View source for Introduction (Sino-Iranica)

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<center>'''<big>Sino-Iranica</big>'''</center>

<center>'''By Berthold Laufer'''</center>



<center>'''INTRODUCTION'''</center>


If we knew as  much about the culture of ancient Iran as about ancient Egypt or Babylonia, or even as  much as about India or China, our notions of cultural developments in Asia would probably be widely different from what they are at present. The few literary remains left to us in the Old-Persian inscriptions and in the Avesta are insufficient to retrace an adequate picture of Iranian life and civilization; and, although the records of the classical authors add a few touches here and there to this fragment, any attempts at reconstruction, even combined with these sources, will remain unsatisfactory. During the last decade or so, thanks to a benign dispensation of fate, the Iranian horizon has considerably widened: important discoveries made in Chinese Turkistan have revealed an abundant literature in two hitherto unknown Iranian languages,— the Sogdian and the so-called Eastern Iranian.1 ' We  now know that Iranian peoples once covered an immense territory, extending all over Chinese Turkistan, migrating into China, coming in contact with Chinese, and exerting a profound influence on nations of other stock, notably Turks and Chinese. The Iranians were the great mediators between the West and the East, conveying the heritage of Hellenistic ideas to central and eastern Asia and transmitting valuable plants and goods of China to the Mediterranean area. Their activity is of world-historical significance, but without the records of the Chinese we should be unable to grasp the situation thoroughly. The Chinese were positive utilitarians and always interested in matters of reality: they have bequeathed to us a great amount of useful information on Iranian plants, products, animals, minerals, customs, and institutions, which is bound to be of great service to science. The following pages represent Chinese contributions to the history of civilization in Iran, which aptly fill a lacune in our knowledge of Iranian tradition. Chinese records dealing with the history of Iranian peoples also contain numerous transcriptions of ancient Iranian words, 1 Cf., for instance, P. Pelliot, Influences iraniennes en Asie centrale et en 


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part of which have tested the ingenuity of several sinologues and historians; but few of these Sino-Iranian terms have been dealt with accurately and adequately. While a system for the study of Sino- Sanskrit has been successfully established, Sino-Iranian has been woefully neglected. The honor of having been the first to apply the laws of the phonology of Old Chinese to the study of Sino-Iranica is due to Robert Gauthiot.1 It is to the  memory of this great Iranian scholar that I wish to dedicate this volume, as a tribute ofhomagenot only to the scholar, but no less to the man and hero  who gave his life for France.2 Gauthiot was a superior man, a kiiin-tse ^ J" in the sense of Confucius, and every line he has written breathes the mind of a thinker and a genius. I had long cherished the thought and the hope that I might have the privilege of discussing with him the problems treated on these pages, which would have considerably gained from his sagacity and wide experience — #^A£,^HfrWft^. 

Iranian geographical and tribal names have hitherto been identified on historical grounds, some correctly, others inexactly, but an attempt to restore the Chinese transcriptions to their correct Iranian prototypes has hardly been made. A great amount of hard work remains to be , done in this field. 3 In my opinion, it must be our foremost object first to record the Chinese transcriptions as exactly as possible in their ancient phonetic garb, according to the method so successfully inaugurated and applied by P. Pelliot and H. Maspero, and then to proceed from this secure basis to the reconstruction of the Iranian model. The accurate restoration of the Chinese form in accordance with 

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1 Cf. his Quelques termes techniques bouddhiques et manich£ens, Journal asiatique, 191 1, II, pp. 49-67 (particularly pp. 59 et seq.), and his contributions to Chavannes and Pelliot, Traite" manicheen, pp. 27, 42, 58, 132. 

* Gauthiot died on September It, 191 6, at the age of forty, from the effects of a wound received as captain of infantry while gallantly leading his company to a grand attack, during the first offensive of Artois in the spring of 1915. Cf. the obituary notice by A. Meillet in Bull, de la Societe de Linguistique, No. 65, pp. 127-132. 

8 I hope to take up this subject in another place, and so give only a few examples here. Ta-ho §wi 3^ -|g ^fC is the Ta-ho River on which Su-li, the capital of Persia, was situated (Sui Su, Ch. 83, p. 7 b). Hirth (China and the Roman Orient, pp. 198, 313; also Journal Am. Or. Soc, Vol. XXXIII, 1913, p. 197), by means of a Cantonese Tat-hot, has arrived at the identification with the Tigris, adding an Armenian Deklath and Pliny's Diglito. Chinese la, however, corresponds neither to ancient ti nor de, but only to *tat, dat, dad, dar, d'ar, while ho fisj represents *hat, kat, kad, kar, kal.  We accordingly have *Dar-kat, or, on the probable assumption that a metathesis has taken place, *Dak-rat. Hence, as to the identification with the Tigris, the vocalism of the first syllable brings difficulties: it is i both in Old Persian and in Babylonian. Old Persian Tigram (with an alteration due to popular etymology, cf. Avestan tiyriS, Persian dr, "arrow") is borrowed from Babylonian Di-ik-lat ( 


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rigid phonetic principles is the essential point, and means  much more than any haphazardly  made guesses at identification. Thus Mu-lu /fc }*&, name of a city on the eastern frontier of An-si (Parthia),1 has been identified with  Mouru (Muru, Merw) of the Avesta.2 Whether this is historically correct, I do not wish to discuss here; from an historical viewpoint the identification may be correct, but from a phonetic viewpoint it is not acceptable, for Mu-lu corresponds to ancient *Mukluk, Mug-ruk, Bug-luk, Bug-rug, to be restored perhaps to *Bux-rux.8 The scarcity of linguistic material on the Iranian side has imposed certain restrictions: names for Iranian plants, one of the chief subjects of this study, have been handed down to us to a very moderate extent, so that in  many cases no identification can be attempted. I hope, however, that Iranian scholars will appreciate the philological contributions of the Chinese to Iranian and particularly Middle-Persian lexicography, for in almost every instance it is possible to restore with a very high degree of certainty the primeval Iranian forms from which the Chinese transcriptions were accurately made. The Chinese scholars had developed a rational method and a fixed system in reproducing words of foreign languages, in the study of which, as is well known, they took a profound interest; and from day to day, as our experience widens, we have occasion to admire the soundness, solidity, and consistency of this system. The same laws of transcription worked out for Sanskrit, Malayan, Turkish, Mongol, and Tibetan, hold good also for Iranian. I have only to ask Iranian scholars to have confidence in our method, which has successfully stood  many tests. I am convinced that this plea is unnecessary for the savants of France,  who are the is, Dik-lat, Dik-rat), which has passed into Greek Tlypijs and TLypis and Elamite Ti-ig-ra (A. Meillet, Grammaire du vieux perse, p. 72). It will thus be seen that the Chinese transcription *Dak-rat corresponds to Babylonian Dik-rat, save the vowel of the first element, which cannot yet be explained, but which will surely be traced some day to an Iranian dialect.—The T'ai p'in hwan yii ki (Ch. 185, p. 19) gives four geographical names of Persia, which have not yet been indicated. The first of these is the name of a city in the form ^ §| J§ Ho-p'o-kie, *Hat(r, 1)- bwa-g'iat. The first two elements *Har-bwa correspond to Old Persian Haraiva (Babylonian Hariva), Avestan Haraeva, Pahlavi *Harew, Armenian Hrew,—the modern Herat. The third element appears to contain a word with the meaning "city." The same character is used in $§j ^ J§'J Kie-li-pie, *G'iat-li-b'iet, name of a pass in the north-eastern part of Persia; here *g'iat, *g'iar, seems to represent Sogdian yr, *yara ("mountain"). Fan-tou ^ or ^ {ftj (Ts'ien Han $u, Ch. 96 a), anciently *Pan-tav, *Par-tav, corresponds exactly to Old Persian Parflava, Middle Persian Parflu. 

