I do not propose on this occasion to initiate a general discussion concerning the authenticity of the plays discovered and edited by the late Mahāmahopādhyāya Gaṇapati Śāstrī and by him attributed to Bhāsa. Hitherto the matter has run rather a normal course, first enthusiastic acceptance, then opposition, then suggestions of a via media. The debate has evoked some treatises which will retain their value even after a consensus is reached. The various questions are, we may assume, familiar to all scholars here, the question of the formal characteristics of the dramas, of their titles, of the Prakrit and the Sanskrit, of imitations in or by other literary works, of references and citations in anthologies and works on poetics, of the history of the stage in the Kerala country.

This poem is contained along with certain other stotras in one of the Nepalese MSS. presented by the late B. H. Hodgson to the Library of the India Office (I.O., 2921). A second copy is included in the collection of the Bengal Asiatic Society, and its initial verses are quoted by Rājendra Lāla Mitra in his account of the MS. A third copy is among the works presented to Burnouf, and now in the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris.

The present narrative was composed, a few months ago, at Tangier, under my direction. It was written by the Taleb Sidi Ibrahim ben Muhammed, of the town of Messa, in the province of Sús. It was first written in the Berber language, and thence translated into Arabic, from which I made an English version.

I concluded a former essay on Mohammedan proper names with a promise of renewing the subject in another paper, which should deal with the names of women, and some other points not included in my first sketch. The system, as it is xepresented to us by Arab authors, though somewhat complicated, admits of a distinct arrangement; and each class of proper names throws light on national character and manners, -as they were developed during the first centuries of the Hejra, and have left their traces in countries over which the Arab dominion extended. My former notice touched very slightly on the meaning and etymology of old names, to which my attention was first directed. I was very soon brought to a stand by difficulties inherent in the attempt to trace the origin of ancient names, and which are enhanced in the case of those of the Arabs by the peculiarities in the structure of the language, where the meaning of words varies so much with the strength and position of the vowel-points, of all sounds the most liable to phonetic decay. The language itself has undergone a great change since the time of Mahomet, and many old words and expressions are interpreted on traditional authority.

Naghm (pi. Anghām) and Naghmah (pi. Naghamāt) mean “Vocal melody”, both being derived from the Arabic “To speak, hum, or sing in a low pleasant tone”. Such were the classical meanings of those terms, in distinction from LAḤN (pi. ALḤĀN), which stood for “melody” whether in the vocal or instrumental art. Thus, one of the earliest Arabic books on music—the Kitāb al-naghm (Book of vocal melody)—by Yūnus al-Kātib (d. c. 765), became the source book on this subject. Then came Isḥāq al-Mauṣilī (d. 791) who wrote the Kitāb al-naghm wa'l-īqā' (Book of melody and rhythm). Yet the famous Kitāb al-aghānī of Al-Iṣfahānī (d. 967) introduces each song under the title of saut, although that is only done so as to indicate the singing (taghannī) of a poem. Later, the term naghm came to be used in a modal sense, equating with the Sanscrit rāga and jātī, and the Persian āvāz. We know of the naghm in the modal sense as early as Al-Kindī (d. c. 874), one of them (called ṭarā'iq) being known as Iṣfahān. In the Mafātiḥ al-'ulūm of Abū 'Abdallāh al-Khwārizmī (d. c. 1000), these modes (dasātīn) were attributed to the famous Bārbad of the court of Khusrau Parviz the Sāsānī ruler. Al-Mas'ūdī (d. c. 957) names one of these modes as mihrbānī (cf. mihrgānī) among the ancient Persian modes, whilst Ibn Zaila (d. 1048) mentions a mode (ḍarb) called nāqūsi, which is the 26th of the Sī laḥn of Khusrau va Shīrīn of Nīzāmī of Ganja (1203).

There is something in a name. Properly it ought to comprise all, or at least much of what is contained in the thing named. The name is therefore a very weighty and important word. In dealing with it, we may be struck as the Tartars were, when they first handled iron; for it evidently gave them the impression that it contained some mysterious substance, some kind of stuffing, concealed under its surface; and therefore they called it timur, i.e. ‘a stuffing, a filling, or something filled, stuffed.’ The Turkish language is remarkably transparent in an etymological point of view, most of its names being still easily traceable to their roots and to their original signification.

