The murder of the Prophet's chief Jewish opponent, Ka‘b b. al-Ashraf, led to grave consequences for the tribe of Banū al-Naḍīr and for the Jews as a whole. The incident ushered in a series of hostile Muslim-Jewish encounters that reached its climax in the battle of Khaybar. Despite the constructive study undertaken by previous scholars, there still seem to be some contradictory elements and vague accounts that have been either utterly ignored or for which a satisfactory explanation is lacking. In the light of certain striking pieces of evidence, scattered in unlikely places in the sīra and tafsīr compendia, the present study sets out to examine critically the extent to which the accounts of Ka‘b's murder can be trusted. It will be argued that what we are faced with is seriously distorted material with logical absurdities and discrepancies that cannot easily be reconciled. Apart from the historical reconstruction, special attention will be devoted to a momentous historiographical point—that our reports have been doctored for political reasons. This helps us adopt a more realistic view of the individuals whose names occurred in the accounts of the event in question.

In ‘The World of the Skandapurāṇa’, published in 2014, Hans T. Bakker presents a possible scenario for the composition of the Skandapurāṇa1 (SP), dating its conception to the reign of the Maukhari king Avantivarman in the late sixth century and the completion of its first recension to the times of king Harṣa in the first half of the seventh. Because of the attention it receives in the text, Vārāṇasī is identified as the most likely place of origin;2 the authors of the text belonged to the Pāśupata Śaivas, writing for a broad audience of mostly lay Māheśvaras.3 In this paper I would like to comment on some aspects of this scenario by investigating the relations between the SP and king Harṣa – both his person and his region of origin, the kingdom of Thanesar. I will argue that there are internal indications that the original constituent parts of the text may originate from there — and that its further development may have been impacted by the political reality of Harṣa having come to power. My argument will consist of three parts: the first related to the geography of the sacred places mentioned in the SP, the second concerning the way Harṣa is alluded to in the chapters describing the birth and consecration of Skanda and the third about the expansion of the original, “core” part of the SP.

This article examines the conduct of Richard Goodlad, the East India Company's collector in Rangpur, north Bengal, upon the outbreak of a peasant rebellion in his district during 1783. It uses his reaction to this event to illustrate the nature of the Company's district bureaucracy and its relationship with the central colonial authorities in Calcutta during the later eighteenth century.

The article considers the aims and limitations of the European officials who were sent out to administer Bengal's districts, detailing their priorities and practices within a weak and decentralised state structure. Ultimately it argues that the relationship between these local and central components of the colonial state was, prior to the Company's rise to subcontinental hegemony in the early nineteenth-century, profoundly shaped both by widespread military under-resourcing, and by the primacy of personal interest among its local officials.

The interpretation of history is often a complex task. All too often, sources are misinterpreted because of historians’ preconceptions. This article takes issue with one such misinterpretation, the anachronistic view that the Strait of Melaka has been the principal sea route connecting the Indian Ocean with the South China Sea throughout most of recorded history. Beginning at a period when an overland journey across the Malay Peninsula was an essential link in the routes connecting South, Southeast and East Asia, it is suggested that the first entirely maritime itinerary to be used regularly passed through the Sunda Strait. Changes in itineraries affected the fortunes of the states of Southeast Asia, particularly of Funan and Srivijaya.

The History of a Loyal Heart (Xin shi) is allegedly a work by the Song loyalist, Zheng Sixiao, written to bemoan the fate of the Song empire after its conquest by the Mongols. There have always been doubts about its authenticity, however, and many scholars have believed it to be a forgery. The arguments for and against this have remained inconclusive, and the work has been commonly used as a source for the history of the Song–Yuan transition period. This article adduces compelling evidence to show that there can be very little doubt that it is a late-Ming forgery. Some of the implications of this conclusion are briefly addressed.

