The Journal of the American Oriental Society articles from April 1994

The Journal of the American Oriental Society archives from April 1994

The historian and the Sumerian Gods. (Thorkild Jacobsen speech) (Transcript)
April 1, 1994... Ladies and Gentlemen. It seems that the English wit Max Beerbohm, the inventor of Zuleika Dobson, once said that there is always something a bit absurd about history. What exactly he had in mind with that remark, I do not pretend to know. But...

The relationships of the Eastern Neo-Aramaic dialects.
April 1, 1994... Introduction IN RECENT YEARS THERE HAS BEEN an increase in scholarly activity in the field of Neo-Aramaic and a corresponding growth in our knowledge of the range of dialects which make up NENA (Northeast Neo-Aramaic).(2) In light of this, it...

The blinding emerald: Ibn al-Rawandi's 'Kitab al-Zumurrud.'
April 1, 1994... INTRODUCTION A CENTRAL ISSUE IN EARLY ISLAMIC THEOLOGICAL DISCUSSIONS is the question of who is to be counted as a believer (mumin). In asking this question medieval Muslim thinkers sought to define the essence of Islam and to delineate the...

Abhinavagupta's aesthetics as a speculative paradigm.
April 1, 1994... SINCE THE PUBLICATION OF K. C. Pandey's pioneering Indian Aesthetics, one of the leitmotifs of scholarship on Abhinavagupta's remarkable aesthetic theory has been commentary on its "philosophical" basis.(1) The main thrust of this inquiry has...

The engraved model-letters compendia of the Song Dynasty.
April 1, 1994... THE EARLY DEVELOPMENT of engraved calligraphy compendia in China is important as an instance of how histories of art are created and contested. It also illustrates how China's cultural and political elite used styles of art for purposes of...

Mountain deities in China: the domestication of the mountain god and the subjugation of the margins.
April 1, 1994... All mountains, whether large or small, have gods and spirits.(1) Ge Hong (283-343) THE MARCHMOUNTS PERHAPS BEST KNOWN of the mountain gods are the marchmounts or sacred peaks (yue). These mountains, one in each cardinal direction, fix and...

A scholar's dictionary of Jewish Palestinian Aramaic. (Michael Sokoloff)
April 1, 1994... Lexicography is an art easily learned but seldom mastered. A comprehensive dictionary requires of its editor dozens of difficult decisions on every page. Moreover, different kinds of users have different needs, diverse enough that it often...

Dictionary of Jewish Palestinian Aramaic.
April 1, 1994... Lexicography is an art easily learned but seldom mastered. A comprehensive dictionary requires of its editor dozens of difficult decisions on every page. Moreover, different kinds of users have different needs, diverse enough that it often...

Baisnabatar bamla kabye baisnab prabhab.
April 1, 1994... The last work to be discussed by us is a study of the impact of Vaisnavism on non-Vaisnava Bengali literature (poetry).(33) The scope of the study includes both Middle Bengali and modern Bengali literature, up to modern poets such as Bisnu De,...

New publications of Bengali syncretistic religions.
April 1, 1994... In a recent article(1) have given copious bibliographic references to material (including newer literature) on the Bauls (Bengali baul), with stray references to other syncretistic Bengali religious groups exhibiting Vaisnava influence. Some...

Songs of Lalon.
April 1, 1994... A translation of selections from the songs of Lalan(3) by Brother James will serve to reinforce such notions. The author is aware of the sexual aspects of the Baul creed, expressly remarking on them (pp. xiv f.); however, one gains the...

Myriad Miracle: Lalon's Song.
April 1, 1994... Another English translation of twenty-five of Lalan's songs(9) focuses, in its selection, not only on their transcendental religious, but also social aspect. The translator's English is however peculiar, and is sometimes so incomprehensible as...

Lalan samgit sbaralipi, pratham khanda.
April 1, 1994... The commercialization of Baul songs has resulted in a mighty industry, centered to a large extent in Calcutta, which spins out fake Baul songs written and set to tunes by professional artistes or their hacks; often genuine songs, too, are given...

