JOURNAL 



OF THE 



ASIATIC SOCIETY, 



Part I.— HISTORY, LITERATURE, &c. 

 No. III.— 1869. 



Baddoni and his Works. By H. Blochmann, Esq., M. A., Assistant 

 Professor, Calcutta Madrasah. 

 [Received 1st April, 1869.] 

 I. — Introduction. 



This paper is the first of a series of essays which I intend to write 

 from copious notes collected by me on the Arabic and Persian editions 

 of our Bibliotheca Indica. The object of the essays is to supply pre- 

 faces and introductions to those works of which merely texts have 

 been printed, to collect whatever biographical information we possess 

 of the authors of our editions, and to remark on the style of their 

 productions. Though the subject matter, especially in the case of our 

 historical publications, has received much attention, the style of the 

 authors presents many interesting features, inasmuch as we can trace 

 in their works the growth of the Persian language in India. I also 

 intend giving translations of new and interesting passages, and thus 

 prepare the way for systematic translations. The more texts the 

 Asiatic Society prints, the more necessary will it become to translate 

 the works. This is of great importance for our historical texts : as 

 long as we have no translations, the Historians of the Bibliotheca 

 Indica will be a treasure under lock and seal. 



The great difficulty connected with the translation of our works is 

 this, that in most cases the translations will have to be made in India, 

 15 



