PIS'MENNYE
PAMYATNIKI
VOSTOKA

Vol. 14, No. 3 (30)
Autumn 2017

Journal based in 2004
Issued quarterly

Selected Materials as a *.PDF file

PUBLICATIONS

Aliy I. Kolesnikov. Miniatures and Texts of Album E 28 in the Collection of the IOM, RAS — 5
Album E 28 is composed of five separate sheets of an unknown Persian manuscript, dated on the basis of circumstantial evidence to the 17th–18th centuries. The texts on these folios comprise mostly narrations concerning the acts of the Sūfī orders in Central Asia in the 11th–15th centuries. The five miniatures are illustrations of the events that were described in the narrations.
Key words: Abū Sa‘īd Abī’l-Xayr, Herat, Khorezm, the Amudarya, shaykh, mysticism, boat

RESEARCH WORKS

Nelly V. Kozyreva. South Mesopotamia under the Last Kings of Hammurapi Dynasty: “Moving Around Babylon” — 28
The later history of the 1st Babylonian Dynasty (about 1711–1595 BC) remains yet one of the poorly studied periods of the Ancient Mesopotamian history. There is no clear answer to the question of what caused the collapse of the Old Babylonian state, once established by the famous Hammurapi, and the overthrow of his dynasty, and who was the actual enemy that destroyed the city of Babylon in 1595 BC. Recent publications of cuneiform records and archaeological data shed some light on the problems and allow us to re-evaluate the role of climate and environmental changes and migration movements in political and demographic processes in South Mesopotamia in the middle of the 2nd millennium BC.
Key words: the 1st Babylonian Dynasty, climate and environmental changes, de-urbanization, migration movements, mercenary army

Youli A. Ioannesyan. The Continuous Tense with the Verb “To Have” as a Peculiar and Exclusive Feature of Western Iranian Dialects Spoken in Modern Iran — 44
The article considers the verb forms with the auxiliary verb “to have” used in Persian and other western Iranian dialects of modern Iran to express a continuous action taking place at the moment of speech in present or at a certain moment in the past. Drawing upon extensive material collected from a large number of dialects, the author proves that the geographic area within which these forms are found is limited to the territory of modern Iran, which makes them a distinguishing and exclusive feature of Western Iranian (Persian and non-Persian alike) dialects spoken in modern Iran. The author supports the idea that these verb forms are completely “native” to the linguistic area they are found in and, therefore, despite the viewpoint of some scholars, could not have originated under the influence of Western or any other foreign languages.
Key words: Persian language, Persian dialectology, Iranian dialectology

Viacheslav M. Rybakov. The Legal Regulation of Serving the Royal Family in the T’ang China. Part 1: Medical Treatment, Food — 54
The security and comfort of the first persons of the state are one of the main elements of the legal system in all countries and in all times. It is clear that for the proper realization of their duties these persons should be relieved of fears for their life and health, and of household chores. However, the notions of safety and comfort are to a high degree defined by the technological level of the era and cultural traditions of the country. A very interesting example of the general trend in specific conditions is the statutory framework for the care of the Emperor and his family, developed in traditional China. This essay analyzes the list of foreseeable unintentional missteps, which could cause this harm, along with a list of punitive measures designed to reduce the possibility of such missteps, and also which household encroachment on the property of the royal family the Tang China legislators considered possible and how they suggested to deal with them.
Key words: traditional China, the state and law, bureaucracy, administrative law, the safety of the first persons of the state, the Tʼang dynasty

Sergey L. Burmistrov. Śaṃkara’s Hymns: The Problem of Authorship, Philosophical Aspects and Religious Practices — 69
Religious hymns (stotra) ascribed to Śaṃkara were addressed not only to Śiva, whose incarnation the founder of Advaita Vedānta was considered, but also to Viṣṇu, Gaṇeśa, Hanuman etc. Neither of Hindu deities was distinguished by Advaitins as the “basic” one for the school. A hymn briefly represents the main features of a deity and mythological themes connected with him. That allowed an adept to catch all the mythology of the deity an a single act of mind. This makes Advaitist hymns close to Indian classical drama with the scene considered a model of the Universe. The aim of the stotra was to change the adept’s mind to make him apt to grasp a deity in a totality of its features and identify himself with the deity.
Key words: Hindu hymns, Indian drama, Advaita Vedānta, Śaṃkara

