Setsuko Matoba: Zipangu and the Philippines

Setsuko Matoba has written a book Zipangu and Japan, after doing extensive primary research of sources in Europe, that suggests that Marco Polo's Zipangu (Cipangu) was actually the Philippines rather than Japan. I had missed the announcement of this book when first released about seven months ago.

Independently, I had come to the conclusion that Zipangu was a confused European conception of a continent that spanned the area from Japan, or at least southern Japan, southward through the Ryukyus, Taiwan, the Philippines all the way to the nutmeg and mace producing lands of the Moluccas.

The "Golden Land" or Suvarnadvipa region of Zipangu would refer to the region now known as the Philippines.

Here is the review of Zipangu and Japan that was published in the International Herald Tribune (Herald Asahi) last September.

29 September 2007
The International Herald Tribune (Herald Asahi)


Although he never visited it, the Venetian voyager wrote about a land that was laden with gold

It turns out he may have been wrong about the location

Setsuko Matoba, a Madrid-based author, raises the intriguing theory that Zipangu could be a reference to the Philippines in her book "Zipangu and Japan" published last month by Yoshikawa Kobunkan Inc. Matoba arrived at the new interpretation after analyzing archives and maps from the Age of Geographical Discovery (the 15th century through the first half of the 17th century) that she came across during visits to libraries and convents in Spain, Portugal and Italy over the past 10 years. Most of the documents dated back to the 16th century. "I published the book because I hoped to bring to attention documents that were not familiar in Japan," she said. "Giving my own opinion was not what I intended to do." "The Travels of Marco Polo" was based on Polo's experiences and observations during his journeys across Central Asia and China

Polo (1254-1324) was thought to have handed down the stories orally in Genoa, Italy, in 1298. They were then compiled into a manuscript, which was later translated into many European languages in and after the 14th century

About 150 original manuscripts of Polo's renditions survive. But there is no mention of "Zipangu" in the earlier versions, according to Matoba

Instead, the island that captured the imagination of medieval Europe was spelled in several ways, including Cipangu, Cipango, Zipangu, Siampagu and Cyampagu

"The Travels of Marco Polo," published in Japanese by Heibonsha Ltd. in its Toyo Bunko (the Eastern Library) series, employs the term based on the spelling of Cipangu. "Zipangu" apparently appears in documents for the first time in the early 17th century. In "Chronicle of Churches in Japan," written in the 17th century, Jesuit missionary Joao Rodrigues of Portugal said there was no question that the Zipangu mentioned in "The Travels of Marco Polo" referred to Japan. He noted that Zipangu derived from "Jepuencoe" or "Jiponcoe," the Chinese way of pronouncing Japan. Rodrigues spent many years in Japan from the late 16th century

Subsequent Jesuit missionaries accepted Rodrigues' view at face value. In turn, it became a mainstream theory in Europe, according to Matoba. Japanese scholars later subscribed to it

To back up his claim, Rodrigues cited the fact that a huge armada of Mongolian ships under Kublai Khan had come to grief in waters off Japan during a terrible typhoon. The incident, one of two attempted Mongolian invasions of Japan, was mentioned by Polo in his book But details do not match historical facts

Matoba offers this viewpoint: "Mongolia dispatched its fleet elsewhere as well." She said Polo could easily have been referring to an incident in Southeast Asia

So where was Zipangu? The documents Matoba gathered suggest the island known by the name of Zipangu is in the tropics

She noted frequent references to the Philippines, which Spain colonized in the 16th century with the lure of gold being a major factor. In contrast, there was no mention of gold in Japan. Moreover, ancient maps put Japan much further north. It was believed to be a peninsula, part of the Asian land mass, not an island nation, according to Matoba

Her findings spurred her to postulate that "Zipangu" actually referred to the Philippines and its far-flung archipelago

Takashi Gonoi, professor emeritus of the history of Christianity in Japan at the University of Tokyo, said he accepted her theory in principle. "It makes more sense if we think that (the island with gold) was a reference to a place other than Japan," Gonoi said. Charlotte von Verschuer, professor of Japanese history and philology at Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes in Paris, said Matoba's theory could answer longstanding questions among European scholars as to the location of gold-laden island if it was not Japan. But Masaaki Sugiyama, professor of the Mongolian history at Kyoto University, disagrees

"The compilation of 'The Travels of Marco Polo' was completed in the latter half of the 14th century, not in the end of the 13th century," he said. "Under the name of Marco Polo, experiences of other people and stories they had heard were incorporated into it." "That is why there are contradictions in it," Sugiyama said, referring to incidents that are at odds with historical facts

"It is possible that reports on Mongolia's expedition to the island of Java got mixed in with it. Still the outline matches that of the Mongolian expedition against Japan of 1281. There is no doubt that the island with gold was a reference to Japan." Sugiyama said that maps and documents pointing to the Philippines as the site of Zipangu referred to another location with a huge reserve of gold since Japan no longer produced the metal during the Age of Geographical Discovery. Matoba's theory has sparked a debate that may not die down easily. Even so, historians appear to agree on one thing: It raises questions about the veracity of the established theory.

Kuroshio Current and the Navel of the Sea

The earliest unmistakable description of the Kuroshio Current (Black Tide), also known as the "Japan Current," is given by Chou Ku-Fei (Zhou Chufei) in 1178.

Southwest of the four commanderies (chun) of Hainan there is a great sea called the Ocean of Chiao-chih (i.e., Vietnam or Tonking). In the midst of this sea there are three currents that carry the bubbling waves off in three directions.

-- Ling wai tai ta, translated in TSCC, first edition, 3118, 9-10.

All these currents are found in the ocean off Vietnam. The southern current is said to flow toward the seas of the southern barbarian states. The northern current flows up the Taiwan Strait. The third current is obviously the Kuroshio Current and flows toward the "Great Eastern Ocean," i.e., the Pacific Ocean. The Ling wai tai ta states that east of the state of Toupo is the Island of Women and then further east the Weilu, the cosmic oceanic drain. Chau Ju-kua (Zhao Rugua, 1226 CE) claims that it is in this region that the waters begin to flow east, i.e., where the Kuroshio Current begins. Actually the Kuroshio flows toward the northeast at its point of origin and then turns toward the east near the Bering Sea.

An interesting at least partial confirmation of the idea of a great ocean drain can be found in the islands of Kiribati in the middle of the Pacific Ocean near the equator. The navigators of Kiribati divide the Western Ocean into four toki or boundaries. Arthur Grimble describes these oceanic zones:

Theoretically the western ocean is plotted out into four zones, of which two are named and two merely described. In the first zone beyond the Fish-trap of Kabaki, the sea is said to take a downward slope away from home, and a mariner's return becomes increasingly difficult as he progresses towards the second zone. The second is a region of dead calms, where the downward of the sea becomes sharper still, and wherein dwells the monstrous uu-fish. This dreadful creature is said to be able with one suck (uu) to engulf and swallow a canoe 'together with all its crew'. The third zone, wherein the strayed voyager abandons all hope of life, is called Te wenei-n-anti, shooting star (or wake) of spirits—and is described as the region where a man has two shadows. In the words of my informant: 'If the voyager looks at looks at the sail his shadow is there, and if he looks upon the water his shadow is upon the water'. The fourth zone is called Te-uabuki-te-re — The-capsize-the-somersault — and is haunted by a strange, lonely bird who cries continually, 'I a kaawa, I a kaawa ('I am unhappy, I am unhappy').' Here the doomed canoe is seized in a resistless current which sweeps it west for a day and a night until it reaches the edge of a tremendous maelstrom, where it is sucked into the depths.

The "Fish-trap of Kabaki" is delineated by a line from the Caroline Islands southeast toward Samoa. So the four toki refer to regions to the west of that line. Grimble thought the South Equatorial Current was meant, although it could just as easily be the North Equatorial Current that also flows toward the Carolines and then continues westward merging with the Kuroshio Current. This ocean current to the West is found mentioned in genealogical stories going back 15 to 20 generations.

In Sulawesi, the landlocked Toraja have a vague myth that might also preserve ancient memories of an oceanic current near an island to the north some 25 generations ago from which they believe clan ancestors ventured to their current home.

The Toraja state the creator god Puang Matua was located in the "center of the sky" across the ocean to the north of Sulawesi. The deity went to the "center of the sea" to fetch gold that was used in creating Manturino, ancestor of water buffaloes; Golden Stem, ancestor of the rice plant; and Datu Laukku, the first human. All three are said to be split from the same "umbilical cord." Other than gold, the elements used to create these beings were the "yellow egg of the Earth," "the Prince of Water," and the "heat of fire." These were all located at the center of the sea at a place known as "River of the Earth" (Atena Padang) and the "source of foam." The ancestors of the Toraja descended from Heaven on a ladder to the island of Pongko directly below the Skyworld and north of Sulawesi.

The Atena Padang or "River of the Earth" near the "center of the sea" and located toward the north of Sulawesi might preserve the same ancient knowledge as found in the Chinese and Kiribati versions. The Bare'e-speaking Toraja know of the Puse Ntasi "Navel of the Sea" through which nine currents flow sometimes interrupted by the giant crab that causes the tides. Water evaporates there and turns into clouds. Here was the great mango tree, the Taripa Djandji or Taripa Djambi where we find various deities and animals dwelling.


Navel of sea, world tree, guardian, tides, ocean currents, earthquakes, etc.

We find scattered in Southeast Asia, various myths related to the navel of the sea that often contain explanations for tides and currents. The associated motifs generally include:

1. Navel or center of the sea that drains waters of the world
2. A submarine tree, pillar, etc. at the navel linking to the underworld and/or the skyworld
3. An animal, fish, bird, deity, etc. dwelling at the navel or the base of the tree/pillar
4. Cause of ebb and flow of tides (usually due to a giant serpent, whale, crab, bird, etc. that covers the drain being attracted by the Full Moon)
5. Cause of ocean currents due to water flowing in and out
6. Cause of earthquakes caused by creature at navel that shakes world pillar
7. Relationship to Sun and Moon e.g., eclipses, tides, lunar months, etc.
8. The sea flood (rising sea levels) is associated with the navel of the sea.
   

Here is a sampling from the region in which a number of these motifs are contained. The myth is very diverse on the island of Mindanao.

In 1698, Gaspar de San Agustin gives one of the earliest accounts of these motifs in the insular Southeast Asia and Pacific region in his Conquista de las Islas Filipinas. He describes the myth of the formation of the island of Bohol in the central Philippines. A goddess falls from a hole in the skyworld to fetch the medicine of the cosmic balete tree growing at the bottom of the ocean. A toad helps her and happens to bring up some earth growing around the balete tree, which is deposited on the back of a giant turtle. This earth eventually grows into the island of Bohol.

The Manobo of Mindanao, Philippines, believe that a great python guards the central mushroom-shaped pillar of the earth. They also have many variants of the navel of the sea (Pusod to Dagat) myth assigning to it the tides and the evaporation of water. The python shakes the pillar causing earthquakes.

The Bagobo of Mindanao conceived of a great eel known as Kasili that was wrapped around the base of the world pillar at the navel of the sea. His companion was the giant crab Kuyamang who when attracted by the Full Moon left the great hole causing the tides. Kasili or a great serpent causes earthquakes by shaking the world's pillars.

Among the Subanu of Mindanao, the hero Punbenua ventures to the Pusu Dagat "navel of the sea," to obtain the liver of the black snake that dwells at the base of the submarine Dangal Bahal tree. The Pusu Dagat is responsible for the ebb and flow of the tide.

Also from Mindanao, the Tiruray believe that a great dragon known as Diwata or Naga lives at the Fused Dagot "Navel of the Sea," that swallows the Sun at its setting.

