Manna 345 



the following note regarding manna (kan lu) in Ma-k'o-se-li : * "Every 

 year during the eighth and ninth months it rains manna, when the 

 people make a pool to collect it. At sunrise it will condense like water- 

 drops, and then it is dried. Its flavor is like that of crystallized sugar. 

 They also store it in jars, mixing it with hot water, and this beverage 

 serves as a remedy for malaria. There is an old saying that this is the 

 country of the Amritaraja-tathagata ~W % rE iu 2&" 2 



Li Si-een, after quoting the texts of C'en Ts'an-k'i, the Pei Si, etc., 8 

 arrives at the conclusion that these data refer to the same honey-bearing 

 plant, but that it is unknown what plant is to be understood by the 

 term yah ts'e. 



The Turk! name for this plant is yantaq, and the sweet resin accumu- 

 lating on it is styled yantaq Sakari ("yantaq sugar"). 4 



The modern Persian name for the manna is tar-dngubin (Arabic 

 terenjobin; hence Spanish tereniabin) ; and the plant which exudates the 

 sweet substance, as stated, is styled xar-i-Sutur ("camel-thorn"). The 

 manna suddenly appears toward the close of the summer during the 

 night, and must be gathered during the early hours of the morning. It 

 is eaten in its natural state, or is utilized for syrup (Sire) in Central Asia 

 or in the sugar-factories of Meshed and Yezd in Persia. 5 The Persian 

 word became known to the Chinese from Samarkand in the tran- 

 scription ta-lah-ku-pin 3H 5P 1& St. 6 The product is described under 

 the title kan lu ~H* % ("sweet dew") as being derived from a small 

 plant, one to two feet high, growing densely, the leaves being fine like 

 those of an Indigofera (Ian). The autumn dew hardens on the surface 

 of the stems, and this product has a taste like sugar. It is gathered and 

 boiled into sweetmeats. Under the same name, kan-lu, the Kwah yii ki 1 

 describes a small plant of Samarkand, on the leaves of which accumu- 

 lates in the autumn a dew as sweet in taste as honey, the leaves resem- 



1 Unidentified. It can hardly be identified with Mosul, as intimated by 

 Rockhill. 



2 Rockhill, T*oung Pao, 191 5, p. 622. This Buddhist term has crept in here 

 owing to the fact that kan lu ("sweet dew") serves as rendering of Sanskrit amrita 

 ("the nectar of the gods") and as designation for manna. 



5 Also the Yu yah tsa tsu, but this passage refers to India and to a different 

 plant, and is therefore treated below in its proper setting. 



* A. v. Le Coq, Sprichw6rter und Lieder aus Turfan, p. 99. If the supposition 

 of B. Munkacsi (Keleti szemle, Vol. XI, 1910, p. 353) be correct, that Hungarian 

 gyanta (gydnta, jdnta, gyenta, "resin") and gyantdr ("varnish") may be Turkish 

 loan-words, the above Turkl name would refer to the resinous character of the plant. 



5 VXmbery, Skizzen aus Mittelasien, p. 189. 



6 Ta Min i t'un U, Ch. 89, p. 23. 



7 Ch. 24, p. 26, of the edition printed in 1744; this passage is not contained in 

 the original edition of 1600 (cf. above, p. 251, regarding the various editions). 