Duddu sah: 1796-1907.
April 1, 1994... The most famous of Lalan's many disciples is probably Duddu. According to a recent biography,(12) Duddu may be regarded as the explicator and popularizer of Lalan's doctrines.(13) Rah-man draws attention to the fact that many particulars of...

Manikganj jelar loksahitya.
April 1, 1994... As any researcher knows, an important source of Baul songs are collections gathered in the field. It is especially East Bengali scholars who have distinguished or are distinguishing themselves in this regard; one particularly indefatigable...

Barisal jelar loksahitya.
April 1, 1994... As any researcher knows, an important source of Baul songs are collections gathered in the field. It is especially East Bengali scholars who have distinguished or are distinguishing themselves in this regard; one particularly indefatigable...

Narayanganj jelar loksahitya.
April 1, 1994... As any researcher knows, an important source of Baul songs are collections gathered in the field. It is especially East Bengali scholars who have distinguished or are distinguishing themselves in this regard; one particularly indefatigable...

The Myths of Bangladesh.
April 1, 1994... A book purportedly on myths in Bangladesh(20) is actually a collection of various essays having nothing to do with myths: on shamanism, folk dances, tribal life and politics, embroidery art--and the Bauls. This last essay (pp. 120-57; "The...

Jatibhed pratha ebam bamladeser baul samaj.
April 1, 1994... The author of the next book (25) is the daughter of the author of the foregoing work. On page 4 she writes that her study is meant to prove the hypothesis that the Bauls are the result of a backlash against caste/class;(26) on page 47 she sees...

Kartabhaja dharmer itibrtta.
April 1, 1994... The syncretistic Kartabhajas have been the subject of much controversy, especially in the last century, when their influence on the Calcutta elite was not negligible. One of the first studies trying to lift the veil of controversy and examine...

Protean prosodies: Alfons Weidert's 'Tibeto-Burman Tonology.'
April 1, 1994... ALFONS WEIDERT WAS SOMETHING OF a tragic figure in Tibeto-Burman (TB) linguistics. His premature, violent death under suspicious circumstances in Bangkok in 1988 deprived the world of a brilliant, yet erratic, scholar, who had personally...

Tibeto-Burman Tonology.
April 1, 1994... ALFONS WEIDERT WAS SOMETHING OF a tragic figure in Tibeto-Burman (TB) linguistics. His premature, violent death under suspicious circumstances in Bangkok in 1988 deprived the world of a brilliant, yet erratic, scholar, who had personally...

An unknown manuscript of the Kitab al-Fawa-id.
April 1, 1994... The book Kitab al-Fawa-id fi usul ilm al-bahr wa'l-qawa id is the most important and best known of the works by the famous navigator Ahmad ibn Majid al-Sa di al-Najdi.(1) It is also his only prose composition (dated 895/1490) and the only one...

Bronzeworking Centers of Western Asia: c. 1000-539 B.C.
April 1, 1994... Edited by John Curtis. London: Kegan Paul International, 1988. Pp. 342 + 183 pls. $59.95, CDN $75. The papers of a meeting organized by John Curtis on behalf of the Department of Western Asiatic Antiquities of the British Museum and held in...

The Cities of Seleukid Syria.
April 1, 1994... By John D. Grainger. Oxford: 1990. Pp. xi + 253. $52. This book, based on the author's Ph.D. thesis, aims at presenting the history of cities in a restricted part of the Seleucid Empire for its own sake and not simply as a facet of dynastic...

A Green Leaf: Papers in Honour of Professor Jes P. Asmussen.
April 1, 1994... By W. Sundermann, J. Duchesne-Guillemin and F. Vahman. Acta Iranica 28, deuxieme serie, Hommages et Opera Minora. Leiden: E. J. BRILL, 1988. Pp. xxix + 547, 24 plates. HFl 150, $75. This is an extremely rich and multifaceted volume, a worthy...

Gott und Gotter im alten Agypten.
April 1, 1994... By Sylvia Schoske and Dietrich Wildung. Mainz am Rhein: Philipp von Zabern, 1992. Pp. viii + 240. DM 88. This is a provocative and infuriating catalogue! The 143 objects here presented for the first time were collected by an anonymous,...

