Indian Antiquary Vol 17

SR No.: 032509
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: John Faithfull Fleet, Richard Carnac Temple
Publisher: Swati Publications
Publication Year: 1984
Total Pages: 430
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 19 MB

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THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
[APRIL, 1988
on the various types are represented well-pre- vowel of Zend and Old Persian words was lost served specimens of Indo-Scythian coins in in their transition into the phonetic state of the British Museum, for the casts of which we Middle Persian or Pahlavi; but as the latter are indebted to the kindness of Prof. Gardner. is in its main characteristics reflected by the This obviates the necessity of noticing in detail legends of the Indo-Scythic coinage, this closing the characteristic designs of the types and the cannot well be considered a representative not less pecaliar writing of the legends. The of the old thematic vowels. We may, however, highly original treatment which the Greek look for some connexion between this O and characters have received at the hands of the the sign which is added to so many Pahlavi Indo-Scythic die-cutters deserve special investi- words with consonantal ending, and is generally gation from epigraphists; but for our present transcribed by ő. object it may suffice to call attention to the Besides the above forms, we meet with general clearness and fluency which distin- numerous variants of the same name, via. guishes very favourably this apparently barba- MEIPO, MIYPO, MYIPO, on Kanishka rous writing on the gold coins of Kanishka and coins, and MIY.PO, MYPO, MIPO, Huvishka from the cramped and ill-shaped MIPPO, MIIOPO, MOPO, on those of legends of their Scythic predecessors.
Huvistika. Some of these forms may be In the large assembly of Zoroastrian deities, viewed as individual attempts to give a phonewhich the coins of their Scythic worshipperstical equivalent for the difficult aspiration; bring before us, Mithra, the God of Heavenly others, like MIPPO, MOPO are scarcely Light, may well claim precedence, from the more than mere blunders of the die-cutters.important position he occupies in Avestic From this list of forms the supposed MIOPO mythology as well as in Eastern colt gene- has been justly eliminated by von Sallet, rally.
as this archaic form can nowhere be read The Iranian Mithra has been long ago with any clearness, and would, in fact, not recognized in the very characteristic type well agree with the general phonetic character of the Sun-god, that on the rare Greek of the names represented. coins of Kanishka bears the name of HAIOC. It is of considerable interest to compare with Not less varied than the representations of the Scythic name of Mithra the various forms in the god himself are the forms in which which the name of the Iranian month Mihr his Iranian name appears. MIOPO and appears in the list of Cappadocian months. This MIIPO (figs. i. and ii.) are the most frequent list has been preserved for us in & chronoreadings, and represent but slightly varied logical table, which compares the calendars of pronunciations of the same form Mihr, which different localities, found in numerous Greek the Avestic name must have assumed at a MSS. of Ptolemy's Canones. It has been carecomparatively early date through the regular fully examined by Benfey, and proved to conphonetic change of th into h. MIIPO corre- tain the names of the months in the Zoroastrian sponds to the Indianized form mihira (mihir), calendar, as still in use in Cappadocia under the with the well-known interposition of a secondary Roman rule. Now Iranian months are desigvowel before r; MIOPO represents mihr, and nated by the names of their respective tutelary gives us a clear instance of the phonetic rendering deities, and as some of the latter are repreof 1 by O (as in OOHPKI-Huvishka), to which sented on the Scythic coinage, the Greek we shall have to refer in the farther course of transcriptions of their names thereon (which our enquiry. The closing O, which recurs at are found, too, in a much later form in the lists the end of almost all Iranian names of the coins, of Persian months given by Isaacus Monachus cannot as yet be accounted for with any cer- and other Byzantine chronologists) will give tainty. The historical study of the Iranian us much valuable help for the identification language leads us to believe that the final of the Scythic forms.
• See Prof. Gardner's Cat. pp. 131, 134; and von 1836, p. 76, sqq.--Irogret that I have not yet been ablo Sallot, Nachfolger, p. 197.
to consult an article by Prof. De Lagarde on this subSee Cat. pp. 141-143, 156, 157; von Sallet, p. 202, ject, in his Abhandlungen, to which Prof. Hoffmann
of Kiel has kindly drawn my attention since my arrival Ueber die Monatenamen einiger alter Völker, Berlin, in India.]