Among the Mandaya, the Sun and Moon had a child, the giant crab known as Tabanakaua. The crab went to live at the navel of the sea and caused the tides by moving in and out of the cosmic drain. His moving about causes the waves and ocean currents. When angry at his mother he tries to swallow her causing the eclipse.

A widespread myth among Malays and Javanese is that of the Pusat Tasik "Navel of the Sea" in the middle of the sea where the Pauh Janggi tree grows. Here is a giant crab at the foot of the cosmic tree that causes the tides and currents by moving in and out of the navel. A great Garuda or Roc bird is perched on the branches of the Pauh Janggi. Also, in Kelantan the deity Si Raya, who appears to be the same as the Cham whale god Po Rayak (Po Riyak) is also thought to dwell at the Pusat Tasik through his identity as To Rimpun Alam. From at least Rumphius' day during the mid-17th century, the Pauh Janggi has been linked by some populations in the region with the coco de mer, although the word "pauh" refers to a wild mango tree species. The coco de mer occurs only in the Seychelles island group today but its fruit often float to the Maldives off the coast of India. However, more than a century earlier than Rumphius, Pigafetta describes the location of the tree near the Island of Women during the voyage of Magellan.

He [the Maluku pilot] told us moreover that an island called Ocoloro, below Java Major, is peopled by women alone, who are rendered pregnant by the wind. Should they produce a boy they kill him immediately ; if a girl she is reared. If a man at any time tries to visit the island they put him to death.

Other tales were likewise related to us. North of Java Major, in the Gulf of China, called by the ancients Sinus Magnus, there is said to be a very large tree, called Campanganghi (cam panganghi), on which there are birds called garuda, of such immense size, and so strong, they can carry a buffalo or an elephant to the place of the tree called Puzathaer (puza thaer). The fruit of the tree, which is called Buapanganghi (bua panganghi), is larger than a cucumber... This tree cannot be approached on account of the whirlpools about the island, which extend three or four leagues from shore.

Now as Pigafetta's Java Major is the island of Borneo, we can see that the myth relates to a location that agrees more with the Chinese account of the Weilu and Kuroshio Current, especially as the "Gulf of China" would mean all the sea opposite the coast of South China. The description of the Island of Women matches much of the detail given by Chau Ju-Kua three centuries earlier of the location with the same name located southeast of Quanzhou.

In olden days, whenever a ship was wrecked by a tempest on these shores, the women would take the men home with them, but they were all dead within a few days....The women of this country conceive by exposing themselves naked to the full force of the south wind, and so give birth to female children.

Also, Muslim literature generally locates the Roc or Ruk bird in Zabag or Wakwak. From Pigafetta's Puzathaer, we get Malay Pusat Air "Navel of the Waters." The "bua" of "Buapanganghi" is likely one of the words, bua, buah, etc. derived from PMP *buak that are found throughout the region meaning "fruit." Some have suggested that Panganghi is a corruption of Pauh Janggi. The word "janggi" appears to probably be a corruption of Toraja "djandji" as mentioned above for the taripa djandji or djambi (taripa "mango," djampu "fruit"). Malay also has the word "djandji," so there must have been some miscommunication along the way. The evidence suggesting the Toraja name is the more original form is that among the Bare'e, taripa djandji is the common way of saying "mango tree," while in Malay, Pauh Janggi refers only specifically to the mythical tree. Also, since "pauh" is the Malay word for a wild mango tree, it is likely that at a late date the Pauh Janggi was conflated by some groups with the coco de mer. The Toraja's seafaring linguistic cousins, the Bugis, are known to collect giant mango stones, which they decorate in silver.

Maori legend tells of the Te Parata, a giant taniwha, a dragon or serpent-like creature, that creates a great whirlpool far beyond the horizon at "mid-ocean." The maelstrom sucks in passing canoes. Te Parata's inhaling and exhaling of the waters causes the tides. In Rarotonga, the great navigator Tangiia traveled with the Samoan Karika to 'Avaiki (Savai'i) in Samoa in possibly the 13th century. From there Tangiia ventured much further West to the original homeland known as 'Avaiki te Varinga or Atia te Varinga. Where exactly this was is hard to say, but on the return journey eastward he stopped at Uea (Wallis Island) . It was while traveling westward from Savai'i to Atia te Varinga that Tangiia encountered the Fafa, a great whirlpool.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Demetrio, Francisco. "Creation Myths among the Early Filipinos," Asian Folklore Studies, Vol. 27, No. 1 (1968), 41-79 .

Downs, Richard Erskine. The religion of the Bare'e-speaking Toradja of Central Celebes, 's-Gravenhage, Uitgeverij Excelsior, 1956

Eugenio, Damiana L Philippine Folk Literature: The Myths, University of the Philippines Press, 1993.

Grimble, R. Migrations, myth and magic from the Gilbert Islands: early writings of Sir Arthur Grimble, London, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1972.

Kruyt, Albert C. Woordenlijst van de Baree-taal, M. Nijhoff, 1894.

Jocano, F. Landa. Outline of Philippine Mythology, Manila: Centre Escolar University Research and Development Center, 1969.

Tregear, Edward. The Maori Race, Wanganui, 1904.

Tsintjilonis, D. "Embodied difference; The body-person of the Sadan Toraja," Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde 153 (1997), no: 2, Leiden, 244-272.

Pre-Columbian Custard Apple in India

Another recent study suggests that an American crop, the custard apple (Annona squamosa) -- was present in India during pre-Columbian times. The discovery of custard apple seed at the Neolithic site of Tokwa is very early, but it would tend to confirm other previous identifications of fruit coat and seeds respectively at Kushan and Iron Age Punjab sites. Custard apples appear to be represented artistically at the 3rd-1st century BCE Sunga dynasty sites of Bharhut, Mathura and Sanchi, identifications made originally by Sitholey and Cunningham.

The authors also mention the archaeological identification of various American beans e.g., the kidney bean or common bean (Phaselous vulgaris), sierra bean (Phaseolus lunatus) and phasemy bean (Phaseolus lathyroides) in peninsular India and a weed Mexican poppy (Argemone
mexicana) in Uttara Pradesh, all from very early sites. They conclude that the evidence argues in favor of pre-Columbian contacts between America and Asia.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

Palaeoethnobotanical record of cultivated crops and associated weeds and wild taxa from Neolithic site, Tokwa, Uttar Pradesh, India

Anil K. Pokharia Birbal Sahni Institute of Palaeobotany, 53, University Road, Lucknow 226 007, India

Investigation of botanical remains from an ancient site, Tokwa at the confluence of Belan and Adwa rivers, Mirzapur District, Uttar Pradesh (UP), has brought to light the agriculture-based subsistence economy during the Neolithic culture (3rd–2nd millennium BC). They subsisted on cereals, viz. Oryza sativa, Triticum aestivum and Hordeum vulgare, supplemented by leguminous seeds of Lens culinaris, Pisum arvense and Vigna radiata. Evidence of oil-yielding crops has been documented by recovery of seeds of Linum usitatissimum and Brassica juncea. Fortuitously, an important find among the botanical remains is the seeds of South American custard apple, regarded to have been introduced by the Portuguese in the 16th century. The remains of custard apple as fruit coat and seeds have also been recorded from other sites in the Indian archaeological context, during the Kushana Period (AD 100–300) in Punjab and Early Iron Age (1300–700 BC) in UP. The factual remains of custard apple, along with other stray finds discussed in the text, favour a group of specialists, supporting with diverse arguments, the reasoning of Asian–American contacts, before the discovery of America by Columbus in 1498. Further, a few weeds have turned up as an admixture in the crop remains."

Full article at:

http://www.ias.ac.in/currsci/jan252008/248.pdf

More on Qingtong

Details of Qingtong's realm in Fangzhou described in the Chen Kao (489 CE) coincide with a series of notices about the country of Fusang in other works. The Liangshu, the annals of the Liang Dynasty compiled in the 7th century, tell of a priest or shaman named Huishen who comes to China in 499 CE as an envoy from Fusang. The same source mentions that in 458 CE, missionaries from Ki-pen brought the Buddhist religion to Fusang. The Liang Si Gong Zhi written in 695 tells of envoys from Fusang who bring official gifts in 520 CE.

Given the timing and the fact that one of Qingtong's titles is "Fusang Great Emperor" (Fusang Daidi, 扶桑大帝) , one can say that Qingtong's domain was intended by the Daoists to refer to the contemporary political entity known as Fusang that had sent two missions to China. And again there is the coincidence also of the introduction of Buddhism to Fusang described in the Liangshu and the mention in the Chen Kao of Buddhism in western Lesser Fangzhu.

Huishen's directions to Fusang are rather confused and have led to a great many theories connecting the legendary land to the Americas across the Pacific Ocean. However, as we have noted earlier the older descriptions of Fusang's location are quite different than those given by Huishen. The Fusang priest states that Fusang is tens of thousands of li to the east of Japan. However, at the same time he mentions the Lieu-kieu (Ryukyu) islands as existing to the north of Fusang.

Also, Huishen in attempting to relate the positions of the Kingdom of Dogs and Kingdom of Women, both linked in his story with Fusang, states that these countries had been visited by a ship from a Fujian port that was blown off course. Therefore it seems that even in Huishen's account, we get an idea of the more traditional location of Fusang. The Kingdom of Dogs (Kou kuo) is described in the contemporary (5th century CE) Hou Han Shu as an island located to the southeast of Zhejiang (Kuai-chi county) matching the geographical location for Fangzhu in the Chen Kao. Possibly the journey to the east of Japan mentioned by Huishen is related to some indirect route to Fusang using the Kuroshio Current.

Buddhism appears to have been introduced to Cambodia, known to the Chinese at the time as Chenla, around about 500 CE. Possibly this what is referred to in the Liangshu and the Chen Kao about the existence of the Buddhist religion in the southern regions.

In the Liang Si Gong Zhi, Prince Yukie interrogates the Fusang envoy of 520 CE about his distant kingdom. In the following passages derived from the Marquis d'Hervey de Saint-Denys' translation, the gifts from Fusang are described.

The envoy from Fusang wept, and responded with respectful ardour. The offering which he presented consisted principally of three hundred pounds of yellow silk, spun by the silkworm of the fusang tree, and of an extraordinary strength. The emperor had an incense-burner of massive gold, of a weight of fifty kin. This could be lifted and held suspended by six of these threads without breaking them. There was also among the presents offered to the emperor a sort of semi-transparent precious stone, cut in the form of a mirror, and of the circumference of more than a foot. In observing the sun by reflection by means of this stone, the palace which the sun contains appeared very distinctly.

The silk from the Fusang Tree is probably barkcloth and that would agree with Huishen's account in which the people make writing paper from Fusang Tree bark. The envoy goes on to describe the Kingdom of Women, where he says the female inhabitants marry serpents rather than dogs as in other accounts.

In this kingdom there are no books, and they know nothing of the art of writing. They believe firmly in the efficacy of certain forms of prayers or maledictions. The women who act uprightly prolong their lives, and those who swerve from the right are immediately cut off. The worship of spirits imposes laws that none dare to violate. To the south of Ho-cheu (the Island of Fire) , situated to the south of this country, is the mountain Yen-kuen (Burning Mountain), the inhabitants of which eat locusts, crabs, and hairy serpents, to preserve themselves from the heat. In this land of Ho-cheu, the ho-mu (trees of fire) grow ; their bark furnishes a solid tissue. Upon the summit of the mountain Yen-kuen there live fire rats (ho-shu), the hair of which serves also for the fabrication of an incombustible stuff, which is cleansed by fire instead of by water. To the north of this Kingdom of Women is the Black Valley (He-ko), and north of the Black Valley are mountains so high that they reach to the heavens...The attendants of tbe court were much amused at these stories. They all laughed and clapped their hands, and said that better stories had never been told. A minister of the emperor, named Wang-yun, interrupted Yu-kie with this bantering objection: 'If we believe the official accounts which have been collected regarding the Kingdom of Women, situated to the west of the country of Tsan-yai and to the south of the Kingdom of Dogs (Keu-kwoh), it is merely inhabited by barbarians of the race of the Kiang-jong, who have a woman as their sovereign; but there has never been any question of serpents filling the office of husbands. How do you account for that?' Yu-kie responded with pleasantry with a new explosion of extravagancies, in the midst of which there appeared here and there a true idea, burlesqued for diversion.

