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THE TS`UNG-LING AND THE HANGING PASSAGE.

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Remarkable for giving the situation of the Hanging Passage and the Ts`ung-ling is also the following information of the Han Annals :

Among the dangers of the passage through the Western regions, are, near home the dragon mound (sandhills on the Lop-nor); and more remote, the Ts`ung-ling, the Fever Bank, the Head-ache Mountain (s. above) and the Hanging Passage.

Compared with that date, the Tse ung-ling is strictly localised westward from Su-lo (Kashgar). The Chinese text says that Yüen-tu, a little kingdom to the west of Su-lo, lies yet east of the Ts`ung-ling and »to the south is the uninhabited region of the Ts`unglang. Ascending the Ts`ung-ling on the west is Hsiu-hsün.» The people »move about the Ts`ung-ling, where they can find water and pasture for their flocks and herds.» 2 While according to the Chinese distances Yüen-tu must lie near Irkeshtam and Hsiu-hsün in the Alai Valley 3, the Ts` ung-ling is here the passage over the Tong-burun or Taun-murun Pass.

Both Hsi yü and Ts`ung-ling are rather vague and uncertain significations. The definition given by the Han Annals to the Hsi yü or Western countries, that they are bounded by high mountains to the north, west and south, and in the east bordering on China proper, would identify them with Eastern Turkistan. But the Hsi yii has also a political meaning, including all the countries conquered by the Chinese, and its boundaries therefore go far outside of Eastern Turkistan. At about B. C. too even Ferghana was included within the Hsi-yü. In the north the Hsiung-nu or Huns, in the southwest the Great Yüeh-chih, were in those days the most powerful neighbours of China. At i oo A. D. Pamir, or Ts`ung-ling again had become the western boundary of the empire. 4

HERRMANN adds the following data:

Auf demselben Standpunkt wie die Han-Annalen steht auch das Shui-thing, das in seinen ältesten Bestandteilen auf die nämliche Zeit zurückgeht. Während das Shui-ching oder der Wasserklassiker, über das unten weiterhin die Rede sein wird, im 3. Jahrh. n. Chr. verfaßt ist, hat um das Jahr Soo Li TAO-YÜAN einen ausführlichen Kommentar hinzugefügt, der später durch einen weiteren Kommentar ergänzt ist.5 Auch im Shui-ching werden Tse ung-ling, Südgebirge und Hmngender Übergang voneinander unterschieden. Sodann wird im Kommentar eine sonst unbekannte Schrift, das Hsi-ho-chiu-shin, d. h. alte Geschichten über den Westfluß, zitiert: »Der Ts` ung-lin4,0- ist 8000 li westlich von Tun-huang (Sha-chou) ; seine Berge sind sehr hoch. Oben bringt er Zwiebeln hervor, daher kommt der Name Ts`ung-ling (Zwiebelpässe).»

3. THE TSUNG-LING AND THE SOURCES OF THE HUANG-HO.

About the same time a double geographical error makes its appearance in the Chinese literature, an error that is reiterated again and again into rather recent times. First it is the identification of the mountains south of Kholan with the source region of the Huang-ho to which, through a misunderstanding, the name of the barbarian tribe of the Kun-lun

I 'WYLIE, 1. C. 1882, p. 114.

2 Ibidem, 1881, p. 47.

3 HERRMANN, Article Sakai in Pauly's Realencyklopädie des klassischen Altertums , 2. Aufl., 2. Reihe, Bd. I, p. 1791.

4 HERRMANN, Die alten Seidenstraßen etc., p. 54-57, also: Zur Alten Geographie Zentralasiens. Petermanns Mitteilungen 1911, I. Halbband, p. 14.

5 Shui-ching-chu-shih, Ausg. 1786, Neudruck 188o, Buch II. Der Shui-ching-Text und seine Kommentare sind dort durch besonderen Druck unterschieden. A. H.