Zan-zuh: the Holy Language of the Tibetan Bon-po
by "
Helmut Hoffmann München
Since the time Anton Schiefneb pubhshed the first translation of a
Tibetan Bon-po text, the Kiu 'bum dkar-po "the White Hundred Thou¬
sand about the Kiu or Nägas*", western scholars were confronted with
titles in the Bon-po scriptures which gave the heading of the respective
book at first in 2ah-zun language (zaw zwn skad du) and after that in
Tibetan {bod skad du). By that Zah-zuh title evidently it is pretended
the texts to have been translated from 2ah-zun into Tibetan. Because
in later times vast masses of Bon-po Texts borrowed their contents from
Lamaist books viz. especially from Riiin-ma-pa writings there arose a
general suspicion those titles in an unintelligible language might be a
mere invention of the character of Indian dhärarfis and similar magic
material.
After the publication of the so-called "Tibetan — 2ah-zuh Dictio¬
nary" by Si-ma Grags-pa at Delhi 1966 that premature conclusion can
be maintained no longer. The material published, to be sure, is nothing
less then a dictionary but can be styled a bilingual collection of scholastic
memorial verses like the Indian kärikäs, a work which from its contents
can be compared in the Buddhist field mutatis mutandis with the
Abhidharmakosa of Vasubandhu. That implies, of course, considerable
difficulties for the research of the syntactical character of the language,
because grammatical particles like Tibetan -kyi for the genetive case or
-na in conditional sentences are dropped very often according to metre.
Moreover, a narrative of simple style would prove very helpful for our
study of this monosyllabic language but until now we have unfortunately
to rest content with a theological treatise. What I have done already is
the preparation of a dictionary out of the described material as well as
that of a grammatical sketch to the extent possible in these days.
The language of a Tun-huang scroll ascribed 1933 to 2ah-!£un language
by professor F. W. Thomas^ does not agree fully with the phonology and
orthography of our material. We have to realize Zan-zuii was divided in¬
to Upper and Lower 2ah-zun {zan-zun stod, zah-zun smad), although the
' Anton Schibfnbb, Über das Bonpo-Siitra: „Das weiße Näga-Hundert-
tausend". Mömoires de l'Acadömie de St. Petersbourg, VII. Serie, Tome 28
No. 1, St. Petersburg 1881.
» JRAS 1933, p. 405—410.
^Ä&n-iuii : The Holy Language of the Tibetan Bon-po 377
question of locating those parts of the kingdom has not been settled
definitely until now.
As to the locating of the 2ah-zmi state as a whole in the seventh and
eighth century A.D. we are rather sure due to the evidences Professor
G. Tucci has brought out. Zaii-zuh was a state or perhaps a confedera¬
tion of K'iang tribes, identical with the Yang-t'ung^ of the T'ang annals,
covering the area now styled West, North and North-eastern Tibet
including parts of the present Indian Himalayas and the western districts
of the actual kingdom of Nepal. The center and capital of the 2ah-zuh
kingdom was undoubtedly K'yun-lun dnul-mk'ar "The Silver Castle of
the Garuda Valley", a place in the upper Sutlej valley, deserted to-day
by its inhabitants but still an important place of pilgrimage for the
Bon-po Tibetans. Tucci has given a description of that site*. During the
eighth century it was also the residence of the Tibetan consort of the
Z&h-inh king Lig-mi-rhya, daughter of K'ri-sran Ide-bcan. The name of
that queen who according to the references in the Tun-huang chronicle
felt very unhappy in her position^ is styled in the text Sad-mar-kar which
does not seem to be Tibetan but 2ah-zuh language, meaning something
like "Queen Gold Splendour" (in Sanskrit it could represent Devi
Suvarnaprabhä). The 2ah-zuh language left also its trace on the map
of Northern Tibet which formerly was integrated in the 2ah-zuh king¬
dom. For instance, the name of the holy lake Dangra Yumtso* is half
Tibetan and half 2ah-zuh, Yumtso meaning "Turquoise Lake" in
Tibetan and dan-ra "lake" in 2ah-zuh.
2ah-zuh was first subdued by the Tibetans during the time of king
Sron-bcan sgam-po (ca. 620—649) but was not included in the Tibetan
empire as a province but retained the status of a tributary kingdom.
