IIIF Color HighRes
National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
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| Sino-Iranica : vol.1 |
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Citation Information
' 1dE. . • ~' ' ' ~ - _ .<
330 SING-IRANICA
that at this early date we know nothing about an Arabic or Persian language; and this rapprochement is wrong, even in view of the Chinese work itself, which distinctly says that both ye-si-min and mo-li were introduced from Ta Ts'in, the Hellenistic Orient. PELLIOT 1 observes that the authenticity of the Chinese book has never been called into doubt, but expresses surprise at the fact that jasmine figures there under its Arabic name. But Arabic is surely excluded from the languages of Ta Ts'in. Moreover, thanks to the researches of L. AUROUSSEAU,2 we now know that the Nan fan ts`ao mu Ewan is impaired by interpolations. The passage in question may therefore be a later addition, and, at all events, cannot be enlisted to prove that prior to the year 300 there were people from western Asia in Canton.' Still less is it credible
that, as asserted in the Chinese work, the Nan yüe hin ki J ui pe
ascribed to Lu Kia N, who lived in the third and second centuries B.C., should have alluded to the two species of Jasminum.4 In fact, this author is made to say only that in the territory of Nan Yûe the five cereals have no taste and the flowers have no odor, and merely that these flowers are particularly fragrant. Their names are not given, and it is Ki Han who refers them to ye-si-min and mo-li. It is out of the question that at the time of Lu Kia these two foreign plants should have been introduced over the maritime route into southern China; Lu Kia, if he has written this passage, may have as well had two other flowers in mind.
The fact must not be overlooked, either, that the alleged introduction from Ta Ts`in is not contained in the historical texts relative to that country, nor is it confirmed by any other coeval or subsequent source.
The Pei hu lu b mentions the flower under the names ye-si-mi iff S t
and white mo-li II • 11 It as having been transplanted to China by Persians, like the p `i- i-§a or gold-coin flower.' The Yu yan tsa tsu has furnished a brief description of the plant,' stating that its habitat is in Fu-lin and in Po-se (Persia). The Pen tstao kan mu, Kwan k`ün fan p`u,8 and Hwa king state that the habitat of jasmine (mo-li) was
1 Bull. de l'Ecole française, Vol. II, p. 146.
2 See above, p. 263.
E HIRTH, Chau Ju-kua, p. 6, note I.
4 This point is discussed neither by Bretschneider nor by Hirth, who do not
at all mention this reference.
b Ch. 3, p. 16 (see above, p. 268).
6 See below, p. 335.
? Translated by HIRTH, Journal Am. Or. Soc., Vol. XXX, 191o, p. 22.
8 Ch. 22, p. 8 b.
9 Ch. 4, p. 9.
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