These passages indicate that as in almost all ancient and medieval accounts, reliable facts are interspersed into a great deal of legend and hyperbole meant to amuse the listener or reader. The knowledgeable were expected to know how to discern the reliable information from entertainment. Of interest above for the themes of this blog is the mention of the "Island of Fire," and the "Burning Mountain."


Religion in Fangzhu

In the last post, the meditation known as 'ingesting the rays of the Sun and Moon' was mentioned. The name of Fangzhu itself might relate to the reverence of the solar and lunar luminaries.

In Daoism, the fangzhu mirrors were believed to capture the essence of the Sun and the Moon in a manner similar to Cinnabar Gold (danjin), which was used to make dishes and cups.

Further, take one pound of this elixir and place it over a fire. Fan it, and it will transmute itself into a flowing scarlet gold, called Elixir-Gold. If you smear daggers and swords with this Gold, they will keep the other weapons ten thousand miles away. If you cast plates and bowls with the Elixir-Gold and take food and drinks from them, you will live a long life. Just as you can collect a liquid from the [the essences of] the sun and the moon, and obtain their liquor. If you drink it, you will be free from death.

-- Ge Hong (3rd-4th century CE) , Baopu zi, 4.83, (Fabrizio Pregadio, 2006: 117)

In the article on alchemy in this blog, we discuss the story in the Shiji in which the fangshi wizard Lin Shaojun advises the Qin Emperor to use drinking and eating vessels of cinnabar transmuted into gold to prolong life.

Li Shaojun then advised the emperor, "If you sacrifice to the fireplace you can call the spirits to you, and if the spirits come you can transform cinnabar into gold. Using this gold, you may make drinking and eating vessels, which will prolong the years of your life. With prolonged life you may visit the immortals who live on the island of Penglai in the middle of the sea. If you visit them and perform the Feng and Shan sacrifices, you will never die."

The name "Fangzhu" referring to the square mirror basins that absorb the energies of the Sun and Moon, may thus relate to the importance of the Sun and Moon in local spiritual techniques including those practiced by Qingtong.

Qingtong is also specially charged with the duty of distributing to the realized seed people a powerful charm known as the "Bell of Flowing Gold and Fire" (liu-chin huo-ling) . This amulet is apparently modeled on the small globular ornamental bells that appear in the region as early as the Late Ban Chiang and Dongson periods.


Bronze bracelet with small pellet bells from Late Period Ban Chiang.


The Dongson variety of these bells, often worn on the ankles or on the fringes of clothing, is decorated with the signature Dongsonian motif of rows of circles joined by tangents. The well-known "tiger bells" that continue to be made today originate from these more ancient grelots and are still used as charms against danger and demons.

Considered one of the most powerful amulets in Shangqing tradition, this bell is considered to consist of the "elemental essence of the Nine Stars [of the Dipper]," and it allows the adept to magically transport away from danger to a place of safety. Qingtong himself is said to be garbed in a blue-green damask with a small bell as his pendant.


Qingtong and Later Millenarian Traditions

As already noted, the messianic beliefs in Qingtong show obvious links with the Buddhist savior Prince Moonlight. In some of the Prince Moonlight texts, we find the term "Luminous King" or "Mingwang" used for the this messianic figure.

The title Mingwang would appear frequently in the latter development of messianic sects. Two of the most important of these sects were the White Lotus Tradition and the Hong Society.

In both traditions, the concepts of a chosen elect, of a future paradise and of a bridge, as found in the Qingtong and Prince Moonlight texts, survive. A feature that is added to both the White Lotus Tradition and Hong Society is that of a boat that assists in the journey to the refuge of the elect.

In White Lotus lore this vessel is known as the "Dharma Boat" (fachuan) and the Hong Society version is naturally called the "Hong Boat."

Often we see earlier themes pop up in latter messianic movements. Such is probably the case with the "Immortal Lad," who was originally named Liu Xi Gour (Liu Xi "The Dog") born in 1778. His deceased father was said to be either a Maitreya Buddha or an Immortal making him an Immortal Lad (xiantong). Around the same time, born in 1778, was Li Quan'er (Li the Dog) who was said to have the characters of the Sun and Moon on his palms together with the ideograph for the Ming Dynasty. Hong Society members believed that the messiah would be a prince from the Ming Dynasty lineage. In both these accounts, we can see motifs that may be related to that of the Blue-Green Lad, the Dog People of Fusang and the Fangzhu reverence for Sun and Moon.

The divine boat that rescues the elect is said by Hong Society members to transport passengers to the "City of Willows." The exact location of this city is not given but it involves an important journey over a body of water and it was located near the "Mountain of Fire" guarded by a deity known as the Hong Child. In White Lotus lore, Guanyin is often said to captain the boat of salvation. Sometimes this ship is said to take the elect to Putuoshan island, at other times to Mt. Ling, the Vulture Peak where the Buddha preached the Dharma, or to other locations. Guanyin is also often described as one of the divine passengers on the Hong Boat.

There may be an impulse from the regions south of China in the introduction of the boat motif. Guanyin in her form as Guanyin Nanhai or "Guanyin of the South Seas" is often shown riding across the sea standing on a giant fish's head or on the head of a dragon. Alternatively she is shown standing in a boat. The giant fish and dragon could be forms of the whale boat found in Southeast Asia and the Pacific. The whale features throughout the region as a savior of people lost at sea, or as one who brings back people stranded on the Island of Women or some other distant place. Also, some researchers believe the Eternal Venerable Mother (Wusheng Laomu), the White Lotus supreme deity, originates primarily from Guanyin Laomu, who may appear earlier in the literature.

When Chinese migrants, mainly from the South -- Fujian and Canton -- began searching for the "Golden Mountain" and its riches in Southeast Asia and western America, they were accompanied by secret societies. These are often known as triad societies, many of them millenarian, although not all are involved in organized crime. Sun Yat-sen was surprised at the very high percentage of overseas Chinese who were members of these societies. He is believed to have become a member himself, of the Zhigongtang in Honolulu, and enlisted their aid in the fight against the Ching Dynasty.

Probably the reason for the strength of the triads among the Chinese diaspora lies in the fact that so many of the migrants were laborers for whom the attraction of the societies was great. We can not though discount any millenarian motivations among triad members to find the fabled overseas paradise -- once known as the home of Qingtong, the Fusang Great Emperor.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Pregadio, Fabrizio. Great Clarity: Daoism and Alchemy in Medieval China, Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2006.

Ter Haar, B. J. Ritual and Mythology of the Chinese Triads: Creating an Identity. Sinica Leidensia Series, 43. Boston: Brill Academic Publishers, 2000.

Vining, E. P. An Inglorious Columbus, D. Appleton and Co., 1885.

Yu, Chun-Fang. Kuan Yin The Chinese Transformation of Avalokiteshvara, Columbia University Press, 2001.

Qingtong, Lord Lad of the East

In the mid to late 4th century CE, messianic Daoist texts particularly those of the Shangqing sect mention the Divine King known as Qingtong, whose island home known as Fangzhu was also the location of the Hot Water Valley (Tanggu) and the fabled Fusang Tree. Qingtong means literally the "Blue-Green Lad" as qing is a blue-green color, but in scholarly literature he is usually referred to as Azure Lad, Green Lad or Blue Lad. He is also called the "Blue-Green-Clad Lad."

The Qingtong theme developed from older beliefs in Dongwanggong the "King Father of the East." Indeed, Qingtong took not only most of the roles of the Eastern King, but also of his consort Xiwangmu "Queen Mother of the West." His home region is also known as the "Eastern Florescence" or the "Blue-Green Florescence" as blue-green is the color of the East in Wuxing cosmology. So, "Blue-Green Lad" is synonymous with "Eastern Lad."

Early texts place Dongwanggong not only in the Eastern seas but decidedly in the southern regions, i.e., to the southeast. In the Zhouli ("Rites of Zhou") redacted around 130 BCE, but containing material mostly from the Zhou Dynasty, Dongwanggong, known by one of his alternate names, Mugong ("Wood Sire"), is said to reside at Chien-mu "the Determining Tree."

The Huainanzi (2nd century BCE) says of the Chien-mu Tree:

The Chien-mu is in Tu-kuang. All the gods ascended and descended by it. It cast no shadow in the sun and it made no echo when someone shouted. No doubt this is because it is the center of Heaven and earth.

As the Chien-mu tree casts no shadows at some point in the year, we should suspect an equatorial location. The Shanhaijing, from about the same period as the Huainanzi, confirms the statement of the Chien-mu Tree casting no shadow and adds:

Beyond the South Sea, between Black River and Green River. . .There is a tree with green leaves, a purple trunk, black blossoms, and yellow fruit called the Chien-mu tree. For one thousand feet upward it bears no branches, and there are nine tanglewoods, while underneath there are nine root twinings. Its fruit is like hemp seed; its leaves resemble bearded grass. T'ai Hao used to pass up and down by it.

In the Shangqing and other medieval texts, the Chien-mu "Determining Tree" is equated with the Fusang Tree, and this probably was also the case in more ancient times judging from the similar geography and characteristics. Medieval sources also place Dongwanggong's home on the island of Penglai suggesting a further equation with this fabled location.

Penglai along with the other paradise islands was famed for its location to the east, but ancient sources also confirm that this should be specifically to the southeast. According to Liezi (4th century BCE), there were originally five paradise islands beyond the eastern seas that floated on the backs of great turtles. A giant caught two of these islands with a fishing line to sacrifice them for tortoise shell divination causing two islands to float away. The remaining three isles of the blest led by Penglai were located near the Ta-Ho a great abyss into which "the waters from the eight points of the compass and from the uttermost parts of the earth, and from the streams of the Milky Way all flow." And it is further states that "this they do without causing any appreciable change in the depth of the 'Abyss."

Zhuangzi from about the same period as Liezi calls this cosmic drain into which all waters flow the Weilu and notes that "it never empties."

In the Chuci, a collection of poems from the state of Chu dating to the Warring States period, this "gap" in the ocean is located to the southeast where the waters drained after Gong Gong caused the earth to lean in that direction.

Kang Hui [Gong Gong] was enraged, and the land leaned southeast [why?]
The nine provinces were askew; the river valleys were fouled [how?]
The eastward flow never fills the sea [who knows why?]

(John S. Major, 1993:64, emphasis added )

Zhuangzi also mentions a geographical feature known as the 'Southern Stygia," to which the Phoenix (Feng) flies regularly with the south-blowing monsoon in the sixth month. This deep or underworld location is also called the "Stygian Sea," and is located a great distance to the South. The 4th to 5th century CE geographical work Hai Nei Shih Chou Chi associates the dark waters of the Southern Stygia with Penglai. During the T'ang Dynasty, the Southern Stygia was located in the midst of the South Sea (Nanhai) where the goddess Lady of the Southern Stygia (Nan ming fu jen) dwelt. Medieval texts also locate the Weilu clearly in the southeastern regions of the ocean.

