Chau Ju-Kua - University of Oregon Libraries

30
ISTKODrCTIOX.
cannot be stored (on board ship), for after a time it breeds insects. Tlie cause
of this is unknown ^
«Ships sail in the eleventh or twelfth moons to avail themselves of the
north wind (the north-east monsoon), and come back in the fifth or sixth
moon to avail themselves of the south wind (the south-west monsoon). 5
((The ships are squarely built like grain measures (((bushels» %^). If
there is no wind (i. e., if the sails are not used) they cannot remove the
masts, for these are firmly planted, and the sails hang down on one side (of
them),—one side close to the mast, around which they move like a door (on
its hinges). They have mat-sails. .These ships are called kia-t'u^ (jjlfl ^), 10
which is a foreign word^ (^ "^ -j;^).
((At sea they can use not only a stern wind, but wind off or toward
shore can also be used. It is only a head-wind which drives them backward.
This is called «using the wind of three directions)) {-^ ^ ^ ^). When
there is a head-wind they can heave the anchor (|J J^) and stop. 15
((The Governor of Kuang-tung in the fifth moon prays to the god Fong-
lung (^ 1^ ^^) for wind.
((On large kia-Ung (Kling?)* sea-going ships (^ ^ "M M ik ^)>
every several hundred men, and on small ones a hundred and more men,
1) Kuang-tung-sin-yfl, 4, 6,a5, contains an account of springs of brackish (or fresh) water 20
in the sea ("^ ptl V^ ^^)' ^^^ "^ which were along the Kuang-tung coasts, two of these
seeming to have been on the coast of Sin-hui-hien near the Bogae. Our author assumes, I take
it, that a submarine spring sends a column of fresh water to the surface where it spreads out,
while the lower strata of the sea remains salt-water, this prevents the formation of certain
organic growths containing the germs that will breed insects in ordinary spring-water. 25
2) Icia-t'u is pronounced Jca-tat in Cantonese, and the second syllable stands for tur or
tur. Final r is quite commonly represented by final t in old inscriptions, as in the name T'u-ku6
which represent Ttlrk of the Old Turkish stone inscriptions preserved in alphabetical script. Katur
is proba.hly the word Catur said to have been in use on the coast of Malabar as the name of a
special kind of sailing ship in the early days of the Portuguese. Yule & Burnell, Anglo-Indian 30
Glossary, s. v. -Catur, say «Jal (Archfiologie Navale, II, 259) quotes Witsen as saying that the
Caturi or Almadias were Calicut vessels, having a length of 12 to 13 paces (60 to 65 feet), sharp
at both ends, and curving back, using both sails and oars. But there was a larger kind 80 feet
long, with only 7 or 8 feet beam». This, it is true, does not tally with the description of our
Chinese author, who compares the ship to a grain measure, hu, the characteristic shape of 35
which is that of the frustum of a pyramid,—an impossible type, even for this remote period, for
distant ocean craft. See, however, the picture of an Arab ship of about this period in Van der
Lith and Devic's Merveilles de I'Inde, 91. Our word «cutter» is derived from Catur (or
kattira).
3) Fang-yen lit. «local terms, in the title of a well-known ancient work, means «terms 40
not usual in the standard language of China)), being some kind of provincialism; but it also occurs
in the sense of a regular ((foreign word)). P'ei-w5n-yiin-fu, 13A, 85.
4) The Kling are usually called Ho-ling (g^ |^) in Chinese mediaeval works; my
suggestion is quite gratuitous. It is certain that the Kling were the principal foreign traders
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