A TEXT which others have confessed their inability to translate is always a challenge, and on reading some of the commentaries on Is. 30, 32 it seemed to me that it was possible to render it quite differently in such a way as to bring it into line with its context. However, if my interpretation were sound it would have to be established that it referred to an object which had special significance for Assyrians and Judeans in the 8th century B.C.

OF all the delegations that are said to have come to pay homage to the Prophet in Madina in A.H. 9, none received so much attention from Arab historians as the delegation of the trībe of Tamlm. They tell1 of a boasting competition between members of the delegation and representatives of the Prophet, which resulted in their defeat and subsequent conversion to Islam. This explanation of the conversion of the Tamīmīs, which was accepted in the Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2 does not appear, however, to be warranted by the circumstances. Moreover, the confusion apparent in the whole story casts grave doubt at least on its details as well as on the degree of importance usually assigned to it, and, furthermore, the poems connected with the story appear to be of later date.

THAT there existed an Arabic translation of the commentary of Themistius on the De Anima of Aristotle has long been known through the references made to it in the works of Ibn Rushd.1 The commentary itself is mentioned by Ibn al-Nadīm in the Fihrist.2 In his note on the De Anima he says: ‘ Themistius wrote a commentary on the whole of this work. He dealt with the first section in two sections, the second in two, and the third in three ’—a division which corresponds to that of the Greek text as we have it. Unfortunately, on the subject of the translation, Ibn al-Nadim's article is not without ambiguity. According to it, Hunain ibn Ishāq translated the entire De Anima into Syriac, while his son, Ishāq, translated the greater part of it into Arabic, and then made a second and complete translation. Ibn al-Nadīm proceeds to quote Ishāq himself as saying: ‘ I translated this work into Arabic from a defective manuscript. Then, after thirty years, I found an extremely good manuscript with which I collated my first version’. The quotation ends with the words: ‘ and it is the commentary of Themistius ’.

THE traveller who approaches Harrān from Urfa passes near an isolated domed building known to the local inhabitants as the shrine of Shaikh Hayāt (ziyārat shaikh hayāt). It stands just outside the city, near the southwest corner of the perimeter-wall1 and is surrounded by some modern tombs (PI. I)2.

THERE still remain many interesting and important problems connected A with, the emergence in the 14th century of the Turkman federations of the Qara-qoyunlu (780–874/1378–1469) and Aq-qoyunlu (780–908/1378–1502). The roots of the Persian risorgimento under the Safavids (1502–1722) go deep into this preparatory period. On the internal policy of the Qara-qoyunlu our documentation is still insufficient. Having succeeded the Jalayirs the Qara-qoyunlu must have inherited the administrative pattern evolved under the Mongol il-khans.1

IT is now almost a century since Rapp cited, 1 among Greek texts relating to Persian customs and beliefs, the charming tale of Zariadres and Odatis, preserved for us by Athenaeus on the authority of Chares of Mytilene.2 The story is in brief as follows: Hystaspes and his younger brother Zariadres were said by the people of their land to be born of Aphrodite and Adonis. Hystaspes ruled Media and the lands below it, Zariadres the region above the Caspian Gates up to the Tanais. Beyond the Tanals lived the Marathi, ruled by Omartes, whose daughter Odatis was the most beautiful woman in Asia.3 Odatis dreamt of Zariadres, and loved him; and he too loved Odatis through dreams. He sought her vainly in marriage, for her father did not wish to give her to a stranger. Soon after, Omartes held a marriage-feast attended by his own kinsmen and nobles, and bade Odatis give a cup of wine to him whom she wished to marry. Zariadres, forewarned by Odatis, came in full haste across the Tanals, accompanied only by his charioteer, and entered the hall in Scythian dress as, weeping, Odatis slowly filled the cup. She recognized him with joy, and he carried her off. This tale, Chares states, was greatly esteemed by the barbarians of Asia, who painted scenes from it on the walls of temples, palaces, and even private houses, the nobles often giving the name of Odatis to their own daughters.

THE following table shows: in columns 1 and 2 two separate series of personal affixes; in column 3 the present tense of the verb ‘to be’; in column 4 the personal inflexions of the present tenses of all other verbs; and in column 5 the personal pronouns in their separable forms.

WHEN the geographical term ‘Bengal’ is used in any study of the old or medieval period of the literary history of the area, it must be borne in mind that it has so far been impossible to delineate its then boundaries with precision. Such early cartographical evidence2 as there is, suggests that it is improbable that the topography of Bengal resembled very closely that which is now familiar in our modern maps. The great rivers, which are the most distinctive characteristic of the formation of this part of India, are known to have made considerable changes in their courses; and the constant depositing of silt in the delta districts has almost certainly increased the area of its land surface during the centuries.

FROM the Western point of view the process by which the Goddess gradually established herself in the official Hindu Pantheon is of great interest. As it took place in historical times and in a culture which has known no violent breaks or radical changes of religion, it gives us a fairly continuous series of glimpses which illustrate the ways and means by which this prominence was reached. On the one hand we find accounts of the violent means—wars and massacres—employed by Devi in order to achieve recognition, as for instance in the Bengali folk-epics of Candi and Manasa-Devi. On the other hand, we find a series of philosophical-metaphysical speculations which increasingly stress the importance of the female principle in the workings of the Universe, and finally establish the Goddess in the very centre of things. Like her Lord Siva, Devi has many aspects, but—at least in the official and orthodox view—all these often conflicting aspects converge in the concept ‘The Goddess’, whatever their individual autonomy may have been or still is among the village worshippers. There is no doubt that, however young both Siva and the Goddess may be in official religion, they can claim a non-canonized existence prior perhaps to that of Brahma himself.

