国立情報学研究所 - ディジタル・シルクロード・プロジェクト
『東洋文庫所蔵』貴重書デジタルアーカイブ

For a Mussulman use of « Java » as a designation of a place on the continent, cf., in the Ḥudūd
al-ʿĀlam of 981-983 (6 b), جابه خشك Jābah-i-bušk, « Java the dry », which BARTHOLD (Introd., 23)
renders by « Continental Java ».

On Java in mediaeval cartography, and the frequent confusion there between Java and Sumatra,
cf. HALLBERG, 274-280. The name of « Major Java », which occurs on several maps, appears
only in VB Mss. of Polo; but it was easily derived from Polo's respective dimensions of the islands,
and his « Java la menor » easily suggested a « Major Java »; moreover, the Genoese Map and Fra
Mauro, who give the two names, are both, although to a different degree, dependent on Conti.

264. JAVA THE LESS

çaua minor, parua çaua Z iaua minor Lr jaua la menor Ft
giaua menor VLr iauua la meneur FA jaua minor L, LT, P
giaua minore R ioua TA³ java la minore TA¹
iana VB jamanaym, javamayn, java- jona la mazor VB
iana menor, iauiaua V meyn G mendre (meneur, petite) isle
iaua la menor F jana, lina menor VA de jaua FB
iaua mener VL jaua L picciola iaua TA¹, TA³

Java the Less (« Java la menor ») is Polo's designation of Sumatra. The use of Jawah as a
designation of Sumatra occurs among Arabic geographers (cf., for instance, Fe, 402), and Zābaj
< *Jāvaga seems to have referred to the south-eastern part of the great island. There was no general
name for the whole island. Even Polo's description applies only to the north-western half, and
he does not suspect that his « Malaiur » is also in Sumatra. In 1365, the Javanese poem Nāgara-
krĕtagāma, for want of a general name, uses Tanah ri Malayu, « Land of Malayu », as a designation
of all Sumatra (Fe, 652). Later writers, like BARBOSA and LINSCHOTEN, for whom the name of
Sumatra already existed as we use it now, apply the name of « Java the Less » to Sumbawa (cf. DAMES,
Barbosa, II, 194-195). In Malaca, l'Inde méridionale et le Cathay, pp. XI-XII, Léon JANSSEN
is satisfied that GODINHO DE EREDIA, in 1613, uses « Java Menor » as a designation of the newly
discovered Australia; but JANSSEN attributes to YULE opinions on Great Java and Java the Less
which are exactly the opposite of those held by that scholar. For the rest, a mere perusal of
ff. 50 b-51 a and 57 a of the Portuguese text of GODINHO, quoting whole passages of Polo, clearly shows
that Polo is GODINHO's only source for « Java the Less ». But, owing to the altered bearings when
Polo's digressions were made to appear as parts of a continuous itinerary, it is true that
GODINHO and his contemporaries, while knowing Sumatra, looked for « Java the Less » to the
south-east of our Java, and duplicated there, in forms more or less corrupt, the names of the very
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