This article discusses the language of the Xūz mentioned in Arabic sources, endorsing the view that it is the latest attestation of the Elamite language. Drawing on models from historical sociolinguistics, it also studies the problem of mutual acculturation between speakers of Elamite and Persian in antiquity.

At the start of the millennium Council reviewed medals and prizes and decided to discontinue the Gold Medal (which had not in any case been awarded for some time) and establish in its place the Society's Award. This Award will be made every two or three years in recognition of outstanding scholarship in Asian studies. Having considered a number of tenders, Council commissioned Ms Danuta Solowiej-Wedderburn to design and cast a medal bearing versions of two of the original Daniell images: the elephant and howdah on one side and the banyan-tree on the other (see John Hansman, “The Emblems, Medals and Medallists of the Royal Asiatic Society”, JRAS [1984 Part 1], pp. 99–119. Council approved the nomination of Mr John M. Gullick, who was recommended by a search committee (chaired by the Director) to be the first recipient of the RAS Award. On 10 January 2002 the President presented the RAS Award for 2001 to Mr Gullick who replied with a lecture, “An Indian official in Singapore: Governor Cavanagh (1859–1867)”.

There is an aspect of the development of South Indian figure A sculpturebetween the seventh and tenth centuries a.d. that has received little attention, namely the stylistic relation of bronzework to stone sculpture, and in particular the reciprocal influences of the two different techniques, modelling and carving, on the formation of a single characteristic Coḷa style in the tenth and eleventh centuries.

In the number of the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal last received, No. III., of 1858, is a short article by Bapu Deva Shastri, Professor of Mathematics and Astronomy at the Government College of Benares, in which he has undertaken to show, that Bháskaráchárya, an astronomer who flourished at Ujjayin in the twelfth century, was fully acquainted with the principle of the Differential Calculus, one of the most important discoveries of the last century in Europe.

The previously unpublished text of a letter written by John Osterwick in Hirado to Richard Fursland, President of the Council of Defence, around the end of September 1621. Its value lies in the detail which it provides of the state of the English East India Company's factory in Japan, eight years after it was established and two years before it closed.

Humāyūn married Hājī, alias Bēga Bēgam, about 1527. Fourteen years later, in 1541, he married Hamīda Bāno Bēgam, who became the mother of Akbar in 1542, and was known by the honorific style of Maryam Makānī, “dwelling with Mary,” that is to say the Virgin Mary, after her death. On the face of it no confusion between the two ladies should be possible. Nevertheless, they have been frequently confounded, and the error can be traced back as early as 1612, only seven years after Akbar's death. The common error is explained by the fact that Akbar treated Hājī Bēgam, the elder lady, as a second mother, so that many people believed him to be her son.

Both interdenominational co-operation and denominational competition featured in the Protestant missionary literary enterprise in nineteenth-century China. The interdenominational Religious Tract Society in London became the most vital link between the missionary translators, printing presses and target audiences in the production, publication and distribution of Christian tracts. Ideally, interdenominational missions would pool resources and promote cooperation among missionaries with different denominational affiliations. Doctrinal disputes, however, seem to have been inevitable among them in the everyday operation of missions. The first tract committee established in China, the Shanghai Tract Committee in the 1840s is a case in point. Unequal denominational representation resulted in heated doctrinal controversies and the resignation of a Committee member over the publication of a problematic tract in Chinese.

This is the story of how G. A. Naqvi (Indian Police, 1926) of the United Province (UP) was affected by the events of 1947–1948 in British and independent India and Pakistan and had to become what he did not wish to be: a private citizen in Pakistan. It shows how he, like so many others, had to become reconciled to the idea of British India breaking-up into independent India and Pakistan. This process changed forever the relationship between institutions of the Indian State and individual lives of Indian Muslims; the ‘long’ Partition of British India prompted new questions of legitimacy, citizenship and sovereignty, while producing “displacement, disruption and disappointment”. This was especially so in the so-called ‘Muslim-minority provinces’, among which the UP held the pre-eminent position and to which Naqvi belonged. After 21 ½ years of service, Naqvi found himself unwanted in both India and Pakistan, in a time of deepening communal divide, suspicion and hostility. A much sought-after officer during the Second World War, how was he to know that over 1947–1948, not one of the four governments to which he was and/or could be affiliated with would want to have anything to do with him.

This, the second of our three articles on the role of the karguzar in the foreign relations of Iran, focuses on internal issues, and, in particular, the problems of security. Its main period of study is the years following the Constitutional Revolution during which Iran witnessed a gradual breakdown of social control resulting from severe government weakness. The Revolution, itself the product of financial fragility, led to the virtual bankruptcy of the country, despite the attempts of the Majlis at fiscal reform. Thus by 1910 the government did not have the means to enforce law and order. Problems of personal security placed considerable pressure on people at all levels of Iranian society. This article is, however, concerned with the experiences of the non-elite and the implications for them of financial crisis and weak government. These circumstances were also to have repercussions for Iran's relations with foreigners.

The fourteenth century saw the production of innumerable Islamic manuscripts, many of which were extensively and expertly illuminated. The period is well-studied, in particular, the products of the ateliers of Baghdad, Tabriz, Shiraz and Cairo. This article concerns a manuscript from a less well-known production centre, namely that of Erzincan. This manuscript is a copy of Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī's Mas̲navī produced in 774/1373. Although discussed briefly in previous scholarship (and attributed to Erzincan), there is much more to say about this skilfully and extensively illuminated manuscript. This article examines the manuscript's text, codicology, illuminations, inscriptions and wider historical context. In doing so, it substantiates the manuscript's connection to Erzincan and adds to the growing body of literature concerning the arts of the book of thirteenth- and fourteenth-century Rūm.

In this essay I will demonstrate the way in which the relationship between political authority and religious authority evolved throughout the history of Islam; and point out where religious rule gave way to the creation of nation states. I will map corresponding changes in Zakāt collections, among various nation states, to support my argument in favour of a continued separation of religious and political functions in contemporary nations with Muslim majority populations.

During the reign of Patriarch Timothy I (780–823), the Church of the East continued to expand into Asia. Metropolitans were consecrated for various places to the east of the Patriarchal see in Baghdad. One of these was the enigmatic Metropolitan of the Turks, about whose location scholars have disagreed for decades. This article seeks to answer the question “Which Turks received the Metropolitan appointed by Timothy?” by systematically examining the different Turkic groups living in Central Asia at the time. Textual and archaeological evidence is considered in support of the conclusion and the various motives and external factors that may have played a role in the conversion are discussed.