IN Tsaur Jyr's Collected Works (Tsaur Jyi Chyuampyng)1 we find under the title Chieh Baurminq two stanzas, together with a few fragments, believed to be parts of the poem, gleaned from commentaries to works other than Tsaur Jyr's and from the encyclopaedia Beeitarng-Shuchau.2 The title of this poem (literally: ‘I am ill-fated’) suggests the story of an ill-fated lady, deserted by her husband or lover, reduced to dire poverty and therefore constantly in tears, as we find her commonly depicted in Chinese poetry. The I contents of the poem, however, do not tally with this expectation. This fact has been ignored by the majority of scholars who commented on the poem, but two commentators3 have touched on it while discussing the significance of the poem as a whole.

IN October 1948, the Governor of Hong Kong appointed a committee to consider the position of Chinese law and custom in that colony. The report of this committee, which was published in February 1953,1 will have drawn attention to the fact that the old family law of China, quite apart from the limited recognition given to it by the courts, continues to exercise considerable influence on the lives of millions of Chinese, not only in Hong Kong, but in the other British territories of South-East Asia. In China itself, as regards matters of the family, the Civil Code of the former National Government had never, over most of the country and for the mass of the people, any very eifectual force, and the customary law continued to exist in almost undiminished vigour until the establishment of the People's Government in 1949.2 Since then the situation has changed completely. New laws regarding marriage and property are effectively enforced, and have everywhere replaced the old customs and, what is still more important, an extremely efficient system of mass-education in the principles of Communism will before long have expelled from people's minds those beliefs on which the old Chinese law was based. From now on, apart from Formosa, it is only in Hong Kong and among the communities of overseas Chinese throughout South-East Asia that Chinese customary family law will continue to exist, but even with such limitations it is still of sufficient importance to make its study of practical significance.

THE paradigms that may be set up for the nominals in Tigrinya1 in terms of the category of number (established on syntactical and further morphological grounds) consist of two members, conveniently termed ‘singular’ and ‘plural’. The morphological analysis for the forms placed in this grammatical relationship may, for some of them, be given in terms of ‘external flection’ or ‘sumxation’, but for many forms, including those in commonest use, the differences of syllabic pattern, and other differences throughout the entire forms, justify the use of the traditional term ‘broken plural’. It is the purpose of this paper to make a phonological analysis to handle the morphological relation between the broken plurals and the singular forms with which they are grammatically paired.

IN representing the vowels of the Isaaq dialect of Somali2 we meet with many difficulties not only because of a large number of vowel distinctions but also on account of the operation of Vowel Harmony. I use the term Vowel Harmony in the same sense as Armstrong,3 i.e. as the harmony (or ‘matching’) of vowels belonging to the same series. Schleicher,4 Reinisch,5 and Abraham6 use this term quite differently, meaning by it certain types of assimilation of vowels without postulating two vowel series. Armstrong was the first writer in the literature on Somali to become aware of the existence and complexity of the problems under discussion.

Although Somaliland has attracted the attention of a distinguished body of Italian scholars it has not yet been subjected to a specifically social anthropological study such as the present writer hopes to make. Excellent studies notably by Puccioni (1919–1937), Cerulli (1918–1943), and Colucci (1924,1943) have elucidated the sociology of the Somali and created a sound corpus of knowledge for future investigations. Colucci's Principi di diritto consuetudinario delta Somalia Meridionale (1924) provides a penetrating analysis delineating with great clarity the general framework of Somali social organization and the political structure of the Sab tribes of Somalia in terms of lineage organization. Cerulli's studies of tribal custom and social organization are also of great value;his ‘Note sul movimento musulmano nella Somalia ’, published over 30 years ago, is at present the foundation of all studies of Islam amongst the Somali. The present paper attempts to set this and other material on Somali religion in the context of the sociological investigation of the literature of the Somali which I have made elsewhere (Lewis, 1955), and in which I have been guided by Somali informants in London. It is hoped that the procedure adopted here may be of value in suggesting the lines along which field studies of Islam amongst the Somali might profitably be conducted, and also that it may make some contribution to studies of Islam amongst tribal societies generally.

In BSOAS XIII, 1950, p. 642, n. 8, I referred to the Pahlavi word for ‘beer’, which had lurked unrecognized in the Frahang-i Pahlavik (v, 2 = xxxi, 2–3), and quoted the Karnamag passage vii, 8 (Sanjana). There it is related that Ardashir, fleeing in disguise, was hospitably received by two friendly brothers. They housed and fed his horse, led him into their dwelling, and seated him in the place of honour. ‘And they sacrificed dron and asked Ardashir “Please speak the vaj and eat and do not worry ”…Ardashir's mind was comforted by these words, he spoke the vaj and ate. They had no wine, but brought “beer ”forward and arranged the meal…’. The passage shows in an unobtrusive way how everyday occasions were encompassed by religious ceremony in pious Zoroastrian society:any meal began with the vaj (the saying of grace, as it were), sacrificial bread (dron) and wine, or at least beer, formed necessarily part of it.