Titles of the Sasanian Government 533 



the crown on the king's head. Another family presides over military 

 affairs, another superintends civil affairs, another settles the litigations 

 of those who have a dispute and desire an arbiter. The fifth family com- 

 mands the cavalry, the sixth collects the taxes and supervises the 

 royal treasures, and the seventh takes care of armament and military 

 equipment." Artabides ('Apra/Si^s), as observed by NOldeke, 1 should 

 be read Argabides ('Apya(3i8r)s), the equivalent of ArgabeS. There 

 is also a form apyaireTrjs in correspondence with Pahlavi arkpat. This 

 title originally designated the commandant of a castle (arg, "citadel"), 

 and subsequently a very high military rank. 2 In later Hebrew we find 

 this title in the forms alkqfta, arkafta, or arkabta. 3 The above tran- 

 scription is apparently based on the form *Argade ('Apyadrf) =Argabe5. 



101. I? $t %h sie-po-p'o, *sit-pwa-bwi5. Officials of Persia in 

 charge of the army (infantry and cavalry, pai7an and aswaran), of the 

 four quarters, the four paikds {pat, "province"; kos, "guarding") 

 9 # Jfc ^: Wei itt, Ch. 102, p. 6. The Cou £« (Ch. 50, p. 5b) 

 has HI *sat, sar, in the place of the first character. The word corresponds 

 to Middle Persian spahbed ("general"); Pahlavi pat, New Persian -bad, 

 -bud ("master"). EranspahbeS was the title of the generalissimo of 

 the army of the Sasanian empire up to the time of Khusrau I. The 

 Pahlavi form is given as spahpat; 4 the Chinese transcription, however, 

 corresponds better to New Persian sipahbad, so that also a Middle- 

 Persian form *spahba5 (-be5 or -bu5) may be inferred. 



102. 3l 5H nu-se-ta, *u-se-daS, used in the Chinese inscription dated 1489 

 of the Jews of K'ai-fon fu in Ho-nan, in connection with the preceding name ??\\ Wi 

 Lie-wei (Levi). 5 As justly recognized by G. Deveria, this transcription represents 

 Persian ustad,* % which means "teacher, master." 6 The Persian Jews availed them- 

 selves of this term for the rendering of the Hebrew title Rab (Rabbi), although 

 in Persian the name follows the title. The Chinese Jews simply adopted the Chinese 

 mode of expression, in which the family-name precedes the title, Ustad Lie-wei 

 meaning as much as "Rabbi Levi." The transcription itself appears to be of much 

 older date than the Ming, and was doubtless recorded at a time when the final 

 consonant of ta was still articulated. In a former article I have shown from the 

 data of the Jewish inscriptions that the Chinese Jews emigrated from Persia and 

 appeared in China not earlier than in the era of the Sung. This historical proof is 

 signally confirmed by a piece of linguistic evidence. In the Annals of the Yuan 

 Dynasty (Yuan Si, Ch. 33, p. 7 b; 43, p. 11 b) the Jews are styled Su-hu (Ju-hud) 



1 Tabari, p. 5. 



2 Christensen, op. cit., p. 27; N6ldeke, op. cit., p. 437; Hubschmann, Per- 

 sische Studien, pp. 239, 240. 



3 M. Jastrow, Dictionary of the Targumim, p. 73. 



4 Hubschmann, Armen. Gram., p. 240. 



8 J. Tobar, Inscriptions juives de K'ai-fong-fou, p. 44. 



6 Regarding this word, see chiefly H. Hubschmann, Persische Studien, p. 14. 