After a rebelhon during the time of K'ri-sron Ide-bcan (eighth century)
the 2ah-Jun king was eliminated definitely. Beginning after those events
the 2ah-iuh culture and language succumbed to those of Tibet and
gradually disappeared.
We have now to fix the position of the 2ah-^uh language within the
frame of the Tibeto-Burmese branch of Sino-Tibetan. The relationship
to Classical Tibetan is undoubtedly rather near. But there are some
typical characteristics that seperate 2ah-4uh from Tibetan. The use of
prefixes in 2ah-iun is, generally spoken, more restricted than it is in
' G. Tuooi, Preliminary Report on two Scientific Expeditions in Nepal,
Roma 1956, p. 105 seq.
* Santi e briganti nel Tibet ignoto, Milano 1937, p. 133 seqq.
' J. Bacot, F. W. Thomas. Ch. Toussaint: Documents de Touen-houang
relatifs a I'histoire du Tibet, Paris 1940/46, p. 155.
• SiEQBBBT Hummel, Namenkarte von Tibet, Kopenhagen o. J., gives the
official Tibetan writing as Dang-rab gyu-mtso.
378 Helmut Hoffmakn
Tibetan. Compare in the table ni "two" (Tib. gnis), sum "three" (Tib.
gsum), cu "ten" (Tib. bcu), nam, the word for plurality (Tib. rnams) and yug "quicli" (Tib. mgyogs). Besides, in the vocabulary we find a consider¬
able reservoir of words a Tibetan equivalent of which does not exist at
all. An important part of them can be made out in the vocabulary of some
Bhotia languages of the Indian Almora district viz. Chaudängsi, Byängsi
and Därmiyä. Here we find parallels of those Zah-zun numerals which
are different from those in Tibetan: tig "one" (CB tig), bin "four" (CB.
pi), snis "seven" (BC nis against Tibetan bdun). Snis should also be
connected with Newäri hnas and Old Kuki sNis. There ought to be
mentioned also some important appelatives like Zah-zun tih "water"
(CB. New. ti, Tibetan Ö'u), hrah "horse" (CB. räng and the related
Tibetan word for "wild horse" rkyan). Judging from those examples it
seems understandable that Dr. Robert Shafer'' styled Zah-zun to be
probably "Old Almora". But there are evidences which are contradictory
to this statement. There seems to exist a phonetic law that the nasalis
labialis m in Tibetan, if not protected as initial sound by a prefix, must
appear in Zah-zun (and therefore also in related languages) as nasalis
dentalis viz. n. Compare ni "man" for Tibetan mi, ne "fire" for Tibetan me, nu "frontier" for Tibetan mu, ma-nih "name" for Tibetan min. But
in this case Chaudängsi, Byängsi and Newäri agree with Tibetan : they
have mi for "man", mäi (C.) and me (B.) for "fire".
Now there are to be mentioned some languages of the Eastern Hima¬
layas which agree with Zah-zun in this respect besides those character¬
istics aheady mentioned shared by them with the Almora group : Daf lä
and Dhimal in the Assam mountains, Tötö near Jalpaiguri in Northern
Bengal and Hruso in the angle formed by Assam and Bhutän, and be¬
sides some languages of Nepal viz. Magar, Murmi, Gur ung and Pahri
which belong to an area that, according to the researches of Professor
Tu.cci in the 13. and 14. century formed an ingredient of a vast kingdom
reigned by a Malla dynasty whose territory included Western Tibet as
well as Western Nepal*. Also in Pahri "one" is thi-ki, "four" pingi. in
Murmi "seven" nis (Gurung ni, Dhimal ni'i). Moreover Zah-iuh ni
"man" has its parallel in Daflä nyi. Hruso ni-na. A striking parallel to
the Zah-zun word for "moon" zla-ri (Tibetan zla-ba, pronounced da-wa)
can be found in Tötö tä-ri and Dhimal ta-li.
With some rather strange conditions we are confronted in the method
of using Zah-zun numerals. Besides the simple numbers in some cases
there are to be found, often obviously due to the metre of the memorial
' Robebt Shafer, Bibliography of Sino-Tibetan Languages I, Wiesbaden
1957, p. 195.
' G. Tucci, Preliminary Report, p. 67 seqq.
2lan-2un : The Holy Language of the Tibetan Bon-po 379
verse, double ntunerals. "Four" is always given as bin-na (literally
"foxu:-five"), "five" sometimes as na-drug ("five-six"), "six" as drug- snis "six-seven"). Surprisingly ne-sum ("two-three") is used in the meaning "three", snis-gyad ("seven-eight") in the meaning "eight".
