国立情報学研究所 - ディジタル・シルクロード・プロジェクト
『東洋文庫所蔵』貴重書デジタルアーカイブ

160   BENEDICT GOES AND ANTONIO DE ANDRADE.

days more took him along the mountains of Ciecialith (Brucker: the plateau of Chichiklik), where he had to pass six days in the snows. Thence he travelled to Tanghetâr, Teng-i-tar, which belongs to Cascàr, and where there was a great river, from which 15 days to Iaconich, perhaps Yaka-arik, as Brucker suggests. After another 5 days he was in Hiarchan, Yarkand.

From Yarkand Goës wrote a letter to his Jesuit brothers in India describing the difficulties of his road straight across the Pamir.

From Yarkand Goës visited Khotan (Cotàn or Quotan), where he was much interested in a kind of »marble», called Tuscè by the Chinese, and of which there are two different sorts, one »è flumine Cotàn», the other, of inferior quality, from a mountain at 20 days from the capital, and called Cansangui cascio, »id est mons lapideus». 2

Goës returned from Khotan to Yarkand, and left this city definitely on No-. vember 14th, 1604, passing Iolci, and further, in the course of 25 days, the following places: Hancialix, Alceghet, Hagabateth, Egriàr, Mesetelec, Thalec, Horma, Thoantac, Mingieda, Capetalcôl Zilan, Sarc Guebedal, Canbasci, Aconsersèc, Ciacor, and Acsù.

Brucker is perfectly justified in saying that it is difficult to identify these names, which have, however, a perfect local physionomy of geographical names in the jagataiturki language. He identifies Capetalcol with Chaptal-kul, Zilan with Tchilan, Sarc with Sai-arik, and Canbasci with Kumbach. The two end stations of Goës' road placed it beyond doubt that he followed the ordinary caravan road along Yarkand-darya to Aksu. Chilan is indeed a station on this road. 3 Sarc is not Sai-arik, for in Trigault 4 it stands together with the next name Guebedal, indicating one name consisting of two words. I will show below that Sarc Guebedal is probably Sarik-abdal.

I Father Iarric has saved this letter: Benedictus a Goes Hircandæ etiam commoratus, iter se difficillimum & molestissimum habuisse scribit, per desertum scilicet Pamech, in quo quinque amiserat equos idque ob intensissimum frigus; turn qudd magna hic ligni sit penuria, ex quo ignis excitatur, turn verd quôd ea fit coeli inclementia vt respirare aniinalia commodè vix possint. hinc equi & homines respirare sæpe per viam demoriuntur. quod homines malum, allio, porro, pomisque; siccatis comestis vitant; iumentis verö gingivae allio perfricantur. Hocce desertum si quando niuosum, quadraginta emetitur diebus; sin minus, paucioribus. Op. cit. III, p. 217. This description could have been written by any modern traveller as well. Even the onions are still used by all native travellers in the high parts of the Pamirs and the Kara-korum.

2 In his above-quoted work, De Christiana Expeditione, Trigault writes Tuscè, but in another work, Regni Chinensis descriptio Ex Varijs Authoribus, Lvgd. Batay. CInrnCXXXIX, p. 345, the same author writes Yusce, which makes it easier to recognise the derivation of the word, namely yü-shi, or jade. Already in 1820 Abel-Rémusat wrote a learned article: Recherches sur la substance minérale appelée par les Chinois Pierre de iu, et sur le jaspe des anciens. As to Cansangui cascio, a name to which we shall have to return later on, Brucker shows that it means Kan-sang-i-kash, or the »Mine of jade-stone».

3 Iolci, Yolchi, means guide, and may well have been the name of a village from which caravan-men were taken for the road. A village, Yolchak, is still situated just outside of Yarkand, though on the road to Khotan. Pet. Mit. 1. c. p. 5.

4 In both his above quoted works.