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0015 Sino-Iranica : vol.1
Sino-Iranica : vol.1 / Page 15 (Grayscale High Resolution Image)

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doi: 10.20676/00000248
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INTRODIICTION   189

games, and musical instruments.' 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 zoögeography 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 : (r) 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 plant-economy 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 Tang 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.