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Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books

HSÜAN-CHAO AND WU-KUNG.

63

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The expression nil fut balancé sous les ponts de corde» shows that he travelled in the region of the Indus river. He also came to Lo-ch`a (for Wu-ch`a, Udyāna?) I

Puis il passa par l'état de Sin-tou (Sindhou, le fleuve Sindh) et arriva alors dans celui de Louo-tch`a. Il fut traité avec honneur et respect par le roi; il séjourna là quatre ans.

CHAVANNES here confines the Tsung-ling to the Belur-tag h. But Belur-tagh itself is a very uncertain term, which, however, by the great French scholar is regarded as separating the Chinese Turkistan from the Russian. Chavannes, therefore, seems to place the term Belur-tagh on the mountains of the Eastern Pamir, and consequently confines the term Tsung-ling in a rather small area.

3. WU-KUNG'S ROUTE OUT FROM CHINA.

WU-K`UNG 4.4   is the last Chinese pilgrim of the Tang period whose acquaintance

we make. Under his earlier name FA-CHIER í (sanscr. Dharmadhātu) he came to India across the Tsung-ling in 751 A. D., and returned to China after no less than some 4o years. If his meager, sometimes even rather dry statements cannot be compared with the narratives of such pilgrims as FA-RIEN and HSi AN-CHUANG, they still constitute a welcome addition, as will appear from the following quotations.

On his way out Wu-k`ung accompanied an imperial embassy to Gandhāra. After having taken the road by Hucha and Kasha ar in Eastern Turkistan, the travellers began to ascend the Ts`ung-ling. Of this and the farther route is said in the translation of LÉVI and CHAVANNES 2:

II passa les monts des Oignons, parvint aux passes de Yang yu, atteignit le royaume des cinq Tcli`e-ni (on dit aussi Che-ni) de la vallée Pouo-mi, puis le royaume de Hou-mi, puis le royaume de Kiu-wei, puis le royaume de Ho-tan, puis le royaume de Lan-so, puis le royaume de Nie-1103, puis le royaume d'Ou-tchang-na (on dit aussi Ou-tcli ang et Ou-tch`an), le royaume de Mang-ngo-po et la ville de Kao-teou, puis le royaume de Mo-tan, puis la ville de Sin-tou (elle est près du fleuve Sin-tou, on l'appelle aussi Sin-t`eou, ou parfois ville de Sin-t`eou). Le 21e jour du deuxième mois de la douzième année, marquée des signes koei-se (753), il arriva au royaume de Kien-t o-lo (la prononciation sanscrite est correctement Gandhāra); c'est là qu'est la capitale orientale du Iii pin.

At the side of some well-known names so many unknown ones make their appearance in this passage, that the route hardly may be regarded as coinciding with any of the ordinary roads described above. Still it is not easy task to fix its situation with any degree of certainty. Even the Yang-yii Pass, which Wu-kung obviously reached from the valley of Gez, cannot be identified. At any rate the pilgrim was then in Shighnūn and Great Pamir, and therefore no doubt on the Sir-i-köl. The following known names, Ru-mi and Chii-wez; point to the road through Wakhūn, and thence across the Barog hil Pass south-west to Mastuj. Then follow some stations that cannot be identified, as Ho-lan, Lan-so4 and Nieh-ho, but which must be situated farther south, as the next kingdom,

I See Vol. I, p. 87, note.

2 L'Itinéraire d'Ou-k`ong (751-790), traduit et annoté par M. M. SYL.VAIN Li:vi et Eil. CHAVANNES. Journ. asiat., IX. Sériee, Toni VI, Paris 1895, pp. 341-384.

3 Um and CHAVANNES make a mistake, writing Ye-ho. A. H.

4 Livi und CHAVANNES ändern Lan-so in Lan-po, weil es das durch Hsüan-chuang (Ausg. Julien, Vol. II, S. 95) bekannte Lamp-aka sei. Dies liegt aber viel zu weit südwestlich am Kabul-Fluß und kann daher für Wu-k` ungs Lan-so wohl kaum in Betracht kommen. A. H.