The Chen Kao dated to about 489 CE states that Qingtong's home of Fangzhu, described as having a square shape, is located in the ocean southeast of Kuai-chi county, the latter corresponding approximately to modern Shaoxing in Zhejiang Province. The name "Fangzhu" has been translated "Square Speculum" and probably is linked to a bronze mirror that was thought in ancient times to collect lunar dew drops during the Full Moon. There was a Greater Fangzhu proper and two Lesser Fangzhus on the eastern and western sides of Greater Fangzhu. There were two great mountains among the ranges of Fangzhu, the Great Mountain of Lasting Light and the High Mound of Night's Moonlight. Qingtong's palace was located on the Mountain of Eastern Florescence. The Lesser Fangzhus were described as circular in shape. The western Lesser Fangzhu had a large Buddhist population with many prominent stupas and tiered buildings. The eastern Lesser Fangzhu was a storehouse of treasures and the plants of immortality. Interestingly with reference to Buddhism in western Fangzhu, the Liangshu states that in 458 CE just 31 years earlier than the Chen Kao, Buddhist monks introduced their religion to the country of Fusang. In 520 CE, emissaries from Fusang are said to have brought to China a gift of a semi-transparent jewel or crystal about a foot in circumference used for gazing at the Sun (Joseph Needham, 1962: 114).


Messianic background

Qingtong plays an important role in Daoist millenarian texts through his connection with Li Hong, the end-times savior believed by some sects to be a reincarnation of the sage Laozi.

Daoist messianism traces its roots back to the earliest sages. Confucius, Laozi and Mencius all believed in a type of savior king who ruled, and shall rule, in the Teh "the age of perfect virtue. Daoists know this virtue as wu-wei and Confucianists call it jen. According to Mencius, a new savior sage or king appears cyclically every 500 years. Zhuangzi used the term "Great Peace" or Taiping to describe the golden ages, and "Perfect Ruler" or Zhenjun for the savior king. These terms would appear predominantly in latter millenarian literature. Early in the Han Dynasty, Jia Yi and the father of Sima Qian expressed expectations of a new sage or king as the period of 500 years from Confucius was fast approaching. A Daoist book, "The Classic on Great Peace and on the conservation of the Origin according to the Calendar revealed by the Officers of Heaven" was presented to the emperor requesting that the dynasty renew the Mandate of Heaven. The author was promptly imprisoned and terminated. Rebellions broke out leading up to the first great millenarian Taiping revolt of 184 CE.

If we admit to a greater antiquity for the legendary history, there are also cosmological cycles of destruction and creation that may have helped in the development of later millenarian views. The great deluges caused by Gong Gong and the battle between the fire and water gods are examples of such upheavals. These world catastrophes are usually followed by golden age periods. The Wupian Zhenwen of Ge Chaofu (400 CE) describes the deluge as the most important element in the turning of the great ages. Medieval punning on the sound "hong" as in the savior Li Hong's name is believed to be linked with the word hong "flood, vast, e.g., the first Ming emperor uses the word in his first year title with suggested millenarian motivations (David Ownby, Mary F. Somers Heidhues, 1993: 167).

By at least the mid-T'ang period, we also see the Daoist idea of the geological formation known as the "Mulberry Fields" in the eastern Ocean that undergoes cyclical catastrophic change. Due to changing sea levels and/or rising land formations, the Mulberry Fields would periodically rise above the ocean allowing people to cross on the resulting land bridge to Penglai. In latter times, messianic Buddhists believed that Prince Moonlight would lead the elect across this land bridge to hide in caverns under Mount Penglai during the apocalypse, which is characterized by a great world flood.

Among Daoists, Qingtong leads the 'seed people' across the Mulberry Fields to Fangzhu during the end-times tribulation.

During the Six Dynasties period, texts like the Spirit Spells of the Abyss suggested that a sage during the Former Han Dynasty known as Muzi Gongkou, the cryptic four character spelling of Li Hong, was an avatar of Laozi. The Shiji (2nd or 1st century BCE) of Sima Qian states that Laozi had the surname of Li and it became a Daoist tradition that future messiahs would have the same surname. Some also suggested they should have the same name as the Han dynasty sage Li Hong. Shangqing texts make Li Hong the deity of the Golden Porte in Heaven, to whom Qingtong visits to obtain millenarian scriptures.

It is Qingtong, acting as a mediator, who delivers these texts to humanity. In some versions, he must deliver them twice because people cannot decipher their hidden meanings. As mentioned, Qingtong also leads the elect over the Eastern Sea dryshod via the Mulberry Fields to his island Fangzhu, and from there to the heavenly Golden Porte of Li Hong during the latter's return.


Solar symbolism

Another example of cosmic cycles in Chinese myth may be found in the story of the archer Yi's shooting down of nine of the Ten Suns. The superfluous Suns rose from the Fusang Tree and fell into the Weilu. Although the legends do not connect the events directly with cyclic periods, the geological and climate upheavals associated with this myth and similar ones in neighboring regions indicate catastrophic and cyclic thinking. The Ten Suns are related to the cyclical ten celestial stems used in astrology and calendrics that originate from at least Shang Dynasty times.

With his residence near the Fusang Tree and "Sun Valley" (Yanggu), Qingtong has clear solar associations. He is called the Lord and Master of the brilliance and "florescence" of the dawn, and one 6th century text states that his given name is Yang "Sun." Thus, it is not surprising that Qingtong along with other residents of Fangzhu practice a type of alchemical mediation known as 'ingesting the rays of the Sun and Moon.'

Performing the Way of holding the sun in the heart, the moon in the "Clay Pellet," is referred to as "Reducing Change" (sheng i). If one is able purposefully to perform it, there will be no marantic or knotted things within. It is a Way of eradicating the Three Corpses of the body, the hundred diseases, and the thousand malevolences, of refining the cloud-souls and constraining the white-souls. If sun and moon constantly illuminate the interior of your physical form, demons will then have no form in which to hide. The Azure Lord performs it (i.e., this exercise) now as he did in the past. We pattern ourselves on his person.

-- Chen Kao
(translated in Paul W. Kroll, 1985: 82)

Another important aspect about Qingtong is his youth. The theme of the precocious child and the child prodigy date back to some of China's oldest extant literature including what is believed to be the most ancient layers of the Book of Odes. Possibly this theme, which became very popular during the Han Dynasty, helped in the development of Qingtong. The Buddhist savior Prince Moonlight, who appears somewhat later, is also portrayed as a youth. In the case of Qingtong though he is only young in appearance as his age in years is great.

There appears to be a good argument for Prince Moonlight developing out of the Qingtong theme. The latter originating from legends of Dongwanggong "King Father of the East" who lives in the region of the Chien-mu "Determining Tree." The Chien-mu is not only to the East but to the South, i.e. to the Southeast in the South Sea and the equatorial region where the Sun casts no shadows at certain times. The Chien-mu acts as an axis mundi and in latter literature is equated with the Fusang Tree. Also in latter literature, Dongwanggong's home is specified as Penglai.

Qingtong's home is said to be in the region of the Chien-mu/Fusang Tree, while Buddhist literature says Prince Moonlight resides on Penglai. Both lead the elect across a land bridge to their paradise islands in the latter days. From Fangzhu, Qingtong leads the seed people to the Golden Porte of Heaven, an obvious reference to the Chien-mu axis mundi. In a similar sense, Prince Moonlight in some versions escorts the chosen people to Penglai but in others to the Tushita Heaven. The following passages, translated by Kroll, from the Chen Kao describe a flight through the heavens that starts from Qingtong's home in the Eastern Florescence.

Relaxed and rested in the stillness of Eastern Florescence,

I take aloft the screened carriage, circumvolve the
Eight Directions.

Looking down peer amidst mounds and ant-hills,
Not at all aware of the Five Marchmounts' eminence.

Those numinous hursts are the equivalent of abyssal
springs;

Larger and smaller follow one another in exchange.

"Length" and "brevity" are lacking in any "more" or
"less";

The great cedrela in just a moment is come to its end.

-So why not commission the compliance of Heaven,
And take office as an unleashed spirit in the Hollow
of space?

The geologic catastrophism associated with Qingtong's home region in the Southeast is noteworthy. In the tales of the loss of two of the original five paradise islands, the catastrophes of the Mulberry Fields, the shooting down of the multiple Suns and the resulting fiery water-consuming Weilu, we could have significations of the "Ring of Fire" environment.

The floating away of the two isles of the blessed could possibly preserve ancient oral remembrance of times when rising sea levels submerged whole islands. The reference to the forming of land bridges at the Mulberry Fields could also possibly refer to the climate cooling phase that started about 5,000 to 5,500 years ago in which sea levels dropped before stabilizing to current levels. During that time, land bridges could have indeed formed among some small island chains.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Birrell, Anne. Chinese Mythology, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1993.

Bokencamp, Stephen R. Early Daoist Scriptures, University of California Press, 1999.

Kroll, Paul W. "In the Halls of the Azure Lad," Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 105, No. 1. (Jan. - Mar., 1985), pp. 75-94.

Liu, Kwang-Ching and Richard Shek [eds.]. Heterodoxy in Late Imperial China, Honolulu : University of Hawai'i Press, 2004.

Major, John S. Heaven and Earth in Early Han Thought: Chapters Three, Four and Five of the Huainanzi, State University of New York Press , July 1993.

Needham, Joseph. Science and Civilization in China. Cambridge University Press, 1962.

Ownby, David; Heidues, Mary Somers, Editors. Secret Societies Reconsidered, Perspectives on the social history of modern South Asia and Southeast Asia, M.E. Sharpe, Armonk, N.Y., 1993

Schafer, Edward H. "Wu Yün's 'Cantos on Pacing the Void'," Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 41, 1981, 377-415.

__. 'Three divine women of south China', CLEAR, 1 (1979), 31-42

Wang, Eugene Y. Shaping the Lotus Sutra: Buddhist Visual Culture in. Medieval China, Seattle WA: University of Washington Press, 2005.

More on Tantric Influence in Grail Legend

Let's take a deeper look at the suggestion of "Tantric" influence on the Holy Grail legend.

Much research exists on the "Oriental" influences in Grail literature. German scholars have long supported the idea that the Grail epic was modeled on one or more Persian tales. Most of the theories involved pre-Islamic influences. One of the champions of direct Islamic influence was P. Ponsoye in his book L'Islam et le Graal.

Various etymologies were suggested, all open to question, for the unusual names in the Grail legend. The 19th century German writer Josef von Gorres suggested that Parzival was derived from Arabic Parsi-fal meaning "Pure Fool," a suggestion later followed by the composer Richard Wagner. Fridrich von Suhtshek explained the true form of the name as Parsi-wal meaning "Persian flower" or "pure, chaste flower."

Suhtshek also offered Persian prototypes for just about every other character in the Grail epic. Max Unger and Theodore Baker suggested that word "grail" was derived from Persian gohar "pearl" compounded with al "coruscating color." The latter also identify the location of the Grail Castle with the Persian fortress of Kou-i Kouadja. Swedish scholar Lars Ivar Ringbom suggested the Takht-i-Suleyman "Throne of Solomon" in Azerbaijan, which closely matched the descriptions given by Albert von Scharfenburg in Jüngere Titurel written around 1270.

Henry Corbin and Pierre Gallais have done an enormous amount of work equating the Grail with the Iranian Xvarenah jewel, and seeking roots of Grail concepts in Persian dervish-inspired Islamic mysticism.

Other Near Eastern influences have been suggested, but possibilities from further East are treated only more rarely. Alfred Nutt in the 19th century explored the possibility that the Holy Grail originates from the Patra, the Buddha's alms dish. Scholars though have generally avoided comparisons of Grail mysticism with Tantric beliefs except to mention such possibilities. There is however a fair amount written on this subject in popular and "New Age" literature.

One though can piece together two different areas of research to construct a framework for such influence. The area of origins and exchange between Islamic mysticism and Tantra is dealt with fairly thoroughly. In the same sense, the links between Shi'ite, Sufi, Ismaili and similar Muslim groups with European culture at the advent of Grail literature and the direct impact on the latter is equally well-studied.


