaza under guard. Beyond Calliena there are other market-towns of this region; Semylla.…” Suppara is now Sopara on the coast above Bassein, Semylla is Cemūla of two inscriptions, now Chaul, and Calliena is Kalyāṇa. This last, situated at the foot of the two regular ascents of the Western Ghats leading towards Nasik and Poona respectively and with good access to the sea, was the natural outlet for the commerce of the Andhra dominions on the west coast, and the notice, just quoted, shows how its trade was stifled, as the Kṣaharātas extended their rule southwards from Broach. It is unnecessary here to consider who are the kings alluded to in this passage or in the earlier one mentioning Nambanus (a conjecture for the text's Mambarus), but clearly we are dealing with the rivalry of the Western Satraps and the Andhra kings. That the former were successful in their policy towards Kalyāṇa is shown by Ptolemy's omission of the town. The order he gives (taking Renou's text) is Souppara mouth of the River Goaris, Dounga, mouth of the River Bêndas, Semyla.

One of the enduring open questions in ancient Indian history is the identity of the king who identifies himself on the reverse of his gold coins as prakāśāditya. Most authors have assumed that he was a Gupta king. This paper reviews the various proposals on the identity of Prakāśāditya, arguing why we can be quite sure, as suggested by Robert Göbl, that he was in fact a Hun king and not a Gupta. Then, by presenting a near-complete reading of the obverse legend, it is shown that it is virtually certain that he was in fact the Hun king Toramāṇa, as Göbl had speculated. Implications of this finding are then considered.

Sa‘d b. Mansūr Ibn Kammūna, a Jewish polymath whose writings are now receiving a good deal of scholarly attention, worked in Baghdad under the aegis of the Mongol rulers and their courtiers. Born early in the thirteenth century, so it seems, he was forced to flee the capital after rioters protested against his book which compared the three revealed monotheistic faiths; he died in the 1280s. His oeuvre includes a treatise on ophthalmology, no longer extant; quotations from it are however available in the writing of another ophthalmologist, Sadaqa ibn Ibrāhīm al-Shādhilī. From these we learn that Ibn Kammūna practiced medicine in Aleppo (Halab).

This article focuses on some representations of Aurangzeb in the Nath Yogi lore; their ambivalence appears as a signifier of the complex relationships the Nath Yogis had with Islam. Aurangzeb figures both as a powerful enemy and as a clumsy devotee, he is depicted more as a symbol than as an historical individual character.

In the aftermath of the Mongol occupations of the largest and most populous societies of Eurasia, greater visibility of popular religion, more widespread vernacular language use, rising literacy, and fundamental shifts in the structure of rulership and the relationship of state and society could all be observed. Many historians have related these changes to a broader chronology of early modernity. This has been problematic in the case of Iran, whose eighteenth-century passage has not been adequately explored in recent scholarship. Our comparative review of ‘post-Mongol’ Iran and China suggests that this period marks as meaningful a break between a schematic medieval and schematic early modern history in Iran as it does in China. Here, we first consider both societies in the post-Mongol period as empires with secular rulerships and increasingly popular cultural trends, and look at the role of what Crossley has called “simultaneous rulership”—rulership in which the codes of legitimacy of civilisations recognised by the conquest authority are given distinct representation in the rulership — in marking the transition away from religious-endorsed rule to self-legitimating rule as a mark of comparative early modernity.

Al-Manār was an Arabic and reformist journal founded by Muḥammad Rashīd Riḍā in Cairo in 1898, and its primary objectives were to examine the decadence of Muslim political institutions, underline the danger of European colonialism in the Muslim world, and promote the idea that Islam was compatible with modernity and reason. The present article attempts to examine the intellectual influence of al-Manār among the Ḥadhramī elite in the Malay-Indonesian world, and critically assess its role as the mouthpiece for the propagation of ‘Abduh's doctrines and accomplishment of his reforms. It first addresses the mission of al-Manār as a reformist journal that worked towards the promotion of social, religious and economic reforms in the Muslim world. It secondly examines the religio-cultural background of the Ḥadhramī elite who were influenced by the reformist mission of al-Manār and subscribed to its ultimate goal. The study finally highlights the impact of al-Manār on the religio-political and social structure of the Ḥadhramī diaspora in the Malay-Indonesian world, and discusses how this impact resulted in the establishment of a revivalist movement that rejected the conservative attitude of blind imitation (taqlīd ) of the four schools of Islamic law, and denounced the Sufi practices that were not in harmony with the fundamentals of Islam. Special attention will also be paid to the role of the Ḥadhramī organisations, schools and press that contributed to the propagation of al-Manār's reformist mission and its dissemination at the grass roots level of the Ḥadhramī community.

