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0144 Sino-Iranica : vol.1
Sino-Iranica : vol.1 / Page 144 (Grayscale High Resolution Image)

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doi: 10.20676/00000248
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318   SING-IRANICA

The last clause means that the plant is propagated from bulbs. There is a much earlier tribute-gift of saffron on record. In A.D. 519, King Jayavarman of Fu-nan (Camboja) offered saffron with storax and other aromatics to the Chinese Court.' Accordingly we have to assume that in the sixth century saffron was traded from India to Camboja. In fact we know from the Tang Annals that India, in her trade with Camboja and the anterior Orient, exported to these countries diamonds, sandal-wood, and saffron.' The Tang Annals, further, mention saffron as a product of India, Kashmir, Uddiyäna, Ja,guda, and Baltistan.3 In A.D. 719 the king of Nan (Bukhara) presented thirty pounds of saffron to the Chinese Emperor.'

Li Si-e'en has added to his notice of yii-kin hian a Sanskrit name

YE    `a-kü-mo, *dia-gu-ma, which he reveals from the Suvar-
4aprabhâsa-sutra.5 This term is likewise given, with the translation yit-kin, in the Chinese-Sanskrit Dictionary Fan yi min yi tsi.6 This name has been discussed by me and identified with Sanskrit jdgucda through the medium of a vernacular form *jaguma, the ending -ma corresponding to that of Tibetan §a-ka-ma.'

A singular position is taken by C'en Ts`an-kg, who reports, " Yit-kin aromatic grows in the country Ta Ts'in. It flowers in the second or third month, and has the appearance of the hun-lan (safflower, Carthamus tinctorius).8 In the fourth or fifth month the flowers are gathered and make an aromatic." This, of course, cannot refer to the saffron which blooms in September or October. C'en Ts`an-kg has created confusion, and has led astray Li Si-e'en, who wrongly enumerates hunlan hwa among the synonymes of yü-kin hian.

The inhabitants of Ku-lin (Quilon)   M rubbed their bodies with

which issues a slender style, terminated by three long convoluted stigmata, of a deep yellow colour. The capsule is roundish, three-lobed, three-celled, three-valved, and contains several round seeds. It flowers in September and October."

1 According to the Lian su; cf. PELLIOT, Bull. de l'Ecole française, Vol. III, p. 270.

2 T`an su, Ch. 221 A, p. 10 b.

3 Kiu Tian su, Ch. 221 B, p. 6; 198, pp. 8 b, 9; raft su, Ch. 221 A, p. 10 b; cf. CHAVANNES (Documents sur les Tou-kiue occidentaux, pp. 128, 15o, 160, 166), whose identification with Curcuma longa is not correct.

4 CHAVANNES, ibid., p. 203.

6 The passage in which Li Si-ben cites this term demonstrates clearly that he discriminated well between Crocus and Curcuma; for he adds that "1"`a-kü-mo is the aromatic of the yü-kin flower (Crocus), but that, while it is identical in name with the yü-kin root (Curcuma) utilized at the present time, the two plants are different."

s Ch. 8, p. Io b.

7 T'oung Pao, 1916, p. 458.

8 See below, p. 324.