Indian Influence on Dervishes

Many a scholar has suggested that the Persian dervish, rather strange to ancient Iranian religion, originates from the begging ascetic of India.

W. Ivanow suggested that the group known in Islamic literature as Zutt, originally from the Sind in India, helped spread these practices throughout the Middle East. The Zutt are thought to be related to the present-day Jats and are almost always mentioned in the literature together with the Sayabiga, a group thought to have originated in Zabag but to have domiciled in the Sind and along the Persian Gulf.

The Zutt have been linked both with the Islamic underworld group of entertainers, artisans and con artists known as the Banu Sasan, and with the origin of the Dom Gypsies. Ivanow found an element of Dervish jargon words used both among the Banu Sasan and all Middle Eastern Gypsy groups. The Qasida Sasaniyya of Abu Dulaf mentions that the Zutt were members of the Banu Sasan and we see a number of Indian words mixed in with this jargon speech.

Groups of Zutt and Sayabiga were relocated to the region of Antioch by the Islamic Caliphate, just north of the area that would later become the stronghold of the Syrian Assassins. This fact will become important when we examine the time frame of the first Grail stories.

Previously in this blog, it was suggested that the people of Zabag, or Suvarnadvipa as it was known in India, were deeply involved with groups in Tibet and India in the development of the Kalacakra Tantric doctrine. Thus, the Sayabiga along with the Zutt would have played a role in diffusion of Tantric-like ideas in the Middle East.

In India, where the Sind region was the early major stronghold for Islamic mysticism in South Asia, the mingling of Tantrism with both Sufi and Ismaili sects is historical and beyond doubt, but the early story in the Middle East is more fuzzy.

We find that one of the most important elements in Tantric doctrine in India is the importance of the feminine principle as compared to the situation in the previous brahmin-dominated system. In the Mahacinatantra, it states:

According to the Brahmayamalatantra, after meditating for a thousand years on the shore of the ocean Vasistha was visited by Devi who told him "he had adopted an altoghter wrong path; her worship was unknown in the Vedas; it was known only in the country of Mahacina; and that Vasistha would gain his object if he received instruction from Vishnu now residing there as Buddha.

The word "Devi" above refers to the female divinity, which in the Tantric view was not sufficiently recognized in Vedic religion. In Tantrism we also find a more important place for women in ritual, and just an overall better treatment of women in general.

We can see then that the most powerful male Tantric deities, including the supreme Kalacakra Deity, appear in icons embraced together with their female consorts. In addition, there are important independent female deities like Tara and Prajnaparamita, and a host of lesser goddesses like the Dakinis that are considered important for spiritual development. In many places in India associated with Tantrism, the worship of the goddess Sakti prevails especially among the royal families and in the villages.

While the place of women in Tantric religious ritual has declined, due probably to the "shocking" nature of some rites, a few more politically-correct remnants survive. For example, among the Newars of Kathmandu we find the ritual marriage of the specially-chosen goddess-child known as Kumari to the King of Nepal was practiced until very recently. Also found among the Newars is the symbolic marriage of young virgin girls known as Gauris to Suvarna-kumara of Suvarnabhumi (Golden Land), the latter represented by a bel tree fruit or a golden coin.

While there was no universal dictate against the disabilities that existed for women at the time, in many areas women achieved rights nearly equal to men in areas where Tantrism dominated. However, in some other areas, only marginal changes were made despite the increased stature of women in religious life in which all areas of initiation and worship were open to them.

Further to the West, we find that the Sufi mystics focused much more attention on the feminine principle in theology than was previously the case. Sufism produced great women saints like Rabia, a tradition that continued for centuries. The importance of marriage for both men and women was stressed less than in orthodox Islam. However, it was among the Ismaili sects that we witness some of the most marked developments in divine feminine thinking. Here we see the recognition of the dual principles -- the Kuni as the female and the Qadar as the male principle. Kuni was predominant and she is said to actually create Qadar from her own light. Ismaili women in many areas can lead prayers and religious ceremonies, and they pray and worship alongside their men.

Now even farther to the West, with the advent of the romance cycles we find that the Holy Grail, that was seen by some as a relic of Christ or as a manifestation of Divine Grace, was tended by Grail Maidens and borne in procession by a female Grail Bearer. Even the Grail itself as a cup, chalice, bowl, platter or stone had a decided female imagery. Even more important may be the identity of Cundrie, the woman from the East Indian kingdom of Tribalibot, as the Grail Messenger. Cundrie teaches, chastises, guides and even at times sustains not only the quester Parzival but also the entire Grail company.

Although this outlook as found in Grail literature had little impact on the role of women in the Catholic Church, the rise of "courtly love" and chivalry as present in medieval epics did signal a generally more favorable position and better treatment at least for women of the noble classes.


Human Body as Microcosm of Cosmos

Earlier in this blog, the Kalacakra belief that cosmic time cycles were mirrored in the human body was discussed. This is part of a strong Tantric belief that the human body represents the universe in microcosm.

We find the same sentiments in Islamic mystic tradition. Corbin discusses various beliefs that can be categorized as pantheistic, panentheistic, monist, etc. among the Dervish-inspired sects. Self-realization can be described as discovering one's own Oneness with the Cosmos and even with the Deity.

Among the Ismaili we find a belief in a pattern of history that is both cyclic and linear. There are seven Ismaili eras, each inaugurated by a prophet known as Natiq. Each era was further subdivided into periods related to a Samit "Silent One" and seven Imams, the last of which becomes the Natiq of the new Era. The seventh Imam of the seventh Era is the Mahdi or Qa'im who ushers in the Resurrection. The six previous Natiqs are Adam, Nuh, Ibrahim, Musa, 'Isa, and Muhammad.

In Kalacakra Tantrism, although there is an underlying belief in infinitely repeating time cycles as found in classic Buddhism and Hinduism, the predominant focus is in the progression of Kulika Kings each connected with a century long period. The final Kulika King or "Rigden" conquers the evil forces of the world bringing in a new Golden Age.

Both the Kalacakra and Ismaili cycles are rife with astrological linkages. In Kalacakra thinking, the planetary cycles are further mirrored within the human body. The Muslim astrologer Abu Ma'shar al-Balkhi, known in Europe as Albumasar, developed a concept of world ages based on conjunctions of Saturn and Jupiter. These ideas were translated into European languages from Muslim Spain beginning in the mid-12th century with the works of John of Seville, not long before the first Grail stories appeared.

In Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival, one of the most highly-lauded scenes occurs when Cundrie relates Parzival's destiny through the seven planets using Latino-Arabic nomenclature.

"Mark now, Parzival:
The highest of the planets, Zval,
And the swiftly moving Almustri,
Almaret, and the bright Samsi,
All show good fortune for you here.

The fifth is named Alligafir.
Under there the sixth is Alkiter,
And nearest us is Alkamer.

I do not speak this out of any dream. These are the bridle of the firmament and they check its speed; their opposition has ever contended against its sweep.

"For you, Care now is an orphan. Whatever the planets' orbits bound, upon whatever their light is shed, that is destined as your goal to reach and to achieve. Your sorrow must now perish. Insatiety alone will exclude you from that community, for the Grail and the Grail's power forbid false friendship. When young, you fostered Sorrow; but Joy, approaching, has robbed her of you. You have achieved the soul's peace and waited amid sorrow for the joys of the flesh.

These verses have been interpreted widely as applying to everything from the announcement of a new age marked by the World Year to the declaration of world dominion for the new Grail King. More to the point for this work, Cundrie's words are thought by some to imply that Parzival's destiny represents a microcosm of events in the greater cosmos. Whatever the case, given that Wolfram admits his use of an Oriental source from Toledo, it seems likely that at least there are some connections with the ideas of Albumasar if not with those of the Ismailis.

Now is a good time to return to the theory offered here for the transmission of the Grail legend, or at least the related source materials, from East to West.


Sources for the Grail Epics

Three authors are connected with the beginning of the Grail literature -- Chretien de Troyes, Robert de Boron and Wolfram von Eschenbach.

All three appear to have been contemporaries to some extent as they all wrote their works around the end of the 12th and the beginning of the 13th century. Chretien's work is generally thought to be the oldest, and Wolfram mentions it in his own book. However, some scholars have suggested that Boron had no knowledge of Chretien and he does not mention either of the other two authors.

All three attribute their works to external sources. Chretien states that he based his version on a book given to him by Philip, Count of Flanders. Boron states that he received a "great book" from "great clerics." Wolfram mentions the bard Kyot who obtained the story from Flegatanis, a "heathen" from Toledo. He also claims to have researched the archives of the House of Anjou.

There is some linkage between Chretien's source and Wolfram's research in Anjou. Earlier it was already suggested that von Eschenbach's tale contained veiled references to the House of Anjou with Gahmuret representing Geoffrey Plantagenet with Parzival as his son Henry II. Gahmuret was an Angevin not in the line of succession who becomes a king through his marriage to the emperor's widow.

There was of course one historical Angevin who fits this description -- Geoffrey Plantagenet.

As it turns out, Philip the Count of Flanders was the son of Sibylla de Anjou, Geoffrey's sister. Philip ventured to Jerusalem to visit his first cousin, Baldwin IV, the last King of Jerusalem from the House of Anjou, a leper with no male heir. He came with the express purpose of marrying his vassals to Baldwin IV's daughter but was rejected and insulted by competitors among the nobility of Jerusalem. He left the city to fight the Muslim enemy in the principality of Antioch instead.

When Philip returned to Europe, he employed Chretien to render his mysterious source book into verse. Using the hypothesis offered here, Wolfram's Anfortas, the Grail King of Montsalvat (Jerusalem) would be Baldwin IV's father, Amalric I of Jerusalem. Baldwin IV, the heir-less king and last Angevin to rule the city would then be represented symbolically by the wounded leg of Anfortas. Wolfram probably threw in some inconsistencies as to maintain a degree of deniability that his story applied to real people. Thus, it is Gahmuret rather than his wife who is a sibling of Anfortas.

Parzival states that the celibate knights who guarded the Grail are Templars and that the first Grail King Titurel established the order. Thus it would have been Baldwin II of Jerusalem, who first accepted the Knights Templar, who answers to Titurel. The latter's son Frimutel is Fulk V, who in reality was the son-in-law of Baldwin II becoming the Angevin King of Jerusalem through his marriage to Melisende.

When Chretien wrote his Grail work between 1180 and 1191, Baldwin IV may have already died and Jerusalem may have fallen to Saladin (1187), although the fall of the city is never hinted at in any of the three early Grail books. Instead we find the development of a cycle of literature that introduces a new concept -- that of the Holy Grail.

Grail kingship is linked originally with the title of King of Montsalvat-Jerusalem, and King of the Grail Temple/Palace in the same location. The Grail was guarded by Templars and previously in this blog it was noted that the object had some of the same characteristics of the pusaka or sacred heirlooms of Southeast Asia tied to the succession of royalty, chiefs and clan leaders. The Grail kingship had hereditary components but was not entirely linked to male primogeniture. One fascinating similarity is the animistic character of both the Grail and the pusaka heirlooms.

Like the talking jars of the sultans and datus of Insular Southeast Asia, the Grail communicated with and guided those in the Grail company. This is one facet that did take hold as much in South Asia or the Middle East. However, it may be that such ideas were retained by the Sayabiga who along with the Zutt were relocated to Antioch. These Sayabiga may have maintained some contact through the trade routes with their former home of Zabag. The Templars appear to have borrowed much in terms of their own organization and structure from the Ismaili Assassins of Syria located directly to the south of Antioch principality. They also maintained unusually close political relations with the Assassins. In 1165, emissaries from Prester John, who is linked here with the King of Zabag, delivered a letter from the latter king to the Pope and Christian emperors. Parzival and other Grail legend authors closely connect Prester John with the Holy Grail, albeit anachronistically.

