any date to the period of the separation, we must decidedly hold it to have occurred before the Vedic era. No such relation exists between the two races as would justify us in assuming that the Iranians formed one community with the Indians during the Vedic period. The great majority of the Vedic gods and of the Vedic conceptions are as little known to the Iranians, as the Iranian conceptions are to the Indians. The ideas which are common to both nations may be most easily and satisfactorily explained by supposing them to have been developed in the ante-Vedic period." Spiegel, in Kuhn and Schleicher's Beiträge zur vergl. Sprachf. vol ii. pp. 3, 4, NOTE I.-Page 316. "It is the common view that it was religious grounds which occasioned the separation of the Indians and Iranians. This opinion is supported by the fact that the names of several divinities which have a good signification among the one people, are used in a bad sense by the other, and vice versâ. Thus the Indian deva (god), has become a demon among the Iranians under the form of daeva; and Indra as Andra has experienced a similar degradation. It must not be denied that these differences of conception may have had their foundation in a religious schism between the two nations; but this opinion should not be regarded as more than a probable conjecture, or held to be an historical fact, which follows from the linguistic data with the same certainty as the proposition that the Indian and Iranian nations had originally the same common ancestors. Other possible modes may be conceived, in which this opposition may have arisen; such as the internal development of the Iranian people itself. We have only to reflect on the case of the German religions, and their ancient gods, who, in presence of Christianity, came to be regarded as evil spirits. Dualism, with its rigorous consequences, was a power which operated in Iran in precisely the same manner as Christianity did in Germany. This dualism, which was a result of the particular development of the Iranian people, was compelled to make room in its system, in the best way it could, for those forms of religious belief which it found already in existence, and did not feel itself strong enough to discard. Many beings formerly regarded as gods may thus have been transformed into evil spirits, because they stood in too strong a contrast to the new moral system. It appears to me that the opposition between the religious conceptions of the Indians and the Iranians grew up gradually, and not all at once, in consequence of a reform of Zarathustra, as some have assumed." Spiegel, as above, p. 3. On Añdra see the 5th vol. of this work. p. 121, and note 212 there. NOTE J.-Page 327. Ptolemy, Geogr. vi. 16, has the following notice of Ottorocorra :Ορη δὲ διέζωκεν τὴν Σηρικὴν, τά τε καλούμενα Αννιβα, κ. τ. λ. "The country of Serica is surrounded by mountain ranges," viz., the Annibian, the Auxacian, the Asmirean, the Casian, the Thagurian, and that of Emodus. Καὶ τὸ καλούμενον 'Οττοροκόῤῥας, οὗ τὰ πέρατα ἐπέχει μοίρας PEO NOT KAÌ POOT 10. "[Another of these ranges] is that called Ottorocorras, the limits of which extend from 169° 36′ to 176° 39′ east longitude." Τὰ μὲν οὖν ἀρκτικώτερα τῆς Σηρικῆς κατανέμονται ἔθνη ̓ΑνОрwπорауwν. "The northern parts of Serica are inhabited by the tribes of the Anthropophagi" (men-eaters). The Annibi, Sizyges, etc. follow. Καὶ μεσημβρινώτατοι παρὰ τὰ Ἡμωδὰ καὶ Σηρικὰ ὄρη Οττοροκόῤῥαι. "And southernmost of all, near the Emodian and Serican mountains, dwell the Ottorocorræ." Among the cities of Serica is mentioned Ottorocorra, in east longitude 165° 37' 15". Ottorocora is again alluded to by Ptolemy in book viii., in his remarks on the eighth map of Asia : Ἡ Οττοροκόρα τὴν μεγίστην ἡμέραν ἔχει ὡρῶν ιδγο ἔγγιστα· καὶ διέστηκεν ̓Αλεξανδρείας πρὸς ἕω ὥραις ἑπτά. “The greatest length of the day in Ottorocora is nearly 143 hours. It is distant from Alexandria seven hours towards the east." See, for an account of Ptolemy's geographical system, Lassen's Ind. Ant. iii. 94, ff.; and for the position of Ottorocorra, the map at the end of the same volume. NOTE K.-Page 334. In regard to Airyanem Vaējo, Lassen observes (Ind. Ant. 1st ed., i., p. 526, ff.; 2nd ed. p. 634, ff.): "If we assume that the Arian Indians and the Iranians had originally the same common abodes, out of India, we should expect to find a tradition on the subject among the latter people rather than among the former. We have already said that the Indians have no longer any legend of this sort, though they imagine a sacred region and the seats of the gods to exist to the north of India.12 The Iranians, on the contrary, clearly designate Airyanem Vaējo as the first created country: this they place in the extreme east of the Iranian highlands, in the region where the Oxus and Yaxartes take their rise. This country was afflicted with winter by Ahriman, and had only two months of summer, as if the tradition of a decrease in the earth's temperature still floated in the legend. We must suppose the cold highlands on the western slopes of Belurtag and Mustag to be meant," etc. [The next paragraph will be quoted in Note M.] The following remarks are added: "It suffices to have made it probable that the earliest abodes of the Indians and Iranians are to be sought in the extreme east of the Iranian highlands; but we may assert it to be more than probable that the Indians were derived from some part of the Iranian 12 Lassen's idea, quoted in p. 337, that the "daily prospect of the snowy summits of the Himalaya, glittering far and wide over the plains," and the knowledge the Indians had of the "table-land beyond, with its extensive and tranquil