History of the Rhinoceros 145 



through in the direction downward. They are styled 'straight,' if one 

 half of the lines pass through in the direction upward. They are 

 styled 'drum-shaped,' if the lines are interrupted in the middle, without 

 passing through. The Pose designate ivory as po-ngan, and rhinoceros- 

 horn as hei-ngan. 1 Wu Shi-kao, a physician from Ch'eng shi m£n, 



century (Wylie, Notes, p. 160), makes the following remark: "The fundamental 

 color of rhinoceros-horn is black. Is the color simultaneously black and yellow, the 

 horn is styled 'standard throughout' (ching t'ou). Is the horn yellow with black 

 borders, it is styled 'inverted throughout' (tao t'ou). The horns of standard color 

 are highly esteemed by our contemporaries. If the shape of the horn is round, it is 

 designated as 'horn communicating with the sky' {rung t'ien si). In the south, there 

 are counterfeits which may be recognized from gradually getting warm when rubbed. 

 In view of the fact that rhinoceros-horn by nature is cold, it does not become warm 

 when rubbed." 



1 Su Sung makes the addition, "words difficult to distinguish." Po-ngan means 

 literally "white ngan" (No. 57), and hei-ngan "black ngan," — evidently transcrip- 

 tions of Pose words. Palladius, in his Chinese-Russian Dictionary (Vol. I, p. 7), 

 has indicated po-ngan ("ivory") and hei-ngan ("rhinoceros-horn") as Persian loan- 

 words. Ivory, however, is called in Persian shirmahl; and rhinoceros, as well as the 

 horn of it, kerkeden. It is true that Pose is the Chinese name for Persia, which first 

 appears in the Wei shu; but Persia is not meant in the above passage. P'ei wen yiin 

 fu (Ch. 8, p. 89 b) gives three quotations under the heading hei-ngan si. One from a 

 book Sheng shui yen Can says that the Pose call rhinoceros-horn hei-ngan; the refer- 

 ence to the name of ivory is omitted, so that the clause " it is difficult to discriminate " 

 makes no sense. The second is derived from the Leng chat ye hua of the monk Hui- 

 hung, written toward the close of the eleventh century (Wylie, Notes on Chinese 

 Literature, p. 164), and says that "the men of the south (nan j en) designate ivory as 

 po-ngan, rhinoceros-horn as hei-ngan." The third reference is taken from a poem of 

 Tu Fu (712-770), who remarks that hei-ngan is a general article of trade of the Alan. 

 These texts render it probable that the country of Pose here referred to is not Persia, 

 but identical with the Malayan region Pose mentioned by Chou K'u-fei in his 

 Ling-wai tai la, written in 11 78 (Ch. 3, p. 6 b; edition of Chi pu tsu chai ts'ung shu), 

 and then after him in the Chu fan chi, written in 1225 by Chao Ju-kua (translation 

 of Hirth and Rockhill, p. 125). The two authors seek it in or near the Malay 

 Peninsula, though Negritos are not necessarily to be understood: the mere state- 

 ment that the inhabitants have a dark complexion and curly hair is not sufficient to 

 warrant this conclusion. Gerini identifies the name Po-se with Lambesi below 

 Atjeh on the west coast of Sumatra, which seems somewhat hypothetical. Mr. C. 

 O. Blagden (Journal Royal As. Soc, 1913, p. 168) is inclined to regard Po-se as 

 identical with Pase (or Pasai) in north-eastern Sumatra, but adds that there is no 

 evidence that the place existed as early as 1 178. The above text shows that the Po-se 

 of the Chinese mediaeval writers were a Malayan tribe speaking a Malayan language, 

 for the two transcriptions po-ngan and hei-ngan can be interpreted through Malayan. 

 In the Hakka dialect, hei-ngan is het-am; and hltam is the Malayan word for "black" 

 (Javanese Ngoko hireng). Pei-ngan is in the Hakka dialect p'ak-am (compare Dic- 

 tionnaire chinois-francais dialecte Hac-ka by Ch. Rey), in Cantonese pak-om, in 

 Yang-chou puk-ya. In Javanese Krama "white" is petak, in Javanese Ngoko putih, 

 likewise in Batak, in common Malayan puteh. We should expect that the two 

 Malayan words, judging from the Chinese transcriptions, would terminate in the same 

 syllable, which caused misunderstandings on the part of Chinese dealers. There is 

 (or was) perhaps a certain Malayan dialect, in which the word for "white" ended in 

 -am, or in which the words for "white" and "black" terminated in -i or -ih (compare 

 Madagassy intim, inti, "black;" and puti, "white;" G. Ferrand, Essai de pho- 

 netique comp. du malais et des dialectes malgaches, pp. 24, 54, Paris, 1909). It is 

 evident that neither the Malayan words for "ivory" (gading, Javanese gading) and "rhi- 

 noceros-horn" (chula bddak or simply chula), nor the words for "elephant" (gdjah, Java- 

 nese gajah) and "rhinoceros" (badak, Javanese warak), are intended here, but only the 

 color names ' ' white ' ' and ' ' black, ' ' with which the traders distinguished ivory and rhi- 



