1855.] Literary Intelligence. 49 



You may make the following offer to the Society, I will write a very 

 full analysis of the work, in fact a complete translation, to be 

 printed with copious extracts from the Arabic original. I sup- 

 pose it will fill three numbers of the Bibliotheca. Anticipat- 

 ing the sanction of the Society, I commenced my labour at once, 

 because here I have greater facilities. Bound with it, is another 

 work on Geography of a still earlier date — it was compiled under 

 Motadhid billah (reigned from 279 to 289) — but of a very different 

 character. The author was not a practical traveller, but a man of 

 great learning. His book is full of quotations from the earliest and 

 best authors: Kalby, Kinchy, Abu 'abaydah, Waqidy, Ibn iZabyb, 

 Ac, and contains many very valuable historical details. I do not 

 know when Ibn al-Eaqyh Hamadany lived. If chronology is not 

 against it, I put it down as his work. The book is not unique. 

 There is an inferior copy of it in the India House, I believe, marked 

 with either No. 616 or 628, and an old copy in the British Museum. 

 This ought to be published in the Bibliotheca. My copy has been 

 transcribed from a MS. which had been written in 413. I will 

 make arrangements to have it copied out, and after having carefully 

 compared it, I will send it to England in hopes to find some good 

 soul who may join me in editing it and compare it with the two 

 copies there. Kindly mention the subject to the Society and obtain 

 their sanction to the publication. 



I am now convinced that the Ashkal albilad is no other work than 

 the original text of Abu Zayd Balkhy, and Istakhry is an abstract, 

 and the d&d\ jj*> sometimes quoted by Dowlatchah and known in 

 Europe as the " Ibn Hawqal of Sir W. Ouseley" is a free transla- 

 tion of it. We must, however, ascertain whether Istakhry or Abu 

 Zayd is older. Be so good as to get the German translation of Istakhry 

 and also Eobinson's Biblical Researches for the Society's library ; 

 they may be useful for our purpose. Your wish, which you 

 expressed in your last, that an ancient work on geography be for- 

 warded is partly fulfilled. 



In the library of the Syrian Society at Beyroot is a copy of He- 

 rawy's places of pilgrimage and sights, which is of some interest but 

 not new, a copy of it being at Vienna. He visited and described 

 these places in the seventh century. Much more curious is the 



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