One of the chief difficulties which I have to encounter in the study of Old-Javanese manuscripts consists in the faulty spelling introduced by the Balinese transcribers. The Balinese language is not closely related to Javanese, the latter being a foreign language in. Bali. Only a few words are identical in both languages, while many others have in each case a more or less different form. Thus, the Old-Jav. nyû, cocoanut, is nyuh in Balinese; hence, the Balinese transcribers, finding the word nyû in a Kawi composition, change it into nyuh. Again, being unable in their own language to distinguish between u, wu and hu, all three being pronounced u, they write promiscuously uçinâra, huçinâra, wuçinâra, as well as hûçinâra or wûçinâra, so that it is difficult to say which is really the Kawi form of this name. The metre sometimes helps us in settling the spelling of a word, but this can only be in the poems called Kĕkawin (from Kawi, poet), the metre of which is essentially Indian and is regulated by long and short syllables; but, clearly, not in the poems called Kiḍung, wherein the metre is regulated by rhyme and the number of syllables. The Kiḍung are of far greater interest than the Kĕkawin, the latter being simply imitations from the Sanskrit, containing nothing about ancient Javanese life, whereas the Kiḍung, on the other hand, supply us with valuable particulars in this respect. It is, therefore, a matter of regret that the manuscripts are so faulty.

To the outside observer the history of Hindu sectarianism often appears as a disorganized tangle, lacking clarity and precision. The whole process is made if anything more complex by the ill-defined relationship of sect and non-sect. As Renou remarks: Though no statistics are available, even for the present day, we have grounds for supposing that the most active sects were themselves only isolated groups within the great body of believers. From another point of view, however, the history is more understandable. A considerable part of sectarian activity during the past 1,500 years has been concerned with the spread and regional development of a single great devotional movement. Seen from this position, the uniformity and theological coherence of the sects, whether they be called Vaiṣṇavite, Śaivite, or by some other name, is remarkable and often overrides the no less real disparities of doctrine or detail at another level. Again, in this process regional variations have arisen in no small measure as a result of the popular character of the writings of particular saints. Thus, for example, Basava or Purandara Dāsa hold pride of place in the Karnāṭka, the one Vīra Śaiva, the other Vaiṣṇava; in Mahārāṣṇra devotion has in no small part been moulded by the thought of Jāân Dev or Tukā Rām; in the Pañjāb by Nānak; and in the Hindī region by Kabīr Dās, Tulsī Dās, and Sūr Dās. Throughout north India the influences which lay behind the movement were largely, but by no means exclusively, Vaiṣṇavite; yet other streams contributed, Śaivite, Buddhist, Tāntrika, Yogī, etc.

In the third volume of Anquetil du Perron's translation of the Zand-Avastá, there are versions of two small liturgical works of the Pársís, entitled by him the “Lesser Si-rozé,” and the “Greater Sirozé.” There is another Sirozé, however, possessed by the Pársís, which he does not translate. It treats of the qualities of the thirty days of the month, as auspicious or inauspicious. Though its intimations are absurd in the highest degree, it exercises great influence over the whole body of Zoroastrians. It is so much regarded by them, that there is scarcely a family without a copy, and there are few individuals who have not its precepts written on the tablet of their hearts. On this account, as well as because of the brief information which it gives respecting the Amsháspands and Izads, to whom the days of the month are sacred, it is not unworthy of the attention of Europeans. It exists in the Persian language; but there are several Gujaráthí versions, which are generally used. The translation which I give is very literal, and is formed from a collation of these versions, and a careful comparison with the original. I have added a few explanatory notes. The only general remark which I would make on the Precepts of Fate which this Sirozé contains, is that its framers seem to have made such a distribution of good and evil throughout the month, and its different days, as is calculated to render those who credit it, neither much elated, nor much cast down, on account of any of its portions. Blessings and curses are made to go hand in hand during the whole journey of the moon.

Khuddaka Páṭha, or “Lesser Readings,” is one of the books of the Buddhist Scriptures. It is the first of the fifteen divisions of Khuddaka Nikáya, and immediately precedes Dhammapada, The text which I have adopted is that of a manuscript written and collated for me by a Singhalese priest of great learning. I have compared with it the Burmese manuscript belonging to the collection presented by Sir A. Phayre to the India Office Library. This, however, I found to contain numerous clerical and other errors, and it failed to supply me with a single corrected reading.

A short time before my leaving Calcutta, a Maulavi, by name Gholaum Hosain, was introduced to me under the character of a great mathematician and astronomer. I found he was in the service of Mirza Khán Bahádur, the Mohammedan son of Mitrajít Singh, the well-known Mahá Rájá, of Takari, in Bahar. The Maulavi stated, that he had devoted himself to the study of mathematics and astronomy, not only as far as they are contained in the Arabian and Brahminical writings, but also as far as he could gain from the interpretation of European books, as given him by European friends, he himself being ignorant of English; that he had, under the patronage of Khán Bahádur, compiled a system of these sciences from all these sources, and that his patron had supplied him with a sum of money to publish this book at one of the lithographic presses of Calcutta. This was the purport of his present errand down the country, and he had already got about 100 pages carried through the press. His object in applying to me was to obtain a recommendation of his work to the Government Education Committee. He produced his MS., but it was much too long to examine minutely in the short time I had to remain in Calcutta, and in my then harassed state of mind and body. I saw enough, however, to convince me that it was a work of very considerable merit and information, compared with the author's opportunities. It commenced with the elements of geometry and arithmetic as known to the Hindús, and thence went on.In the course of the work are explained, the European methods of decimal fractions, logarithms, and trigonometrical tables. The author then gives a system of astronomy, first according to the Brahmins, then according to Ptolemy, and then according to Copernicus, together with an account of astronomical instruments, and the mode of calculating astronomical tables and almanacs. The whole MS., as will appear from the author's own computation, comprehends 900 closely-written quarto pages.

