Indian Antiquary Vol 17

Author(s): John Faithfull Fleet, Richard Carnac Temple
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 68

60
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
given; so he surrendered his treasury, and ceded his post to the prince, who then treated him kindly and himself assumed the Government, carrying on the administration with such
CORRESPONDENCE.
THE YAVANAS OF ORISSA.
To the Editors of the Indian Antiquary.
SIRS, Sir W. W. Hunter in his work on Orissa refers to the attacks continually made upon the shoras of Bengal during the 7th, 8th and 9th centuries by Pirates called Yavanas. Who were these Yavanas? They can have had nothing to do with the Yavanas of the Epics,-the Greeks and their descendants in Bactria, who were not a maritime people, and lived too far away back in space
CURIOSITIES OF INDIAN LITERATURE. A QUAINT BLESSING.
The following blessings were collected by me in Mithila. They are much admired by the Pandits:
MISCELLANEA.
I.
राजोत्पले हरिभुजामिह के शवस्य
यस्योरसन्दुरदनं हि जटाकलापे । शंखाम्बरो हि पवनाइरिनाथसूनुः कान्तागशो ऽगतनया विपुलं ददातू ।। May he-who sleeps on a mountain (3--i.e. Siva), whose (44) beloved is the Daughter of the
[FEBRUARY, 1888.
leniency towards the Afghâns, that the whole province became loyal to the Maharajâ, who for this bestowed a costly robe of honour upon the prince. (To be continued.)
CONTES ET LEGENDES ANNAMITES, par A. LANDES, Saigon, Imprimerie Coloniale, 1886, pp. viii. 392 in
8vo.
and time to have troubled Orissa at this period. May I suggest that they were Malays from Java ? Java we now know from the Camboja inscriptions was subject to the Cambojan kingdom in the 7th century; and as far as the evidence points, and it accumulates rapidly, it received its Hinduism at that very time, not from India but from Camboja; and it would seem to have been a very active period of Malay energy.
Yours etc.,
This collection of Annamite tales and legends, published first in the Excursions et Reconnaissances (Nos 20-23, 25, 26) will be welcome to all students of Folklore, and more especially to those interested in Annamite ideas and manners. Popular tales are the same everywhere; and what is special to the Annamite Folklore is that it is essentially local; every rock, every pagoda has its own legend. M. Landes thinks that the Indo-Chinese popular literature has come from abroad. And several of the tales he has gathered do look more like a summary analysis of a foreign tale picked up by chance, than a national creation. But their strict locali. sation makes them valuable for a knowledge of the Annamite history and customs.
BOOK NOTICE.
HENRY H. HOWORTH.
Mountain (4-i.e. Pârvati), whose garment is the ethereal void (), whose son is the lord (i.e. Kumara) of the enemy (i.e. the peacock) of the eaters of air (i.e. serpents), on whose breast (a) is the king (i.e. Vasuki) of the eaters of frogs (y-i.e. snakes), whose repast (34) is on the fleshless (3) head () of a corpse, and on the top-knot of whose matted hair (जटाकलापे) is the moon (इन्दुः ) – give thee abundant prosperity.'
G. A. GRIERSON.
In this connection, we may aptly notice here the Index des caractères Chinois contenus dans le Dictionnaire Chinois-Anglais de Williams, avec le prononciation Mandarine Annamite par M. Phan-duc-hoa, Saigon. Collège des Interprètes, 1886, pp. 449-193 in 4to.
This index, done by a lettré of the Collège des Interprètes at the suggestion of M. Landes, will be of great practical utility, as it gives for each Chinese character its Chinese Mandarin pronunciation, both according to Williams and the Shanghai Jesuit pronunciation, and its Cantonese pronunciation, as well as the Annamite Mandarin. It will be not less useful for comparative philology, as it will help us to establish the laws of permutation between the Chinese and the Sinico-Annamite, and, by recognising thus better what in the Annamite is of Chinese origin, to sift out the specially Aunamite element.