Even Chretien seems to have borrowed from Prester John's letter, which mentions a table in the king's palace with legs of ivory. Parzival and Jüngere Titurel describe the table bearing the Holy Grail in the Grail Castle as having ivory legs. Chretien says the same table has ebony legs and an ivory top. The palace of Prester John, like that of the King of Shambhala and the Grail Castle, have strong mystical links.

The round churches of the Templars were said to have been modeled on the Dome of the Rock, the Al-Aqsa Mosque, sometimes referred to as the 'Temple of Solomon.' The Templar headquarters was originally located in or next to this mosque in Jerusalem. Ringbom has shown, quite conclusively I think, that the Grail Temple as described in Titurel was inspired by the Takht-i-Suleyman, the "Throne of Solomon" in Azerbaijan. In both cases, we find round, domed and lavish buildings with the stars, marked by rubies in the Takht and red jewels in Titurel, and heavens displayed on the domed ceiling. In both cases, the buildings have only three entrances, and the outer circle of the building is divided into 22 parts each marked by an ornamental tree. The temple described in Titurel was probably inspired by the Takht as partially rebuilt by the Shi'ite and heavily Sufi-influenced Ilkhanate dynasty in the 13th century.

Ringbom has also shown that both the Grail Temple and the Takht are types of mandalas. A mandala is a representation of the universe used in Tantric ritual. It usually consists of a circular design on the outside with usually a square design within, but also at times another circle. There usually is at least one instance in a mandala where an outer design is replicated in smaller form within the mandala, an example of the macrocosm-microcosm principle.



Grail Temple plan after Ringbom (A. A. Barb, 1956: 34) following descriptions in Titurel. Note mandala-like replica of building structure at central sanctum where Holy Grail was kept. The domed ceiling was said to display the celestial vault further giving the idea of a cosmic representation. Ringbom also found mandala-like features in the sanctuary of the Ismaili "Old Man of the Mountain," the leader of the Assassins at Alamut.

Now with the Grail acting as the token of the holy kingship, even the looming loss of Jerusalem would allow a 'sacred lineage' to prevail at least in the eyes of those closely connected with the House of Anjou. Thus, it may not be entirely by coincidence that Henry II's son and heir (by force) Richard I would lead the efforts of the Third Crusade to retake Jerusalem, although he was forced by election to accept Conrad of Montferrat as King of Jerusalem. When the latter was killed by Assassins before his coronation, Richard was widely suspected in the plot. He married his nephew Henry II of Champagne to the widow Isabella eight days after the death making Henry II the pretender King of Jerusalem. Angevin hopes for the Holy City though ended as they could not persevere against Saladin's forces.

Quite likely some type of Holy Grail really existed, maybe first among the Templars who had shown they were quite amenable toward Eastern mysticism. However, such ideas may not have been strange either to the House of Anjou.

Robert de Boron's "great clerics" who authored the source of his Grail book may very well have been Templar clerics. The Templar bond with the House of Anjou in Jerusalem was natural. The sources found by Wolfram at the county seat in Anjou may have consisted of the same or similar works as found with Boron. Philip, Count of Flanders, who gave Chretien his source book had obvious enough ties with Anjou through his mother Sibylla. He also helped mediate disputes between Henry II, on the one hand, and Louis VII of France and Thomas Beckett on the other. Henry II of course in addition to being the English king was also the Count of Anjou at the time.

Philip had shown keen interest in establishing marital ties with the Angevins in Jerusalem, at which time he could have easily come across the same source materials as Boron and Wolfram. It might be worth noting also that Henry II had close relations with the Templars and was the first to grant them land in England, and that Guy de Lusignan, the king who succeeded Baldwin IV in Jerusalem was Henry II's vassal.

From the Angevin and Templar connections, we can suggest that the eastern links of the Grail literature are quite likely. The Tantric influences would have come from the same sources that influenced Ismaili and other Islamic mystic traditions.




Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Barb, A. A. "Mensa Sacra: The Round Table and the Holy Grail," Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, Vol. 19, No. 1/2. (Jan. - Jun., 1956), pp. 40-67.

Bosworth, C. E. The Mediaeval Islamic Underworld: The Banu Sasan in Arabic Society and Literature, Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1976.

Corbin, Henry. Temple and Contemplation, translated by Philip Sherrad & Liadain Sherrad, London: KPI & Islamic Publications, 1986.

__, The Voyage and the Messenger, translated by Joseph Rowe, Berkeley, California: North Atlantic Books, 1998.

Daftary, F. The Ismailis. Their History and Doctrines, Cambridge, 1989.

Galais, Pierre. Perceval et l'Initiation, Paris: Editions Sirac, 1972.

Ivanow, Wladimir. "On the Language of the Gypsies of Qainat (in Eastern Persia)," J(R)ASB, N.S. 10/11, 1914, 439-55. Idem. "Further Notes on the Gypsies in Persia," J(R)ASB, N.S. 16, 1920, 281-91. Idem, "An Old Gypsy-Darwish Jargon," J(R)ASB, N.S. 18, 1922, 375-83. Idem, "Jargon of Persian Mendicant Darwishes," J(R)ASB, N.S. 23/1, 1927, 243-45.

Nutt, Alfred. "The Legend of the Buddha's Alms Dish and the Legend of the Holy Grail," Archaeological Review 3 (1889), 267-71.

Ponsoye, Pierre. L'Islam et le Graal étude sur l'ésotérisme du Parzival de Wolfram von Eschenbach, Éditions Arché, 1976

Ringbom, L. A. Graltempel und Paradies. Beziehungen zwischen Iran und Europa im Mittelalter, Stockholm, 1951.

Suhtshek, F. von. La Traduction du Parsiwalnama par Wolfram d'Eschenbach," Forschungen und Fortschritt, nr. 10, Berlin, 1931.

Woodroffe, John. Shakti and Shakta, Madras: Ganesh & Co., 1975.

Datura transported from 'New' to 'Old' World in Pre-Columbian Period

A study released in December, 2007 suggests that at least one species of the plant Datura (D. metel) was transported by humans from the "New World" to the "Old World" at least by the early first millennium BCE.

The researchers believe the transfer to India was either transpacific through Southeast Asia or transatlantic through Africa. At a later date, the plant was diffused from India to North Africa and the Middle East during Muslim times and from there to Europe. They suggest further research in the Southeast Asia/Pacific and African regions to determine the route that Datura took to reach India.

The full article can be found here in pdf form:

http://www.ias.ac.in/jbiosci/dec2007/1227.pdf


Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento
---

J Biosci. 2007 Dec;32(7):1227-44. Links

Historical evidence for a pre-Columbian presence of Datura in the Old World and implications for a first millennium transfer from the New World.

Geeta R, Gharaibeh W.

Department of Biotechnology and Genetic Engineering, Faculty of Science and Arts,Jordan University of Science and Technology,PO Box 3030,Irbid 22110,Jordan, geeta@life.bio.sunysb.edu.

Datura (Solanaceae) is a small genus of plants that, for long,was thought to occur naturally in both the New and Old Worlds. However,recent studies indicate that all species in the genus originated in the Americas. This finding has prompted the conclusion that no species of Datura could have been present in the Old World prior to its introduction there by Europeans in the early 16th century CE. Further, the textual evidence traditionally cited in support of a pre-Columbian Old World presence of Datura species is suggested to be due to the misreading of classical Greek and Arabic sources. As a result, botanists generally accept the opinion that Datura species were transferred into the Old World in the post-Columbian period.While the taxonomic and geographic evidence for a New World origin for all the Datura species appears to be well supported, the assertion that Datura species were not known in the Old World prior to the 16th century is based on a limited examination of the pre-Columbian non-Anglo sources. We draw on old Arabic and Indic texts and southern Indian iconographic representations to show that there is conclusive evidence for the pre-Columbian presence of at least one species of Datura in the Old World. Given the systematic evidence for a New World origin of the genus,the most plausible explanation for this presence is a relatively recent but pre-Columbian (probably first millennium CE) transfer of at least one Datura species, D. metel, into the Old World. Because D. metel is a domesticated species with a disjunct distribution, this might represent an instance of human-mediated transport from the New World to the Old World, as in the case of the sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas).

PMP Quadripartite Social Structures

In 1980, Robert Blust, following Otto Dempwolff, suggested that the Proto-Malayo-Polynesian (PMP) reconstruction *rumaq meaning "house," also referred to descent groups in that early society. He further suggested that these descent groups were based on bilateral kinship and that the PMP term *datu originally applied to the leaders of the *rumaq descent groups. Over time according to this theory, *datu came to apply both to chiefs-kings and priests-shamans, or to leaders who combined both sacred and temporal functions.

Blust suggested that originally there was a form of dual organization based on an "upper half" or male datu and a "lower half" or female datu, although his conclusion was based on only two examples from Sulawesi and Ambon.

In the classic fashion of Austronesian recursive dualism, it is suggested that this dual system bisected into a sociopolitical structure based on four groups. Alkire and Fujimura, describing Micronesian organizational systems state:

The Micronesian world view, like that of many Austronesian speakers, emphasizes dualistic oppositions, quadripartite divisions and mid-points as loci of control and mediation...When more than two units occur, they frequently derive from earlier dualistic divisions that have been further subdivided into quadripartite units.

Van Wouden, in his study of Eastern Indonesian marriage practices, states:

Because both the patrilineal and the matrilineal clans form exogamous groups, pair by pair, a double two-phratry system is also entailed. The entire society is divided into four main classes.The consequent cooperation of the system is thus wholly identical with a simple four-class system with reciprocal affinal relationships. One belongs both to the matrilineal moiety x or y of the mother, and to the patrilineal moiety I or I1 of the father. Class XI stands in a relationship of reciprocal connubium with yII, and the children are xII or yI, which likewise are related to each other by reciprocal connubium. The first and third matrilineal or patrilineal generations belong to the same main class. The difference between this system and a genuine four-class system is constituted by the unilaterality of the affinal relationships between the clans and by the feature of same generation marriage.

Dempwolff had suggested PMP *suku "limb; quarter (quarter of a people= kin group)." Blust suggests that *suku was a quadripartite division of the "total society" in Proto-Malayo-Polynesian times. Fourfold social divisions have been described in detail among many groups in eastern Indonesia; among the Pasemah, Toba Batak and Minangkabau of Sumatra; among the Maranao of Mindanao; among the Tagalogs of Luzon; in Tonga; Fiji; Belau (Palau); Tikopia; Hawai'i; the Kiriwina Islands (Trobriand Islands) and other areas of the Austronesian domain. Blust asserts:

Perhaps most striking of all is the reference to a fourfold social grouping under the literal designation "four council halls"or "four houses" (= four lineages) in Western Malayo-Polynesian, Central Malayo-Polynesian, and Eastern Malayo-Polynesian languages. Thus, in describing the semisacred Jangdipatuan, the highest traditional ruler of the Minangkabau, de Josselin de Jong (1951 :13) notes that we "should really speak of three Rulers, all belonging to the same House. The Jangdipatuan . . . was the Radjo Alum, 'King of the World'; he appears to have dealt with political affairs, and it is he whom officials of the Dutch East India Company used to designate as 'emperor of Minangkabau.' The other two members of the royal trio were the Radjo Adat, 'King of Custom,' and the Radjo Ibadat, 'King of Religion.' Important dignitaries in the royal entourage. . .were the Basa Ampe' Balai, the Great Men of the Four Council Halls. These four, whom we might designate as ministers . . . were not members of the royal family, but in all probability were prominent headmen of the nagari that formed their residences." (Blust, 1980: 218)

Using the designations for "four council halls" and "four houses" mentioned in the quote above, Blust reconstructs PMP *na xe(m)pat na balay "four houses."


Four Stones

From the island of Belau in western Micronesia, Richard J. Parmentier has studied local myths related to the founding of the quadripartite sociopolitical system there.