The Ratnāvalī by Nāgārjuna was well known from the numerous quotations scattered in the Mahāyāna literature in India as well as in Tibet, but no manuscript of it was up to now available. Fortunately, Nepal, which has yielded so many treasures of ancient Indian literature, has recently rendered back to light a large fragment of this work, the importance of which cannot be overlooked by scholars. Nāgārjuna was certainly one of the greatest thinkers ever born in India, and whatever was written by him deserves our greatest attention. His thought has permeated, as it were, not only the Abhidharma of Mahāyāna, but also the mystical experiences of the Tantric systems. Therefore we must welcome anything written by him, because it will help our understanding of Buddhist, and therefore of Indian, mind.

It is well known that Damascus was formerly celebrated all over the world for its manufacture of sword-blades, and it is recorded, that when Timúr Lang conquered Syria, in the beginning of the fourteenth century, he carried off all the manufacturers of steel into Persia; since which period, the fabrication of arms has declined at Damascus, and the successors of those workmen, being dispersed over the East, are said either to have lost the secret, or ceased to make blades of more than ordinary goodness. We must, however, first divest ourselves of all prejudice in favour of the exaggerated reports of their qualities, and remember, that at the time when the natives of the East were well acquainted with the art of working in iron and steel, we, and indeed all Europe, appear to have been comparatively in a state of perfect ignorance; the ancient swords of Damascus, therefore, when opposed to those of other countries, were probably found to be infinitely superior in temper and quality; which, combined with their great external beauty, stamped them for ages with so high a character for excellence, that they are even now handed down as heir-looms by Eastern princes to their posterity. The extraordinary prices that have been offered and obtained for them, sufficiently attest the estimation in which they were held, which is certainly not warranted in the present day, when swords of equal, or superior quality, might be manufactured at one-twentieth of the expense. In addition to the foregoing observations, the strength and great dexterity of the swordsmen must be taken into consideration, and much of the apparent superiority of these blades may be undoubtedly ascribed to this cause.

In the monograph by Professor Sayce and myself, The Tablet from Yuzgat in the Liverpool Institute of Archœology (I believe the document is now in the Louvre), which forms vol. xi of the Asiatic Society Monographs (see pp. 15–19), I discussed the possibility of Kassite being a language more or less akin to Hittite. In dealing with this question, I made use of the well-known tablet discovered by the late Hormuzd Rassam in 1882, and published in transcription by Professor Fried. Delitzsch in his Die Sprache der Kossäer (Leipzig, 1884). To all appearance this important inscription has never been printed in the original character, and as its appearance is held to be desirable, I now place before the British public the copy which I made in 1882 or 1883.

SINCE, during the last few years, Si-Hia texts with transliterations into Tibetan character have been brought to light, it seems that a new aspect may be put upon the morphology of this language.

Previously the texts studied provided us only with transcriptions into Chinese characters, and it is on their evidence that reconstructions of Si-Hia words were first based. Writing in 1916 with this class of material before him, Laufer consequently stated that “consonantal prefixes can be pointed out only in four cases: k-ṅü or k-ṅu(‘five’), k-ṅum (‘heaven‘), r-ni (‘ear’), and possibly m-ru, m-lu (‘worm’)”.

The P'hansigárs are a tribe of, perhaps, the most deliberate and decided villains that stain the face of the earth. I hardly know whether they should be called a tribe, for they have no distinct religion or prejudices; they admit into their fraternity persons of all castes and persuasions; and the gangs which are found in different parts of the country appear to have no general knowledge of, or connexion with, each other, further than the diabolical compact existing among a few of the members who may at any period have acted in concert in their trade of villany. The following few particulars I gathered from the examination of part of a large gang which inhabited a village on the western frontier of the Nizáms country, not very far from Bíjápúr.

This year witnesses the completion of a task begun soon after the inception of its forty-two years of publishing texts by the Pali Text Society. I refer to the completion of its editions of that third section of the Buddhist canon entitled the Abhidhamma Piṭaka, and of its editions of the Commentaries on that section. In 1883 the fourth of the seven Abhidhamma texts appeared : the Puggala-Paññatti. In the present year the Society brings out the conclusion of the seventh text: the Paṭṭhāna, and the belated Commentary on the second text: the Vibhanga.