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1 Hou Han Su, Ch. 116, p. 8 b. 

* Hirth, China and the Roman Orient, p. 143. 

• Cf. also the observation of E. H. Parker (Imp. and As. Quarterly Review, !903. p. 154)1 who noticed the phonetic difficulty in the proposed identification. 


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most advanced and most competent representatives of the sinological field in all its varied and extensive branches, as well as in other domains of Oriental research. It would have been very tempting to summarize in a special chapter the Chinese method of transcribing Iranian and to discuss the phonology of Iranian in the light of Chinese contributions. Such an effort, however, appears to me premature at this moment: our knowledge of Sino-Iranian is in its infancy, and plenty of fresh evidence will come forward sooner or later from Turkistan manuscripts. There is no doubt that  many hundreds of new Iranian terms of various dialects will be revived, and will considerably enrich our  now scanty knowledge of the Iranian onomasticon and phonology. In view of the character of this publication, it was necessary to resort to a phonetic transcription of both ancient and modern Chinese on the same basis, as is  now customary in all Oriental languages. The backwardness of Chinese research is illustrated by the fact that we slavishly adhere to a clumsy and antiquated system of romanization in which two and even three letters are wasted for the expression of a single sound. My system of transliteration will be easily grasped from the following comparative table. 

OLD STYLE PHONETIC STYLE ttg A Ch I CV  r j & (while j serves to indicate the palatal Ih $ sonant, written also dh). 

Other slight deviations from the old style, for instance, in the vowels, are self-explanatory. For the sake of the numerous comparative series including a large number of diverse Oriental languages it has been my aim to standardize the transcription as far as possible, with the exception of Sanskrit, for which the commonly adopted method remains. The letter x in Oriental words is never intended for the combination ks, but for the spirant surd, sometimes written kh. In proper names where we are generally accustomed to kh, I have allowed the latter to pass, perhaps also in other cases. I do not believe in superconsistency in purely technical matters. 

The linguistic phenomena, important as they may be, form merely a side-issue of this investigation. My main task is to trace the history of all objects of material culture, pre-eminently cultivated plants, drugs, products, minerals, metals, precious stones, and textiles, in their migration from Persia to China (Sino-Iranica), and others transmitted from China to Persia (Irano-Sinica). There are other groups of Sino- Iranica not included in this publication, particularly the animal world 


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games, and musical instruments.1 The manuscript dealing with the fauna of Iran is ready, but will appear in another article the object of which is to treat all foreign animals known to the Chinese according to geographical areas and from the viewpoint of zoogeography in ancient and modern times. My notes on the games (particularly polo) and musical instruments of Persia adopted by the Chinese, as well as a study of Sino-Iranian geographical and tribal names, must likewise be reserved for another occasion. I hope that the chapter on the titles of the Sasanian government will be welcome, as those preserved in the Chinese Annals have been identified here for the first time. New results are also offered in the notice of Persian textiles. 

As to Iranian plants of which the Chinese have preserved notices, we must distinguish the following groups: (1) cultivated plants actually disseminated from Iranian to Chinese soil, (2) cultivated and wild plants of Iran merely noticed and described by Chinese authors, (3) drugs and aromatics of vegetable origin imported from Iran to China. The material, as far as possible, is arranged from this point of view and in chronological order. The single items are numbered. Apart from the five appendices, a hundred and thirty-five subjects are treated. At the outset it should be clearly understood that it is by no means the intention of these studies to convey the impression that the Chinese owe a portion of their material culture to Persia. Stress is laid on the point that the Chinese furnish us with immensely useful material for elaborating a history of cultivated plants. The foundation of Chinese civilization with its immense resources is no more affected by these introductions than that of Europe, which received numerous plants from the Orient and more recently from America. The Chinese merit our admiration for their far-sighted economic policy in making so  many useful foreign plants tributary to themselves and amalgamating them with their sound system of agriculture. The Chinese were thinking, sensible, and broad-minded people, and never declined to accept gratefully whatever good things foreigners had to offer. In planteconomy they are the foremost masters of the world, and China presents/ a unique spectacle in that all useful plants of the universe are cultivated there. Naturally, these cultivations were adopted and absorbed by a gradual process : it took the Chinese  many centuries to become familiar with the flora of their own country, and the long series of their herbals (Pen ts'ao) shows us well  how their knowledge of species increased from the T'ang to the present time, each of these works stating the 1 Iranian influences on China in the matter of warfare, armor, and tactics have been discussed in Chinese Clay Figures, Part I. 


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number of additional species as compared with its predecessor. The introduction of foreign plants begins from the latter part of the second century B.C., and it was two plants of Iranian origin, the alfalfa and the grape-vine, which were the first exotic guests in the land of Han. These were followed by a long line of other Iranian and Central-Asiatic plants, and this great movement continued down to the fourteenth century in the  Yuan period. The introduction of American species in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries denotes the last phase in this economic development, which I hope to set forth in a special monograph. Aside from Iran, it was Indo-China, the Malayan region, and India which contributed a large quota to Chinese cultivations. It is essential to realize that the great Iranian plant-movement extends over a period of a millennium and a half; for a learned legend has been spread broadcast that most of these plants were acclimatized during the Han period, and even simultaneously by a single man, the wellknown general,  Can K'ien. It is one of my objects to destroy this myth. Can K'ien, as a matter of fact, brought to China solely two plants,—alfalfa and the grape-vine. No other plant is attributed to him in the contemporaneous annals. Only late and untrustworthy (chiefly Taoist) authors credit him also with the introduction of other Iranian plants. As time advanced, he was made the centre of legendary fabrication, and almost any plant hailing from Central Asia and of doubtful or obscure history was passed off under his name: thus he was ultimately canonized as the great plant-introducer. Such types will spring up everywhere under similar conditions. A detailed discussion of this point will be found under the heading of each plant which by dint of mere fantasy or misunderstanding has been connected with Can K'ien by Chinese or European writers. In the case of the spinach I have furnished proof that this vegetable cannot have been cultivated in Persia before the sixth century a.d., so that  Can K'ien could not have had any knowledge of it. All the alleged Cah-K'ien plants were introduced into China from the third or fourth century a.d. down to the T'ang period inclusively (618-906). The erroneous reconstruction alluded to above was chiefly championed by Bretschneider and Hirth; and A. de Candolle, the father of the science of historical botany, who, as far as China is concerned, depended exclusively on Bretschneider, fell victim to the same error. 

F. v. Richthofen,1 reproducing the long list of Bretschneider's Cah-K'ien plants, observes, "It cannot be assumed that Can K'ien himself brought along all these plants and seeds, for he had to travel 1 China, Vol. I, p. 459. 


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with caution, and for a year was kept prisoner by the Hiun-nu." When he adds, however, "but the relations which he had started brought the cultivated plants to China in the course of the next years," he goes on guessing or speculating. 

