IIIF Color HighRes
National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
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| IIIF Color HighRes |
| Sino-Iranica : vol.1 |
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Citation Information
284 SING-IRANICA
dâna ("grain, berry, stone of a fruit, seed of grain or fruit"), dângû ("kind of grain"), gina danu (" pomegranate ") ;1 Sanskrit dhanika, dhanyâka, or dhaniyaka (" coriander"; properly "grains"). The notion conveyed by this series is the same as that underlying Latin granatum, from granum (" grain"); cf. Anglo-Saxon cornceppel and English pomegranate (" apple made up of grains").
(3) : nan . i liu or .i liu. This transcription is generally
taken in the sense "the plant liu of the countries Nan and Si, or of the country Nan-gi." This view is expressed in the Po wu ci, which, as stated, also refers to the Can-K`ien legend, and to the term t`u-lin, and continues that this was the seed of the liu of the countries Nan and Si; hence, on the return of Can Kien to China, the name nan-§i-liu was adopted.' Bretschneider intimates that Nan and Si were little realms dependent on K`ain at the time of the Han. Under the Tang, the name Nan referred to Bukhara, and Si to Taskend; but it is hardly credible that these two geographical names (one does not see for what reason) should have been combined into one, in order to designate the place of provenience of the pomegranate. It is preferable to assume
that f nan ,i, *an-sek, an-sak, ar-sak, represents a single name
and answers to Arsak, the name of the Parthian dynasty, being on a
par with ,. nan-si, *Ar-sik, and nan-si, *Ar-sai. In fact,
is the best possible of these transcriptions. We should expect, of course, to receive from the Chinese a specific and interesting story as to how and when this curious name, which is unique in their botanical nomenclature, was transmitted;3 but nothing of the kind appears to be on record, or the record, if it existed, seems to have been lost. It is manifest that also the plant-name liu (*riu, r'u) presents the transcription of an Iranian word, and that the name in its entirety was adopted by the Chinese from an Iranian community outside of Parthia, which had received the tree or shrub from a Parthian region, and therefore styled it "Parthian pomegranate." It is not likely that the tree was transplanted to China directly from Parthia; we have to assume rather that the transplantation was a gradual process, in which the
1 W. LEITNER, Races and Languages of Dardistan, p. 17.
2 It is not correct, as asserted by BRETSCHNEIDER (Chinese Recorder, 1871, p. 222), to say that this definition emanates from Li Si-ben, who, in fact, quotes only the Po wu ci, and presents no definition of his own except that the word liu
means liu ("goitre"); this, of course, is not to be taken seriously. In Jehol, a
variety of pomegranate is styled hai liu (O. FRANKE, Beschreibung des Jehol-
Gebietes, p. 75); this means literally, "liu from the sea," and signifies as much as "foreign liu."
3 Cf. nan-si hian 1 ("Parthian incense") as designation for styrax
benzoin (p. 464).
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