domains, its clear and cloudless sky," etc., would point out the "north as the abode of the gods, and the theatre of wonders," is confirmed by Homer's description of Olympus, Odyss. vi. 42, ff. : Οὔλυμπόνδ ̓, ὅθι φασὶ θεῶν ἕδος ἀσφαλὲς αἰεὶ Εμμεναι· οὔτ ̓ ἀνέμοισι τινάσσεται, οὔτε ποτ ̓ ὄμβρῳ "Olympus, where they say the blessed gods No stormy blasts athwart those summits sweep, And golden radiance plays around its head." This, however, is the ideal Olympus. The mountain is styled ¿yávvipos, “snowy,” in Iliad i. 420, where the scholiast explains the discrepancy by saying that the epithet "snowy" applies only to the parts below the clouds, the summits being above the clouds, and exempt from rain or snow. country. . . The means of arriving at a conclusion on this subject are uncertain; we can only form conjectures from a review of the later geographical positions occupied by these nations; and we are thus led to fix on the country lying between the Caspian sea and the highlands before mentioned, as having been most probably their ancient seats." See also Ariana Antiqua, p. 134, quoted in Note M. Baron von Bunsen also treats of the First Fargard of the Vendidad in one of the Appendices to his Bibel-werk, vol. v. pp. 315, 316. I abstract the following remarks :— "The sacred books of Zoroaster's followers begin with a description of the gradual diffusion of the Arian races of Bactria, as far as the Penjab. The account of these migrations of the Bactrian Arians is preceded by a remarkable reference to the primeval country in the north-east, from which their forefathers removed to their present abodes, in consequence of a great natural convulsion. It appears that that once perfect primeval country, Airyana, had originally a very mild climate, until the hostile deity created a powerful serpent, and snow; so that only two months of summer remained, while winter prevailed during ten. The country next occupied was Sogdiana; and the third Bactria. The progress of the Arians with their civilization is, as it were, the march of Ahura Mazda, the lord of spirits. This advance has an historical import, for all the countries which are specified form a continuous series, extending towards the south and west, and in all of them the Arian culture is discoverable, and even now (in part exclusively) predominant. The first-named country can be no other than that where the Oxus and Yaxartes take their rise; the table-land of Pamer, and Khokand. Assuming the genuineness and antiquity of the Bactrian tradition, we have here a testimony, deserving of the highest consideration, to the historical character of the Biblical tradition regarding the interruption of the life of the Asiatic population by a great natural convulsion confined to this locality. The country lying between the highlands just mentioned to the east, and the mountains of Caucasus and Ararat to the west, with the Caspian Sea in its centre, is regarded by scientific geologists, such as Humboldt and Murchison, as the very region where the most recent convulsions of nature have occurred. The snow and the prolonged winter alluded to in the oldest Arian tradition must have been the result of an upheaving of the land into mountains." NOTE L.-Page 354. In the Asiatic Researches, vol. xv. 108, Professor H. H. Wilson translates parts of a long passage in the Karna Parva, or viiith book of the Mahabh., verses 2025, ff., in which the manners of the Bāhīkas, Madras, Gāndhāras, Araṭṭas, and other tribes of the Panjab are stigmatized as disgraceful. The same text is quoted and translated in the appendix to M. Troyer's Rājataranginī, vol. ii. pp. 549, ff. I will cite a few specimens from this passage. The country where the Bāhīkas dwell is thus defined (verses 2029, ff.): Vahishkritaḥ Himavatā Gangayā cha vahishkṛitāḥ | Sarasvatyā Yamunayā Kurukshetrena chāpi ye Panchānām Sindhu-shashṭānāṁ nadīnāṁ ye'antarāśṛitāh | Tān dharmavāhyān aśuchin Bähikān parivarjayet | "Let every one avoid those impure Bāhīkas, who are outcasts 13 from righteousness, who are shut out by the Himavat, the Ganga, the Sarasvati, the Yamuna, and Kurukshetra, and who dwell between the five rivers which are associated with the Sindhu (Indus), as the sixth." Their women are thus described (v. 2035): Gāyanty athacha nrityanti striyo matṭāḥ vivāsasaḥ| Nagarāgāra-vapreshu vahir māl yānulepanāḥ, etc. "The women, drunk and undressed, wearing garlands, and perfumed with unguents, sing and dance in public places, and on the ramparts of the town," etc.; with much more to the same effect. Again (v. 2063, ff.): Panchanadyo vahanty etāḥ yatra nissṛitya parvatāt | Araṭṭāḥ nāma Bāhīkāḥ na teshv Aryo dvyaham vaset | (v. 2068, ff.) Āraṭṭāḥ nāma te deśāḥ Bāhīkam̃ nāma tajjalam | Brāhmaṇā ́pasadāḥ yatra tulyakālāḥ Prajāpateḥ| Vedo na teshām vedyañcha yajño yajanam eva cha | Vrātyānām dāsamīyānām annam devāḥ na bhunjate | Prasthalaḥ Madra-Gāndhārāḥ Āraṭṭāḥ nāmataḥ Khaśāḥ | VasātiSindhusauviraḥ iti prayo 'tikutsitäḥ| "In the region where these five rivers flow after issuing from the mountains dwell the Bāhīkas, called Arattas; let no Arya dwell there even for two days. . . . The name 13 These expressions, “dharma-vahyān” and “vāhish-kṛitāḥ,” seem to contain a play on the name of the Bāhīkas. This tribe is mentioned in the S'. P. Br. i. 7, 3, 8, quoted above, p. 202; where it is said that they gave to Agni the name of Bhava. This reference to their recognition of one of the Indian gods, without any deprecia. tory allusion to their manners, may perhaps be held to indicate that the author of the Brahmana did not hold them in such low esteem as the speaker in the Mahābhārata. See also the quotations from Pāņini in note 142, p. 354. |