470 Sino-Iranica 



and people P'o-lo-men on the border of Burma, the Po-se likewise on the 

 border of Burma, and the Malayan K'un-lun. In the first half of the 

 eighth century, accordingly, we find the Malayan Po-se as a seafaring 

 people trading with the Chinese at Canton. Consequently also the 

 alleged "Persian" settlement on the south coast of Hainan, struck by 

 the traveller, was a Malayan-Po-se colony. In view of tttis situation, the 

 further question may be raised whether the pilgrim Yi Tsih in a.d. 671 

 sought passage at Canton on a Persian ship. 1 This vessel was bound 

 for Palembang on Sumatra, and sailed the Malayan waters; again, in 

 my opinion, the Malayan Po-se, not the Persians, are here in question. 



The Malayan Po-se were probably known far earlier than the T'ang 

 period, for they appear to have been mentioned in the Kwan li written 

 before a.d. 527. In the Hian p'u & b? of Huh C'u ^ M of the Sung, 2 

 this work is quoted as saying that $u hian ?L # (a kind of incense) 3 is 

 the sap of a pine-tree in the country Po-se in the Southern Sea. This 

 Po-se is well enough defined to exclude the Iranian Po-se, where, more- 

 over, no incense is produced. 4 



The same text is also preserved in the Hai yao pen ts*ao of Li Siin of 

 the eighth century, 5 in a slightly different but substantially identical 

 wording: "Zu hian grows in Nan-hai [the countries of the Southern 

 Sea] : it is the sap of a pine-tree in Po-se. That kind which is red like 

 cherries and transparent ranks first." K*ou Tsuh-si, who wrote the 

 Pen ts'ao yen i in a.d. 1116, says that the incense of the Southern Bar- 

 barians (Nan Fan) is still better than that of southern India. The 

 Malayan Po-se belonged to the Southern Barbarians. The fact that 

 these, and not the Persians, are to be understood in the accounts relating 

 to incense, is brought out with perfect lucidity by C'en C'eh ffi. ?k, 

 who wrote the Pen ts'ao pie $wo ^ ^ #'J H& in a.d. 1090, and who says, 

 "As regards the west, incense is produced in India (T'ien-cu); as re- 



1 Chavannes, Religieux eminents, p. 116; J. Takakusu, I-Tsing, p. xxvm. 



2 Ed. of T'an Sun ts'un Su, p. 5. 



8 Not necessarily from Boswettia, nor identical with frankincense. The above 

 text says that iu hian is a kind of hiin-lu. The latter is simply a generic term for 

 incense, without referring to any particular species. I strictly concur with Pelliot 

 (T'oung Pao, 1912, p. 477) in regarding hiin-lu as a Chinese word, not as the tran- 

 scription of a foreign word, as has been proposed. 



4 If hiin lu is enumerated in the Sui $u among the products of Persia, this means 

 that incense was used there as an import-article, but it does not follow from this 

 that "it was brought to China on Persian ships" (Hirth, Chau Ju-kua, p. 196). 

 The "Persian ships," it seems, must be relegated to the realm of imagination. 

 Only from the Mohammedan period did really Persian ships appear in the far east. 

 The best instance to this effect is contained in the notes of Hwi Cao of the eighth 

 century (Hirth, Journal Am. Or. Soc, 1913, p. 205). 



5 Pen ts'ao kan mu, Ch. 34, p. 16. 



