National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books

speaks of « açur » as a mineral, the word really means lapis-lazuli only once; the second time, the product is malachite, a carbonate of copper. It was extracted abundantly in northern Shan-hsi, and may be either green malachite, or blue malachite (azurite) which, as KING said, would become green through moisture (cf. also Ch, II, 53). The « rocks of azure » of «Mont Vers must have been malachite.

« Mont Vers » has been clearly identified; it is not the Ching-shan or Mei-shan, but what is known now as the Pai-t'a, « White Pagoda », on account of the stiipa erected on it in the 17th cent. (cf. BRETSCHNEIDER, Recherches archéol. 42, 107; Y, I, 370-371). BRETSCHNEIDER speaks of it at length, and professes to translate its description (pp. 58-61) from the Cho-kêng lu of T'ao Tsung-i, published in 1366; unfortunately, he has amalgamated, without distinction, the two texts given in two different chapters (ch. 1 and 21) of his source, which moreover he has sometimes misunderstood or misreproduced. For instance, he says that the text places the hill south of the lake T'ai-i, when T'ao Tsung-i says correctly that it is north of the lake (yang is south of a mountain, but north of a river or a lake). This artificial hill was called 1 It A Ch'iung-hua-tao, « Hortensia Island », under the Chin. According to T'ao Tsung-i, Qubilai prescribed in 1262 to have it put

in order, and according to BRETSCHNEIDER'S translation, the name was changed to   j    [1] Wan-sui-
shan in 1271. But in YS, 5, 5 b, it is said that in the 4th year chung-t'ung, 3rd month, on the day kêng-tzü (April 29, 1263), Ihtiyâru-'d-Din asked that the Ch'iung-hua-tao be put in order, and the request was refused; nevertheless, we find in the 1st year chih-yüan, 2nd month, on the day jên-tzü (March 6, 1264), a mention of work that was then being carried out at the Ch'iung-hua-tao. The Cho-kêng lu, in ch. 21, 8 b, says that, in 1271, Qubilai changed the name to Wan-shou while, in ch. 1, 19 b, the same work says it was changed to Wan-sui-shan, this time without indication of the year. But the only mention I find of the place under 1271 still calls it by the ancient name : in the 8th year chip yüan (1271), the 5th month, on the day chi-ssü (June 15, 1271), a Buddhist service was held at Ch'iung-hua-tao ( YS, 7, 4 b). Despite BRETSCHNEIDER'S Recherches archéologiques, the history of « Mont Vers » is in need of further investigation.

248. GUASMUL

gasmul FA   griarsemaoli VA   guasmullus Z

gasmuli VL   guasmul F   sasmul FB

gasmulli, gassmulli VB

Half-breed of Latin and Greek parents; see « Argon 2 ».