In his recent study of  Can K'ien, Hirth 1 admits that of cultivated plants only the vine and alfalfa are mentioned in the Si ki. 2 He is unfortunate, however, in the attempt to safeguard his former position on this question when he continues to argue that "nevertheless, the one hero who must be looked upon as the pioneer of all that came from the West was Chang K'ien." This is at best a personal view, but an unhistorical and uncritical attitude. Nothing allows us to read more from our sources than they contain. The TsH min yao $u, to which Hirth takes refuge, can prove nothing -whatever in favor of his theory that the pomegranate, sesame, garlic, 3 and coriander were introduced by Can K'ien. The work in question was written at least half a millennium after his death, most probably in the sixth century a.d., and does not fall back on traditions coeval with the Han and  now lost, but merely resorts to popular traditions evolved long after the  Han period. In no authentic document of the Han is any allusion made to. any of these plants. Moreover, there is no dependence on the Ts'i min yao iw in the form in which we have this book at present. Bretschneider4 said wisely and advisedly, "The original work was in ninety-two sections. A part of it was lost a long time ago, and  much additional matter by later authors is found in the edition  now current, which is in ten chapters. . . . According to an author of the twelfth century, quoted in the Wen hien fun k'ao, the edition then extant was already provided with the interpolated notes; and according to Li Tao, also an author of the Sung, these notes had been added by Sun Kuh of the Sung dynasty." 5  What such a work would be able to teach us on actual conditions of the Han era, I for my part am unable to see. 1 Journal Am. Or. Soc, Vol. XXXVII, 1917, p. 92. The new translation of this chapter of the Si ki denotes a great advance, and is an admirable piece of work. It should be read by every one as an introduction to this volume. It is only on points of interpretation that in some cases I am compelled to dissent from Hirth's opinions. 8 This seems to be the direct outcome of a conversation I had with the author during the Christmas week of 191 6, when I pointed out this fact to him and remarked that the alleged attributions to Can K'ien of other plants are merely the outcome of later traditions. * This is a double error (see below, p. 302). 4 Bot. Sin., pt. I, p. 77. 8 Cf. also Pelliot (Bull, de I'Ecole franqaise, Vol. IX, p. 434), who remarks, "Ce vieil et preaeux ouvrage nous est parvenu en assez mauvais 6tat." 


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It has been my endeavor to correlate the Chinese data first of all with what we know from Iranian sources, and further with classical, Semitic, and Indian traditions. Unfortunately we have only fragments of Iranian literature. Chapter  xxvn of the Bundahisn1 contains a disquisition on plants, which is characteristic of the treatment of this subject in ancient Persia. As it is not only interesting from this point of view, but also contains a great deal of material to which reference will be made in the investigations to follow, an extract taken from E.  W. West's translation2 may be welcome. 

"These are as  many genera of plants as exist: trees and shrubs, fruit-trees, corn, flowers, aromatic herbs, salads, spices, grass, wild plants, medicinal plants, gum plants, and all producing oil, dyes, and clothing. I will mention them also a second time: all whose fruit is not welcome as food of men, and are perennial, as the cypress, the plane, the white poplar, the box, and others of this genus, they call trees and shrubs (ddr va diraxt). The produce of everything welcome as food of men, that is perennial, as the date, the myrtle, the lote-plum (kiindr, a thorny tree, allied to the jujube, which bears a small plumlike fruit), the grape, the quince, the apple, the citron, the pomegranate, the peach, the fig, the walnut, the almond, and others in this genus, they call fruit (tnivak). Whatever requires labor with the spade, and is perennial, they call a shrub (diraxt). Whatever requires that they take its crop through labor, and its root withers away, such as wheat, barley, grain, various kinds of pulse, vetches, and others of this genus, they call corn (jurddk). Every plant with fragrant leaves, which is cultivated by the hand-labor of men, and is perennial, they call an aromatic herb (siparam). Whatever sweet-scented blossom arises at various seasons through the hand-labor of men, or has a perennial root and blossoms in its season with new shoots and sweet-scented blossoms, as the rose, the narcissus, the jasmine, the dog-rose (nestarun), the tulip, the colocynth (kavastik), the pandanus (kedi), the camba, the ox-eye (heri), the crocus, the swallow-wort (zarda), the violet, the karda, and others of this genus, they call a flower (gill). Everything whose sweet-scented fruit, or sweet-scented blossom, arises in its season, without the hand-labor of men, they call a wild plant (vahdr or nihdl). Whatever is welcome as food of cattle and beasts of burden they call grass (giyah). Whatever enters into cakes (pes-pdrakihd) they call spices (dvzdrihd). Whatever is welcome in eating of bread, as torn shoots of the coriander, water-cress (kakij), the leek, and 1 Cf. E. W. West, Pahlavi Literature, p. 98 (in Grundriss iran. Phil., Vol. II). 2 Pahlavi Texts, pt. I, p. 100 (Sacred Books of the East, Vol V). 


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others of this genus, they call salad (terak or tdrak, Persian tarah). Whatever is like spinning cotton, and others of this genus, they call clothing plants (jdmak). Whatever lentil (mafag) is greasy, as sesame, dutedh, hemp, vandak (perhaps for zeto, 'olive,' as Anquetil supposes, and Justi assumes), and others of this genus, they call an oil-seed (rokano). Whatever one can dye clothing with, as saffron, sapan-wood, zalava, vaha, and others of this genus, they call a dye-plant (rag). Whatever root, or gum (tuf), or wood is scented, as frankincense (Pazand kendri for Pahlavi kundur), vardst (Persian barghast), kust, sandalwood, cardamom (Pazand kdkura, Persian qaqulah, 'cardamoms, or kakul, kdkul, 'marjoram')? camphor, orange-scented mint, and others of this genus, they call a scent (bod). Whatever stickiness comes out from plants they call gummy (vadak). The timber which proceeds from the trees, when it is either dry or wet, they call wood (Zihd). Every one of all these plants which is so, they call medicinal (ddruk). 

"The principal fruits are of thirty kinds, and there are ten species the inside and outside of which are fit to eat, as the fig, the apple, the quince, the citron, the grape, the mulberry, the pear, and others of this kind. There are ten the outside of which is fit to eat, but not the inside, as the date, the peach, the white apricot, and others of this kind; those the inside of which is fit to eat, but not the outside, are the walnut, the almond, the pomegranate, the coco-nut, 1 the filbert (Junduk), the chestnut (Sahbalut), the pistachio nut, the vargdn, and whatever else of this description are very remarkable. 

"This, too, it says, that every single flower is appropriate to an' angel (ametospend), 2 as the white jasmine (satnan) is for Vohuman, the myrtle and jasmine (ydsmin) are Auharmazd's own, the mouse-ear (or sweet marjoram) is A&avahist's own, the basil-royal is SatvirO's own, the musk flower is Spendarmad's, the lily is Horvadad's, the lamba is Amerodad's, Din-pavan-Ataro has the orange-scented mint (vddrang-bod), Ataro has the marigold (ddargun), the water-lily is Avan's, the white marv is Xursed's, the ranges (probably rand, 'laurel') is Mah's, the violet is Tir's, the meren is Gos's, the kdrda is Din-pavan- Mitro's, all violets are Mitro's, the red chrysanthemum (xer) is Sr5§'s, the dog-rose (nestran) is Rasnu's, the cockscomb is Fravardin's, the sisebar is Vahram's, the yellow chrysanthemum is Ram's, the orange- 

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1 Pazand anarsar is a misreading of Pahlavi anargll (Persian nargll), from Sanskrit ndrikela. 

2 These are the thirty archangels and angels whose names are applied to the thirty days of the Parsi month, in the order in which they are mentioned here, except that Auharmazd is the first day, and Vohuman is the second. 


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scented mint is Vad's, the trigonella is Dln-pavan-Dln's, the hundredpetalled rose is Din's, all kinds of wild flowers (vahdr) are Ard's, Actad has all the white Horn, the bread-baker's basil is Asman's,  Zamyad has the crocus, Maraspend has the flower of Ardaslr, Anlran has this Horn of the angel Horn, of three kinds." 

