THE ISLAND CF BALT, 
119 
when such investigations were stigmatised as barren and dry, 
and knowing from Dr Prichard, in his last anniversary'ad- 
dress, having directed the attention of the Ethnological So¬ 
ciety to our previous notice of Mr Freidrich’s researches, 
ti«at their importance is fully understood in England, we lose 
no time in presenting our readers with a translation of his 
first essay.-{* 
A PRELIMINARY ACCOUNT OF THE ISLAND OF BALL 
By R. Fkiedericit. 
INTRODUCTION, 
I must request the indulgence of friendly readers for the 
following paper on Bali. Not having prepared myself for 
this labour on Bali itself, I had not the means of collecting 
and properly arranging all my materials I could only use 
for this purpose a small portion of the valuable manuscripts 
of the priests which were placed at my disprsal, I could not 
avail myself of the information of the natives as to many 
points, and I was deprived of a great part of my manuscripts. 
These circumstances will perhaps in some degree excuse 
the many, and to the writer best known, deficiencies of this 
preliminary account. I have divided this work into three 
divisions—1st, language and literature ; 2nd, religion, wor¬ 
ship and cremation ; 3rd, castes and royal races. With this 
is given a short description of the Balinese calendar, and, as 
illustrative of the lithographed manuscript Wretta-Santyaya f 
an enumeration of the Kawi-Metra. 
In the - Tijdschr'ft voor iVeerlands-Indie 9.3.340, an ex¬ 
planation from the Sanscrit is given of the name Bali in the 
paper u Usana Bail': —subsequently the title of a work, Bali 
Sanyraha , became known to the writer. This work, which 
however appears no longer to exist, was presented by a 
pandita to one of the Kings of Ball. The name is explain¬ 
ed thus,— Bali—ivis-esa, sanyraha—kumpulan. Following 
the Indian manner of composition, where the word in the 
oblique case is placed before that in the nominative, "it is to 
be explained thus,— The gathering of the excellent (heroes.) 
With this the Sanscrit sanggreehi entirely agrees. Bali is 
then not to be considered as li offering/’ but as the nomi¬ 
native of the theme balin , a strong person, powerful, a hero. 
The name Bali signifies thus a hero, and the name of the 
f It will appear in Dutch in a forthcoming volume ef the Transactions of 
the Batavian Societv, but Mr Freidrich’s kindness in sending us proof sheets 
enables us to give it without waiting for lie publication of that volume. 