HISTORY AND HISTORIOGRAPHY

Shimon M. Iakerson. Dedications in Hebrew Manuscripts as a Source of Information and Disinformation — 85
The present article deals with one kind of marginal texts in the Hebrew Manuscripts — dedications. Various kinds of dedications — of a scribe to an patron, of an owner to the synagogue or to some noble person are observed and analysed using as samples manuscripts from the collections of the Russian National Library and the Institute of Oriental Manuscripts.
Key words: Dedications, Hebrew manuscripts, Hebrew Bible, Karaites, Codices, Crimea, Damascus

Mark A. Kozintcev, Sergey A. Frantsouzoff. A Negative Review in Two Languages on the Margins of a Handwritten Arab Christian Treatise on Meteorology — 97
The article examines a bilingual note in Arabic and Ottoman Turkish on the unique Arabic Christian manuscript from the collection of the Institute of Oriental Manuscripts in St. Petersburg (B 1234). This copy contains a treatise on meteorology mistakenly ascribed to the deacon from Antioch ‘Abdallāḥ b. al-Faḍl (11th century AD). The article demonstrates that the above-mentioned bilingual note was undoubtedly composed by a Muslim in 1823, and represents a real negative review of that work. The article suggests philological analysis of the Arabic and Ottoman Turkish texts of the note.
Key words: Arabic Christian manuscripts, notes to manuscripts, bilingual texts, medieval Middle Eastern meteorology

COLLECTIONS AND ARCHIVES

Alexander V. Zorin. Some Tibetological Documents Found in B. I. Pankratov’s Fund at the Orientalists Archive of the IOM, RAS. Part 1. Materials on Tibetan-Mongolian Iconography — 105
This paper presents some documents found in the B. I. Pankratov archival collection that have a great significance for the history of Russian Tibetology and Buddhology. The first part deals with some draft materials relating to the early stage of Pankratov’s study of the collection of Tantric sādhanās compiled by Ching su tsug thu no mon han blo bzang nor bu shes rab (b. 1677?), this text was apparently translated by Pankratov for the Sino-Indian Institute at Yenching University, Beijing, in the first half of the 1930s.
Key words: archival documents, B. I. Pankratov, Buddhist iconography, Ching su tsug thu no mon han, sādhanā

Tamura Masato, Suzuki Kenji. The IOM RAS Japanese Books from Sakhalin Libraries. Translation from Japanese, Introduction and Commentary by Karine G. Marandjian — 121
The article by Japanese historians deals with Japanese books from Southern Sakhalin (Karafuto) brought to Leningrad in 1948. Analyzing the library stamps and bookplates, the autors trace the sources the ownless books were gathered from after the repatriation of the Japanese population.
Key words: Japanese bookplates and library stamps, private owners’ ex-librises, libraries of Southern Sakhalin (Karafuto), repatriation of the Japanese population

ACADEMIC LIFE

Tatiana V. Ermakova. Conference “Current Topics of the Buddhist Studies” (St. Petersburg, February 20, 2017) — 131

Ivan V. Bogdanov. The Second Academic Conference “Society and Culture of the Ancient Near East” in Memory of Vladimir A. Jacobson (St. Petersburg, March 14–15, 2017) — 134

Tatiana A. Pang. The 2nd All-Russian Scientific Conference of Young Orientalists “China and Its Neighbors” (St. Petersburg, March 16–17, 2017) — 139

REVIEWS

The Thirteenth Dalai Lama on the Run (1904–1906). Archival Documents from Mongolia. Ed. by Sampildondov Chuluun, Uradyn E. Bulag. Leiden–Boston: Brill, 2013. XXVIII, 598 pp. (Brill’s Inner Asia Archive 1) (in English) (Tatiana A. Pang) — 142

Mitteliranische Handschriften. Teil 2: Berliner Turfanfragmente buddhistischen Inhalts in soghdischer Schrift, beschrieben von Christiane Reck. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 2016 (VOHD; XVIII,2). 473 S. (in German) (Olga M. Chunakova) — 145

IN MEMORIAM

Anna Arkadievna Iskoz-Dolinina (S.Yu. Gintsburg) — 150