 From this extract it becomes evident that the ancient Persians paid attention to their flora, and, being fond of systematizing, possessed a classification of their plants; but any of their botanical literature, if it ever existed, is lost. 

The most important of the Persian works on pharmacology is the Kitab-ulabniyat 'an haqd'iq-uladviyat or "Book of the Foundations of the True Properties of the Remedies," written about a.d. 970 by the physician Abu Mansur Muvaffaq bin 'All alharavi,  who during one of his journeys visited also India. He wrote for Mansur Ibn Nuh II of the house of the Samanides,  who reigned from 961 to 976 or 977. This is not only the earliest Persian work on the subject, but the oldest extant production in prose of New-Persian literature. The text has been edited by R. Seligmann from a unique manuscript of Vienna dated a.d. 1055, the oldest extant Persian manuscript.1 There is a translation by a Persian physician, Abdul-Chalig  Achundow from Baku.2 The translation in general seems good, and is provided with an elaborate commentary, but in view of the importance of the work a new critical edition would be desirable. The sources from which Abu Mansur derived his materials should be carefully sifted:  we should like to know in detail what he owes to the Arabs, the Syrians, and the Indians, and what is due to his  own observations. Altogether Arabic influence is pre-eminent. Cf. Appendix III. 

A good  many Chinese plant-names introduced from Iran have the word Hu t$ prefixed to them. Hu is one of those general Chinese designations without specific ethnic value for certain groups of foreign tribes. Under the Han it appears mainly to refer to Turkish tribes; thus the Hiun-nu are termed Hu in the Si ki.  From the fourth century onward it relates to Central Asia and more particularly to peoples of 

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1 Codex Vindobonensis sive Medici Abu Mansur Muwaffak Bin All Heratensis liber Fundamentorum Pharamacologiae Pars I Prolegomena et textum continens (Vienna, 1859). 

2 Die pharmakologischen Grundsatze des A. M. Muwaffak, in R. Kobert's Historische Studien aus dem Pharmakologischen Institute der Universitat Dorpat, l &73- Quoted as "Achundow, Abu Mansur." The author's name is properly 'Abdu'l-Khaliq, son of the Akhund or schoolmaster. Cf. E. G. Browne, Literary History of Persia, pp. II, 478. 


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Iranian extraction.1 Bretschneider2 annotated, "If the character hu occurs in the name of a plant, it can be assumed that the plant is of foreign origin and especially from western Asia, for by Hu len the ancient Chinese denoted the peoples of western Asia." This is but partially correct. The attribute hu is by no means a safe criterion in stamping a plant as foreign, neither does hu in the names of plants which really are of foreign origin apply to West-Asiatic or Iranian plants exclusively. 

i. The word hu appears in a number of names of indigenous and partially wild plants without any apparent connection with the tribal designation Hu or without allusion to their provenience from the Hu. In the Li Sao, the famous elegies by K'u  Yuan of the fourth century B.C., a plant is mentioned under the name hu Sen. #1 $81 , said to be a fragrant grass from which long cords were made. This plant is not identified.3 

2. The acid variety of yu fib (Citrus grandis) is styled hu kan #J "HY apparently an ironical nickname, which may mean "sweet like the Hu." The tree itself is a native of China. 

3. The term hu hien ffl fL occurs only in the T'u kin pen ts'ao of Su Sun of the eleventh century as a variety of hien (Amarantus) , which is indigenous to China. It is not stated that this variety came from abroad, nor is it known what it really was. 

4. Hu mien  man #J M ^ is a variety of Rehmannia, 5 a native of China and Japan. The name possibly means "the  man with the face of a Hu."6 C'en Ts'ah-k'i of the T'ang says in regard to this plant that it grows in Lih-nan (Kwah-tuh), and is like ti hwan #& iic (Rehmannia glutinosa). 

5. The pla^it known as ku-sui-pu H* #$ $f (Polypodium fortunei) is indigenous to China, and, according to C'en Ts'an-k'i, was called 

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1 "Le terme est bien en principe, vers Tan 800, une designation des Iraniens et en particulier des Sogdiens " (Chavannes and Pelliot, Traite manichden, p. 231). This in general is certainly true, but we have well authenticated instances, traceable to the fourth century at least, of specifically Iranian plants the names of which are combined with the element Hu, that can but apply to Iranians. 

1 Chinese Recorder, 1 871, p. 22 1. 

8 Bretschneider, Bot. Sin., pt. II, No. 420; and Li sao Is'ao tnu su (Ch. 2, p. 16 b, ed. of Ci pu tsu £ai ts'un su) by Wu Zen-kie ^| £l §J! of the Sung period. See also T'ai pHn yii Ian, Ch. 994, p. 6 b. 

4 Bretschneider, op. cit., No. 236; W. T. Swingle in Plantas Wilsoniana?, Vol. 11, p. 130. 

* Stuart, Chinese Materia Medica, p. 372. 

6 Cf. analogous plant-names like our Jews-mallow, Jews-thorn, Jews-ear, Jewsapple 


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by the people of Kian-si ffl J£ ^ hu-sun-kian, a purely local name which does not hint at any relation to the Hu. 

6. Another botanical name in which the word hu appears without reference to the Hu is Vui-hu-ken ^1 #3 J8, unidentified, a wild plant diffused all over China, and first mentioned by C'en Ts'an-k'i as growing in the river-valleys of Kian-nan.1 

7-8. The same remark holds good for ts'e-hu j£ (^) #l 2 (Bupleurum falcatum), a wild plant of all northern provinces and already described in the Pie lu, and for ts xien-hu Hf fifl 3 {Angelica decursiva), growing in  damp soil in central and northern China. 

9. Su-hu-lan 13 #} fl& is an unidentified plant, first and solely mentioned by C'en Ts'ah-k'i, 4 the seeds of which, resembling those of Pimpinella anisum, are eatable and medicinally employed. It grows in Annam. One might be tempted to take the term as hu-lan of Su (Se-2'wan), but lu-hu-lan may be the transcription of a foreign word. 

10. The ma-k'in E$ jfjf or niu *r k'in (Viola pinnata), a wild violet, is termed hu k'in #J 7r in the T'un li 3® iS by Ceh Tsiao % Wl (1 108-62) and in the T'u kin pen ts'ao of Su Sufi. 6 No explanation as to the meaning of this hu is on record. 

11. The hu-man (wan) S3 s is a poisonous plant, identified with Gelsemium elegans.* It is mentioned in the Pei hu lu1 with the synonyme ye-ko Jn  H,8 the vegetable yun ^g (Ipomoea aquatica) being regarded as an antidote for poisoning by hu-man. C'en Ts'ah-k'i is cited as authority for this statement. The Lin piao lu i 9 writes the name I? 35, and defines it as a poisonous grass; hu-man grass is the  common colloquial name. The same work further says, "When one has eaten of this plant by mistake, one should use a broth made from sheep's blood which will neutralize the poison. According to some, this plant grows as a creeper. Its leaves are like those of the Ian hian S3  #, bright and thick. Its poison largely penetrates into the leaves, and is not employed 

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1 Pen ts'ao kan tnu, Ch. 16, p. 7 b. 

• *Op. cit., Ch. 13, p. 6 b. 

* Op. cit., Ch. 13, p. 7 b. 

* Op. cit., Ch. 26, p. 22 b. 

