American Oriental Society
ABSTRACTS OF COMMUNICATIONS
Presented at the 209th Annual Meeting
21-24 March 1999-Baltimore

(Listed in order of presentation)

 

 

 

Peter T. Daniels

If the Greeks ``Needed'' to Write the Vowels, How Come the Iranians Didn't?

W. Randall Garr

`Image' and `Likeness' in the Inscription from Tell Fakhariyeh

Eleonora Cussini

Aramaic Inscription from Babylonia: A Palæographic study of the Murasû texts

Christa Müller-Kessler

The Babylonian Legacy in Aramaic Incantation Texts of Late Antiquity

The result of this study stands in contrast to former opinions that the incantation formulas of Late Antiquity are more closely connected with the religion of the scribe, the script and the dialect, in which the formulas are composed and written. The method of analyzing and interpreting the incantation texts has to be reconsidered in light of the new evidence

Calvert Watkins

An Indo-European Divine Name in Anatolian and Celtic?

(a) South and West Anatolian	Tarhunt-s	(u-nt > unt)
	Tarhwant-s	(old full grade)
	Tarhunt-as	(thematicized)
	Tahunz-as	(hypostasis or -nt-io- )
	Tarhunt-i(ya)s	(post-Com. Anatolian -ya- )
(b) Central Anatolian	Tarhunna-s.

(a) can be exactly equated with the Vedic participle and divine epithet t\skew4\acute[`u]rvan `overpowering' (Eichner, IE ^*terh₂-). For (b) there is ample Indo-European evidence for a suffix of variable form specifically in divine names, containing -u- and -n(o)- .

We also find a set of derivatives of the name of the Stag God, derived from the word for `horn', parallel to those in the name of the Storm God:

(a)	K(u)runt-s
	later
	Runt-s
	K(u)runt-as
	Runz-as
	Runt-iyas.

The suffix of Tarunnas recurs exactly in the Gaulish name of the Celtic Stag God

(b)	C]emunnos,

also from the word for `horn'. It would be improper methodology to postulate an Indo European Stag God on the basis of an ``equation" of Anatolian K(u)runt- and Celtic Cernunno- , and the iconic similarity of their respective images belongs to the plane of universals. Yet one might imagine an inherited portmanteau semantic structure for a divine name or epithet HORN (-u- ) + possessive, OVERCOME (-u- ) + possessive, which could be independently implemented in the given tradition. Such reconstructions provide a necessary flexibility in the deten-nination and specification of semantic structures in many culturally important areas of the lexicon, as Benveniste in Le vocabulaire des institutions indo-européennes (1969) was at pains to show. It remains the case that the unique implementation of the possessive suffixes as

OVERCOME + -unt-	(Luvian)
OVERCOME + -unno-	(Hittite)

HORN + -unt-	(Luvian)
HORN + -unno-	(Celtic)

is a striking coincidence, and the existence of an Indo-European Stag God cannot be disproved.

H. Craig Melchert

Hittite damnassara- domestic

Furthermore, damnassara - at least once designates `men' and also occurs as the epithet of various animals: male goats, a male sheep, and snakes. In one instance it appears to contrast explicitly with gimras `of the field/open country'. The total evidence for damnassara - argues that it is an adjective with a basic meaning `domestic, of the household'. The application to animals is straightforward. The men so designated are probably not servants, but `household members' (Grk.  oke[^(i)]oi, Lyc. prñnezehi -). The Damnassara -deities are protective spirits of internal spaces, dwellings and temples, comparable in function to the Latin penates . Although these probably are goddesses, the use of damnassara- to qualify males suggests that the suffix -(a)ssara- here is not that marking females, but that which forms various secondary derivatives (such as ispantuzziassara- `libation vessel' < ispantuzzi- `libation'). The base ^* damn(a)- is itself surely a derivative of the PIE word for `house' ^*dóm-/dém- .

David Testen

Conjugating the ``Prefixed Stative'' Verbs of Akkadian

What is the source of the peculiarities surrounding these verbs? Synchronic irregularities frequently provide insights into the nature of earlier stages of a given language. It is suggested here that, however curious they may be from the standpoint of historical Akkadian, the shapes of ``know" and ``have" reflect the regular preterite-formation processes of a prehistorical stage of the language. An investigation into the reconstruction of Semitic verbal inflection suggests that the ide and isu which we find in the documented language have been left stranded by the expansion of what has now become the generalized pattern-i.e., they originated as preterite forms built from ``weak" roots of a sort which has not otherwise survived into Akkadian.

Alan Kaye

Afroasiatic and Alleged Nostratic Etymologies

Our conclusion is that there is no convincing evidence in favor of the Nostratic macrofamily.

