Notes on Marco Polo : vol.1 / Page 213 (Color Image)

0213	Notes on Marco Polo : vol.1

adopt a transcription 沙勒 Sha-lo (*Ṣa-lək; cf. STEIN, Ancient Khotan, I, 48). Various attempts
have been made in China and in Europe to account for this name.

The oldest one is due to Hsüan-tsang, who, in a note of his Memoirs of 646, states that
Shu-lo is an inaccurate rendering of the name of the capital, and that the correct form of
the latter name is 室利訖栗多底 Shih-li-ki-li-to-ti (*Śiět-lji-kịět-liět-tâ-tiei). JULIEN (Mémoires,
II, 219) restored this as *Śrīkritati; if we abide by Hsüan-tsang's rules of transcription,
the original ought to be *Śrīkṛtātī. Of course, Hsüan-tsang was himself mistaken when
he tried to explain Shu-lo by the beginning of his *Śrīkṛtātī. The latter name, to judge
from Hsüan-tsang's words, must be a sanskritized name of the capital, being some epithet
beginning with śrī-, «fortunate», though the second part remains unexplained. FRANKE's
«Śrīkiritadhi» (SPAW, 1903, 738; STEIN, Ancient Khotan, 50) is not acceptable. The variants
mentioned by LÉVI (BEFEO, v, 261), and which have been taken into account by MARQUART,
Wehrôt und der Fluss Arang, 68, are valueless : the second 利 li is a wrong duplication of the
first one, and 乾 ch'ien is a wrong duplication of 訖 chi.

Another explanation was proposed at the beginning of the 8th cent. by 慧苑 Hui-yüan, a
priest of Hsi-an-fu, in his commentary on the Avataṃsaka (Lo Chên-yü is mistaken when, in his
丙寅稿 Ping-yin kao, 2 b, he identifies this Hui-yüan with a Tun-huang priest Hui-yüan for
whom a document was written by Tu Mu c. 845; neither the date nor the place will fit). Finding
the name Shu-lo in the new translation of the Avataṃsaka made in 695-699, Hui-yüan commented
on it as follows (Tōkyō Tripiṭ. of Meiji, 菀, x, 121 a, 140 b) : «The correct name is 佉路數怛勒
Ch'ieh-lu-shu-ta-lo (*K'ja-luo-sịu-tât-lək). This country (— China) has from old preserved it in
the abbreviated form Shu-lo (*Śị*o-lək), in which, moreover, the sound 數 shu (*ṣịu) was altered
to 訖 shu (*ṣị*o). This name, however, is the name of a mountain in that country, and the
designation was made on account [of the mountain]. Moreover, the name is sometimes translated
'Kingdom of Wicked Nature'; it is because the nature of the people of that country is mostly
savage and cruel.» The changes made to Hui-yüan's text in later compilations are few and
unimportant.

S. LÉVI discovered this passage in 1902, and drew from it conclusions which were sharply
opposed by O. FRANKE and PISCHEL (cf. BEFEO, II, 246-255; III, 339-341; IV, 543-579; SPAW,
1903, 184-196; 735-745; 1905, 238-248; J. HALÉVY, Le berceau de l'écriture kharoṣṭrī, in Rev.
sémitique, 1903, reprint of 15 pp.). Two different problems were concerned : the restoration of
the «correct» name proposed by Hui-yüan, and its application.

LÉVI had restored Ch'ieh-lu-shu-ta-lo to Kharoṣṭra. FRANCKE and PISCHEL suggested
*Kaluṣāntara, or *Kaluṣadhara, or *Kaluṣottara, all entirely unlikely forms, which ought not to
have been accepted, as they were more or less, in STEIN, Ancient Khotan, I, 49. LÉVI's Kharoṣṭra
is the regular original suggested by the Chinese transcription, except in two points : 怛 ta (*tât)
generally renders a form in -t-, not in -ṭ-; 勒 lo (*lək) is abnormal for -ra. LÉVI's explanation of
the final character as rendering a locative Kharoṣṭre of the Sanskrit original is unfounded. My
own view is that we have here to deal with an iranized form like *Kharoṣṭrag. We can now
appreciate better than thirty-five years ago the important part played by the Iranians in the
diffusion of Hindu doctrines in China. The texts of the Avataṃsaka show a strong influence of

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