* Op. cit., Ch. 26, p. 21 ; Ci wu min Si t'u k'ao, Ch. 14, p. 76. 

•Cf. C. Ford, China Review, Vol. XV, 1887, pp. 215-220. Stuart (Chinese Materia Medica, p. 220) says that the plant is unidentified, nevertheless he describes it on p. 185. 

7 Ch. 2, p. 18 b (ed. of Lu Sin-yoan). 

8 According to Matsumura (Shokubutsu mei-i, No. 2689), Rhus toxicodendron (Japanese tsuta-uruii). 

9 Ch. B, p. 2 (ed. of  Wu yin Hen). 


[197] 

as a drug. Even if an antidote is taken, this poison will cause death within a half day. The goats feeding on the sprouts of this plant will fatten and grow." Fan C'en-ta t& $c ^C (1126-93), in his Kwei hai yii hen Zi, x mentions this plant under the name hu-man t'en j§£ ("hu-man creeper"), saying that it is a poisonous herb, which, rubbed and soaked in water, will result in instantaneous death as soon as this liquid enters the mouth. The plant is indigenous to southern China, and no reason is given for the word hu being prefixed to it. 

12. Hu Vui-tse ~$ M ? (literally, "chin of the Hu") is the  name of an evergreen tree or shrub indigenous throughout China, even to Annam. The name is not explained, and there are no data in Chinese records to indicate that it was introduced from abroad.2 It is mentioned by C'en Ts'ah-k'i as a tree growing in P'in-lin *P  $s and it is said to be alluded to in the chapter Wu hin ci 3l fx i& of the  Sun s"u. The synonyme kHo'r-su ^ jS 8£ ("sparrow-curd," because the birds are fond of the fruit) first appears in the Pao ci lun of Lei Hiao of the fifth century. The people of  Yue call the plant p'u-Vui-tse W M "& ; the southerners, lu-tu-tse M. HE  ?, which according to Liu Tsi ^J ^ of the Ming, in his Fei sue lu IS W- $k, is a word from the speech of the Man. The people of Wu term the tree pan-han-c'un ^ff$, because its fruit ripens at an early date. The people of Sian IS style it hwah-p'o-nai JI9$flR ("yellow woman's breast"), because the fruit resembles a nipple. 

13. In hu-lu 5§8 or HI iH. (Lagenaria vulgaris) the first character is a substitute for 1$ hu. The gourd is a native of China. 

14. Hui-hui tou IhJ j£ (literally, "Mohammedan bean") is a plant everywhere growing wild in the fields. 8 The same remark holds good for hu tou W[ i£, a kind of bean which is roasted or made into flour, according to the Pen ts'ao H i, a weed growing in rice-fields. Wu K'i-ts'un, author of the Ci  wu min H Vu k'ao, says,  "What is  now hu tou, grows wild, and is not the hu tou of ancient times." 4 

15. Yen hu su $j£ #i ^ denotes tubers of Corydalis ambigua: they are little, hard, brown tubers, of somewhat flattened spherical form, averaging half an inch in diameter. The plant is a native of Siberia, 

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1 Ed. of Ci pu tsu lai ts'un Su, p. 30. 

1 Stuart (Chinese Materia Medica, p. 161) is mistaken in saying that several names of this plant are "possibly transliterations of Turkic or Mongol names." There are no such names on record. The tree is identified with Elcsagnus longipes or pungens. 

3 Ci wu min Si t'u k'ao, Ch. 2, p. 11 b. _It is first mentioned in the Kiu hwan Pen ts'ao, being also called na-ho-tou |)5 ^ B. 4 

See, further, below, p. 305. 


[198] 

Kamchatka, and the Amur region, and flowers upon the melting of the snow in early spring. 1 According to the Pen ts'ao kan mu, 2 the plant is first mentioned by C'en Ts'an-k'i of the T'ang period as growing in the country Hi f&, and came from Nan-tun $t M (in Korea). Li Si-cen annotates that by Hi the north-eastern barbarians should be understood. Wan Hao-ku 3: jft ii, a physician of the thirteenth century, remarks that the name of the plant was originally hiian 5£ hu-su, but that on account of a taboo (to avoid the name of the Emperor Cen-tsun of the Sung) it was altered into yen-hu-su; but this explanation cannot be correct, as the latter designation is already ascribed to C'en Ts'an-k'i of the T'ang. It is not known whether hu in this case would allude to the provenience of the plant from Korea. In the following example, however, the allusion to Korea is clear. 

The mint, W ffi po-ho, *bak-xa (Mentha arvensis or aquatica), occurs in China both spontaneously and in the cultivated state. The plant is regarded as indigenous by the Chinese, but also a foreign variety is known as hu pa-ho (*bwat-xa) #! ^ jlfi. 3 C'en §i-liaft ffl> ~il It, in his Si sin pen ts'ao 'ffc'144^, published in the tenth century, introduced the term  wu i$| pa-ho, "mint of Wu" (that is, Su-cou, where the best mint was cultivated), in distinction from hu pa-ho, "mint of the Hu." Su Sun, in his T'u kin pen ts'ao, written at the end of the eleventh century, affirms that this foreign mint is similar to the native species, the only difference being that it is somewhat sweeter in taste; it grows on the border of Kian-su and Ce-kian, where the people make it into tea; commonly it is styled Sin-lo M H po-ho, "mint of Sinra" (in Korea). Thus this variety may have been introduced under the Sung from Korea, and it is to this country that the term hu may refer. Li §i-2en relates that Sun Se-miao 3% M> 28, in his Ts'ien kin fan *r & jfr, 4 writes the word ^ Wfan-ho, but that this is erroneously due to a dialectic pronunciation. This means, in other words, that the first character fan is merely a variant of ^,5 and, like the latter, had the phonetic equivalent *bwat, bat.6 

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1 Hanbury, Science Papers, p. 256. 

2 Ch. 13, p. 13. 

' The word po-ho is Chinese, not foreign. The Persian word for "peppermint" is pudene, pudina, budenk (Kurd punk) ; in Hindi it is pudlna or pudinekd, derived from the Persian. In Tibetan (Ladakh) it is p'o-lo-lin; in the Tibetan written language, byi-rug-pa, hence Mongol jirukba; in Manchu it is farsa. 

* See below, p. 306. 

6 As Sun Se-miao lived in the seventh century, when the Korean mint was not yet introduced, his term fan-ho could, of course, not be construed to mean "foreign mint." 

• In T'oung Pao (1915, p. 18) Pelliot has endeavored to show that the char 


[199] 

In the following example there is no positive evidence as to the significance of hu. Hu wan Si Ze ffl 3E ^ 41 (" envoy of the king of the Hu") is a synonyme of tu hwo ffl ?§ (Peucedanum decursivum).1 As the same plant is also styled k'ian tsHh 7^ W, k'ian hwo, and hu k'ian H ce Ml 7& $i  %, the term K'ian (*Gian) alluding to Tibetan tribes, it may be inferred that the king of the Hu likewise hints at Tibetans. In general, however, the term Hu does not include Tibetans, and the present case is not conclusive in showing that it does. In the chapter on the walnut it will be seen that there are two introduced varieties,— an Iranian (hu t'ao) and a Tibetan one (k'ian t'ao). 

In hu ts'ai (Brassica rapa) the element hu, according to Chinese tradition, relates to Mongolia, while it is very likely that the vegetable itself was merely introduced there from Iran.2 

In other instances, plants have some relation to the Hu; but what this relation is, or what group of tribes should be understood by Hu, is not revealed. 