Fenicios, Griegos y Cartagineses en Occidente.
April 1, 1994... By Jose Maria Blazquez. Historia, serie menor. Madrid: 1992. Pp. 546 (paper). Since 1980, Spanish and German archaeologists have transformed our knowledge of Phoenician and Carthaginian archaeology in Spain, making it clear that a Semitic...

Jewish Lore in Manichaean Cosmogony: Studies in the Book of Giants Traditions.
April 1, 1994... By John C. Reeves. Monographs of the Hebrew Union College, no. 14. Cincinnati: Hebrew Union College Press, 1993. Pp. xi + 260. $49.95. Well before the major modem discoveries of Manichaean manuscripts, the 18th-century French Huguenot scholar...

The Syntax of Masoretic Accents in the Hebrew Bible.
April 1, 1994... By James D. Price. Studies in the Bible and Early Christianity, vol. 27. Lewiston, N.Y.: Edwin Mellen Press, 1990. Pp. ii + 323. Given the scant knowledge most Hebraists possess in accentual matters, James Price's Syntax of Masoretic Accents...

Valentinus Gnosticus? Untersuchungen zur valentinianischen Gnosis mit einem Kommentar zu den Fragmenten Valentins.
April 1, 1994... By Christoph Markschies. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament, 65. Tubingen: J. C. B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck), 1992. Pp. xii + 516. DM 178. This book, a slightly revised 1991 Tubingen dissertation directed by L. Abramowski and M....

Testi cuneiformi neo-sumerici da Drehem: n. 0001-0412.
April 1, 1994... By Alfonso Archi and Francisco Pomponio. Catalogo del Museo Egizio di Torino, serie seconda: Collezioni, vol. 7. Milan: Istituto Editoriale Universitario, 1990. Pp. 215 67 plates. This volume contains a republication of 250 Drehem texts of...

Colonialism and Revolution in the Middle East: Social and Cultural Origins of Egypt's Urabi Movement.
April 1, 1994... By Juan R. I. Princeton Studies on the Near East. Princeton: 1993. Pp. xiii + 341. $49.50. 33[pounds]. In Colonialism and Revolution, Juan Cole returns to the relatively well-worked subject of what, to use a neutral definition, is often...

A Greek and Arabic Lexicon: Materials for a Dictionary of the Medieval Translations from Greek into Arabic.
April 1, 1994... Edited by Gerhard Endress and Dimitri Gutas. Handbuch der Orientalistik, 1. Abteilung: Der Nahe und der Mittlere Osten, Bd. 11. Leiden: E. J. BRILL, 1992. Pp. 96 + 20 (Parts B-F). HF1. 40, $23. Specialists in the field of Graeco-Arabic...

A Medieval Muslim Scholar at Work: Ibn Tawus and His Library.
April 1, 1994... By Etan Kohlberg. Islamic Philosophy, Theology, and Science. Texts and Studies, 12. Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1992. Pp. ix + 470. HF1 210, $120. The present volume is a classic in the bibliographical study of Islamic primary sources, especially...

The Byzantine and Early Islamic Near East, vol. 1: Problems in the Literary Source Material, vol. 1.
April 1, 1994... Problems in the Literary Source Material. Edited by and Lawrence I. Conrad. Studies in Late Antiquity and Early Islam, 1. Princeton: Darwin Press, 1992. Pp. xiv + 428. $29.95. This volume constitutes the first publication of an...

Qanaa (Genugsamkeit) in der arabischen Literatur, anhand des Kitab al-Qana a wa-t-ta affuf von Ibn Abi d-Dunya.
April 1, 1994... By Stefan Weninger. Islamkundliche Untersuchungen, Bd. 154. Berlin: Klaus Schwarz Verlag, 1992. Pp. 307. Ibn Abi d-Dunya (A.D. 823-94) was the prime practitioner in his day of the genre of literature that is sometimes called zuhd...

Taj Mahal, the Illumined Tomb: An Anthology of Seventeenth-Century Mughal and European Documentary Sources.
April 1, 1994... Compiled and translated by W. F. Begley and Z. A. Cambridge, Mass.: Agha Khan Program for Islamic Architecture; Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1990. Pp. 320, 22 color illustrations, 168 black and white. $45 (cloth); $29.95 (paper)....