This is proved by the fact that ne-sum ought to have the meaning "three"
in ne-sum-cu rce-tel sum, the 2ah-zuh equivalent of the "Thirty-three
Gods" well-known also in Buddhist literature as Trayastrimsat. The
meaning of snis-gyad as "eight" is made clear by the example of "the eight fruits of Srotapatti", viz. "the entering of the stream of deliverance"
Igyu-zi-ne k'ri-rce snis-gyad), a term which is common to Buddhism and
systematized Bon religion. Those data specified above seem to be very
striking and until now I did not meet with similar phenomena in other
languages.
As to grammatical particles which play so important a role in Classical
Tibetan as well as in Chinese the material at our disposal proves to be
rather meagre. That seems understandable since also in Tibetan metrical
compositions those particles, abundant in classical prose are dropped to
a great extent. Nevertheless particles for the designation of plurality
and the cases of the noun can be found in our material. The mark of
plurality nam, identical with Tibetan rnams, is to be met with in the
examples ni-nam "men" tin-rmm "rivers". The genitive particle is met
with frequently. It appears in the euphonic forms -61, -zi, -gyi, -gi the
distribution of which seems not to be as strict as in Tibetan. Some of the
examples might be due to carelessness or clerical error. We give the
following specimens: ni-ci dbyig-mar "the riches of men", ha-ra sad-ti
äe-skya "the compassion of the Wisdom God", mar-zi ni-ri (like Tibetan gser-gyi ni-ma) "the golden sun", but also ha-ra k'i-k'ar-6i "having rays
of light of wisdom" — here as in many other examples the particle is
used also for Tibetan can "being provided with". Furthermore we find
-gyi in zur-gyi nar-la "at the edge of the rock" and -gfi in tin-gi dmu-un
"the turquois dragon".
As in Tibetan the particle -la is used for the locative case. We give
the following examples: dan-ra p'yin-la mar-ca yug "in the depth of the
lake the golden fish is quick", gyi-gran-gyi §e-la sne-ce rbad "pierce the
spear into the heart of the enemy". Like in Tibetan -la is used also for
coordinative purposes: de-la dub-sna "happiness and misery".
The ablative particle -las is to be found until now only once : drun-mu
gyer-gyi mu-ye k'i-k'ar-las "from the rays of light of the Svastika-Bon sphere".
The terminative particle -du is met with more frequently: tift-nam
k'ud-du 'brug "the rivers fall down to the valley", wer-sun ku-trig bran- du rkyes "the demons are subdued for being slaves".
380 Helmut Hoffmann
Like Tibetan -te, -de, -ste in 2ah-zuh -ti is to be found in coordinative
clauses: rkyan-t'an kun-Ses du-zi-ti j nu-ci p'yo-ye du-drod-ye "being of
tbe essence of omniscience and boundless, limitless and without qua¬
lities".
At the end of this paper I need not miss to lay stress on the frequency
of Indian loan words which show that there must have existed 2ah-zuh —
Indian contacts before the translation of 2ah-zuh Bon-po texts into
Tibetan. Those words comprise partly expressions of the daily life on
the other hand theological terms. 1. has-ti "elephant", sah-go "lion",
citta "heart" (denoting the corporeal organ but not the mind), cakra
"wheel" (also in the form of a synonym compound: cag-kor), cur-ni
"powder", a-yu "time", sam-pad "happiness", rad-na" jewel", pad-ma
"pudendum muliebre", 2. from the religious sphere bho-dha "buddha", ta-t'a-ga-ta, dha-ki = däkini, gu-ru "spiritual teacher", parjL-tri "scholar", jüa-na and pra-jna "wisdom", si-dhi "magic perfection".
Due to time and circumstances* I could give here only some general
outlines. The whole material will be given in a study that will comprise
a detailed grammatical sketch and a complete dictionary of all available
material.
Linguistic Table'
one tig gßig CB. tig P. thi-ki
two ni gnis C. nis T. ne
B. nisi
three sum gsum CB. sum Ma. Mu. T. sung
ne-sum som Dh. sum
four bih hii CB. pi P. pingi T. di
bih-ha
N. pi
five na lha
C .ngaii N. ha T. ngä
ha-drug B. nge
six drug drug CB. tug N. k'u T. tü
drug-snis
seven snis bdun CB. nis Mu. nis Dh. n'ii
N. hnas
eight gyad brgyad C.jyad N. täyä T. ge, nS
snis-gyad B. jed
*) This paper was read at the Intemational Congress of Orientalists at
Ann Arbor 1967.