Timothy C. Wong

Commentaries and Evolutionary Xiaoshuo Texts

Fang-yi Chao

On the Origin of the Aspect Markers in Chinese

Charles Yim-tze Kwong

Man and Religious Nature in Ancient Chinese Poetry

With the development of imaginative thought and language and Nature's domestication into a relationship of agricultural affinity, this response took on a supernatural dimension, as seen in religious incantations and songs expressing worship of an animistic world. The actual religiousness of the sentiment is uncertain, for the practically-directed prayers clearly arose from the hopes and needs of primitive livelihood. Seemingly exuding a mystical power in the course of singing and dance, such religious verse reflects a dual attitude to Nature: an appeasement of fearsome nature spirits, yet also an attempt through ritual to harness them to serve human purposes. Empirical agents affecting livelihood became deified spirits, enjoying sacrifices but summoned by words of authority to serve man's will. Majestic, supernatural Nature could apparently be mastered through intelligence and language. Like primitive poetry itself, visualizations of Nature in early China blend secular and religious, real and imaginary elements together.

This topic forms part of a half-written book that will be the first comprehensive study of the interflows shaping the Chinese vision of Nature and its poetic expression over time, and of Nature's total literary import on multiple planes. Related to the topic of this particular paper are a few articles and a book in Chinese on nature worship, but their focus is not on poetry.

Denis Sinor

Women in Medieval Inner Asia

Ruth I. Meserve

Punishments for Livestock Theft in Inner Asia

Punishments for livestock theft must, however, be dealt with on two separate planes. The first included those punishments applied under law by a judge or court to a ``convicted" thief or band of thieves. The second operated on the level of public opinion, capable of castigating the rustler(s) or, at the other extreme, rewarding or praising the clever thief, who managed to thwart the authorities. Whether operating under legal institutions or public opinion, both were often forced to consider the ethnic origins of victim and thief as well as their positions-official versus non-official, rich versus poor, etc.-adding fascinating elements to the equation of guilt related to punishment.

Barbara Kellner-Heinkele

Russia and the Nogays in the 18^th Century: Documents from the Arkhiv Vneshney Politiki Rossiyskoy Imperii in Moscow

In spite of the solid work of Russian scholars, published mainly in the 19^th century and focusing on Russian-Crimean Tatar relations in the 16^th to l8^th centuries, not much is known on the political, economic and social factors that determined the Crimean Tatar khanate's interior situation in the 18^th century. On the basis of so far unpublished documents from the Arkhiv Vneshney Politiki Rossiyskoy Imperii in Moscow, this paper attempts to show the important role the Nogay tribes played in the khanate's disintegration from within and their impact on Russian policy towards the Crimean Tatars before 1783.

Majd Y. Al-Mallah

Panegyric Poetry and Court Ceremonial: al-Mutanabb¯i's ``Victory Ode''

Elizabeth M. Bergman

Metrics by the Meter in Ibn al-H¯ajib and al-Khazraj¯i

The topic considered here is metrics (al-`ur¯ud ). This paper examines two texts: al-Maqsad al-jal¯l f¯i `ilm al-Khal¯il by Ibn al-H¯ajib (d.  1248) and al-Qas¯ida al-khazrajiyya by al-Khazraj¯i (d. 1228 or 1229). The two texts share a tripartite reminiscent of the classical Arabic qas¯da and also of the treatment of metrics found as early as Ibn `Abd Rabbihi's (d. 940) al-`Iqd al-Far¯id . They begin with the building blocks of meter, move on to the 16 meters of classical poetry, and close with a discussion of rhyme. They differ, however, in their treatment of the topic. Ibn al-H¯ajib grounds his text on dialogue, beginning with an introduction that addresses the novice and proceeds through definitions and lists. Al-Khazraj¯i, in contrast, relies on an oblique, highly allusive approach directed to an advanced student. Differences between these texts result, thus, from the level of the learner addressed rather than from differences in style or content. For all of the differences between them, each texts skillfully evokes the scholarly tradition toward which it seeks to guide the learner and in which its authors is clearly an active participant

Nitza Maoz

The Emergence of a System of Arabic Books for Children, 1826-1918, and Its Role in Building the Child Image

The new education systems produced new generations of enlightened individuals who participated in creating a modern secular cultural establishment. This establishment played a major role in Arabic Ottoman culture. The texts prepared its readers to utilize and produce books and newspapers, including translations and adaptations from Western literature.

These modern texts for children and youth had a great impact on society as a whole, for they were used to prepare them to become ``modern" rather than ``traditional" adults. They also helped modem literary Arabic become accessible to a broader sector of the population as a main medium of expression in secular culture and literature.

This research, which includes approximately 500 books for children, covers (or more accurately: uncovers) for the first time a ``forgotten corpus: Arabic texts for children published in the 19^th century". Because this type of research has not been done before, its relationship with other scholarships is mostly marginal. However, it opens new research options, which were not previously considered.

John C. Eisele

Mistaking the Map for the Territory: Representations of Arabic in Arab grammatical and modern linguistic traditions

The difference between traditional approaches to Arabic grammar and modernist approaches may be described in terms of the differing values (and stigmas) that each places on the subject of their study and on its manner of representation. For example it may be said that Arab grammarians valued the linguistic purity of Arabic and stigmatized linguistic diversity, ostensibly (as the stories of early grammatical tradition go) to protect and maintain the proper reading and understanding of the Quran. However, in the formative years of the tradition much more value was placed upon speech elicited from tribal `rawis' from specific selected areas of the Arabian peninsula than was placed on the language in the Quran, to the extent that certain speech styles found in the Quran were judged not acceptable as the basis for analogical rule formation in the grammar. In other words, their actual practice (derived from the social and cultural concerns of individual grammarians, many of whom were non-Arab) contradicted somewhat their stated goals.

