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『東洋文庫所蔵』貴重書デジタルアーカイブ

free of such borrowings. Yet, since Hsüan-tsang is the first to speak both of the 'Eastern Kingdom
of Women' and of the 'Kingdom of Women in the Western Sea', I feel inclined to think that
the new designation originated with him.

The text of the Sui shu provides no certain clue for the location of this 'Kingdom of Women'.
It lay 'south of the Onion Range', but this term must certainly be taken here as a very broad
designation, and cover at least the western part of the K'un-lun Range. I have no information on
the salt trade between that 'Kingdom of Women' and India. Of more importance is the indication
that the 'Kingdom of Women' more than once fought against India and the Tang-hsiang. India
would seem here to mean Kashmir, but the Tang-hsiang carry us much more to the east. The
Tang-hsiang, which are the ancestors of the Tangutan tribes of Kan-su, were of the same stock
and, to a great extent, the descendants of the earlier Ch'iang, and, c. 600, lived on the western borders
of Kan-su and Ssŭ-ch'uan. Their many tribes included, among others, the Po-lang or White
Wolves, and all described themselves as having a monkey ancestry (自 稱 猴 種 Sui shu,
83, 2 b). Their wandering tribes could spread far enough towards the west; the Sui shu (followed
by Chiu T'ang shu, 198, 1 b) gives as their western limit «[the territory of] the yeh-hu», i. e. the
yabγu, which means the sovereign of the 'Western T'u-chüeh' (Turks). But this can be accepted
only inasmuch as the sway of the yabγu extended over Chinese Turkestan, and it was certainly
not in the north-western part of Tibet that the Tang-hsiang could come into conflict with the 'King-
dom of Women'. Consequently, the 'Kingdom of Women', i. e. the Suvarṇagotra or Su-p'i,
seems to have covered a large area in the central part of northern Tibet; and there may be some
foundation in Hsüan-tsang's statement that it was «extended from east to west, but narrow from
north to south».

Apart from the clan name Su-p'i, and the title Chin-chü of the husband of the woman king,
the only native name of the 'Kingdom of Women' occurring in the Sui shu is the 'appellation'
of the woman king, that is to say, in the present case, her real name, transcribed 末 稼 Mo-chieh
(*Muât-kjât). This must have begun with maᵒ or baᵒ, but -t- may render -t-, -d-, -r-, -l-; *Mar-
kar or *Bal-kar are only two possible forms out of many.

Other features in the notice, like the many-storeyed houses, the polyandry and the painted
faces, point to Tibetan habits; and so does the use of monkeys in sacrifice, also attested for the
Tibetans proper (T'u-fan) in Chiu T'ang shu, 196 A, 1 a; the Tibetans, like the Tang-hsiang, had
a tradition of a monkey ancestry. It must be admitted, however, that the clan name Su-p'i
and the title Chin-chü are the only direct connection between this 'Kingdom of Women' and
the kingdom of Su-p'i or Sum-pa on the one hand, and the Suvarṇagotra or 'Gold Race' on the
other. The Chiu T'ang shu and the Hsin T'ang shu do not allude to the 'Kingdom of Women'
when speaking of the Kingdom of Su-p'i, and the names of the sovereigns never coincide. Moreover,
the Tibetan texts published by Thomas leave no doubt that, for the Tibetans, the Gold Race and
the Sum-pa were two different countries.

But who were the Su-p'i (Supīya, etc.) or Sum-pa? Thomas holds them to have been originally
Hsiung-nu, adding that they were of «Sien-pi» origin, and he seems to consider Su-p'i, Sum-pa
and «Sien-pi» as different forms of one and the same name; at the time of the events narrated in
the prophecies, their name would have been inherited by Qarluq Turks. The 鮮 卑 Hsien-pei