Firuzabad: Palace City of the Deccan.
April 1, 1994... By George Michell and Richard Eaton. Oxford Studies in Islamic Art, 8. Oxford: (for the Board of the Faculty of Oriental Studies, University of Oxford), 1992. Pp. 102, numerous black-and-white plates. $65. Studies of Islamic art in India...

Muqarnas, an Annual on Islamic Art and Architecture, vol. 8: K.A.C. Creswell and His Legacy.
April 1, 1994... Edited by Oleg Grabar. Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1991. Pp. 138. HFI 90, $51.43. K. A. C. Creswell's works are continually being reexamined and updated. A Festschrift, Studies in Islamic Art and Architecture in Honour of Professor K. A. C. Creswell...

Political Islam.
April 1, 1994... Edited by Charles E. Burreworth and I. William Zartman. The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, vol. 524. Newbury Park, Cal.: Sage Publications, 1992. Pp. 236. $24. This special issue of the Annals, edited by two...

Risala fi tahqiq tarib al-kalima al-agamiyya. (Treatise on the Verification of the Arabicization of Foreign Words)
April 1, 1994... By Ibn Kahmal Pasha. Edited by Mohammad Sawie Damascus: Insititut Francais d'Etudes Arabes de Damas, 1991. Pp. 172 (Arabic) + 13 (English). There has always been discussion among Arabic scholars with regard to foreign words in the Arabic...

L'Occident musulman au bas moyen age.
April 1, 1994... By Rachel Arie. Paris: De Boccard, 1992. Pp. 132. FF 160. This collection brings together articles previously published in various sources, often difficult to obtain on their own (Festschrift or Homenaje volumes, etc.). Mme. Arid is an...

Women in Middle Eastern History: Shifting Boundaries in Sex and Gender.
April 1, 1994... Edited by Nikki R. Kiddie and Beth Baron New Haven: Yale University Press, 1991. Pp. xii + 343. $35. Women in Middle Eastern History focuses on the changing boundaries between male and female in the Middle East and North Africa through...

Radical Islamic Fundamentalism: The Ideological and Political Discourse of Sayyid Qutb.
April 1, 1994... By Salem Ahmad Tairan. Texte und Studien zur Orientalistik, Bd. 8. Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1992. Pp. 265. DM 49.80. The book under review is the last (so far) in a series of limited Semitic onomastic presentations intended to spread the...

Die Personennamen in den altsabaischen Inschriften: Ein Beitrag zur altsudarabischen Namengebung.
April 1, 1994... By Ahmad S. Mousall. Beirut: American University of Beirut Press, 1992. Pp. 262. $20 (paper). Studies of Islamic movements often focus either on the transitory political conditions which explain their radicalism, or treat them as...

Story-Telling Techniques in the Arabian Nights.
April 1, 1994... By David Pinault. Studies in Arabic Literature, 15. Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1992. Pp. xi + 262. HF1 115, $65.75. David Pinault's book is a significant contribution to the study of the Arabian Nights, and, more generally, a valuable study of...

Modern Literature in the Near and Middle East: 1850-1970.
April 1, 1994... Edited by Robin Ostle. Routledge/SOAS Contemporary Politics and Culture in the Middle East. London and New York: Routledge, 1991. Pp. x + 248. $59.95. The volume under review is a survey in the classic sense of the word, with both the...

Language Change and National Integration: Rural Migrants in Khartoum.
April 1, 1994... By Catherine Miller and Al-Amin Abu-Manga. Khartoum: Khartoum University Press, 1992. Pp. xi + 208. More than a hundred languages are currently spoken in the Sudan. When it received its independence in 1956, Arabic was declared the sole...

Al-Hind: The Making of the Indo-Islamic World, vol. 1: Early Medieval India and the Expansion of Islam: 7th-11th Centuries.
April 1, 1994... By Andre Wink. Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1991. Pp. viii + 396. HF1 165, $82.50. This book is the first of a projected series of five volumes in which Dr. Wink intends to examine the changes which resulted from the Islamization of South and...

