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148
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
[APRIL, 1891.
well with cards and with pickled ginger served in lemon juice."
In this case the cold rice has been served on a plantain-leaf, and not into the palm of the hand.
S. M. NATESA SASTRI.
SACRIFICES IN PERSIA. It is the custom, whenever a house, garden or kiln is constructed, to sacrifice & sheep, and to imprint on the door a right hand stooped in the blood. The sheep is distributed amongst the poor. This custom is said to be a propitiation of Fate, to avoid bloodshed within the building in future. For a bath, a cow is sacrificed, and the hand steeped in its blood is imprinted on the door.
There is a custom amongst the Persians of sacrificing and distributing the remains of a shoop to the poor, on the safe return home of any member of a household after a journey. The custom is that, just as you get down from your horse, the animal's neck is cut before you.
When any member of a household in Persia is very ill, it is the custom to kill a shoop in order to propitiate Fate and to avert danger from the sick person. Should a goat or any animal die during the illness of any member of a household, it is held as a sure sign of the recovery of the patient, as it is thought that Fate has been satisfied by the substitution of the goat or other animal in the place of the patient. Tehran.
S. J. A. CHURCHILL.
BOOK NOTICE. PROCEEDINGS OF THE AMERICAN ORIENTAL SOCIETY. I He also adds four notes on Avestan gramNew York, 30th and 31st October 1889.
mar: (1), on a genuine instance of a sish-aorist Prof. Whitney sets himself to answer the in the Avesta (Yasht iii. 2); (2), on a cas question whether roots in Sanskrit that contain Avestan 3rd dual middle in -aits ; (3) several ar in their weaker forms should be written and instances of difference in gonder between named as roots with or with ar. He thinks Avestan and Banskrit in the same word; (4), that the form is preferable and likely to in- on the rendering of the Avestan ereddo dor. crease in prevalence of usage.
hanem in Vendidad, v. 11. Prof. Bloomfield discourses on the etymology
An article by Dr. Cyrus Adler on the Shofar, of the particle om. He would divest it of all its use and origin is of general interest. This sanctity, and make it a mere introductory word like
word is rendered in the Bible by 'cornet,' though the Greek að (að-ri, au-tis, að-Aus) Lat. au-t, au-tem, it is usually made of a ram's horn, straightened Goth. au-k, and so on, with the meaning of now and flattened by leat. After a lengthy enquiry then, well now.' Then he would regard as due into the origin of the instrument, Dr. Adler to the utterance of the vowel with pluti.
concludes by saying that the following deduce He also discusses the Vedio instrumental tions would seem to be legitimate :padbhis. It occurs six times in the Rig Veda. (1) The oldest wind instrument used by'inland In these cases, RV. v. 64,7 cd, BV. 1. 99,12 and peoples was the horn of an animal with a natural RV. 1. 79,2, he would render it by quickly,
cavity, and a mouth-piece formed by cutting off the nimbly, briskly,' eto. In BV. iv. 2,12 and 14 he end. Horns which required hollowing came later. would render it with the eyes,' and in the remain- (2) These horns were originally used as signals ing passage RV. iv. 38,3 by with his feet.' This, in time of danger and for making announcements of course, gives two separate words from two in general. separate roota pdd and pat.
(3) Many of the more important announceMr. Hatfield of the Johns Hopkins University | mente had a religious character. The antiquity of follows with an attempt at the satisfactory the instrument caused ite permanent adoption for numberins of the Parisishtas of the Atharva sacred purposes. Veda, which he hopes may prove permanent. (6) The shofar, speaking especially of the
Prof. Hopkins gives an interpretation of Mand- instrument of that name, was originally a wind bharata iii. 42, 5, and a not very clear note on instrument, made of the horn of a wild goat. No "female divinities in India."
sacred character may be connected with the Dr. Williams Jackson sends an abetract of an sacrificial nae made of the goat. exceedingly interesting paper on the sense of (6) The etymology of the word is to be sought colour in the Avesta, and argues that we are in the Assyrian tappar, a species of wild goat: not justified in assuming any ignorance or lack Sapparta (fem.) meant originally the horn of a of the colour perception in the people whose fappar, and it may afterwards have been used civilization it represents:
for horn in general.
