Sogdian documents from Khotan, I: four economic documents.

• Author: Bo, Bi
• Position: Report

INTRODUCTION

In the spring of 2010 the Museum of Renmin University of China acquired a collection of documents from Hetian (Ancient Khotan), Xinjiang. The main part of the collection is a group of manuscripts written in Chinese, Khotanese, Sogdian, and Tibetan, including both religious texts and secular documents such as official documents and economic texts. The present authors were allocated the task of editing and studying the Sogdian part of the collection, which amounts to twelve items, making it one of the more significant Sogdian finds to come from China in recent years. Four of these texts are economic documents and are published in the present article; the rest, apart from a few fragments which are too short or unclear to be identified, are all letters. (1)

Only a few Sogdian documents from the Khotan area have previously been made known. Most of these are now in the British Library and were published in Sims-Williams 1976 with facsimiles in Sims-Williams and Hamilton 1990 (henceforth DTS). Those referred to in those publications as Fragments 12, 15, 16, 23, 27, 30, and 33 belong to the Stein collection and come from Mazar Tagh. Fragment 36 (H.143 MNS 18 = IOL Khot 158/5) belongs to the Hoernle collection. There seems to be no evidence about the exact findspot of this text, but it is certain that it comes from the Khotan region; (2) moreover, according to Yutaka Yoshida's recent reading, Khotan is even mentioned in the text. (3) Yet another Sogdian fragment from this area survives only in the form of a photo in the Trinkler collection, Bremen. This fragment was published by Gropp, (4) who tentatively suggested that it may come from Mazar Tagh. (5) However, since Trinkler only mentions Brahmi and Tibetan documents from Mazar Tagh, it is more likely that the Sogdian fragment is to be identified with the so-called "Uighur" fragment found by Trinkler at Dandan Uiliq. (6) Finally, there is also a small Sogdian fragment amongst a collection of more than five hundred documents and other items from the Khotan area recently acquired by the National Library of China in Beijing. (7)

[FIGURE 1 OMITTED]

Amongst these texts, the most relevant to the new documents published here is British Library Fragment 33 (see the appendix at the end of this article), a fragment of a commercial document similar to document no. 4 below. The surviving part consists largely of numerals and the repeated word pr'[delta] t 'sold'.

Unfortunately the findspots of the new documents are not recorded and the texts themselves provide no clear indications of their place or date of writing. However, a significant Sogdian presence at sites such as Mazar Tagh, Dandan Uiliq, and Old Domoko is clear from references in the Khotanese, Chinese, Tibetan, and Judeo-Persian documents from these sites, (8) as well as from the earlier discoveries of Sogdian documents cited above. It seems likely that the newly acquired texts have a similar provenance and are roughly contemporary with the Chinese and Khotanese documents; that is, they may be attributed to around the eighth to ninth centuries.

THE TEXTS

No. 1 (Fig. 1)

Catalogue No.: GXW 0116. A fragment of paper bearing writing on one side, with a large hole in the centre. Judging from the creases, the paper was apparently used as a makeshift wrapper for a small quantity of some substance, as was a small Sogdian fragment found at Niya. (9)

1. traces only

2. [[beta] M] N [beta] mwt't ct[beta]'r (l00)[pny]

3. [[beta] (yrt) MN nwrtwt'[delta] w100 pny [

4. ([beta] MN sit' [delta] w 100 pny

5. ([beta] MN nmtkr'y 100 30 pny

   rest blank

   "[Received from] Vamutat: 400 [pny]. -- Received from Nurtut: 200pny. -- Received from Sart: 200 pny. -- Received from the felt-maker: 130 pny"

   Commentary

   This is a very simple document listing receipts of sums of money ranging from 130 to 400 pny. The word pny, which ultimately derives from Skt. pana-, refers to the Chinese copper coins with a square hole (Chinese qian [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII], Khotanese mura-) that were the normal currency of the "Western Regions" from the middle of the seventh century C.E. (10) The verb [beta] yrt, which introduces each record, is formally a 3rd person form of the intransitive preterite: 'has/have been received'. The recipient is not indicated but is presumably the writer of the text, so that the formula is equivalent to 'I have received'.

   Line 2. The personal name [beta] mwt't or [beta] mwtnt, less likely [beta] mwtyt, is unknown. It does not appear to be Sogdian or Chinese.

   Line 3 contains another unknown personal name, probably to be read as nwrtwt/zwrtwt or ywrtwt. -- '[delta] w100 '200' here looks like [delta] w100, but '[delta] r is hardly possible as a form of [delta] ry 'three'.

   Line 4. srt, less likely srt, could be compared with the Bactrian personal name oapxo (sarto), for which see Sims-Williams 2010: 126 (no. 421). In addition to the possible etymologies suggested there, one could also consider deriving this name from Old Iranian * sarta-'cold', Sogdian srt.

   Line 5. The first two letters of nmtkr'y are not joined, which naturally suggests a reading Z-mtkr'y. However, some irregularity in the joining of the letters seems to be a characteristic of the writer's hand without significance for the reading; cf. the unjoined initial [beta] - of fimwt't in line 2 and of [beta] yrt in line 5. If nmtkr'y is indeed the correct reading, this may be not a name but an occupational designation 'felt-maker'. The word for 'felt' itself is attested as nmty in P3, line 229, (11) and as nmfk in the Mug document [??]20, line 3.(12) -- Finally, it is worth noting that 100 is here written in a more elaborate form than in the preceding lines, with an extra initial stroke resembling an aleph.

   [FIGURE 2 OMITTED]

   No. 2 (Fig. 2)

   Catalogue No.: GXW 0438. A fragment of paper with writing on one side.

1. traces only

2. [beta] ntk(sy)r 'yw kpc(k s)y'swn pnc snk

3. ct [beta]'r kpc('kk)[

4. ] * '[delta] (w)[

   " ... (to/from) Vandesir, I kapcakk (of) mustard(?), 5 sang (and) 4 kapcakk (of) ... 2(?) ... *

   Commentary

   This scrap seems to be part of a list of persons and amounts of certain commodities assigned to them (or received from them). The script, evidently written with a brush rather than a pen, is extremely irregular and ambiguous.

   Line 2. Although only a small part of each side margin is preserved, this line seems to be complete. The first word must be a Sogdian name beginning with [beta] ntk 'slave' (more common as the final component of compound names) and a second component which is illegible apart from the final-r. The reading/restoration [beta] ntk(sy)r is based on the occurrence of a similar name in the Mug document [??]9, line 1, where the editors actually read fintksyr. (13) Recently this reading has been corrected to ([beta] ntysyr, (14) but this would merely be a later variant of the same name, for which (Sntksyr would in fact be the normal and expected spelling.

   Both kpc 'bushel' and kpc'kk iittle kapc' are well...