Drei Schriften des Theosophen von Tirmid: Das Buch vom Leben der Gottesfreunde; Ein Antwortschreiben nach Sarahs; Ein Antworschreiben nach Rayy.
April 1, 1994... Edited by Bernd Radtke. Bibliotheca Islamica, Bd. 35/a. Beirut and Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1991. Pp. 78 (German) + 295 (Arabic). DM 68. Do not be deterred, or attracted, for the wrong reason: the "theosopher" of Tirmidh is, of...

Tshad ma sde bdun rgyan gyi me tog.
April 1, 1994... By Bcom ldan Rigs pa'i ral gri. Edited by Rdo rje rgyal po. Pe cin: Krung go'i bod kyi shes rig dpe skrun khang, 1991. Pp. 521. Rmb 14. Our knowledge of the early development of Tibetan Buddhist epistemology and logic (tshad ma) is...

Xizang Wenwu Jingcui /Bod kyi rig dngos snying btus, A Well Selected Collection of Tibetan Cultural Relics.~
April 1, 1994... Edited by The Management Committee of Cultural Relics of the Tibetan Autonomous Region. Peking: Gugong Bowuyuan Zijingcheng Chubanshe, 1992. Pp. 187. Rmb 280. This impressively and exquisitely produced book is a catalogue of an exhibit of...

Textkritische Bemerkungen zur Kathaka-Samhita.
April 1, 1994... By Martin Mittwede. Alt- und Neu-Indische Studien 37. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1989. Pp. 160. DM 38. The Maitrayani Samhita (MS) and the Kathaka Samhita (KS) are the most unjustly ignored texts of the Vedic corpus. Though both are...

A Reference Grammar of Classical Tamil Poetry: 150 B.C.-Pre-fifth/Sixth Century A.D..
April 1, 1994... By V. S. Rajam Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1992. Pp. xvi + 1101. $45. It has frequently been pointed out that among India's many living languages, Tamil has the longest continuous literary history, a history approximately...

A Word Index of Old Tamil Cankam Literature.
April 1, 1994... By Thomas Lehmann and Thomas Malten. Beitrage zur Sudasienforschung, Bd. 147. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1992. Pp. xi + 425. It has frequently been pointed out that among India's many living languages, Tamil has the longest continuous...

A Reference Grammar of Mundari.
April 1, 1994... By Toshiki Osada. Pp. 168. Tokyo: Tokyo University of Foreign Studies (Institute for the Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa), 1992. Although this is not quite the stand-alone resource its title might lead one to expect, it is...

The Stanzas on Vibration: The Spandakarika with Four Commentaries, the Spandasmdoha by Ksemaraja, the Spandavrtti by Kallatabhatta, the Spandavivrti by Rajanaka Rama, the Spandapradipika by Bhagavadutpala.
April 1, 1994... Translated with an introduction and exposition by MARK S. G. Dyczkowski. Albany: State Univeristy of New York Press, 1992. Pp. xx + 427. $49.50 (cloth); $16.95 (paper). This translation of the Spandakdrika, the basic text of the Spanda...

The Aphorisms of Siva: The Sivasutra with Bhaskara's Commentary, the Varttika.
April 1, 1994... By Mark S. G. Dyckowski. SUNY Series in Tantric Studies. Albany: 1992. Pp. xvii + 247. $12.95 (paper). This is the first translation into English of Bhaskara's interesting commentary on the Sivasutras of Vasugupta. The Sutras, a work of...

Music and Musical Thought in Early India.
April 1, 1994... By Lewis Rowell. Chicago Studies in Ethnomusicology, edited by Philip V. Bohlman and Bruno Nettl. Chicago: The Univeristy of Chicago Press, 1992. Pp. 409; tables, notes, glossary, bibliography, index. $59 (cloth); $23.95 (paper). For many...

After the Masters: Contemporary Indian Architecture.
April 1, 1994... By Vikram Bhatt and Peter Scriver. Ahmedabad: Mapin Publishing, 1990. Pp. 222, 83 drawings, 268 plates, 103 in color, map. $45. Trying to present diverse contemporary architecture is a difficult task at the best of times, when there is an...

