252 Sino-Iranica 



pistan ("a place abounding with pistachio-nuts"). 1 Again, the Persian 

 word in the transcription pi-se-ta >Sb A %£ appears in the Pen ts'ao 

 kan mu H i 2 by Cao Hio-min, who states that the habitat of the plant 

 is in the land of the Mohammedans, and refers to the work Yin San 

 leh yao 3 of 133 1, ascribed by him to Hu-pi-lie %& 4b Wt\ that is, the 

 Emperor Kubilai of the Yuan dynasty. We know, however, that this 

 book was written in 133 1 by Ho Se-hwi. 4 Not having access to this, 

 I am unable to state whether it contains a reference to pi-se-ta, nor do 

 I know whether the text of Cao Hio-min, as printed in the second 

 edition of 1765, was thus contained in the first edition of his work, which 

 was published in 1650. It would not be impossible that the tran- 

 scription pi-se-ta, accurately corresponding to Persian pista, was 

 made in the Mongol period; for it bears the ear-marks of the Yuan style 

 of transcription. 



The Persian word pista (also pasta) has been widely disseminated: 

 we find it in Kurd fystiq, Armenian fesdux and jstoul, Arabic fistaq or 

 fustaq, Osmanli fistiq, 6 and Russian fistaZka. 



In the Yuan period the Chinese also made the acquaintance of 

 mastic, the resinous product of Pistacia lentiscus* It is mentioned in 

 the Yin ia« leh yao, written in 133 1, under its Arabic name mastaki, 

 in the transcription $1 JS %£ l=f ma-se-ta-ki. 7 Li Si-cen knew only the 

 medical properties of the product, but confessed his ignorance regarding 

 the nature of the plant; hence he placed his notice of it as an appendix 

 to cummin {M-lo). The Wu tsa tolll, written in 1610, says that 

 mastaki is produced in Turkistan and resembles the tsiao W> (Zanth- 

 oxylum, the fruit yielding a pepper-like condiment) ; its odor is very 

 strong; it takes the place there of a condiment like pepper, and is 

 beneficial to digestion. 8 The Persian word for "mastic" is kundurak 

 (from kundur, "incense"), besides the Arabic loan-word mastaki or 



1 As already recognized by W. Schott (Topographie der Producte des chinesi- 

 schen Reiches, Abh. Berl.Akad., 1842, p. 371), who made use only of the new edition. 



2 Ch. 8, p. 19; ed. of 1765 (see above, p. 229). 

 8 Cf. above, p. 236. 



4 Bretschneider, Bot. Sin., pt. 1, p. 213. 



6 Hence Pegoletti's fistuchi (Yule, Cathay, new ed. by Cordier, Vol. Ill, 

 p. 167). 



6 Greek axivos (Herodotus, iv, 177). 



7 The Arabic word itself is derived from Greek naorlxn (from paor&feu', "to 

 chew"), because the resin was used as a masticatory. Hence also Armenian tnaz- 

 tak'e. Spanish almdciga is derived from the Arabic, as indicated by the Arabic 

 article al, while the Spanish form m&sticis is based on Latin mastix. 



8 Quoted in the Pen ts'ao kan mu H t, Ch. 6, p. 12 b. The digestive property 

 is already emphasized by Dioscorides (1, 90). 



