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Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books

326   SINO-IRANICA

V V-, in his Yü sie i can u   ff S, says,1 `These are hull-
lan (Carthamus) :2 did you know these previously, Sir, or not? The people of the north gather these flowers, and dye materials a red-yellow by rubbing their surface with it. The fresh blossoms are made into a cosmetic.' Women, when dressing, use this pigment, it being the fashion to apply only a piece the size of a small bean. When distributed evenly, the paint is pleasing, as long as it is fresh. In my youth I observed this cosmetic again and again; and to-day I have for the first time beheld the hun-lan flower. Afterwards I shall raise its seeds for your benefit, Sir. The Hiun-nu styled a wife yen-ci FqLß,4 a word just as pleasing as yen-a 4;A x (`cosmetic'). The characters r4:' and have the same sound yen; the character & has the sound Ix ci. I expect you knew this before, Sir, or you may read it up in the Han Annals.' Ceti K`ien CIS s says that a cosmetic may be prepared from pomegranate flowers." 6

The curious word yen-ci has stirred the imagination of Chinese scholars. It is not only correlated with the Hiun-nu word yen-a, as was first proposed by Si Ts`o-c`i, but is also connected with a Yen-6i mountain. Lo Yüan, in his Er ya i, remarks that the Hiun-nu had a Yen-6i mountain, and goes on to cite a song from the Si ho kiu

,' which says, "If we lose our Kti-lien mountain 4   Ili,' we cause
our herds to diminish in number; if we lose our Yen-6i mountain, we cause our women to go without paint." 9 The Pei Lien pei tui 1~ 11, a work of the Sung period, states, "The yen-c'i 4 x of the Yen-6i

mountain    x III is the yen-ci INa of the present time. This moun-

1 This author is stated to have lived under the Tsin dynasty (A.D. 265-419) in the T`u Su tsi c`en, XX, Ch. 158, where this passage is quoted; but his book is

there entitled Yü yen wan Su ` a   t. The same passage is inserted in the

Er ya i of Lo Yüan   PA of the twelfth century, where the title is identical with

that given above.

2 In the text of the T`u Su: "At the foot of the mountain there are hun lan." s Carthamus was already employed for the same purposes in ancient Egypt.

4 This is the Hiun-nu word for a royal consort, handed down in the Han Annals (Ts`ien Han Su, Ch. 94 A, p. 5). See my Language of the Yüe-chi, p. Io.

6 Author of the lost Hu pen ts'ao (above, p. 268).

6 Then follow a valueless anecdote anent a princess of the Tang dynasty preparing a cosmetic, and the passage of the Ku kin cu given above.

7 Mentioned in the Tang literature, but seems to date from an earlier period (BRETSCHNEIDER, Bot. Sin., pt. I, p. 190).

8 A mountain-range south-west of Kan 6ou in Kan-su (. i ki, Ch. 123, p. 4). The word k`i-lien belongs to the language of the Hiun-nu and means "heaven." In my opinion, it is related to Manchu kulun, which has the same meaning. The interpretations given by WATTERS (Essays, p. 362) and SHIRATORI (Sprache der Hiung-nu, p. 8) are not correct.

9 The same text is quoted in the commentary to the Pei hu lu (Ch. 3, p. II b).