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NOVEMBER, 1890.)
BOOK NOTICES.
409
sometimes assists us to recognise the explanatory His carelessness is also evident in some of his additions. For, the translations contain more than explanatory statements, e.g. regarding the parenthe verses in the text can have contained, and not tage of Vajra (extract No. xviii.), regarding the enough for additional ones. The same wish seems
parentage of Råma (extract No. vii.), and regardalso to have induced Berani to translate loosely or ing the deadly power of Márkapdêya (ibidem). to substitute expressions more familiar to Muham- He had the book before him, and might in the first inadans for those in the text. Instances of this two cases easily have got from it the correct kind are found in his rendering (extract No. information. xviii.) bhagavan,' worshipful, divine,' by the ruler of the inhabitants of paradise, lôkaprakdlanan,
Finally, the deficiency of Beruni's knowledge of
Sanskrit is only too patent in these extracts, as Itine) driving the world onwards' by (time)
well as in other quotations (see e. g. Professor rising, growing, getting old and vanishing,' and
Sachau's notes to Vol. I. pp. 351 and 394). Some. vimdna, 'self-moving palatial chariot,' by throne.' The substitutions of one name of a deity for
times it happens that a bad blunder is combined, another, such as occur in the extract No. xiv.,'
as, e. g., in extract No. xviii., verse 10, with an are probably due to the same cause, and so are
omission, and it looks as if Beruni had wilfully
discarded the words which do not agree with his perhaps the transpositions of whole sentences, a
rendering. This becomes particularly probable perfectly certain instance of which is found in extract No. xxii. With respect to the transposi.
by the fact already pointed out, that also in other tions, I may add that they are extremely com.
quotations difficult words or phrases are simply mon also in the translations from other works,
ignored. and that they occur even in such passages where
The lesson, which the above analysis of Bêruni's Bêrůni promises to render the text in full and quotations from the Vishnu-Dharma teaches, is, exactly as it is.' The latter note is prefixed to it seems to me, thnt, discrepancies between his some quotations from Varábamihira's Brihat. translations and the Sanskrit texts, which we posSamhitu (Indica, Vol. II. p. 92). Nevertheless sess, do not mean much. A careful investigation he has taken the liberty to place a paraphrase of each particular case is required in order to deterof a great portion of verse 6 of Chaptermine what the causes of these discrepancies are, XII. in the beginning. The construction of and the probability is that in the great majority the little Prasasti, with which Varahamihira
of cases they will be owing to Bêrani's method of begins his chapter on the movements of Agastya translating. It is, therefore, not advisable to or Canopus, and its wording, leave no doubt that jump at once to the conclusion that his Sanskrit the order of the verses in our text is correct, and
texts must have been very different from those make it impossible to suppose that even a bad existing in our times or must have been different MS. can ever have had such a great confusion as
versions, because his renderings do not agree. The Berani's rendering would ask us to assume. The very bad blunders as to facts, which he makes in fact that the transposition nevertheless occurs. his remarks, make it further necessary to be very and the circumstance that Bêráni's translation is
cautious with respect to all startling statein most of the following eighteen verses very
ments, of which there is a good number in his imperfect, -- the particularly difficult passages
work. It will not do to give to them implicit being invariably left out, -shew that his ideas credence, without carefully inquiring whether of completeness and exactness differed very consi
there are not circumstances which render a misderably from the standard applied to translations
take on his part certain or probable. in our days.
In conclusion, I must state that in spite of all Moreover, it is impossible to deny that Berani their shortcomings Bêrani's Indica remain in my was sometimes very careless. In several cases he opinion a very important work for the Sanskritist, convicts himself. If in extract xix. he omits the and that their careful study may be recommended mention of the orbit of the fixed stars, or in er. to every student of Indian literature and history. tract xviii. the word crystal,' and afterwards refers Nothing, I think, would contribute so much to to these points, it is evident that the omissions make this study truly fruitful, as a detailed exaare due to slips of the pen. Equally clear is the mination of all Beruni's quotations on the plan case in extract No. vii., where his omission of the adopted above, which no doubt is still open to words adi,' in the beginning,' and antardla, ' in the improvements. Will not one of the Indian intervals,' makes the calculation come out wrong, Universities set this investigation as a subject for and in extract xvii., where his neglecting to state a prize-essay P The materials are more easily that the serpent Kulika is another designation accessible in India than anywhere else, and a of Rahu, obscures the drift of the whole passage. young Indian Sanskritist would do with such an
