Chau Ju-Kua - University of Oregon Libraries

1 50 MAIiAT «MEN OF TBE SKA» (oKANG-LAUT). 1,38,8
2) In Ch6u K'fl-fei's work, this island is not located, and after the words 'carried off',
Dccurs the phrase: athousands and'tens of thousands of them are sold as foreign slaves (^ ^JC)"-
Conf. supra, p. 31, n. 2. Edrisi, I, 58 says that the Arabs of Oman kidnapped children on the
Zanguebar coast by offering them sweets. He also tells us (I, 61) that there was the Island of
Monkeys some two days distant from the African coast. The inhabitants of the islands of Khartan 5
and Martan (Kurian - Murian Islands) captured the monkeys by ruse and sold them in the
Yemen, where they were used as slaves. The people of Kish and of Socotra were great slave traders.
T'ang-shu, 2220,8*, says that during the h'ai-yuan period (A. D. 713—742) there came a
mission to China from Shi-li-fo-shi (Sumatra) which, among other things, presented two dwarf
women and two women from S8ng-ti
('j^ ^ ^ |_^ ^ ^ Zl), also singers and dancers. 10
It seems possible, considering the constant relations between the Arabs of Sumatra with those in
the African trade, that these Sbng-ti women were of the same race and country as the K'un-lnn
ts'ong-k'i of our author. There was, however, in the T'ang period, an island near the north-east
point of Sumatra called Ko-ko-song-chii {or ti), and SOng-ti in the present case may be an
abbreviated form of that name. The T'ang-shu (loc. cit., 6») says the Sho-p'o country sent in 15
A. D. 613 as tribute to China «four Song-chi slaves» (j^ f\^ j^ ^). By a slight change of
the second character the name may appear as Song-k'i, j^ without the dot underneath being
homophonous with iffl as used by Chau Ju-kua.
3. Malay „Men of the Sea" (Oraiig--laut).
Sha-hiia-kung {fp ^ >^). 20
«The people of the country of Sha-hua-kung are in the habit of going
out on the high seas for plunder, and sell their prisoners to Sho-p'o».
«Again in a south-easterly direction (from this country?) there are certain
islands inhabited by savage robbers called Ma-lo-nu (^ Rp ^). When
traders are driven to this country, these savages assemble in large crowds 25
and, having caught the shipwrecked, roast them over a fire with large bamboo
pinchers and eat them».
«The chiefs of these robbers bore their teeth and plate them with yellow
gold. They use human skulls as vessels for drinking and eating. The farther
one penetrates among these islands, the worse the robbers are». 30
Note.
The whole of this chapter is taken from Ling-wai-tai-ta, 3,&^. Our author has omitted
some important remarks of Chou. The latter begins by saying: «Sha-hua-kung is a country in
( \') the south-eastern Sea». In the second paragraph, first line, after the word 'country', Ch6u
adds 'and near the Fo country'
(jg; ^ |g),
which, in view of the statement made' in the 35
first paragraph that the pirates of Sha-hua-kung sell their prisoners in Sho-p'o (i. e., Java), we
think must stand for Fo-shi {^ ^), the name used during the T'ang period to designate
Eastern Sumatra, the San-fo-ts'i of the Sung period. Probably Ch6u's authority wrote in the
T'ang period, hence the use of the older name, fallen in disuse in his time. Pelliot B. E. F.
E. 0., IV, 301 translated this passage of the Ling-wai-tai-ta differently; he read: eFurther to the 40
south-east is the kingdom of Kin-fo, etc.» V\'e have never met with this name in Chinese works, nor
apparently had Pelliot, for he offers no explanation of it.