Modern theoretical linguistics, on the other hand, has tended to value linguistic diversity (by maintaining an interest in both official and unofficial forms of language) and has stigmatized attempts at linguistic purism. However the actual practice of theoretical linguists has tended to stigmatize the diversity of representation and has privileged the representation of a pure or idealized speaker competence. This is reflected in modernist linguistic representations of Arabic (especially Modern Standard Arabic), which often turn out to be little more than translations of the grammatical rules of Arab grammarians into modern theoretical terminology.

I will exemplify each of these problems with examples taken from the literature, and will point out the ways in which a critically reflexive understanding of these different approaches helps not just to clarify their limitations but also leads to a renewed appreciation of their insights and contributions to understanding the Arabic linguistic situation.

Signe Cohen

The Katha Upanisad Reconsidered

Natalie Gummer

Potent language: Translating the Heart S¯utra

Such a close reading provides resources for reconsidering the relationship between the communication of meaning and the creation of power in processes of translation in historical Buddhist communities, and suggests that we approach the study of Buddhist texts in terms of not only what they say, but also what they do.

Maria Hibbets

Altruism, Violence, and Generosity: Buddhist, Hindu, and Jain reflections on the gift of fearlessness ( abhayad¯ana )

The gift of fearlessness involves either rescuing beings from violence threatened by others, or abstaining from violence oneself. In the second sense, the gift of fearlessness suggests that merely refraining from inspiring fear in others can be considered a gift or an act of generosity towards them. The intersection in this gift of two very different virtues, generosity and non-violence, is illuminating for understanding South Asian views on human nature, social obligations, and the implications of the gift itself. Moreover, the use of the language of gift-giving for a conscious act of self-restraint brings together in a curious way two often opposed religious values in Indic religion: positive, merit-making activity on the one hand, and renunciation and withdrawal from activity on the other.

Jerome H. Bauer

The Origin of the Harivam\'sa Lineage

The paper discusses the story as an exception to the general karmic rules of rebirth, as an articulation of conflicted feelings about deathbed conversion, and as a ``theodicy," a characteristically Jaina solution to the problem of evil and unjust suffering. The paper also discusses briefly the theme of incest in stories of karmically linked twins.

George Thompson

On the Language of the Da¯euuas

In this paper a new hypothesis relating to the language of da¯euuas will be explored. Without denying the general legitimacy of the standard view, which relates the Avestan phenomenon to the more general Indo-European one, the dichotomy between the ``language of gods" vs. the ``language of men," it is argued here that this set of da¯evic terms may refer to, or imply an awareness of, a non-Avestan language or dialect. I suggest that this language is Vedic, known internally as the ``language of the gods" [daiv¯i v¯ac], and by no means a language unknown in early Avestan texts. More specifically, I would suggest that the ``Vedic" that I claim to be known to speakers of Old Avestan is specifically the formulaic poetic language out of which the Rgveda itself was constructed. As all students of Old Avestan know, this poetic language formed the fundamental background to the innovative poetry of Zarathustra's G¯ath¯as.

Evidence of mutual knowledge between speakers of Old Avestan and speakers of Old Vedic will be offered in support of this claim.

Paul-Alain Beaulieu

Babylonian Uranography

Francesca Rochberg

On Prediction in Babylonian Science: The Case of celestial divination

This paper investigates the nature of prediction as one aspect common to a number of texts counted among the Babylonian tradition of ``science." The success of late mathematical astronomy has been measured in terms of the accuracy of its predictions of dates and positions of celestial phenomena, and the mere fact of its predictiveness, as explicated by O. Neugebauer and others, has earned it a place in the history of positive science. The mathematical astronomical science of late Babylonia did not emerge from the head of Zeus, fully mature, but in several respects traces back to earlier tradition, to early astronomy and to divination. To my knowledge the way in which prediction itself formed an important connecting link from early to late tradition and how it was transformed from its role in a system such as celestial omens to one so different from it as the ephemerides of the late tupsar En¯uma Anu Enlil 's has not been investigated.

John M. Steele

Eclipse Prediction in Late Babylonian Astronomical Texts

Ktziah Spanier

Aspects of Feminine Authority: The ana abb¯uti Texts from Nuzi

It has been suggested that this clause was meant to protect the woman after the testator's death, or that it gave her the authority to act as guardian for her minor children. An examination of the texts indicates, however, that the ultimate heirs were not always minors, and that the woman was not necessarily their mother. In many instances, the authority vested in her far exceeded her need for protection.

I propose to demonstrate that the ana ab¯uti clause functioned to make the woman the effective head of the family, and that her authority was commensurate with many of the patriarchal duties and privileges.

Raymond Westbrook

Hard Times: CT 45 37

Peggy J. Boden

``If the workmanship of that god is not suitable for repair... you send it to Ea''

Timothy J. Collins

Theurgical Elements in Babylonian Medical Incantations

Some have assumed that all medical incantations were thought to be theurgically efficacious, and only seem to make little or no attempt to persuade a god to help because they follow rhetorical principles peculiar to magic, or else because they preserve forms from an earlier, non-theurgical conception of magic, which have been transposed into theurgy and endowed with a new meaning.

