National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books

Sec. i]   FROM THE WESTERN END OF THE WALL TO T. vu'   659

The fact already mentioned that the débris of the falling tower had crushed at least a portion Remains of of the quarters, together with the roofing of reed bundles laid over Toghrak beams, explains why roofing. more fittings and implements, left behind after the abandonment of the post, were found at this ruin than at other stations where the deserted quarters had probably lain exposed for many centuries. No place, however, within the quarters had been turned into a dust-bin before they were abandoned, and hence the number of inscribed pieces found here was not great, only about a dozen in all. But several of them are of special interest on account of their local associations or for some other reason. A definite date is furnished by the ` slip ' fragment T. vIII. ii. 2, Doc., No. 585 Document (Plate xvI), which mentions the year corresponding to A. D. 8, and thus agrees with the chronologicalfound a8

evidence contained in T. vimi. g, No. 586, which refers to Tun-huang by the name Tun-tê   . T. Vin.

This was the designation borne by the district at the time of the usurper Wang Mang, A. D. 9-23. The fact that both these dated records were found within the rooms of the post, and are not likely to have been left there a very long time before its abandonment, deserves to be noted. We shall see that none of the documents discovered at stations to the west of the ancient ` Jade Gate ', marked by the remains at T. xiv, nor those at T. xtv itself are of a later date than the reign of Wang Mang .4 This points to the conclusion that the westernmost section of the Limes may have been abandoned not long after that period.

Two records relating to objects which undoubtedly belonged to this watch-station are curious Inscribed

in themselves, and also claim importance because they give us the name of the detachment entrusted lid of medi-

cine case.

with the guarding of it. The inscribed lid T. vIII. 5, Doc., No. 588 (Plate XVII), was a particularly

interesting discovery, the value of which I at once recognized. The obverse of this piece of wood

measuring about 62 by 32 inches, with its rectangular socket for a clay seal and its string

grooves, exactly reproduced the shape and arrangement so familiar to me from the envelopes

of the rectangular Kharosthi tablets of the Niya and Lou-lan Sites. A small rim sunk on the

under surface proved that this particular ` envelope ' had served to cover not a tablet but a box,

and there was the Chinese inscription, written in fine big characters above the socket for the

seal, to show that the receptacle, of which only this lid remained, had been ` the medicine case

belonging to the l-Isien-ming company'.

Here we clearly have the true prototype of the wooden envelopes from Niya and Lou-lan, Chinese

some three centuries older than they are and used where everything else in the way of writing se gin of

materials was purely and unmistakably Chinese. It confirms, in the strongest possible way, the wooden

conjectural opinion which I formed on the strength of my first Niya finds and recorded in Ancient envelopes.

Khotan,5 that the device of those wooden envelopes, with other equally clever arrangements in the

form and fastening of the Kharosthi letters and documents, was originally derived from Chinese

models. But, apart from this important evidence concerning the ancient stationery in wood, the lid

T. vIII. 5 (found, I may add here, in the débris covering the stairs in room i) is of antiquarian

interest as proving that regular medicine cases were already included in the military equipment of

troops in Han times.

Less curious, perhaps, but equally valuable archaeological information is furnished by the Ammuni-

wooden label T. vIII. 6, Doc., No. 587 (Plate xvli), which on the obverse is inscribed : ` The Hsien-

ming   Ammuni-

tion

ming

company of Yüi-men,' and on the reverse : ` Hundred bronze heads for arrows of the Mêng type.' company. There can be no doubt that the label was meant to be attached to a bag or small box holding this quantity of ancient ammunition provided for the company named, and the presumption is that the guard for the post T. wit was at the time furnished by the company. The fact that the H sien-

See below, pp. 688, 694.   for similar confirmatory evidence supplied by inscribed wooden

Cf. Ancient Kholan, i. pp. 361 sq. ; also above, p. 382,   lids of the L.A. Site, Lou-lan.

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