There is a plant, termed hu hwan lien SH !fc 31, the hwan-lien (Coptis teeta) of the Hu, because, as Li Si-cen says, its physical characteristics, taste, virtue, and employment are similar to those of hwan-lien. It has been identified with Barkhausia repens. As evidenced by the acter fan, on the authority of K'ah-hi, could never have had the pronunciation po nor a final consonant, and that, accordingly, in the tribal name T'u-fan (Tibet) the character fan, as had previously been assumed, could not transcribe the Tibetan word bod. True it is that under the character in question K'an-hi has nothing to say about po, but ^§p is merely a graphic variant of f£, with which it is phonetically identical. Now under this character, K'ah-hi indicates plainly that, according to the Tsi yiin and Cen yun, fan in geographical names is to be read p'o (anciently *bwa) §j£ (fan-ls'ie $f $£), and that, according to the dictionary Si wen, the same character was pronounced P'o (*bwa) §£, p'u |jff , and p'an§R£(ci. also Schlegel, Secret of the Chinese Method, pp. 21-22). In the ancient transcription K| or£ 9fi fan-tou, *par-tav, reproduction of Old Persian Parflava (see above, p. 1 87) ,fan corresponds very well to par or bar; and if it could interchange with the phonetic f£ pa, *bwat, bwar, it is perfectly clear that, contrary to Pelliot's theory, there were at least dialectic cases, where ^ was possessed of a final consonant, being sounded bwat or bwar. Consequently it could have very well served for the reproduction of Tibetan bod. From another phonetic viewpoint the above case is of interest: we have *bak-xa and *bwat-xa as ancient names for the mint, which goes to show that the final consonants of the first element were vacillating or varied in different dialects (cf. Voung Pao, 1916, pp. 110-114). 

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<references/>


1 "Pun ci (above, p. 196), Ch. 75, p. 12 b. 

2 See below, p. 381. In the term hu yen ("swallow of the Hu")» Am appears to refer to Mongolia, as shown by the Manchu translation monggo cibin and the TurkI equivalent qalmaq qarlogal (Mongol xatun xariyatsai, Tibetan gyi-gyi k'ug-rta; cf. Ross, Polyglot List of Birds, No. 267). The bird occurs not only in Mongolia, but also in Ce-kian Province, China (see Kwei ki sanfu iu "f^ f§ E£ |K jet, Ch. 2, p. 8; ed. of Si yin hiian ts'un §u). 


[200] 

attribute Hu, it may be of foreign origin, its foreign name being H>J ffl> % W ko-hu-lu-tse (*kat-wu-lou-dzak). Unfortunately it is not indicated at what time this transcription was adopted, nor does Li Si-cen state the source from which he derived it. The only T'ang author  who mentions the plant, Su Kun, does not give this foreign name. At all events, it does not convey the impression of representing a T'ang transcription; on the contrary, it bears the ear-marks of a transcription made under the Yuan. Su Kun observes, "Hu hwan-lien is produced in the country Po-se and grows on dry land near the sea-shore. Its sprouts are like those of the hia-ku ts'ao Jt $T ^ (Brunella vulgaris). The root resembles a bird's bill; and the cross-section, the eyes of the mainah. The best is gathered in the first decade of the eighth month." Su Sun of the Sung period remarks that the plant  now occurs in Nan-hai (Kwah-tun), as well as in Ts'in-lun §HPti (Sen-si and Kan-su). This seems to be all the information on record.1 It is not known to me that Barkhausia grows in Persia; at least, Schlimmer, in his extensive dictionary of Persian plants, does not note it. 

$ou-ti M. (£ is mentioned by C'en Ts'an-k'i as a plant (not yet identified) with seeds of sweet and  warm flavor and not poisonous, and growing in Si-fan (Western Barbarians or Tibet) and in northern China At zh, resembling hwai Man ^ ^r {Pimpinella anisum). The Hu make the seeds into a soup and eat them.2 In this case the term Hu may be equated with Si-fan, but among the Chinese naturalists the latter term is somewhat loosely used, and does not necessarily designate Tibet. 3 

Hiun-k'iun *§f || (Conioselinum univittatum) is an umbelliferous plant, which is a native of China. As early as the third century a.d. it is stated in the Wu H pen ts'ao 4 that some varieties of this plant grow among the Hu; and Li Si-cen annotates that the varieties from the Hu and Zun are excellent, and are hence styled hu k'iuh tft |f. 5 It is stated that this genus is found in mountain districts in Central Europe, Siberia, and north-western America.6 N 

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1 What Stuart (Chinese Materia Medica, p. 65) says regarding this plant is very inexact. He arbitrarily identifies the term Hu with the Kukunor, and wrongly ascribes Su Kuh's statement to T'ao Huh-kih. Such an assertion as, "the drug is now said to be produced in Nan-hai, and also in Sen-si and Kan-su," is misleading, as this "now" comes from an author of the Sung period, and does not necessarily hold good for the present time. 

2 Pen ts'ao kan mu, Ch. 26, p. 22 b. 

3 Cf. below, p. 344. 

4 Cf. Beginnings of Porcelain, p. 115. 

5 He also imparts a Sanskrit name from the Suvarnaprabhasa-sutra in the form f§ Jt£ 7& Se-mo-k'ie, *ja-mak-gia. The genus is not contained in Watt's Dictionary. 

6 Treasury of Botany, Vol. I, p. 322. 


[201] 

In hu tsiao ("pepper") the attribute hu distinctly refers to India.1 Another example in which hu alludes to India is presented by the term hu kan kian U\ $L ^ ("dried ginger of the Hu"), which is a synonyme of T'ien-tu % *5 kan kian ("dried ginger of India"), "produced in the country of the Brahmans."2 

In the term hufen tfi $r (a cosmetic or facial powder of white lead), the element hu bears no relation to the Hu, although it is mentioned as a product of Kuca3 and subsequently as one of the city of Ili (Yi-lipa- li). 4 In fact, there is no Chinese tradition to the effect that this substance ever came from the Hu.6 F. P. Smith8 observed with reference to this subject, "The word hu does not denote that the substance was formerly obtained from some foreign source, but is the result of a mistaken character." This evidently refers to the definition of the dictionary $i min W & by Liu Hi of the Han, who explains this hu by t$ hu ("gruel, congee"), which is mixed with grease to be rubbed into the face. The process of making this powder from lead is a thoroughly Chinese affair. 

In the term hu yen ffl IS ("salt of the Hu") the word Hu refers to barbarous, chiefly Tibetan, tribes bordering on China in the west; for there are also the synonymes Hun -& yen and kxian 3& yen, the former already occurring in the Pie lu. Su Kun of the seventh century equalizes the terms Hun yen and hu yen, and gives t'u-ten 35 $£ yen as the word used in Sa-cbu& /H.  Ta Mih ^C *5§, who wrote in a.d. 970, says that this is the salt consumed by the Tibetans (Si-fan), and hence receives the designation Hun or k'ian yen. Other texts, however, seem to make a distinction between hu yen and Hun yen: thus it is said in the biography of Li Hiao-po ^ # f9 in the Wei Su, "The salt of the Hu cures pain of the eye, the salt of the 2un heals ulcers." 

The preceding examples are sufficient to illustrate the fact that the element hu in botanical terms demands caution, and that each case must be judged on its own merits. No hard and fast rule, as deduced by Bretschneider, can be laid down: the mere addition of hu proves neither that a plant is foreign, nor that it is West-Asiatic or Iranian. There are native plants equipped with this attribute, and there are foreign plants thus characterized, which hail from Korea, India, or 

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<references/>


1 See below, p. 374. 

2 Cen lei pen ts'ao, Ch. 6, p. 67 b. 

* Cou $u, Ch. 50, p. 5; Sui Su, Ch. 83, p. 5 b. 