In this paper, however, I argue that Old Babylonian medical incantations were composed to be efficacious automatically, but were subsequently reinterpreted as being efficacious theurgically. I suggest that this change does not reflect a shift in Babylonian conceptions of magic over time, but rather medical incantations' transition from the oral to the written tradition.

Anne Marie Kitz

Divination in Ancient Near Eastern Religion

While both positions may be valid, they tend to overemphasize the contribution of human beings to the general process. Since divination presumes some form of divine communication, it may be productive to shift the focus from an analysis of human actions to one that examines the range of divine activity. To do this one can begin with the hypothesis that divination was based on the presupposition that all divine action caused material reaction . Since the deities were free to manipulate any element of the created world, then all things, animate and inanimate alike, could at any time become the conduit through which divine sentiments were expressed. Divination is a human response to this theological principle. It seeks to study divine activity as manifested by its affects on the physical universe. Consequently, the principal role of a diviner is to authenticate and, most importantly, interpret the relevance of these heaven-sent omens.

A classification of divination strategies according to this premise illustrates the breadth of the deities' transcendent nature. Additionally, the degree of divine power involved in material contact correlates with physical effects that range from violence yielding deformation and scars, to gentle provocation producing unusual behavior. These effects constitute the signs that are then interpreted by the diviner. A brief review of one major category, anthropromancy, the divine manipulation of human beings, and its subsets demonstrates that human beings experienced the divine in a manner that was shared by all elements of the physical universe.

Jack M. Sasson

Ancestors Divine

James Evans

Cycle Theory in Ancient Literature

The Sumerian King List dates to circa 2000 BC. After the flood, 23 kings ruled for 24,510 years, 3 months, 3 one-half days, the remnant of 24,513.5 years. It is twelve h-cycles of 2043.6 years, equal to 746130 ^* 12 days. 746130 is the product of the numbers 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 17, 19

Herodotus writes that the number of Persians who crossed from Asia was 5,283,220. This is 100 times the probable actual number, it is equal to 7 ^* 47 ^* 71 ^* (h-cycle 226.175) days, and also 249.5 h-cycles of 57.97 years.

Herodotus states that the Egyptians calculated 341 generations to their history, a reference to the 341.3 year h-cycle.

Diodorus Siculus quotes Egyptian history as `470 kings and 5 queens', taken as 4700 ^* 226.175 days, less 5 ^* 360 days, the date of the Rosetta stone from 3102 BC, the start of the Egyptian calendar and epoch of the 36.5 year h-cycle.

The list of the gifts in Esdras 1:7 read as a linear string is 3326357. This is 14707 h-cycles of 226.175 days. It is also 112641 lunar months and 1029 m-cycles of the rotation of the lunar orbit.

During the reign of Ammizaduga of Babylon a series of observations of the planet Venus was recorded as the observations of Ninsianna Ahutum, the ``other" Venus. The ninth year of this King is named, ``Year of the Golden Throne". In this year, 1575 BC, The epoch of this `Second Venus' h-cycle of 226.175 days coincided with the summer solstice, at the same time as the conjunction of the planet Venus.

The apocryphal Book of Adam and Eve, in Ethiopian, speaks of Adam and Eve having sex 226 days, four hours after the Creation, a creative explanation of ``Investment Day"

Melinda Zeder

The Role of Pastoralism in Developing Specialized Urban Economies in the Ancient Near East

Anne Porter and Thomas L. McClellan

Funerary Practices and Pastoralism at Third Millennium Tell Banat

Michael D. Danti and Richard L. Zettler

Pastoralism and the Evolution of the Tell es-Sweyhat (Syria) Settlement System in the Third Millennium bc

Christine K. Kimbrough

Spinning a Yarn: Textile production in third millennium bce northern Mesopotamia

Paul W. Kroll

Forgotten Poets of the T'ang Dynasty, III: Liu Shen-hsü

Michael R. Drompp

The T'ang Debate on the Settlement of the Türks

Jonathan Pease

Why Couldn't Prime Minister Wang Ride through the Palace Gate?

Joseph E. Lowry

Ijm¯a` in Sh¯afi`¯i's Ris¯ala

The place of ijm¯a` in Sh¯afi`¯i's legal epistemology in the Ris¯ala shows that problems which require recourse to ijm¯a` are, by definition, difficult and meet the attention of specialists rather than the community at large. Moreover, the example-problems in the Ris¯ala in which Sh¯afi`¯i appeals to ijm¯a` show that there is no principled difference between the ijm¯a` of the `¯amma and that of the ahl al-`ilm and, most significantly, that that the two terms are even used synonymously.

Given the logic of the legal-theoretical content of the Ris¯ala , found primarily in Sh¯afi`¯i's concept of the bay¯an , it is surprising that Sh¯afi`¯i did not do away with ijm¯a` altogether. There are, however, hints in the Ris¯ala that he was moving in that direction and in a later work, the Jim¯a` al-`ilm , he argues that one can dispense with ijm¯a` entirely.

