Book Title: Indian Antiquary Vol 52
Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Stephen Meredyth Edwardes, Krishnaswami Aiyangar
Publisher: Swati Publications
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THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY
[ MAY, 1923
and on p. 124 there is a note worth quoting: "The word grão (gram in the old spelling) is almost always used in the sense of the red dye (not really a grain). The use of the word gran (pronounced as an English word) to denote the chick-pea (Cicer aretinus) is modern. For this Barboga employed the word chicharo (chicharro in modern spelling), the correct Portuguese name for this pea." Incidentally, a note on p. 131 points out that a very early, if not the earliest, use of casta in Portuguese for the modern term "caste" is in Correa, I. p. 746 : “Melequiaz (Malik Ayyaz) was a foreigner, a Moor, a Jao (Javanese] by caste." On p. 206 there is a valuable note on " umbrella " and the various terms in European languages therefor, and on p. 218 another on tambarane, the portable lingam worn by Lingâyats.
This volume closes with a long note by Barbosa on Jogues, or, as the copyist has it, Jones ! And here I propose to leave him, with gratitude to Dames for his version and his annotations. Would that he were still alive to give us more.
(To be continued.)
A CHINESE EXPEDITION ACROSS THE PAMIRS AND
HINDUKUSH, A.D. 747.1
By StR AUREL STEIN, K.C.I.E. At the beginning of my second Central Asian journey (1906–08), and again at that of the third (1913-16), I had the good fortune to visit ground in the high snowy range of the Hindukush which, however inaccessible and remote it may seem from the scenes of the great historical dramas of Asia, was yet in the eighth century A.D. destined to witness events closely bound up with a struggle of momentous bearing for vast areas of the continent. I mean the glacier pass of the Darkot (15,400 feet above sea level) and the high valleys to the north and south of it, through which leads an ancient toute connecting the Pamirs and the uppermost headwaters of the Oxus with the Dard territories on the Indus, and thus with the north-west marches of India.
The events referred to arose from the prolonged conflict with the Arabs in the west and the rising power of the Tibetans in the south, into which the Chinese empire under the Tang dynasty was brought by its policy of Central Asian expansion. Our knowledge of the memorable expedition of which I propose to treat here, and of the historical developments leading up to it, is derived wholly from the official Chinese records contained in the Annals of the T'ang dynasty. They were first rendered generally accessible by the extracts which M. Chavannes, the lamented great Sinologue, published in his invaluable Documents sur les Turcs occidentaux."
1 Reprinted from the Geographical Journal for February, 1922.
2 The accompanying sketch-map 1 is intended to illustrate the general features of the mountain territories between the western T'ien-shan and the Indus which were affected by the political developments and military operations discussed in this paper.
Sketch-map 2 reproduces essential topographical details of that portion of the ground between the uppermoat Oxus and Gilgit river valleys which witnessed the chief exploits of the Chinese expedition of A.D, 747 into the Hindukush region. It has been prepared from Northern Transfrontier Sheet No. 2 S. W. of the Survey of India, scale 4 miles to 1 inch.
For convenient reference regarding the general topography of this mountain region may be recommended also sheet No. 42 of the 1: 1,000,000 map of Asia published by the Survey of India (Calcutta, 1919).
8 Documents sur les Tou-kite (Turcs) occidentaux, recueillis et commentée par Edouard Chavannes, Membre de l'Institut, etc., published by the Imperial Academy of Sciences of St. Petersburg, 1903, see in particular pp. 149-154.
