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| 0299 |
Southern Tibet : vol.1 |
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OCR Text
regions as Dsungaria, Tian-shan, Eastern Turkestan, and Kwen-lun, though they had
been crossed and seen by several travellers. How utterly they are missing is best
seen by the fact that the Siberian Ob and the Indian Ganges have their sources in
one and the same range. In a corner between two ranges N.W. of the source of
the Ganges sufficient room has, however, been found for Tibret forsan et Tobrot.¹
Only a year after Sanson d'Abbeville's map of Tartaria had appeared, or in
1655, Father Martini published his Atlas of China which marks a perfect revolution
in the European conception of the far eastern empire.² We have to direct our atten-
tion only to the frontispiece map: Imperii Sinarum nova descriptio, of which Pl. XXXI
is a part. To begin with, the course of Hwangho, or Croceus flu.,³ has been much
corrected, and the river takes its rise in two lakes, Sosing and Singsieu, as is indeed
the case.⁴ West of Hwangho the Koko-nor makes its appearance under the name
Mare nigrum Sinis Cinghai. The Chinese name of the Blue Lake is Tsing-hai, so
cæruleum or cæsium would perhaps have been more adequate than nigrum, in a
country with many Khara-nor and only one Koko-nor. However, the existence of
the lake on the map proves that Martini has never confounded the Koko-nor and
the Chiamay lacus, which sometimes occurred in later years. He does not reject
the latter, which he calls Kia L., for he had no reason to disbelieve its existence.
Xamo desertum he identifies with what the Europeans used to call Desertum
Lop. To the north of the sand desert he has Samahan Tartariæ sive Samarcandæ
Pars, which is surprising. And south of the same desert is Tibet Regnvm. Then
follow Kiang Regnvm and Vsvçang Regnum all of which belong to the western
countries of Si-fan.⁵
As regards the situation of Tibet, Martini has given a new impulse to the
development of European knowledge. And still he has a very uncertain conception
of where it really is. On his map he places it in the Koko-nor district which we
know is inhabited by Tangut and Mongol tribes. But in relation to Martini's Koko-
nor it is to the S.W. as is correct. Speaking of the country Laos, or the N.W.
part of Siam, which he correctly places east of Arakan, Father Martini quotes the
manuscript of Father Leria, in whom he has great confidence, and who, during his
mission travels, had visited Laos, and found it inundated by its rivers in summer.
¹For when the snows of the mountains of Tibet, — I (Martini) believe that he (Leria)
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