Devin Stewart

Notes on the Early History of the Us¯ul al-Fiqh Genre

M. G. Carter

Legal Reasoning in Tenth-Century Grammar-A Missing Link

Norman Zide

The Tense/aspect Systems in the Gta? (South Munda) Language

The two `past' tenses, the `-ge past', and the `-ke past' ( -tI in Hill/Riverside Gta?) are distinguished-usually contrasted, but in a few cases (e.g. interrogation ) only one of the form occurs-in a largeish-and confusing-number of dimensions-tense, aspect, direction, negation, focus, interrogation (see Kh. Mahapatra , and Zide and Mahapatra's unpublished papers). It is only recently that N. Zide found that some clarification in the understanding of these `pasts' can be made if we set up two different systems, one operating in the traditional tales collected in Mahapatra and Zide (Gta? Texts) and the other elsewhere, i.e. in the spoken language materials collected. It turns out that -ge/-ke usage in the tales-exclusive of certain limited `everywhere' functions (negation, interrogation, tense/aspect marking in a few auxiliaries-is largely discourse-driven. The choice of -ge or -ke doesn't indicate the tense/aspect, etc. meanings it does elsewhere, but does mark discourse structure segments. So far as I have observed-not that there is much data or analysis on the subject-nothing like this has been observed elsewhere in South Munda. (On North Munda I reserve judgment pending further examination of the - extensive - data.)

Gregory D. S. Anderson

A New Classification of the Munda Languages: Evidence from the verb

Bhattacharya, S. 1975. A new classification of Munda. Indo-Iranian Journal 17: 97-101.

Zide, N. and D. Stampe. 1964. The position of Kharia-Juang in the Munda family. Studies in Indian Linguistics (Emeneau's 60th birthday volume): 370-7.

Kengo Harimoto

On the Manuscripts of the P¯atañjalayoga\'s¯atravivarana

Availability of five manuscripts will be reported. The discussion will include characteristics of each manuscript and the relationship among them. Also reported will be to what extent the original text can be restored utilizing the manuscript materials.

The text was first published in 1952 by the Government Oriental Manuscript Library, Madras. In 1968, Paul Hacker published an article, ``\'Sa\.nkara der Yogin und \'Sa\.nkara der Advaitin," and suggested that it is an earlier work of the famous Hindu philosopher. Since the publication of Hacker's article, authenticity problem has been one of the most interesting questions among the students of Indian philosophy. Interests into the text is so high that already more than one translation, including that of the entire text has been published. However, the text critical problems in the printed edition is easily noticeable and pointed by scholars, such as Albrecht Wezler. He, not only attracted interests of scholars to the text as a resourceful material in studying Indian philosophy, but also pointed out text critical problems of the printed edition, and reported the existence of two Malayalam manuscripts. The text is even considered not suitable for serious studies due to the lack of confidence into the printed edition. A new improved edition based on available manuscript materials is of urgent necessity.

The paper will conclude that all the five available manuscripts can be traced to a single archetype, and that despite the fact that the archetype already contained errors, it is possible to prepare much improved and philologically useful edition utilizing the materials.

Masato Kobayashi

Deocclusion of Sanskrit dh after Front Vowels

It becomes commoner, but still not regular in early MIA languages such as A\'sokan or P¯ali; and puzzlingly, dh reflecting PIIr. ^*d^h is sometimes preserved or restituted while the corresponding Skt. form has h : PIIr. ^*id^ha > Vedic ihá :: P¯ali idha `here' besides less frequent iha , A\'sokan (Gi. and Dh., whereas Sh. iha ), \'S., Mg. and ¯Av. idha . Here I try to find conditions triggering the deocclusion of dh in Sanskrit and propose phonological or phonetic motivation for it.

In most cases the deocclusion seems to be an idiosyncratic property of the morpheme in question: For example, while the PIE ending ^*-med^hoy always shows up as -mahe in Skt. and PIE ^*-d^hí as Skt.  -hí in most postvocalic contexts, infinitive -dhyai (see Rix [1976] for its PIE origin) never has a form with h , nor does the adverbial suffix -dh¯a `-fold', and the PIIr. locatival suffix ^*-d^ha is -dha in some words and -ha in others. Due to such apparent irregularity and lexical idiosyncrasy, it has traditionally been understood as pr¯akrtism or dialectal (e.g. Meillet (1912/3] p. 123 ``les parlers du Nord-Ouest sur lesquels repose en principe la langue du Rgveda ouvraient plus ou moins régulièrement dh et bh intervocaliques en h "). Wackernagel (1896) § 218 proposes conditions such as the context _wd[  V or the position after an unaccented vowel, but the paucity of the examples and insufficient regularity make it hard to call them laws. In the case of the 2sg. imperative suffix -dhí ~ hí in forms such as krdhi , vrdhi , \'srudhí and sprdhi , minimal word size of two moras might be related to the unexpected preservation of dh , but ihí does not follow this pattern.

