Southern Tibet : vol.8 / Page 111 (Grayscale High Resolution Image)

0111	Southern Tibet : vol.8

5. SEVERTSOFF.

In his important article »A Journey to the Western portion of the Celestial Range
(Thian Shan), or 'Tsun-Lin of the Ancient Chinese, from the Western Limits of the
Trans-Ili region to Tash-kend«, N. SEVERTSOFF makes a more serious attempt to fix the
boundaries of the system in question.¹

He finds a complete accordance between HSÜAN-CHUANG'S narrative and his own
investigations.

Speaking of the location which Hsüan-chuang has given to the Ts'ung-ling mountains
Severtsoff concludes:

According to these boundaries of the Tsun-lin Mountains, it would appear that I visited the
northern portion of this rugged region, between the Sir-Darya and a line extending from Lake Issik-kul
to Mynbulak, or, more correctly, the northern boundary of the Tsun-lin.

The region between Chu and Talas belongs according to Severtsoff, to the northern
Ts'ung-ling, and, travelling from Vernoie towards the SW. he crosses this system. Of the
valleys of the Talas, Forghāna, Zerafshān and Badakhshān, he says: »These are the hollows
that indent the Tsun-lin mountain-rise.« When he speaks of the mountainous country
between the Chu and the Western Himalayas as being the Ts'ung-ling, he does it »in the
recognized wide Chinese sense of that appellation«. Therefore he is in opposition to the
view of HUMBOLDT, who has used the name for a too small region.² But Severtsoff himself
seems to go too far when he includes nearly the whole Central Asiatic world of mountains
within the Chinese name:

Arguing from the data we at present possess respecting the Central Asiatic mountain region (i. e.,
the Tsun-lin of the ancient Chinese), the Bolor, in the sense of a distinct range, does not exist, and
the mountains so called ought to be classed with the Himalayan system.

It is not quite easy to understand the meaning of this passage. First he gives the
widest possible geographical extent to the old Chinese name. Then he says that a range
Bolor does not exist, but so much as exists should be classed with the Himalaya. A few
pages above he has reckoned the Ts'ung-ling in its wide Chinese sense as including the
whole region between the Chu and Western Himalaya. Whether Bolor is a range or not
it falls within the boundaries of this region, it is even in the midst of it. So it cannot
possibly be classed with the Himalayan system.

Oro-morphologically he expresses his views thus:

Properly, those places on the map should be marked where there are actual ranges, that is, where
there are upheaved strata preserving a uniform extension for a great distance; and also those places
where the lines of the extension of these uplifted, contorted, and broken strata frequently cross each
other, and where, consequently, many conterminous elevations of inconsiderable magnitudes, as regards
their horizontal extension, unite in one vast contiguous mass of highlands, reft, however, by the narrow
chasms of river valleys. Such an elevation the Tsun-lin appears to me to be, as it is formed by the
intersection of the Thian-Shan system with elevations from the Himalayas. It would be more correct
to represent it without any ridges, and to shade it more or less darkly, according to its height, with
the river valleys, and with lines marking the direction and extent of the various strata.

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

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

Citation Information

OCR Text

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