104 The Rev. Dr. Wall on the Nature, Age, and Origin of the 



and consequently the Syriac writing, was spread through India in the sixth 

 century. " In the Island Taprobana [that is, Ceylon. Our author elsewhere 

 tells us that what was called Taprobana by the Greeks, was named Selediva by 

 the Indians.* But Selediva, in the language of the country, means the island, 

 Sele, or, as the word is now pronounced by Europeans, Ceylon'] adjoining to the 

 inner India, where the Indian Sea is, there exists a church of Christians, 

 including both clerics and lay-believers ; whether it extends still farther I do not 

 know. In like manner it exists in the region called Male [that is, in Malabar ; 

 for Male barr means, in the language of the country, the main land, or continent, 

 3fale], where the pepper is produced ; and in that called Calliana [it is uncer- 

 tain what district this may be ; Montfaucon conjectures, it is that of which 

 Calicut is the principal emporium] there is moreover a bishop elected from Persia. 

 In like manner also, in the island called Dioscorides [which still retains the same 

 name, only that it is corrupted into Socotora or Socotra], situated in the same 

 Indian Sea, where the inhabitants, colonists planted by the Ptolemies, successors 

 of Alexander the Macedonian, speak Greek, there are both clergy (elected from 

 Persia, and sent into those parts), and also a multitude of Christians. Which 

 island we sailed by, but I did not land on it ; with certain persons, however, of 

 those using the Greek language, I kept company as they were proceeding to 

 Ethiopia."! 



Thus, I apprehend, an intercourse between the Indians and Abyssinians 

 about the time of the formation of the older part of the Sanscrit alphabetic 

 system, and long before, has been sufficiently made out. The similarity, indeed, 



* — — T»/c vriaov r^c icaXovfiivri^ vapa /niv 'IvSoTc, SeXtS/jSa, Trapii St To7g "EXXj)(r(, 

 TaTrpoj3avii. — Montfauc. Collec. nov. lib. ii, p. 137. 



f Ev ry Tairpoj3avp vi'icri^ tv ry trrwripif 'ivSt^, tvOa to 'IvSikov niXajo^ itJTi, KOt 

 SKKAr)(jia \picmavtii)v laTiv f k£i koi KkriptKol Koi TTtorot, ouk otSa 8e ii koi TrtpairipW ofioiwQ 

 Koi tie rijv Xiyofxivriv MaXt, ivQa to TTtptpt •^iveraC ku\ iv ry KaXXtav^ St ry KoXov/iivij, 

 Kai tiritTKOTTog tariv inrb YlcpaiSoc \cipoTovoi/iivog. 'OfioiwQ koI iv ry vriacf) ry KaXoujUti')} 

 AioiTKOptoove Kara ro avro IvStKov TTtXa-yoc, ivOa koi ol TrapoiKovvng 'EXXjjvtori XoXoikti, 

 irapoiKOi Twv nToXifiaiuiv twv /xera 'AXt^avSpov tov MaKtSova {nrapxovTwv, koX /cXrjpdcot 

 tlmv IK rLtpaicog x^^po'''°'''Ovfiivoi koI TrtfVKOfuvoi iv roig avroOi, koi ^piariavwv TrXfjSoc' 

 Tjii vr\aov TrapiirXivcrafitv, oil icarJjXflov St tv avry' avvtTvxov Si uvSpdai twv Ikh 'EXXjj- 

 vi(7Ti XaXoiKjiv, iXOovatv iv ry 'AiOioiriq. — Montfauc. Collec. nov. lib. ii, pp. 178-9. 



