Tabashir 351 



pen ts'ao; but at the same time we are informed that it was then obtained 

 from all bamboos of China, 1 and that the Chinese, according to their 

 habit, adulterated the product with scorched bones, the arrowroot 

 from Pachyrhizus angulatus, and other stuff. 2 The Pen ts'ao yen i of 

 1116 s explains the substance as a natural production in bamboo, yellow 

 like loess. The name was soon changed into "bamboo-yellow" {Zu 

 hwan 1T jiaf) or "bamboo-grease" (fukao).* It is noticeable that the 

 Chinese do not classify tabashir among stones, but conceive it as a 

 production of bamboo, while the Hindu regard it as a kind of pearl. 



The earliest Arabic author who has described the substance is 

 Abu Dulaf, who lived at the Court of the Samanides of Bokhara, and 

 travelled in Central Asia about a.d. 940. He says that the product 

 comes from MandQrapatan in northwestern India (Abulfeda and 

 others state that Tana on the island of Salsette, twenty miles from 

 Bombay, was the chief place of production) , and is exported from there 

 into all countries of the world. It is produced by rushes, which, when they 

 are dry and agitated by the wind, rub against one another; this motion 

 develops heat and sets them afire. The blaze sometimes spreads over 

 a surface of fifty parasangs, or even more. Tabashir is the product of 

 these rushes. 8 Other Arabic authors cited by Ibn al-Baitar derive the 

 substance from the Indian sugarcane, and let it come from all coasts 

 of India; they dwell at length on its medicinal properties. 6 Garcia 

 da Orta (1563), who was familiar with the drug, also mentions the 

 burning of the canes, and states it as certain that the reason they set 

 fire to them is to reach the heart; but sometimes they do not follow 

 this practice, as appears from many specimens which are untouched 

 by fire. He justly says that the Arabic name (tabaUr, in his Portuguese 

 spelling tabaxir) is derived from the Persian, and means "milk or juice, 

 or moisture." The ordinary price for the product in Persia and Arabia 

 was its weight in silver. The canes, lofty and large like ash-trees, 



1 The Cen lei pen ts'ao (Ch. 13, p. 48) cites the same text from a work Lin hai 

 & $8> '$£ t&< apparently an other work than the Lin hai i wu li mentioned by Bret- 

 schneider (Bot. Sin., pt. 1, p. 169). 



3 The following assertion by Stuart (Chinese Materia Medica, p. 64)is erroneous: 

 "The Chinese did not probably derive the substance originally from India, but it is 

 possible that the knowledge of its medicinal uses were derived from that country, 

 where it has been held in high esteem from very early times." The knowledge of 

 this product and the product itself first reached the Chinese from India, and nat- 

 urally induced them to search for it in their own bamboos. 



1 Ch. 14, p. 4 b (ed. of Lu Sin-yuan). 



4 Pen ts'ao kan mu, Ch. 37, p. 9. 



1 G. Ferrand, Textes relatifs a l'Extreme-Orient, p. 225. 

 * L. Leclerc, Traits des simples, Vol. II, pp. 399-401. 