It should be noted that there is no case of ^*d^h retained after i in the examples of the -dhí/-hí imperatives, while -dhí is preserved in some bimoraic imperative forms after the stem-final vowels u , r and a: i `go': ihí :: krdhí , \'srudhí etc. It can be just a coincidence that there is no fidhí attested besides ihí , unlike the case of gam : gahí ~ gadhi where gadhi appears only once in the RV while there are a good many occurrences of gahí . However, if -dhí of juhudhí is to avoid sequence of h in adjacent syllables as Whitney says, then why don't we have f jahidhí ? The total absence of fidhá in Vedic should also be recalled. I would like to propose a rule of deocclusion of ^*d^h by a preceding front vowel, which are i and its diphthongs (e and ai ) in the vowel system of OIA. This can either be formulated as a palatalization rule ^*d^h > [+distributed] / [-back]  V (fed to the output filter ^*j^h > h ) or a direct deocclusion rule ^*d^h > h / [-back]  V. Apparent counterexamples like edhí are ruled out by ordering ^*az > e after this rule.

Acoustic measurements of Hindi nonsense sequences show that /d^h/ tends to be short after /i/ and /u/ than after /a/, while /i/ after voiced aspirates does not show any consistent tendency of shortening or lengthening them.

Madhav M. Deshpande

Fluidity of Early Grammatical Categories in Sanskrit

Joshua T. Katz

How the Mole Got His Name

(a)sp\acutealax (etc.). The principal line of argument rests on the linguistic, cultural, and even biological connections between moles and badger-like animals (on the latter, see Historische Sprachforschung 111 [1998] 61-82, an expansion of my talk at the AOS last year, ``The Curious Case of the Hittite Mustelid"), and I attempt to show that the morpho-phonologically obviously very similar words in Indo-European for `badger,' <sup>*</sup>tasku- and `mole,' ^*¯asku- , make their way into India along one and the same path. I also address the problem, apparently hitherto unnoticed, that the geographical distribution of talpids precludes interpreting ¯akhu as `mole.'

Richard Salomon

A Fragment of a Sanskrit Manuscript in Kharosth¯i Script Found in Xinjiang

The main point of interest in this fragment is its value as a rare specimen of a Sanskrit text in Kharosth¯i script. A few other specimens of Sanskrit or hybrid Sanskrit written in Kharosth¯ have been found among inscriptions from the Gandh¯ara region of South Asia and the wooden Kharosth¯i documents from Niya on the southern rim of the Tarim Basin, but this is the first known specimen of a Kharosth¯ manuscript in Sanskrit. But it is hardly likely to have been unique, and suggests that Kharosth¯i was at some point adapted in Buddhist circles in central Asia, and possibly also in South Asia, for writing Sanskrit texts. The recent discovery of several Kharosth¯i manuscripts in a Sanskritized form of G¯andh¯ar¯i from Bamiyan, Afghanistan, presents us with what seems to be a forerunner of such a development.

Judy Bjorkman

Writing and the Crafts: The `Great Smith' ( simug.gal)

As sensible as these suggestions are, I propose that another hypothesis may have greater merit, based in part on a phrase from the Sumerian Sargon Legend (Cooper and Heimpel, JAOS 103). In line 30, Lugalzagesi describes his SIMUG.GAL as a man who can write. This suggests that an ability to read and write, at least in some basic sense, may have been what distinguished the ``great smith" from others of the same profession.

It is not clear that the term, ``great smith," retained the same meaning over the entire temporal and geographical spans of its use, nor that GAL, when used to qualify other professions, always indicated basic literacy. Some of these additional uses of GAL, as well as some aspects of the nature of the interface between literacy and the crafts, will be reviewed.

Glenn R. Magid

Quantitative Reflections on the `Temple-State'

An opposing model of the Girsu data took shape in the former Soviet Union. There, scholars like Struve, Tyumenev, and Diakonoff, sought to place contradictory evidence, e.g., the data deriving from land-sale documents, the so-called ``ancient kudurrus," within an evolutionary model, grounded in the historical-materialist paradigm. The model which developed out of their researches emphasized the limitations of the extant data-base, and situated the phenomenon of temple-households strictly within the urban sphere. Outside the cities, it was alleged, settlement, land tenure, and governance, were based on ancient kinship patterns.

In recent years the temple-state controversy has been revisited in the work of a number of scholars, Foster, Renger, and Steinkeller prominently among them. At present, a consensus has not been reached in the Assyriological literature.

My paper will examine the quantitative basis for both models. I will focus on sources pertaining to temple land-holdings, in an effort to define, more rigorously than has been done in the past, both the physical extent of the household as well as the social and economic relations adhering in its system of land-tenure. In light of my observations, I will conclude with a critique of the dominant models.

Atsuko Hattori

A Textile Archive from Ur III Nippur

Thus, for example, the textile industry has been extensively studied by Jacobsen, Waetzoldt and Maekawa, with the focus on the rich administrative archives from Ur and Lagas. However, the much smaller textile archive from Nippur of about 200 texts spanning the later years of Sulgi to the early years of Ibbi-Sîn, has been relatively overlooked. This paper, therefore, will firstly identify about 40 of these texts as belonging to a coherent archive of a female official named Ummi-tabat, and concentrated in Amar-Sîn years 8, 9, and Su-Sîn year 1. Ummi-tabat worked for Sat-Sîn, the daughter of Sulgi as a supervisor (ugula) of weavers. The archive consists largely of receipts of raw wool and the delivery-records of the finished garments registered in her name and marked with impressions of her seal. The paper will then examine both the ramifications of the archive for our understanding of the socio-economic structure of the Ur III period and the implications of its probable archaeological context, Mound X in western Nippur.