Roles and Rituals for Hindu Women.
April 1, 1994... By Julia Leslie. Madison, Wis.: Farleigh Dickinson University Press, 1991. Pp. 267, 19 plates and 4 figures. $38.50. This collection of ten articles, edited by Julia Leslie, grows out of a conference, "Women and Indian Religion," organized...

Mesocosm: Hinduism and the Organization of a Traditional Newar City in Nepal.
April 1, 1994... By Robert I. Levy with the collaboration of Kedar Raj Rajopadhyaya. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1990. Pp. xxii + 829, 14 maps, 36 figures, [8] plates. This anthropological study of Bhaktapur is certainly one of...

The Srivaisnava Theological Dispute: Manavalamamuni and Vedanta Desika.
April 1, 1994... By Patricia Y. Mumme. Madras: New Era 1988. xvi + 303. Rs 150. Gone are the days when the Visistadvaita Vedanta of Ramanuja (11th century) could be studied simply as a school of Sanskrit philosophy, a devotional counterpart to the Advaita...

Devotional Literature in South Asia: Current Research, 1985-1988.
April 1, 1994... Edited by R. S. McGregor. University of Cambridge Oriental Publications, no. 46. Cambridge: Cambrige University Press, 1992. Pp. xv + 322. $99.95. Like many other collections of conference papers, this is a mixed bag, but anyone concerned...

The Poet Shen Yueh (441-513): The Reticent Marquis.
April 1, 1994... By Richard B. Mather, Princeton: University Press, 1988. Pp. xi + 260, with maps. $42.50. A study of the third to mid-sixth centuries in Chinese history, a period generally designated as the Six Dynasties, is a great undertaking. In both...

Confucian Discourse and Chu Hsi's Ascendancy.
April 1, 1994... By Hoyt Cleveland Tillman, Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1992. Pp. 328. Historians frequently work from more recent times backwards, trying to account for the ways things turned out. As a result, people, ideas, institutions, events...

Anthology of Modern Chinese Poetry.
April 1, 1994... Edited and translated by Michelle Yeh. New Haven: Conn.: Yale University Press, 1992. Pp. lv + 245. $35. Do NOT buy this book; wait until the paperback comes out, as certainly it soon should. Not that the hardbound edition is not worth the...

A Change in Dynasties: Loyalism in Thirteenth Century China.
April 1, 1994... By Jennifer W. Jay. Studies on East Asia, 18. Bellingham, Wash.: Center for East Asian Studies, Western Washington University, 1991. Pp. xiv + 309. $35. The topic of loyalism at the time of change of dynasties has always fascinated Western...

The Willow in Autumn: Ryutei Tanehiko: 1783-1842.
April 1, 1994... By Harvard-Yenching Monograph Series, 35. Cambridge, Mass.: 1992. Pp. vi + 291 + illus. $28. The Willow in Autumn is in many respects a model literary biography: Markus has an elegant and appealing style and a judicious approach to...

The Tao and the Logos: Literary Hermeneutics, East and West.
April 1, 1994... By Zhang Longxi. Post-contemporary Interventions. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1992. Pp. xix + 238. $16.95 (paper). "Let your speech be imprinted with silence, and your silence with good timing," said old Solon of Athens. Zhang...

East Asian Art and American Culture: A Study in International Relations.
April 1, 1994... East Asian Art and American Culture: A Study in international Relations. By WARREN I. COHEN. New York: COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS, 1992. Pp. xxi + 264. $32.50. Warren 1. Cohen's volume might be better titled, A Narrative History of the Growth...

Twentieth-Century Chinese Painting.
April 1, 1994... Twentieth-Century Chinese Painting. Edited by KAO. New York:OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS, 1988. Pp. xxxii +258 + illustrations. Twentieth-century Chinese Painting is a collection of papers originally presented at the Symposium on Twentieth-century...

Contradictions: Artistic Life, the Socialist State and the Chinese Painter Li Huasheng.
April 1, 1994... Contradictions: Artistic Life, the Socialist State and the Chinese Painter Li Huasheng. By JEROME SILBERGELD, with Seattle: UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON PRESS, 1993. Pp. xxii + 242 + illustrations. Twentieth-century Chinese Painting is a...