• Column one gives the meaning of the words, no. 2. the words in 2aA-
äuü, 3. Tibetan, 4. Almora Languages (B =Byängsi, C =Chaudäng8i), 5. Nepal
Languages (P=Pahri, G = Gumng, Mu=Murmi, Ma=Magar, N=Newäri),
6. Languages of the Eastern Himalayas (D=Daflä, H=Hruso, T^Tötö,
Dh=Dhimal).
2aA-2im : The Holy Language of the Tibetan Bon-po 381
nine gu-dun dgu CB. gvi N. gu T. gu
ten 6u böu CB. 01 N. di'i T. chutämbä
plurality nam rnams
water tih ö'u CB. ti Ma. di N. ti T. ti Dh. t§i
horse hrah rkyan
(rta)
CB. rang
man ni mi CB. mi Gu.Ma. mhi H. ni-na
N. mi
fire ne me C. mai
B. me
N. me T. megne
D. ni, nyi
frontier nu mu
moon zla-ri zla-ba CB. lha N. la T. tä-ri
Dh. ta-li
26 ZDMO 117/2
Das Arta Viraz Namak*
Von Günter Gobrecht, Berlin
Auf Empfehlung meines Lehrers Prof 0. Hansen habe ich eine Neu¬
edition des Artä Viräz Nämak nach den seinerzeit auch von Martin
Haug benutzten ältesten mittelpersischen Handschriften (K 20, H 6,
K 26) angefertigt. Die Neuedition ist mit einem kritischen Apparat,
einer Übersetzung, Erläuterungen zum Text und zur Übersetzung und
einem vollständigen Glossar versehen. Der Text ist nach der Methode
von Prof. Hansen transliteriert, während im Glossar neben der Trans¬
literation die Transkription angegeben ist. Eine Edition des Textes
wurde aus hauptsächlich zwei Gründen sinnvoll, einmal, um die restlos
veraltete Transkription von Haug durch eine der heute gebräuchlichen
Transliterationen zu ersetzen und zweitens, um nach kritischer Durch¬
sicht des Textes, einigen Verbesserungen des Apparates und Vorschlä¬
gen zu eventuell anderen Lesarten einiger Wörter eine neue Übersetzung
zu geben, insbesondere der Versuch, einige problematische Textstellen
zu interpretieren. Da der Druck der gesamten Arbeit noch nicht be¬
gonnen wurde und also vermutlich noch einige Zeit in Anspruch neh¬
men wird, sei es gestattet, hier im voraus auf ein allgemeines Problem
des Textes einzugehen, die sogenannte historische Einleitung und eine
damit verbundene Charakterisierung des Textes.
Das AVN erzählt, wie bekannt ist, die Jenseitsvision eines Zoroa-
striers. Man kann den in den Handschriften fortlaufend geschriebenen
Text in drei Abschnitte teilen : einen Prolog, eine Rahmenerzählung
und das Hauptthema. Der Lihalt der Rahmenerzählung und des Haupt¬
themas ist folgender :
Arta Viraz, ein als 'sündenfreiester' und 'rühmlichster' bezeichneter
Mann einer Gemeinde in einer nicht näher genannten Epoche wird
während einer Versammlung im Feuertempel Atur-Farnhag von den
Dasturs der Religion und 'allen' Menschen durch Wahl und durch das
Los dazu bestimmt, in Trance versetzt zu werden, und eine Vision des
Jenseits zu erleben und anschließend den zweifelnden Menschen Kunde
aus dem Jenseits zu bringen und ihnen zu berichten, ob ihre Kulthandlun¬
gen richtig sind oder falsch. Im Rahmen einer großen Zeremonie wird
Viraz dann in Trance versetzt und, sehr ähnlich Dantes Göttlicher Ko¬
mödie, geht seine Seele ins Jenseits und wird dort von Atur Yazat, der
Gottheit des Feuers, einer Personifizierung des Feuers (Ohrmazds) und
dem Gerechten Sroä (dem gerechten oder frommen Gehorsam) empfan¬
gen. Sie zeigen ihm die Wonnen des Paradieses und die Strafen der
♦ D 188