Tonia Sharlach

The Bala of the Province of Lagash in Ur III Times

An outline of the bala system was provided by W.W. Hallo, in his 1960 article, ``A Sumerian Amphictyony." While other scholars, such as Steinkeller (in an article called ``The Administrative and Economic Organization of the Ur III State: The Core and the Periphery") have investigated the problem, a detailed study using evidence from all of the three major Ur III archives has been lacking. In this paper, I will summarize data from my dissertation, showing that each year approximately one half of a province's total economic output was sent to the central government, which then redistributed the goods as needed.

The province of Lagash, probably the largest in the Ur III state, had the longest bala obligations. In this paper, I will examine the evidence for the bala of Lagash, including the form of their bala payments, the locations to which the payments were sent and the timing of the payments

William W. Hallo

Carcasses for the Capital

John M. Russell

A Remarkable House at Til Barsip

The wall in this area was painted with a half life-size image of Ishtar standing on a lion. She faces towards a niche paved with an ablution slab, upon which was a peculiar mudbrick platform, riddled with concealed cavities that were evidently designed to contain liquids. The ensemble, which seems to be unique in Assyrian archæology, is apparently a libation installation in front of a divine image. I will venture some preliminary speculations about the chronology and function of this room. Additional thoughts and comparanda from the audience will be most welcome.

Clemens Daniel Reichel

The `Seal of the Ruler' at Eshnunna (Tell Asmar)

This analysis, therefore, supports the idea of a connection between image, ideology and function of a seal and offers some new and unsuspected insights into this relationship.

Samuel M. Paley

The Northwest Palace of Ashurnasirpal at Nimrud. A Multimedia interactive publication project.
http://www.learningsites.com/NWPalace/NWPalhome.html

Since the publication of the volumes that document the theoretical reconstruction of the Northwest Palace of Ashurnasirpal II at Nimrud, Baghdader Forschungen 2, 10, and 14, (and the publication of several previously-unknown examples), is now complete, it has become possible to consider other ways of bringing this palace to the notice of the public and scholarly community. This paper will introduce a new project which will bring together, for the first time, all the new extant materials and research, using leading-edge computer-graphics technologies, to create a multimedia, interactive research tool.

The purpose of this paper is to explain how this process has begun to enhance our understanding of the palace in new ways, as the creation of a single database and unique computer environments proceeds. In these environments one can consider anew and in an interactive way how bas-reliefs might have looked in-situ and how the palace was utilized by its inhabitants. The creation of new drawings and the use of in situ and museum-quality photographs has already caused us to re-consider, in more detail, archaeological evidence, Assyrian architectural theory, construction methods, the interplay of natural and man-made light, iconography, ancient representational conventions, and palace decoration. Issues also being reconsidered are the integration of archaeology with architecture, history, and text transmission-linking this palace with other Assyrian monuments; the meaning of place (siting of the palace); Assyria's view of world domination as reflected in palace art; the economics that produced the resources to build palaces; religion, iconography and their relationships to the resulting built forms; the place of ``Assyrian Style" in the development of ancient art; and the place of the palace in Assyrian society.

The project will publish on DVD and the Internet (see our WEB prototype at the above address).

Samuel M. Paley, Richard P. Sobolewski, Donald H. Sanders, Alison B. Snyder (Paley delivering)

Grant Frame

The Rock Relief at Tang-i Var

K. R. Veenhof

The Archive of the Old Assyrian Trader Elamma

Gary Beckman

Matriarchy in Hatti?

Daniel A. Nevez

Seal Ownership and Use in the Kassite Period

Daniel E. Fleming

On the Yaminites and the Sim'alites at Mari

Durand offers persuasive evidence that the word Hana is first of all a word for ``bedouin", and not an individual tribe. Nevertheless, among the Yaminite and Sim'alite divisions of the Amorrite tribal peoples, the word most often means ``(our) bedouin", not the general category. Because king Zimri-Lim was a Sim'alite, and his administration was dominated by this people, a large proportion of ``Hana" occurrences refer only to Sim'alites. With this information, it is then possible to pursue the distinct organizations of Yaminite and Sim'alite tribal populations in both their mobile and their sedentary modes of existence.

In fact, while these peoples lived in very much the same way, the two divisions developed different structures, marked above all by the role of the sug¯agum or local chief. Among the Yaminites, the population led by a sug¯agum was defined by the settlement with which the tribal group was identified. The Sim'alites, in contrast, regarded their sug¯agum s as heads of the lowest identifying group above the household level in a kinship hierarchy that ignores sedentary affiliations.

Peter Feinman

The Kings of the East in Genesis 14: Chedorlaomer of Elam as Attila the Hun

This paper will not review the longstanding efforts to achieve such an identification except to note that such efforts have not been successful despite over one century of trying. Instead, this paper will address the question of why the biblical author chose to make an Elamite king the lead figure in the forces of chaos which disrupted the land and what impact such a figure would have on the intended audience.

