________________
SEPTEMBER, 1881.]
PIYADASI INSCRIPTIONS.
259
it, would at once set off on his swift horse and give his master warning: he dismounted, pretending that a stone had got into his horse's hoof, and asked Iturgin to dismount too and hold the foot, thus causing some delay. Meanwhile Chinghiz Khản arrived. Iturgin was dumb-foundered. He was handed over to Juchi Khasar, inasmuch as he had appropriated his wives and children and worldly goods. The Huang-Yuan as usual tells the story like Rashidu'd-din. It calls the place where Khasar took shelter after the battle of Khalaljin Alat, Khalakhunjidun," and says the blood which Wang Khân took from his hand he sent in a vessel used for boiling water."
This use of blood as a symbol of fidelity in making an oath is a very wide-spread custom among the Nomades. Herodotus speaking of the Skyths says: Oaths among them are accompanied among other things by the following ceremonies : a large earthen bowl is filled with wine, and the parties to the oath, wounding themselves slightly with a knife or an awl, drop some of their blood into the wine, then they plunge into the mixture a scymitar, some arrows, a battle axe and a javelin, all the while repeating prayers; lastly, the two contracting parties drink each a draught from the bowl as do also the chief men among their followers." Luciani" gives a similar notice of the Skythian custom and Mela" assigns it to the Axiaka e. Speaking of the Medes and Lydians, Herodotus says, oaths are taken by these people in the same way as by the Greeks, except that they make a slight flesh wound in their arms from which each sucks a portion of the other's blood." Speaking of the struggle between the Armenians and Iberians, Tacitus says it was the custom of their kings when they made a pact to take each other by the right hand, and binding their thumbs
together with a tight ligature until the blood was forced to the extremities, to make a slight puncture until the blood exuded, which they then gucked. This form of treaty was held very sacred inasmuch as it was ratified by the blood of each party." Valerius tells us how, when the Armenian king Sariastes was at issue with his father Tigranes, this practice was carried out. The practice was in vogue also among the early Romans. Festus explains the word assiratum thus: assiratum apud antiquos dicebatur genus quoddam potionis ex vino at sanguine temperatum, quod Latini prisci assis vocarunt. Sallust, speaking of Catiline, says, humani corporis sanguinem vino permixtum in pateris circumtulisse inde cum post execrationem omnes degustavissent, sicuti in solemnibus sacris fieri consuevit, quasisse consilium suum, &c.
In the Magyar Sagas we read how the Hetu Moger or Seven Mogers or Magyars swore to be faithful to their chief Almus while standing round a tub with their left arms outstretched and pierced so that the blood ran out into the tub as they swore. These are all instances from races of Asiatic origin, but the custom also extended to Africa. The ancient Lybians and Numidians, in swearing mutual oaths, drank out of their hollow hands, or in default of sufficient material licked them." Livingstone speaking of the Kasendi or contract of friendship in South Africa says: "the hands of the parties are joined, small incisions are made in the clasped hands on the pits of the stomach of each, and on the right cheeks and foreheads a small quantity of blood is taken from these points by means of a stalk of grass. The blood from one person is put into a pot of beer, and that of the second into another; each then drinks the other's blood, and they are supposed to become perpetual friends and relations."01
M. SENART ON THE INSCRIPTIONS OF PIYADASI.
From the French.
(Continued from p. 211.) Thirteenth Edict.
version at this part render the Khálsi text The breaks in the Girnår inscription and the specially important. It is accordingly made the insufficiency of the copies of the Kapur-di-giri basis of translation.
- Berenine, vol. II, pp. 143-145; Erdmann, pp. 296 and Travels, pp. xxiv., 488; Rawlinson, op. cit. book I, ch. 267; D'Ohsson, vol. I, pp. 80 and 81.
70, note 6. * 1. e. Karaun Chidun. 3 Op. cit., pp. 176 and 176. Journal Asint., tom. XVII, pp. 97ff, also now publish** Book IV. o. 70, ed. Rawlinson.
ed separately as Les Inscriptions de Piyadasi, tome 1, 65 Tasares, XXXVII.
pp. 265ff. "Op. cit. bk. 1, c. 74.
Prinsep, J. A. S. Ben., vol. VII, pp. 261f.; Wilson, #8 Tacitus Annales, lib. XII, . 47.
J. R. As. Soc., vol. XII, pp. 228f. ; Lassen, Ind. Alt. * Erdmann, note 155.
60 la.
(2 Auf.) Bd. II S. 241 n. 1, 942 n. 4, 243 n. 1, 259 n. 6.
100. #
II. 1. 120.