This article discusses a story that has enjoyed a long life in scholarly literature, drama, and the visual arts: the alleged caging of the Ottoman Sultan Bayezid I Yildirim (r. 1389–1402) by the Central Asian conqueror, Temür (r. 1370–1405). Attention is focused on the evolution of scholarly discourse on the existence (or otherwise) of the cage. The period from the late seventeenth to the first half of the twentieth century is looked at in particular detail. The debate around the captivity of Bayezid is only fully understood when it is located within a larger historical framework, namely the changing political relationships between Christian Europe and the Ottoman Empire from the fall of Constantinople in 1453 until the nineteenth century.

An aerial city in the north is detrimental to the court priest; one in the east, is so to the sovereign; one in the south, to the commander of the troops; one in the west, to the prince royal. A white one is pernicious to Brahmans, a crimson one to Kshatriyas, a yellow one to Vaiçyas, and a dusky one to Çûdras.

Nicolaus Dicolaus, in a fragment preserved by Strabo, relates “that at Antioch Epidaphne, he fell in with three Indian ambassadors, then on their way to the court of Augustus. They were, as their letter showed, the survivors of a larger embassy, but to the others the length of the journey principally had proved fatal. Their letter was written on parchment (διØθɛρα) and in the name of Porus, and in Greek. It set forth that Porus, though Lord over 600 600 kings, much valued the friendship of, and was ready to open his ‘dominions to, Caesar, and to assist him on all just and lawful occasions. The presents they brought with them were in the charge of eight well-anointed slaves, naked all but their girdles, and consisted of a youth whose arms had been amputated at the shoulders in childhood, a sort of Hermes, some large vipers, a snake ten cubits long, a river tortoise of four cubits, and a partridge somewhat larger than a vulture. With the ambassadors was that Indian, who burned himself at Athens, not to escape from present ills, but because hitherto successful in every thing he had undertaken; he now feared, lest any longer life should bring him misery and disappointment, and so smiling, naked and perfumed, lie leaped into the burning pile. On bis tomb was placed this inscription:—

This paper investigates the nature of the British and Foreign Bible Society's (BFBS) patronage of the translation of the Chinese Union Versions (CUVs), the largest Chinese Protestant Bible translation project initiated by the western Protestant churches in the nineteenth century. Drawing on André Lefevere's concept of patronage, it delves into how the BFBS served as a controlling factor of the translation of the CUV by examining the BFBS's financial support to the translation project, conferment of honorary titles to the translators and ideological influence on the translators’ choice of Greek text as the basis for the CUVs New Testament translation.

Recent work among the Sippar Collections of the British Musuem has brought to light a number of interesting texts, among which is the fragment BM 63570. This text lists the qīpu's of numerous temples along with other officials, associating them all with bundles of reeds measured in hundreds. This is of unusual interest, however it is not the first time such a text has come to light as a similar fragment, BM 68777, was identified and published by the present author in 1993. Indeed, without a doubt the two pieces belong to the same tablet. BM 68777 is the beginning of the text, while BM 63570 carries on the obverse from this after a very small break and then gives some lines from the top of the reverse. The reverse of BM 68777 was uninscribed.

How did people in Tang dynasty China view textiles and how did they conceive of their value? Those involved in production could calculate the value in terms of the costs of raw materials, labour and the loom used to weave a particular textile. They might add to this the costs of workshop supervision and maintenance, distribution and marketing, and they might expect to see some benefit – a profit – in the process. However, most people would be end users, and would reckon the value of textiles by eye, if not also by hand, and what they considered to be the market value. Some might have expert knowledge, but many would not. The non-expert evaluation by eye and hand would likely include aspects such as colour, pattern, level of workmanship and intricacy but would probably also reflect some awareness of status and fashion.

In the volume of the Journal of the Royal Asiatio Society for the year 1848, is to be found a paper descriptive of such coins of the Sultáns of Ghazní as chanced to form part of the varied numismatic accumulations of Mr. Masson, gleaned, under his personal superintendence, chiefly to the northward of the metropolitan province from which the dynasty takes its name.