* Ta Min i t'un li, Ch. 89, p. 22; Kwan yii ki, Ch. 24, p. 6 b. 

' Pen ts'ao kan mu, Ch. 8, p. 6; Geerts (Produits, pp. 596-601), whose translation "poudre des pays barbares" is out of place. 

* Contributions towards the Materia Medica of China, p. 231. 


[202] 

some vaguely defined region of Central Asia. The fact, however, remains that there are a number of introduced, cultivated Hu plants coming from Iranian lands, but in each and every case it has been my endeavor to furnish proof for the fact that these actually represent Iranian cultivations. With the sole exception of the walnut, the history of which may tolerably well be traced, the records of these Hu plants are rather vague, and for none of them is there any specific account of the introduction. It is for botanical rather than historical reasons that the fact of the introduction becomes evident. It is this hazy character of the traditions which renders it impossible to connect these plants in any  way with Can K'ien. Moreover, it cannot be proved with certainty that any names of plants or products formed with the element hu existed under the Han. The sole exception would be hu ts'ai, 1 but its occurrence in the T'un su wen of the Han is not certain either; and this hu, according to Chinese tradition, refers to Mongolia, not to Iran. Another merely seeming exception is presented by hu t'un-lei* but this is a wild, not a cultivated tree; and hu, in this case, has a geographical rather than an ethnographical significance. In the wooden documents discovered in Turkistan we have one good, datable instance of a Hu product; and this is hu Vie ("iron of the Hu" and implements made of such iron). These tablets belong to the Tsin period (a.d. 265-419),* while in no wooden document of the Han has any compound with Hu as yet been traced. Again, all available evidence goes to show that these Hu plants were not introduced earlier than the Tsin dynasty, or, generally speaking, during what is known as the Leu c'ao or six minor dynasties, covering the time from the downfall of the  Han to the rise of the T'ang dynasty. It is noteworthy that of none of these plants is an Iranian name on record. 

The element hu, in a few cases, serves also the purpose of a transcription: thus probably in the name of the coriander, hu-swi,* and quite evidently in the name of the fenugreek, hu-lu-pa} 

Imported fruits and products have been named by  many nations for the countries from which they hailed or from the people by whom they were first brought. The Greeks had their "Persian apple" (jxrj\op Ucpaindv, "peach"), their "Medic apple" (wXov Mt;5ik6v, "citron"), their "Medic grass" (MtjSiKi) 71-60, "alfalfa"), and their "Armenian 

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<references/>


1 Below, p. 381. I 

s Below, p. 339. 

* Chavannes, Documents chinois ddcouverts par Aurel Stein, pp. 168, 169. 

4 Below, p. 298. 

1 Below, p. 446. It thus occurs also in geographical names, as in Hu-2'a-la (Guzerat); see Hirth and Rockhill, Chao Ju-kua, p. 92. 


[203] 

apple" (hjj\ov 'Apfxeviandv, "apricot"). Rabelais (1483-1553) 1 has already made the following just observation on this point, " Les autres [plantes] ont retenu le nom des regions des quelles furent ailleurs transporters, comme pommes medices, ce sont pommes de Medie, en laquelle furent premierement trouv^es;  pommes puniques, ce sont grenades, apportees de Punicie, c'est Carthage. Ligusticum, c'est livesche, apport£e de Ligurie, c'est la couste de Genes: rhabarbe, du fleuve Barbare nomine" Rha,  comme atteste Ammianus: santonique, fenu grec; castanes, persiques, sabine; stoechas, de mes isles Hieres, antiquement dites Stoechades; spica celtica et autres." The Tibetans, as I have shown, 2 form  many names of plants and products with Bal (Nepal), Mon (Himalayan Region), rGya (China), and Li (Khotan). 

In the same manner we have numerous botanical terms preceded by "American, Indian, Turkish, Turkey, Guinea," etc. 

Aside from the general term Hu, the Chinese characterize Iranian plants also by the attribute Po-se (Parsa, Persia): thus Po-se tsao ("Persian jujube") serves for the designation of the date. The term Po-se requires great caution, as it denotes two different countries, Persia and a certain Malayan region. This duplicity of the name caused grave confusion among both Chinese and European scholars, so that I was compelled to devote to this problem a special chapter in which all available sources relative to the Malayan Po-se and its products are discussed. Another tribal  name that quite frequently occurs in connection with Iranian plant-names is Si-2un f§ & ("the Western £un"). These tribes appear as early as the epoch of the Si kin and $u kin, and seem to be people of Hiun-nu descent. In post-Christian times Si-zun developed into a generic term without ethnic significance, and vaguely hints at Central-Asiatic regions. Combined with botanical names, it appears to be synonymous with Hu.3 It is a matter of course that all these geographical and tribal allusions in plant-names have merely a relative, not an absolute value; that is, if the Chinese, for instance, designate a plant as Persian (Po-se) or Hu, this signifies that from their viewpoint the plant under notice hailed from Iran, or in some way was associated with the activity of Iranian nations, but it does not mean that the plant itself or its cultivation is peculiar or due to Iranians. This may be the case or not, yet this point remains to be determined by a special investigation in each particular instance. While the Chinese, as will be seen, are better informed on the history

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1 Le Gargantua et le Pantagruel, Livre III, chap. L.

* "Poung Poo, 1916, pp. 409, 448, 456. ,

* For examples of its occurrence consult Index. 


[294] 

of important plants than any other people of Asia (and I should even venture to add, of Europe), the exact and critical history of a plantcultivation can be written only by heeding all data and consulting all sources that can be gathered from every quarter. The evidence accruing from the Semites, from Egypt, Greece, and Rome, from the Arabs, India, Camboja, Annam, Malayans, Japan, etc., must be equally requisitioned. Only by such co-ordination may an authentic result be hoped for. 

The reader desirous of information on the scientific literature of the Chinese utilized in this publication may be referred to Bretschneider's "Botanicon Sinicum" (part I). 1 It is regrettable that no Pen ts'ao (Herbal) of the T'ang period has as yet come to light, and that for these works we have to depend on the extracts given in later books. The loss of the Hu pen ts'ao ("Materia Medica of the  Hu") and the C'u hu kwo fan ("Prescriptions from the Hu Countries") is especially deplorable. I have directly consulted the Cen lei pen ts'ao, written by T'ah Sen-wei in 1108 (editions printed in 1521 and 1587), the Pen ts'ao yen i by K'ou Tsun-si of 11 16 in the edition of  Lu Sinyuan, and the well-known and inexhaustible Pen ts'ao kan mu by Li Si-cen, completed in 1578. With all its errors and inexact quotations, this remains a monumental work of great erudition and  much solid information. Of Japanese Pen ts'ao (Honzo) I have used the Yamato honzo, written by Kaibara Ekken in 1709, and the Honzo komoku keimo by Ono Ranzan. Wherever possible, I have resorted to the original source-books. Of botanical works, the Kwah k'iinfan p'u, the Hwa p'u, the Ci  wu min Si t'u k'ao, and several Japanese works, have been utilized. The  Yu yah tsa tsu has yielded a good  many contributions to the plants of Po-se and Fu-lin; several Fu-lin botanical names hitherto unexplained I have been able to identify with their Aramaic equivalents. Although these do not fall within the subject of Sino-Iranica, but Sino-Semitica, it is justifiable to treat them in this connection, as the Fu-lin names are given side by side with the Po-se names. Needless to say, I have carefully read all accounts of Persia and the Iranian nations of Central Asia contained in the Chinese Annals, and the material to be found there constitutes the basis and backbone of this investigation. 2 

There is a class of literature which has not yet been enlisted for the 

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1  We are in need, however, of a far more complete and critical history of the scientific literature of the Chinese. 