At the recent Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale, there were two papers presented which serve as reminders of the place of Elam in Mesopotamian lore. Frances Reynolds focused on the impact on Babylonian tradition of the Elamite invasion of 155 BCE and noted the image of the Elamites ``as the most noxious of all foreign enemies." Kathryn Slanski spoke on the Babylonian entitlement narus and historiography using Nebuchadnezzar I, the hero over the Elamites, as the example for the case study.

This paper will suggest that the image of the Elamites as the ``bad guys" in Babylonia tradition was the reason why the biblical author chose to make the ``bad guy" of the story of Genesis 14 and Elamite. The audience was already familiar with that designation and would have understood immediately who in the story was wearing the black hat and who in the story was wearing the white in the ancient showdown at high noon.

Paul E. Walker

The Relationship between Chief Judge ( Q¯ad¯i al-Qud¯at ) and Chief Religious Propagandist ( D¯a`¯i al-Du`¯at ) under the Fatimids

Moreover, in North Africa, the Fatimids appointed separate q¯ad¯i s for the various cities of their empire with no hierarchy among them. During the reign of al-Mu`izz, the leading Ismaili authority on law was the famous Q¯ad¯i al-Nu`m¯an who is often said to have held the rank of chief judge (q¯ad¯i al-qud¯at ). That, however, appears unlikely. Not until Egypt did the Fatimid institute such a position in which the meaning of ``judge of judges" truly indicates the power to appoint subordinate judges.

Coincidentally, the first four men to hold this post were also chief d¯a`¯i s (the d¯a`¯i al-du`¯at ), although the connection between the two functions was poorly defined. Nevertheless, al-Maqr¯z¯ made a point of relating them in the case of the Fatimids. Starting in 406, however, these two offices were again split with the d¯a`¯iship naturally remaining in the control of the Ismailis and the basic governance of the judiciary falling to a judge who happened to be Hanbal¯i. Later efforts to recombine these positions most often failed.

In the era of the all-powerful wazirs beginning with Badr al-Jam¯al¯i, the wazir always assumed titular control of both offices. The relationship of chief q¯ad¯i to chief d¯a`¯i is thus even more difficult to investigate. Few of the later head judges were Ismaili even though there were also chief d¯a`¯i s until the end of the dynasty. A detailed list of the holders of both offices in these years is essential for understanding the connection between them.

Maya Shatzmiller

Society at War: Women and property in fifteenth-century Granada before and after the Conquest

The paper will study the legal aspects of the transaction, the notarial act itself and the legal conditions affecting women's property rights in Islamic Maliki law. I will use the results of my previous research on Muslim women's property rights in Islamic law and society, to implement the information provided by the documents. Finally I will address the question how did the continuous pressure of the Reconquista, contributed to the large amount of property held by Granadan women and how did the Granada situation influence women's economic and social status in a society at war.

Alan M. Guenther

D¯ar al-Harb or D¯ar al-Isl¯am : The Controversy regarding the British presence in India, 1870-72

William M. Brinner

Remarks and Reminiscences on David Ayalon

Ayalon is best known for his books and articles on aspects of the history, organization, and culture of the Mamluks in Egypt (1250-1517) that were influential in creating the modem study of the Mamluk institution. His long-awaited final work, ``Eunuchs, Caliphs and Sultans", completed shortly before his death, is to appear in the coming months.

This paper consists of personal reminiscences of thirty years about Ayalon, remarks about his important scholarly work and its impact on Mamluk scholarship, as well as about his contribution to the advancement of understanding between Israel and the Arabs.

Jacob Lassner

More Reflections on the Reign of al-Mutawakkil

Reuven Amitai

The Conversion of the Ilkhan Tegüder to Islam

Much of the material for this paper is derived from Arabic works written in the Mamluk Sultanate, sources which have not been fully used for the history of the period. This is one reason why it thought appropriate to deliver this paper in a session devoted to the memory of Professor David Ayalon.

James L. Fitzgerald

p¯ita and \'saikya : Two terms of iron and steel technology in the Mah¯abh¯arata

Stella Sandahl

The M¯anasoll¯asa by Some\'svara III: An Encyclopedia of social history

The M¯anasoll¯asa is a long text, some 8000 granthas , divided into five vim\'satis ., each containing 20 chapters of very unequal length. The total consists of 100 chapters treating 100 different topics. The first vim\'sati deals with the duties of a king, one of the more interesting is found in chapter 19 stressing the ``necessity of appointing excellent physicians and free distribution of medicines" to the subjects-an early example of state administered social welfare. The second vim\'sati deals with administration, policy and appointment of officials, and how to catch and train elephants. The third vim\'sati deals with twenty kinds of bhogas or upabhogas , the fourth devotes its longest chapter to music, and the fifth describes the sports and games the king enjoyed, including erotic dalliances.

I wish to give a brief overview of the M¯anasoll¯asa to stress its importance for various fields of Indology and discuss in detail two very short chapters of which I shall provide translations, the p¯an¯yabhoga and the vilepanabhoga . The first describes the different sources of water supplies and the second describes ointments and pomades.

David Pingree

The Amrtalahar¯i of Nity¯ananda

Christopher Minkowski

The Uses of Inconsistency

Addendum: Report on some unknown Johns Hopkins University Sanskrit manuscripts