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THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
Among a multitude of curious facts contained in the large Arabic Encyclopedia of Shahabu❜ddin Al-Kalkashandi (1418), is to be found the following interesting account of the relations between the Mamlak Sultans and Georgia in the four. teenth century and of the relations of the latter country with the Khulaqds at that time ruling in Persia. There are also details concerning the Georgian monastery of the Holy Cross at Jerusalem.
(h). Nestorian Inscriptions from Semirechia, continued by D. Chwolson.
No. (xxiii). In the year 1584 (1273). This is the grave of Periodeutés Patzermangu, a humble believer. No. (xxiv). In the year 1607 (1296); according to the Turks the year of the ape (i.e. the ninth year of the cycle of twelve years). This is the grave of the young girl Mariam (Mary) No. (xxv). In the year 1624 (1313): that is the year of the ox (second year of the cycle of twelve years). This is the grave of the priest Kutlug. No. (xxvi). In the year 1642 (1331); this is the year of the ram (the fourth of the cycle of 12 years) in Turkish lui. This is the grave of the priest Sergis (Sergius). No. (xxvii). This is the grave of the young man Kutlug-Terim. No. (xxviii). This is the grave of the young man Alexander. (In inscription xiv. Prof. Nöldeke conjectures rightly that the words signify: he died of the plague.
(i).. The discovery of coins at Kulja, by Baron Tysenhausen. The Chughatai coins, relating to the years 650-723 A.H.(-1252-1323 A.D.), belong to the class of the rarest and most interesting. They also help to explain two silver coins which the late Academician Dorn considered incapable of being deciphered, though Frähn already conjectured that one of them was Chughatai. The summer residence of the Chughatai Khans was the town Altalik, as is well known, and therefore reads the inscription 'Belonging to Altalik.' Three copper coins sent by M. Uspenski confirm this explanation, on which we read this coin was struck at Altalik,' and a large silver coin with inscription in Uighur, where the letters.... malik may be clearly read. This last coin is the only one of its kind known as far as the writer's experience goes, and serves as a fresh proof that the Uighur language was used by the Mongol Khans of the time not only for diplomatic correspondence and the most important official papers, but also for the coining of money.
(j). Chinese Mirrors, found in the City of Kulja, by A. Posdneiev. In 1885 N. N. Pantusov, sent three circular pieces of metal found in the town of Kulja. Mirror No. 1 is made of brass. To it is attached a fastening, by which
[SEPTEMBER, 1887.
apparently it is to be hung up. On this fastening are four Chinese characters, which signify "the birds Lonan and Fyn singing harmoniously." The Lonan is a mythical bird, the appearance of which betokens happiness. According to Chinese belief these birds always fly in pairs, and thus in Chinese literature they are represented as inseparable. The Fyn denotes the female. The two together form among the Chinese the emblem of conjugal happiness. This Mirror was probably either a marriage gift or was included in the bride's dower. The writer has seen similar mirrors fastened on the doors of houses where marriages were being prepared. Mirror No. 2 is of the same description as the first, but a little smaller, with the following inscription,-" for long years never separated." This mirror in all probability is one of the customary presents offered among the Chinese to some old man on his seventieth or ninetieth birth-day. Mirror No. 3 has no inscription on it, but a representation of two dragons playing with the moon. The writer remembers to have seen something of the kind in China offered as a gift in congratulation of long life.
(k). Newly discovered MS. of Ibn-Khurdddbih, by Baron Rosen. Only one manuscript was known up to the present time of the adventures and countries of Ibn-Khurdådbih.' This was preserved at Oxford and translated by Barbier de Meinard in 1865. A better MS. was found by Count Landberg in Egypt. This he has since presented to the Imperial Library of Vienna, and it will soon be edited by Dr. de Goeje of Leyden.
(1). On Nalivkin's Short History of the Khanate of Kokan, by V. R[osen.]-V. Nalivkin, a teacher in the school at Tashkand well acquainted with the native language, has produced a useful book, though in some respects it is a disappointing one. Only in the present century have any native historical writers appeared in Kokan. The history is almost an uninterrupted series of
wars.
(m). Tysenhausen on Jacob's-(a) Der Bernstein bei den Arabe in des Mittelalters.-(b) Welche Handelsartikel bezogen die Araber (?) des Mittelalters, aus den Nordisch-baltischen Ländern? Leipzig 1886.-On the relations between the East and North-Eastern Europe from the seventh to the twelfth Centuries, as shewn by the discovery of coins &c., but in the strict sense of the term not carried on only by Arabians. Dr. Jacob gives a list of objects brought from Russia to the East (gathered from the works of Arabian writers) such as male and female slaves, mammothtusks, horned cattle, firs of foxes, sables, ermines, martins, polecats, squirrels, otters, beavers and hares, isinglass, honey, wax, &c. Dr. Jacob does
