Derbend-ndmeh: or the “Hhstory of Derbend. 445 
tion of some few words, and by changing the t terminations of-all the -nouns'and pro- 
nous in their oblique cases and according to the Grammar of the Osmanli idiom, may 
pass for common Turkish. The versions in -the Imperial Public Library of St. Petersburg 
(especially one of them I bave, in, this respect, undergone the least change; and next to 
them follow the versions of the Royal Libraries of Paris and Berlin. The style of our 
version. differs_considerably- from that-of either-of these, «being -written- in_the modern 
idiom spoken in the northern parts of Aderbijan. It contains, however, a great number of 
“Arabic words and Persian” expressions, which aré not formed according” to the principles 
of the Turkish language. They are sometimes arranged s0 irregularly. as to, suggest at 
once the idea of their being borrowed from a Persian original, and to lead us, with the 
assistance of some, other arguments, to suppose that the whole version. is. a.-retranslation 
from the Persian version of Ali-yar, of which we are about to speak. | 
… B) The. Persian versions. = We knoy ‘two- versions”of: the Derbend-nämeh in the 
Persian language: one in the Asiatic Museum of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, and the 
other in the Imperial Public Library of St. Petersburg. We shall here insert sôme lines 
from the beginning of the. MS. of the Asiatic Museum, indicating_at the same, time the 
variations between it and that in the Imperial Public Library *. For these lines 1 am indeb- 
 ted to the obliging care of my. learned friend Mr. Gottwaldt, formerly attached :to 
the said Imperial Library of St. Petersburg. | 
: : Pa " : LL : . 
Sn Les ! . \ A Le Ê « ù Le 
1 
© à: 
15 ï mean to say de one from which Dr. Doru' 's D À has been copied; it begins thus: | A Je 
el Ge F2 onde Do us EL ro le ne Sales SJ 
3h < )_ pas $ “ Praise and glory be ‘to that art creator ‘who favoured manwith sagacity and understanding; 
and blessings be upon the chosen ones (Prophets) who have guided us to the true faithli — It was tran- 
scribed ät Tiflis by a Russian Officer in April 4829; but I do not know by what means it was procured for 
the Joperall Si 4 — ‘At the bottom of the last page of-the MS. we read the following lines written 
by the transcriber: Lies RS AT 1AP9 du - Jeel > nr) cb) EU on ge SE er 
S sell dde SN 95 Se ra 4: which signify: » This koh was fiched b 
Ci gr 75 PE gnify : 5 
the aid of God, the gracious {heavenly) King in the month of April of the Christian year 1829 in M town 
of Tiflis. Ît was written by the'Topographer of the second class Michaël Saradjoff. 
16 We,have put in parentheses all the words, and expressions that.are wanting in the MS. of the Im- 
perial Library , and have exhibited the variations de tislauer at the botiom of the page by the letters L. P. L. 
That which îs referred to'by the word’ read {is our correction of both the texts. 
: 
 Mém. des sav. étrang. :T. VI. 57 