2 The non-sinological reader may consult to advantage E. H. Parker, Chinese Knowledge of Early Persia (Imp. and Asiatic Quarterly Review, Vol. XV, 1903, pp. 144-169) for the general, contents of the documents relating to Persia. Most names of plants and other products have been omitted in Parker's article. 


[205] 

study of cultivated plants, and this is the early literature on medicine. Prominent are the books of the physician  Can Cun-kin 5H ity Hk or  Can Ki 35 JS, who is supposed to have lived under the Later  Han at the end of the second century a.d. A goodly number of cultivated plants is mentioned in his book Kin kwei yii han yao lio fan lun 4£ fSf 3E #3 3c H ~J5 Ift or abbreviated Kin kwei yao lio.1 This is a very interesting hand-book of dietetics giving detailed rules as to the avoidance of certain foods at certain times or in certain combinations, poisonous effects of articles of diet, and prescriptions to counteract this poison. Neither this nor any other medical writer gives descriptions of plants or notes regarding their introduction; they are simply enumerated in the text of the prescriptions. But it is readily seen that, if such a work can be exactly dated, it has a chronological value in determining whether a given plant was known at that period. Thus  Can Eli mentions, of plants that interest us in this investigation, the walnut, the pomegranate, the coriander, and Allium scorodoprasum (hu swan). Unfortunately, however, we do not know that we possess his work in its original shape, and Chinese scholars admit that it has suffered from interpolations which it is no longer possible to unravel. The data of such a work must be utilized with care whenever points of chronology are emphasized. It was rather tempting to add to the original prescriptions of  Can Ki, and there is no doubt that the subsequent editions have blended primeval text with later comments. The earliest commentary is by Wan Su-ho 3: $£ ^P of the Tsin. Now, if we note that the plants in question are otherwise not mentioned under the Han, but in other books are recorded only several centuries later, we can hardly refrain from entertaining serious doubts as to  Can Ki's acquaintance with them. A critical bibliographical study of early Chinese medical literature is an earnest desideratum. 

A. de Candolle's monumental work on the "Origin of Cultivated Plants" is still the only comprehensive book on this subject that we have. It was a masterpiece for his time, and still merits being made the basis and starting-point for any investigation of this kind.  De Candolle possessed a really critical and historical spirit, which cannot be said of other botanists who tried to follow him on the path of historical research; and the history of many cultivated plants has been outlined by him perfectly well and exactly. Of  many others, our conceptions are now somewhat different. Above all, it must be said that 

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<references/>

1 Reprinted in the Yu tswan i Isun kin kien of 1739 (Wylie, Notes on Chinese Literature, p. 101). A good edition of this and the other works of the same author on the basis of a Sung edition is contained in the medical Ts'ufi-su, the J t'un ten mo ts'uan Su, published by the Ce-kian Su ku. 


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since his days Oriental studies have made such rapid strides, that his notes with regard to India, China, and Japan, are thoroughly out of date. As to China, he possessed no other information than the superficial remarks of Bretschneider in his "Study and Value of Chinese Botanical Works," 1 which teem with misunderstandings and errors. 2  De Candolle's conclusions as to things Chinese are no longer acceptable. The same holds good for India and probably also for Egypt and western Asia. In point of method, de Candolle has set a dangerous precedent to botanists in whose writings this effect is still visible, and this is his over-valuation of purely linguistic data. The existence of a native name for a plant is apt to prove little or nothing for the history of the plant, which must be based on documentary and botanical evidence. Names, as is well known, in  many cases are misleading or deceptive; they constitute a welcome accessory in the chain of evidence, but they cannot be relied upon exclusively. It is a different case, of course, if the Chinese offer us plant-names which can be proved to be of Iranian origin. If on several occasions I feel obliged to uphold V. Hehn against his botanical critic A. Engler, such pleas must not be construed to mean that I am an unconditional admirer of Hehn; on the contrary, I am wide awake to his weak points and the shortcomings of his method, but wherever in my estimation he is right, it is my duty to say that he is right. A book to which I owe  much information is Charles Joret's "Les Plantes dans l'antiquite' et au moyen age" (2 vols., Paris, 1897, 1904), which contains a sober and clear account of the plants of ancient Iran.3 

A work to which I am greatly indebted is " Terminologie medicopharmaceutique et anthropologique francaise-persane, " by J. L. Schlimmer, lithographed at Teheran, 1874. 4 This comprehensive work of over 600 pages folio embodies the lifelong labors of an instructor at the Polytechnic College of Persia, and treats in alphabetical order of animal and vegetable products, drugs, minerals, mineral waters, native 

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<references/>

1 Published in the Chinese Recorder for 1870 and 1871. 

1 They represent the fruit of a first hasty and superficial reading of the Pen ts'ao kan mu without the application of any criticism. In Chinese literature we can reach a conclusion only by consulting and sifting all documents bearing on a problem. Bretschneider's Botanicon Sinicum, much quoted by sinologues and looked upon as a sort of gospel by those who are unable to control his data, has now a merely relative value, and is uncritical and unsatisfactory both from a botanical and a sinological viewpoint; it is simply a translation of the botanical section of the Pen ts'ao kan mu without criticism and with many errors, the most interesting plants being omitted. 

1 Joret died in Paris on December 26, 1914, at the age of eighty-five years (cf. obituary notice by H. Cordier, La Geographie, 19 14, p. 239). 

* Quoted "Schlimmer, Terminologie." I wish to express my obligation to the Surgeon General's Library in Washington for the loan of this now very rare book. 


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therapeutics and diseases, with a wealth of solid information that has hardly ever been utilized by our science. It is hoped that these researches will chiefly appeal to botanists and to students of  human civilization; but, as it can hardly be expected that the individual botanist will be equally interested in the history of every plant here presented, each subject is treated as a unit and as an independent essay, so that any one, according to his inclination and choice, may approach any chapter he desires. Repetitions have therefore not been shunned, and cross-references are liberally interspersed; it should be borne in mind, however, that my object is not to outline merely the history of this or that plant, but what I wish to present is a synthetic and comprehensive picture of a great and unique plant-migration in the sense of a cultural movement, and simultaneously an attempt to determine the Iranian stratum in the structure of Chinese civilization. It is not easy to combine botanical, oriental, philological, and historical knowledge, but no pains have been spared to render justice to both the botanical and the historical side of each problem. All data have been sifted critically, whether they come from Chinese, Japanese, Indian, Persian, Arabic, or classical sources, and in no instance have I depended on a second-hand or dogmatic statement. The various criticisms of A. de Candolle, A. Engler, E. Bretschneider, and other eminent authorities, arise from the critical attitude toward the subject, and merely aim at the furtherance of the cause. 

I wish to express my thanks to Dr. Tanaka TyOzaburO in the Bureau of Plant Industry of the Department of Agriculture, Washington, for having kindly prepared a translation of the notices on the grape-vine and the walnut from Japanese sources, which are appended to the chapters on the history of these plants. The manuscript of this publication was completed in April, 191 8. 

The generosity of Mrs. T. B. Blackstone and Mr. Charles R. Crane in contributing a fund toward the printing of this volume is gratefully acknowledged. 


[[Category:Laufer, Sino-Iranica]]