These myths revolve around the goddess Milad who, after the Great Deluge, gives birth to four children in the form of stones named in birth order Imiungs, Melekeok, Oreor and a daughter Imeliik, on the mountain Ngeroach. These stones were distributed to the four corners of the island and marked the major political districts.

These districts were ranked by precedence, the order of birth, with Imiungs having the highest rank. Interestingly, there is a lithic representation of Imiungs at Ngeroach called Imiungselbad (Imiungs Stone) consisting of two stones -- one a circular mortar-like stone with hollowed-out center, and a smaller round stone placed on the mortar's rim called Imiungseldui (Imiungs Title).

Parmentier mentions in his notes similar mortar stones found elsewhere in the Austronesian-speaking regions:

Imiungselbad is one of several mortarlike stones reported in Belau; similar stoned are widespread in Indonesia and Melanesia; see especially Kaudern 1938:8, fig. 3, and 25, fig. 16; Fox 1924:223. Risenfeld (1950:246) cites a stone from Maevo villatge in the New Hebrides which resembles Imiungselbad in that a second stone, corresonding to Imiungseldui, sits on top fo the larger mortar stone. Also, the symbolic unity of the female Imiungselbad and the male vertical pillar Ngartemellang, both located traditionally at the Orukei square, is echoed in a similar pair of stones found in Bali described by F. A. Liefrinck (in Swellengrebel 1960:28), and a pair found in an Ifugao village in northern Luzon (Christie 1961: plate 13). (Parmentier, 1987:163 n. 25)

Previously, I have suggested that the mortars known as lusung, lusong, lesong, etc. in the Philippines and Guam, and throughout much of Island Southeast Asia, were often used by certain Nusantao trading clans to symbolize a central volcanic axis mundi, according to my theory the dual volcanoes of Pinatubo and Arayat on Lusung (Luzon).

The island of Lusung-Luzon is thus named after these central cosmic volcanoes.

In the myths of the Bagobo goddess Mebuyan in Mindanao, southern Philippines, the deity sits on her rice mortar placed at the "center of the world." In some versions, this mortar is located on a "mound" which may represent the cosmic mountain or hill. The mortar begins to spin drilling a hole to the Underworld and the subterranean Black River, where Mebuyan becomes overlord of the dead.

Interestingly, in the Belau myths, at the mountain where Milad gives birth to her children, and from which she sends them to the four quarters, stands a massive 50 ft. high volcanic plug known as 'Milad's House' or 'Milad's Cave.' According to one version, Milad even throws one of her sons, Oreor, to his respective district. The thought of Milad in her volcanic house or cave throwing her sons/stones can conjure up imagery of a volcanic eruption.

Some of the Semang people of Malaysia believe in a giant stone pillar known as Batu Herem at the "center of the Earth" that reached to and supported the sky. The Batu Herem rested upon a dragon found at the source of the Perak River. According to Semang chants, there appeared to be an opening at the end of the Batu Herem that opened and closed.

The opening created by Mebuyan's mortar and the opening at the end of the Batu Herem could symbolize the volcanic crater, often believed to lead to the Underworld. The same symbolism might be found in the hollowed center of the symbolic mortar-like stones of Belau and elsewhere.


Four corners of the House

Parmentier describes the assigned seating according to rank, at one of the four corners of the Belau meetinghouse, of the four highest-ranking title holders .

In some Austronesian societies, the house is seen as a model of the cosmos and the four corners or four corner-posts of the house can represent the extent of the world. For example, among the Manobo of the southern Philippines, the Earth is supported by four posts. In the Philippines in general the pillars of the world are associated with the common name of the house post. In Hawai'i and among some Tahitian groups, the sky dome was supported by four pillars or poles. Belau society and political units were compared to the four corner posts of a house.

We find a situation similar to that described by Parmentier at Belau meetinghouses in the Wajo Bugis kingdom of South Sulawesi. During the inauguration of the Wajo Bugis Rajah, the king sits in the corner of the room assigned the highest precedence. Senior officials are seated in the other three corners advising the king to carry out the four pillars of Wajo administration, ade' covering ethics; bicara, the criminal and civil justice system; rapang dealing with kinship and political relationships; and wari', which classified and ordered society.

Concepts of the world divided into four parts are also found in the fixed wind compasses scattered widely throughout the Austronesian regions. The simplest type of this compass indicates the four cardinal directions named after the corresponding wind blowing from that direction. Using the principle of recursive dualism, these directions are further bisected resulting in wind compasses with eight, 16 and 32 directions. In nearly all cases each direction is named after the corresponding wind. In Madagascar, the name of the eight point wind compass translates to "corners of the Earth."

We've seen the notion that the earth or the sky is supported by pillars or posts, sometimes four in number matching the four piles of the classic Austronesian house. In Panay island in the central Philippines, the highest mountains are seen as pillars supporting the sky and are called hagiri sa kalibutan "pillars of the world." The ancient Chinese also viewed four pillars as supporting the sky in the northeast, southeast, northwest and southwest, a belief that apparently originates at least by the time of the Shang Dynasty. Later on, these pillars were viewed as four mountains and the number was eventually increased to eight supporting mountains.

In some cases, a central pillar is added and this usually takes on the highest order of precedence. Here we may find an effort to assign the concept of centrality to the highest order of rank. In the Philippines, were the world pillar concept is widespread the central pillar is often directly linked with the myth of the "navel of the sea."

In Belau, while the mortar-like Imiungselbad would represent the center, the island polity became divided into two sides, the "Sides of Heaven," represented by Imiungs brothers, Oreor and Melekeuk.

I have suggested previously that a major magnitude eruption at Pinatubo, located centrally along the Nusantao trade and communication routes of the time, was interpreted by certain trading clans as indicative of the primal location, the first cause, the highest mundane order of precedence. A rift developed between some of these trading clans resulting in a "war in heaven," and corresponding competition in the Nusantao merchant trade.

The dualistic ideology and the "news" of the new discovery was spread along the trade and communication routes by messengers of the different clan confederations. There was a major expansion of these routes during this time in different directions. In the areas of Southeast and East Asia, and the western part of the Indian Ocean, this expansion would correlate with the diffusion of Lungshanoid, Proto-Lungshanoid and Lungshanoid-like elements.

In many cases, the histories, traditional histories, mythologies, etc. distributed over wide areas by the Nusantao messengers give geographic directions to their claimed world center/axis mundi. These directions usually agree in general terms with each other, even if sometimes conflicting localization exists, and in some cases navigational indicators like zenith stars may give more precise coordinates. Even some of the legendary chronologies can agree rather closely with the archaeological hypotheses. For example, Chinese traditional dating of the influences brought by the maritime Dongyi people who inhabited the eastern province of Shandong, agree fairly well with early datings of Lungshanoid, Proto-Lungshanoid and other coastal evidence of Nusantao influence as interpreted, for example, by Wilhelm Solheim.

Across the Austronesian-speaking world, one repeatedly finds indigenous forms of political districts in which authority revolves around a central mountain. The centrality of this mountain is not so much geographical as based on sacred precedence. The leader in these districts is generally hereditary belonging to the traditionally oldest family associated with the mountain, and having priest-king type functions. When Hindu-Buddhist influences arrived in Southeast Asia, the older and newer views merged to produce the "King of the Mountain" and "Devaraja" type theater states and galactic polities.


Quadripartition in Art

We know that many cultures express their cosmologies, worldviews and philosophical concepts through their artistic forms. For example, the elemental philosophy of China is graphically represented by the bagua octogonal template. The Chinese yin-yang principle is expressed in the well-known Taijitu symbol.

Taijitu, the traditional symbol representing the forces of yin (dark) and yang (light). (Source: Wikipedia)

In Tantric art, many types of thought are symbolized in geometric forms. In the Austronesian domain, the meanings of many symbols are still retained in the indigenous textile and tattoo art forms, for example, the tree of life and the bird as a symbol of the soul.

Therefore, it could be useful to see if there are any artistic indicators of the concepts of quadripartition and duality in the proposed PMP and Malayo-Polynesian language regions during the times these languages likely dispersed.

Red-slipped and lime-impressed pottery provides probably the first example of symbols used by Nusantao peoples, who according to theory were largely composed of Malayo-Polynesian speakers. The earliest examples of this pottery date back to about the middle of the 6th millennium BCE from Balobok Rockshelter in the southern Philippines. These early examples possess as decoration only impressed circles that often filled with lime powder.

Later on, we find throughout much of Southeast Asia, and eventually extending out to the Marianas in western Micronesia, the use of triangular and dentate patterns and often triangles topped with circles or semicircles. In Luzon, Masbate, Sulawesi and the Marianas, we also see some rectangular designs. This type of decoration was found most commonly during the fourth and third millennia BCE.

Rectangular patterns could potentially represent the four corners of the Austronesian house that in turn modeled the four quadrants of the cosmos. The use of triangles together with circles might be related to dualistic thinking if we see the two geometric forms as opposites. Decorations of linked triangles or dentate patterns are still used by present-day folk artists who in Southeast Asia often use the word tumpal to describe the motif. According to many of these artists, tumpal represent mountains or hills.

If we accept the mountain explanation, then the triangles with circles or semicircles at their apex could possibly be seen as early forms of the primordial mountain or "mountain of fire" motif that I have suggested was a symbol of the cosmic volcanoes.



Types of early Southeast Asian and Pacific pottery designs. Note in the first three rows at the top examples of triangular patterns with circles or semicircles. The figure in the middle of the second row from the top could be seen as a fair representation of a volcanic eruption.

In the first figure of the second row of the graphic above, the triangles topped with semicircles might also be seen as types of the "Crescent Sun" motif displaying the upright "horns" of a Sun in near full eclipse by the Moon. The same Crescent Sun motif seems also to appear on Liangzhu Culture jades near the mouth of the Yangtze River in China.


Crescent sun-like motif on jade ring from Liangzhu Culture (3500 BCE-2250 BCE), bottom left; bird on cartouche and possible Crescent Sun on bi disc, right top and bottom, Liangzhu. Source: Wu Hung, "Bird Motifs in Eastern Yi Art."


Even the impressed, lime-filled circles on the earliest Nusantao-related wares could have some volcano symbolism. The impressed circles remind us of the hollowed out mortarlike stones of Belau and elsewhere in Austronesia. The Chamorro of Guam formerly carved out mortars from natural stone formations near rivers. And there is also the case of cupmarks carved into megaliths and natural rocks discussed here previously. The lime in the impressed circles using this hypothesis could then represent the ash from the volcanic crater that may have been associated with the whiteness ascribed to sacred locations like Svetadvipa and Penglai in Indian and Chinese classical literature respectively.

We first encounter rather clear examples of possible artistic representations of quadripartite thinking in the artifacts of the Sa-Huynh-Kalanay culture of Southeast Asia and the earlier Peinan culture of Taiwan, which appears to have strongly influenced the former. It was from Taiwan that most of the nephrite used by the Sa-Huynh-Kalanay culture originated.

Possibly as far back as 3000 BCE, the Peinan culture made nephrite earrings-pendants with four projections located at each quadrant. In the latter Sa-Huynh-Kalanay culture, one projection of the pendants known as lingling-o is omitted, possibly to prevent poking of the skin, but the three remaining projections retain a square angular relationship to each other.



Peinan proto-lingling-o ornaments, left, with four projections at right angles (Source: http://www.tpg.gov.tw/e-english/historic/link13.htm). On the latter Sa-Huynh-Kalanay ornaments, which date back to about 2000 BCE, one of the projections -- probably the one facing the neck when used as an earring -- is omitted, but the others are still separated at quadrants (Source: http://www.nature.com/doifinder/10.1038/450588a).


