Under this heading Mr. A. C. Banerji discusses in pages 655–666 of the JRAS. for 1935 the northern invasion of Rājēndra, the Gangaikoṇḍa-Chola, on which subject I made a contribution long ago to the late Sir Asutosh Mukerjee Commemoration Volumes, which article appeared in a slightly revised form in the Journal of Indian History, volume ii, pp. 317–369, more than a decade since. There are some points in the discussion which seem to admit of a few remarks in criticism—perhaps even correction—pending publication of a typical historical document of the great Chola, and attaining to a correct version of the details of the invasion.

The following are translations from the cuneiform texts of the seventh century b.c. (from Ashurbanipal's library at Nineveh) which deal with diseases of the feet and legs. The tablets are published in my Assyrian Medical Texts, and the translations are given here with various duplicates from elsewhere. Some have already been put before scholars by Ebeling (Archivf. Gesch. d. Medizin, xiii, xiv, and Keilschrifttexte Medidnischen Inhalts), but since his publication of them several “joins” have been made, so that, with the texthitherto untranslated and with the new knowledge subsequently acquired, a fresh edition will not be out of place. The connection of these medical texts dealing with diseases of the feet with those given in the series SA.GAL.LA (CT. xxiii, 1 ff.) will be obvious.

The Ariyapariyesana-Sutta in the Majjhima-Nikāya specifically mentions these two as the main points of Buddhism: (1) Paṭiccasamuppāda and (2) Nibbāna. The first point is the basic idea of Buddhism as a system of thought, and the second, the goal of Buddhism as a religion. The former is introduced as idappaccayatā, “causal relations.” The latter is introduced as sabbasaṅkhāra-samatho sabbūpadhipaṭinissaggo taṇhāhākkhayo virāgo nirodho, “the stilling of all plastic forces or the renunciation of all worldly ties, the extirpation of craving, passionlessness, peace.” The Sutta does not, however, offer any formula to interconnect the two.

Landsberger, ZA., 42,147 and 155, deduced the reading zamin for i.e. zag-mim > zamin, loan-word sammû, from the gloss [za]-me-in on gišar-ri “instrument of praise” = sammû. But the reading zagšal > zašal is proved by the dialectic ša-za-al in Genouillac, Textes Cunéiformes, xvi, pl. 144, AO., 7687, 28; a ùr-a al-a ša-za-al ga-na-ab-du “How long, O city, to the tambourine and lyre? I will say”. Cf. á-lá zag-sal-zu = ina alê ta[nitta-ka], K. 3228, Rev. 8, OECT., vi, pl. 16. zag-sal ba-an-du, Zimmern, Kultlieder, 207, i, 9. For a ùr-a, dialectic for a uru, see my Babylonian Liturgies, 189, 12, a urú-mu im-me “How long, O my city, she cries”. a urú, PBS., x, 4, pl. 94, 52. a é-mu im-me = aḫulap bîti-mi igabbi, SBH., 93, 1. For du = ḳabû, cf. be-dúg (= iḳbi) with var. be-du, RA., 9, 115, 31 = 10, 100, 10; ga-an-na-ab-du, JRAS., 1932, 929, iii, 1 = ga-na-ab-dúg, 946, 28.

The feudal system of the Mamlūks is of great interest not only because it existed for 267 years in the leading state of the Arab world and left some permanent marks on the subsequent social and economical development of Egypt, Syria and Palestine, but also from the sociological point of view, being the result of an intermixture of three various feudal systems which corresponded to peculiar cultural worlds: the Mongol, the Islamic, and the West European. The fundamental principles were borrowed from the Mongol Empire and consequently all the lawsuits relating to the fiefs were settled not by the qāḍīs and according to the Islamic Law, but by the military judges (ḥujjāb) and according to the laws based upon the rules of Chingiz Khān. The technical terms used in the official Arabic-written documents and in the Arabic literary sources were partly borrowed from the terminology of the Islamic Law, but their sense was considerably removed from their ancient meanings—which may signify that they were now used only as more or less faithful translations of the terms employed in the Turkish dialect of the Mamlūks. The Western feudalism, brought to Syria by the Crusaders, influenced the Mamluk system chiefly through the medium of the native tribal chieftains, who after having been vassals of the kingdom of Jerusalem were gradually becoming feudatories of the Sultan of Cairo, and sometimes received the feudal charters from both powers at the same time. In the charters granted by the Latin rulers of Sidon (in 1256) and Beirut (in 1280) to two chieftains of the Buḥturide family the term “fief” is translated by the word shahāra, which means “a land given in reward for a service”, but the word mulk is also used, as well as the verbs a'ṭā and wahaba which usually refer to the unconditional transfers of the right of possession.

In this Journal for January, 1937, Mr. A. F. Hemmy, from an exhaustive examination of the weights of silver punch-marked coins, “570 in the British Museum, 196 in Calcutta, and a single hoard of 108 coins (of which 103 are included) found near Patna, and now in the museum of that place; in all, 869 coins,” shows that (excluding a small number of the coins, 4 per cent only, which Mr. Hemmy considers have a different standard), the standard of weight of these coins is 52 grains, which multiplied by 4 is 208, and that the standard is therefore one-fourth of the revised principal unit of the Indus (Mohenjo-Daro) system of weights, viz. 13·625 gm. = 210·2 gr.