This beautiful vessel is in the collection of Mrs. B. Z. Seligman of London. It measures 7 inches in height and 9⅜ inches in width across the handles. The merit of the design lies in its dignity and fine simplicity of form, rather than in the superficial decoration. Indeed, one has here a foretaste of that Chinese genius for plastic form in vessels which attained its full manifestation some 2,000 years later in the ceramic triumphs of the Sung Dynasty. The beauty of the bronze is enhanced in modern eyes by the fine, smooth, blue-green patina that covers the surface. The shape and decoration are characteristic of the First Phase of archaic bronze design, associated with the Shang-Yin and Early Chou periods, the style and content of the inscription favouring the latter of these two alternatives and suggesting a date in the late eleventh or the tenth century b.c. The vessel was publicly shown for the first time at the Exhibition of Early Chinese Bronzes held by the Oriental Ceramic Society in London last autumn.

The word śāsana means “a royal charter” and tāmra-śāsana “a royal charter engraved on a plate or plates of copper”. Revenue-free gifts, granted by ancient Indian rulers in favour of persons, deities, or religious establishments were usually endowed with a deed engraved on durable tāmra-paṭṭa, i.e. “a plate or plates of copper”. By lakṣaṇā, a tāmra-śāsana was sometimes called tāmra-paṭṭa. Often again the word indicating the deed or charter was applied, by lakṣaṇā, to indicate the land granted. But the expression tāmra-śāsana, in this modified sense of a gift of revenue-free land, was often indicated either by tāmra or by śāsana. The word śāsana in this sense is used not only in the medieval records of Orissa but even in modern Oriya. Numerous villages in Orissa still bear names ending with the word śāsana, indicating that originally they were gift villages. Besides the word tāmra-śāsana, early Orissan epigraphy knows of two other types of śāsanas. These are the deeds called kraya-śāsana and kara-śāsana.

From the beginning of Indian studies in Europe Sūrat and Soraṭhh have been constantly confused. Denison Ross continues this confusion (Arabic History of Gujarat, vol. i, p. x): Surat is spelt indifferently and although the two places are distinguished in the index and in chapter 13, CHI, vol. iii. Elliott and Dowson (History of India told by its own historians, v, 350, n. 4) distinguish the places, but derive both names from the Sanskrit Saurāsṭra, which is absurd. More recently the authors of the Advanced History of India, R. C. Majumdar, H. C. Raychaudhuri, and K. Datta, uniformly spell the first name as Surāt; and Jules Bloch, Les Inscriptions d'Asoka, 103, n. 9, equates with Saurāṣṭra with Surate.

THE original function of the suffix -tār (-dār) was to form nomina agentis, and such is still its function in some cases, e.g. xārīdār “purchaser”, parastār “worshipper”, “attendant”. But some nouns in -tār (-dār) are now passive in signification, e.g. giriftār “taken prisoner”, “prisoner”; and in several cases the meaning has been so much altered that the original nomen agentis has become to all intents and purposes a nomen actionis, e.g. kirdār “action”, guftār “speech”.

The first five objects described in this note are the property of Squadron-Leader M. Blaymires, R.A.F., and are at present on loan to the Birmingham City Museum and Art Gallery. I am much indebted to Squadron-Leader Blaymires for permission to publish them, and to Mr. Oswald, Keeper of Archaeology and Local History in the Museum, for the facilities which he has afforded me of examining them.

Before the invention of printing, when copies of a book were few, it was common to find works falsely attributed to an author. The person of unorthodox opinions, like the PseudoDionysius, assigned his works to someone of unimpeachable reputation in order to avoid censorship or other obstacles to circulation. Or a man might insert heretical material into a rival's book to discredit him. Of al-Ghazali's Maḍnūn (? aṣ-Ṣaghīr), D. B. Macdonald wrote: —

“Of course it is quite possible and in accordance with the rules of Muslim polemic that there should also have been in circulation a false Maḍnūn teaching these heretical doctrines. Many such cases occur. A book against the belief in saints was ascribed to Abū Bakr ar-Rāzī (d. cir. 290–320) … and, it was suspected, falsely, in order to bring him into discredit. The same thing happened to ash-Sha'rānī. One of his enemies obtained a copy of his Al-Baḥr al-Mawrūd, left out parts and inserted others of a heretical nature, and then spread it as the original work. In defence ash-Sha'rānī was compelled to lay before the ‘Ulamā’ of Cairo his original copy signed by themselves, and so demonstrate the spuriousness of the other. Again, ash-Sha'rānī had to defend Ibn al-'Arabī against a similar injury. Some hostile theologians interpolated his Futūḥāt with heresy. Even Fakhrad-Din ar-Rāzī suffered from this; and there were enough suchcases for ‘Alī b. Muḥammad al-Miṣrī to make up a list of them. So we need not be at all surprised if this befell al-Ghazālī also …”

Abān is one of the least known poets of the second century a.h. References to him and his poetry are in the Kitāb al-Aghānī and a few allusions to him in the Fihrist, the History of Baghdad, by al-Khaṭīb, the Kitāb al-Ḥayawān, and the Kitāb al-Bayān of al-Jāḥiẓ. But these are so inadequate and sporadic that it is impossible to form a coherent picture either of his personality or his work.

Islām, notwithstanding its immediate and overwhelming triumph, was unable to eradicate the paganism which had preceded it. In pagan Arabia the jinn and spirit world could be conjured by music, and even in ʻAbbāsid times such famous musicians as Ibrāhīm al-Mauṣilī of Baghdad and Ziryāb of Cordova claimed to derive some of their music from the jinn and even shaiṭān himself. This conceit is understandable. The voice of the jinn was termed ʻazf, and when we know this, we can appreciate the occult significance of the word ʻazīf or miʻzaf for a harp-like instrument. We read in the ʻIqd al-Farīd (tenth century) that David the Prophet played a miʻzaf when he wanted to gather the jinn unto himself. Even to-day the Arabic name for an instrumentalist is ʻazzāf.

From about the year 1823 the education of the people had been a matter of increasing concern to those responsible for the administration of the East India Company's territories in India. The authorities both in London and in India began to recognize that it was closely connected with the carrying out of the plans and policies of the Government. In London it was beginning to be realized that efficient government was altogether beyond the capacity of the East India Company unless Indians were employed on a scale greater than hitherto had been considered expedient. In India the increased importance attached to education led, in 1823, to the creation of the Committee of Public Instruction, and during the next few years there developed within the Committee a group which sought primarily to increase facilities in India for education along Western lines through the medium of the English language.