The transcription of the Cuneiform signs presents a problem much more difficult than that of the transcription of the ordinary Semitic alphabetical scripts. The object of transcriptions of Cuneiform signs is not merely that of obtaining phonetic perfection, but it must also distinguish the signsemployed for the same sounds. In the earlier stages of Assyriology Delitzsch and others adopted the system of accentuating the signs, and before a larger number of homophones were discovered this system sufficed, and has beenadopted for the transcription of both Sumerian and Semitic texts. But at present there is complete anarchy among Assyriologists in transcribing Cuneiform texts. A tablet of the Rassam Collection in the British Museum, which the writer recently copied through the kindness of Sir Ernest Wallis Budge, groups together the homophonic signs. On this tablet there are, for example, eight different signs for the phonetic syllable eš. nine for še, eleven for gir, and eighteen for ge! It is not possible to devise eleven and eighteen different accents for thesevalues. The writer, therefore, proposes to introduce the method of numbering the signs with inferior exponents, eš1 eš2 eš3; ge1, ge2, ge3, etc., following a suggestion made by Dr. A. Walther, ZA. xxix, 147. [The idea was taken from Weissbach.]

This article examines seemingly monotheistic, polytheistic and dualistic features of Zoroastrianism from the point of view of the Zoroastrian creation myth. Exploring the personality of the principal deity, Ahura Mazdā, the origin of the spiritual and material worlds and the worship of the Yazatas, it is argued that Zoroastrianism has its own particular form of monotheism.

Know that the first step in Hearing is understanding what is heard, and applying it to an idea which occurs to the hearer. Then this understanding has as fruit ecstasy, and ecstasy moving of the members. Let there be a consideration, then, of these three stages.

In the course of an article I published in this Journal (October, 1924) entitled ‘ Rūdakī and Pseudo-Rūdakī ’ I referred to a long qaṣīda beginning with the words ‘ mādar-i-may’, which has been commonly attributed to Rūdakī, but could not be definitely assigned to that poet until the identity of the mamdūḥ Abū Ja‘far Aḥmad b. Muḥammad had been established. Moreover, Riẓā Qulī Khān, who quotes a few verses from it, was persuaded that the poem was not the work of Rūdakī but of Qaṭrān. I pointed out that I had not found it anywhere else attributed to Qaṭrān, and that the mamdūḥ was certainly not among the patrons of this poet. Thanks to my learned friend Mīrzā Muḥammad Khān of Qazwīn, the question has now been finally disposed of, and the qaṣīda is proved beyond doubt to be the work of Rūdakī. This discovery is of the highest importance for the history of Persian literature, as the qaṣīda represents the only genuine long poem of the “ Father of Persian Poetry ” which has hitherto been found. I naturally wish to disclaim any credit for the discovery, and the notes I now give and the edition of the poem which I print below are due entirely to the learned Mirza Muhammad.

This paper is about an Old Indian judicial institution called paṇa (“wager”). Within a court proceeding, a judicial wager is a certain sum of money that a conflicting party offers to pay if he ends up losing his case. This paper explains the rationale of judicial wagers by showing that they may signal truthfulness.

A glance at the List of Members of this Society shows a number of Oriental names from every country between the Danube and the Pacific, which is, in itself, a matter for congratulation. A second will suggest a doubt as to the proper style in which to address one or two of their owners; and a detailed examination is enough, like Colonel Bowie's tooth-pick, “to give a timid man the colic.” The fact is, that we have not yet acquired a system by which we can index these names so as to know at a glance the proper written or spoken address of an Oriental.

The monument at Pl I, until recently called the “Allahabad-Kosam” pillar and attributed to Aśoka, is now known to have been erected before Aśoka came to the throne in 272 B.C. We also know with certainty that its original emblem had been – not a lion, as previously supposed – but the bull of pre-Buddhist, brahmanical religion. Moreover, there is no longer any reason to suppose that it had not always held a position overlooking the confluence of the two sacred rivers, the Gaṇgā and the Yamunā, otherwise known as “the holiest site in India”.

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.