Another ornament associated with Sa-Huynh-Kalanay culture is the bicephalous pendant. We find that the Peinan culture may also have a prototype at least conceptually in pendants consisting of dual anthropomorphs side-by-side connected at the top of the heads by a zoomorph. In some examples, the zoomorph heads bear some slight resemblance to the zoomorphic heads of the Sa-Huynh-Kalanay bicephalous pendants.



Dual zoo-anthropomorphs from Peinan culture, Taiwan, left (Source: http://www.twhistory.org.tw/20010319.htm), and a bicephalous lingling-o as still traditionally made in present times by Igorot blacksmiths in Northern Luzon.

Although Sa-Huynh-Kalanay-like bicephalous ornaments are still made today by the Igorot peoples of the Philippines, I have not come across any connection between the double-heads and the pervasive Igorot dual classification system. The usual explanation is that the pendants are simply good luck charms or fertility charms, the latter view though possibly having some binary implications.

In Melanesia and Polynesia, double-headed carvings and figures are fairly common. The double-headed frigate bird image found on Easter Island is said to represent the Supreme God Makemake, a solar deity. Double-headed bird figures are also common in the Solomon Islands.

Among the Hawaiians, there was a belief that children could be sired by two different fathers and such progeny were known as po'olua "double-headed." In such cases, both fathers acknowledged the child resulting in a union of clans.


Austronesian Quadripartition and the Indian Varna System

In 1995, I wrote an article "Austric Influence in the Brahmana and Rishi Traditions," in which I examined the Austric contribution to the formation of the varna, or four caste system, and also to the linked brahmin and rishi (seer) traditions of India.

My view was that the varna system was mainly an indigenous development with major contributions from Dravidian and Austric societies rather than something brought in by Indo-European invaders, which is the more common position in Western scholarship.

The mainstream Western view is that the Aryan invaders or migrants into South Asia retained the Proto-Indo-European system of three classes, conceived by Georges Dumézil as consisting of clerics, warriors and husbandmen/agriculturalists. Upon arriving in India, they supposedly forced those aborigines who adopted their religious system into a fourth lower class known as Sudras. A strong racial component is evident in this theory with some asserting the Sudras were originally slaves and they were darker-skinned than the other three classes composed of the Aryan invaders. According to this theory, these four classes eventually evolved into the four varnas.

To support this theory, it is argued that the supposedly oldest parts of the Rgveda, considered the oldest literary work of India, do not mention the Sudra caste. Sudras though are mentioned in Purusa-sukta section of the book. Also, supporters of this view point out that the Sudras were not considered "twice-born" and worthy of pursuit of Brahman, a mana-like spiritual power or asset.

Here are a few of the main problems with this theory:

• The Vedas, which supposedly cover the period of Aryan invasion/migration into India do not mention the mass conversion process of aborigines into Sudras or the conversion of the old Indo-European husbandman/agriculturalist class into, presumably, the Vaisya or merchant caste. Such a conversion process would have been messy to say the least. In comparison, latter works mention the adoption of foreigners like the Sakas and Cinas into the caste system.
• According to present-day mainstream Western views, a relatively small number of Aryan speakers were involved in a migration and elite dominance scenario upon arriving in South Asia. However, how successful could a small number of people be in converting an entire indigenous population into slavery or servitude? More recent history shows that the process of caste assimilation involved introducing people into the brahmin system according to their position and rank in the previous society. Thus, we have Dravidian Brahmins and Dravidian Kshatriyas (warriors) and Yavana brahmins and Yavana Kshatriyas.
• Neither genetic nor physical anthropology studies support ideas that the upper castes are composed of recent (post-Neolithic) migrants to India or that the Sudra caste is more aboriginal than the upper castes. As caste is determined by patrilineage, the genetic evidence suggests that upper castes consist overwhelmingly of Y chromosome types that have been in India long before the Neolithic. The only male haplogroups that show strong evidence of relatively recent arrival are J haplogroup and O haplogroup, neither of which appear linked with the theory of an Aryan invasion/migration into Northwest India. In most parts of India, forensic science can not reliably distinguish upper castes from sudra castes based on craniofacial or other physical anthropology techniques.
• The most important aspects of the varna system are not reconstructible to the suggested Proto-Indo-European system.

Now let us turn to the theory of Austric influence. Austro-Asiatic culture shows evidence of dualism and it may be that both this worldview and that of the Austronesians ultimately originates from Austric social systems. However, I have not found anything written on quadripartite divisions in Austro-Asiatic society. It may be that such influence in India could have come directly from Austronesian speakers via the trade routes.

Varna in India and South Asia is a hierarchal social grouping loosely based on function and occupation. Another classification system known as jati really defines the occupational groupings in South Asia. Louis Dumont suggested that the caste system was based ultimately on a dualistic opposition of ritual purity vs. ritual impurity with the loss of purity resulting in the loss of mana. Now, the latter term mana may be appropriate for my argument as it is a word of Polynesian origin signifying in modern anthropology a sacred power, force, authority, essence, charisma, etc. that abides in a person or object.

A number of researchers have classified the Indian concepts of brahman and akasa as types or variations of mana. One increases or maintains brahman partly by maintaining ritual and sacred purity. The same relationship of purity and mana is found in many Austronesian societies. Taboos prevent certain types of defiling behavior especially with relation to intermarriage and any contact with objects or locations that cause loss of purity. The intermarriage taboo is natural because in both the Indian and Austronesian systems, mana is inherited.

Now, the caste system in India developed a complexity and severity well beyond that of Austronesian societies in general. For example, only rarely do we find outcastes and practices similar to untouchability in the Austronesian examples. Usually impurity was temporary as in the case of menstruation or contact with with dead bodies rather than permanent as with entire "unclean" castes. Austronesian speaking peoples often did have rank-based endogamous groups similar to varna, although the rigidity of these groups based on birth was usually much less severe.

Still marital endogamy and exogamy was a common characteristic of the quadripartite systems in both regions.

While the varnas were endogamous, within each varna were exogamous groups known as gotra. These gotras appear to have been originally totemic in nature and the word itself originally meant "cowpen," an interesting fact considering the totem-like taboo against harming and killing cows in Hindu society. The names of many gotra ancestors including most of the earliest and most important ones were names of animals, plants, fish or other objects. Although gotra ancestors were considered human in not a few cases we find that the actual animal, plant or other object indicated by the gotra ancestor's name was actually revered sometimes to include taboos against harming or killing. The gotras like totemic clans were exogamous and often showed other aspects of totemism like the existence of split totems. It has been suggested that the names of certain gotra ancestors that have meanings like "rabbit's ear" or "dog's tail" actually refer to split totems.

According to the Mahabharata (Santiparva: 296), there were, as with the varnas, originally only four gotras -- another sign of quadripartition. Other classical works mention eight gotras, and by the time of the Mahabharata both varnas and gotras had multiplied rampantly. It can be suggested that the original number was four and this was bisected into the eight gotras, prior to the wholesale division leading to the highly complex system of today with an estimated 3,000 castes and 25,000 subcastes. In North India, a practice prevails of avoiding marriage with four gotras involving close kin, which possibly could be a remnant of the original four gotras.

Tradition states that the varnas and gotras originate with the pantheistic deity Purusa. The four varnas of humanity are said to come from the four parts of the Purusa's body. The gotra ancestors known as Rishis are also said to originate from the Purusa although some traditions state that they combined to form the Purusa and others that they sacrificed the Purusa in creating the cosmos.

Earlier in this blog, the relationship between Purusa and the pantheistic cosmologies of Southeast Asia, South China and the Pacific were discussed. The latter examples include themes of the creation of the world using the body of the pantheistic deity. In some cases, we find evidence of quadripartition in these myths.

For example, in Java, Bali and Sulawesi, there is a belief that every person is born together with "four siblings" consisting of the amniotic fluid, blood, vernix caseosa and the afterbirth. According to Stephen C. Headley this belief is linked with a wider Austronesian theme linking four siblings with the primordial being and the first creation.

With the four siblings an Austronesian myth and polythetic classification are at work here. The classificatory siblingship used in western Austronesian is well attested through the central section of the archipelago and has resisted "Indianization" and Islamization. The anthropomorphic identification of parts of the world with parts of the body or of siblingship did not await the advent of Samkhya philosophy from India to be used in Java and Bali. All personhood is relational and the society is built out of such relationships and not individuals. One's body is not the innermost point in one's identity, for an invisible world inhabits it and has relationships from the oriented cosmos in which it moves.

In the Philippines, the pantheistic deity from which all things originate is in some cases considered a deity or personification of time. In this same region, we often find the generations of a clan are expressed in the form of a human body i.e. a representation of generational time. In most cases, five generations of a clan are likened to sequential parts of the human body with the waist sometimes representing the current generation. Also, the Proto-Austronesian words for "body," "year," and "season" may be related.

Body metaphors find wide use in the Austronesian sphere (emphasis added):

Body metaphors are also used widely for the imagery of social space in the Austronesian world. In highland Bali, for example, differently ranked members of the village council of elders are associated with specific body parts of sacrificial animals, which are divided among them to be consumed during the ritual meals. Indeed, some of the titles of elders are derived from body parts, especially from the divisions of the forelegs (Reuter 2002a, 2002b). The 'head' of domains is often associated with the most upstream inhabited locations at the source of river systems. Left and right body halves are often associated with ceremonial moieties or other forms of dual social categories. The four extremities of sacrificial animals, finally, tend to be associated with some form of fourfold division of space and society (see Mosko, this volume), which is also a common pattern within the region. (Reuter, 2006: 25)

Milad's story also has what may be remnants of pantheistic belief. Her four children/stones become the dominant villages of Belau's quadripartite society. Her afterbirth is also said to become a village, and Milad herself is said to have turned into a stone landmark.


Cross Cousin Marriage

While the North Indian practice of four gotras may be a relic of an original quadripartite system of exogamy, the current system prevents any marriage of close kin. In South India, where gotras are rampant we find, however, that cross cousin marriage is the rule even among the high brahmin caste. This has led some to suggest that the "Aryan" system restricted cousin marriage as compared to the aboriginal system. However, the literary data does not really support such a theory.

The Vedas are mostly silent about the subject but the little they say would suggest that cross marriage was accepted at that time. Arthur Maurice Hocart noted that a Rgvedic verse supported bilateral cross cousin marriage. The hymn was apparently so controversial that commentator Sayana skips over it, but Yaksa includes it in his commentary. The verse suggests that the mother's brother's daughter (matrilateral) and the father's sister son (patrilateral) as the "share" or "portion" for marriage. The use of the word "portion" as Hocart notes was also found in distant Fiji even seems to suggest prescriptive cross cousin marriage.

Now, we should note that Blust suggested that the Proto-Malayo-Polynesian quadripartite divisions arose out of a system of bilateral cross cousin marriage groups with reciprocal exchange!

Later on in India history, the genealogy of the Buddha (Prince Siddharta) suggests that among the Sakya people of his kingdom, cross cousin marriage was either prescriptive or preferred. In classical Hindu literature, we hear of cross cousin marriages -- Arjuna with Subhadra, Sahadeva with Vijaya, Pradyumna with Rukmavati -- indicating that while not particularly common the practice was still acceptable at the time, at least among the Pandava and Yadava clans.

All in all, I would have to say that the similarities between and the likely genesis of the quadripartite systems in the two regions deserve further study especially when linked together with other collaborative evidence.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Alkire, WH, and Fujimura, K. "Principles of Organization in the Outer Islands of Yap State and Their Implications for Archaeology." In Hunter-Anderson, RL (ed.). "Recent Advances in Micronesian Archaeology." Micronesica, Suppl. 2. I, 1990.

Blust, Robert ; David F. Aberle; N. J. Allen; R. H. Barnes; Ann Chowning; Otto Chr. Dahl; Jacques Faublée; James J. Fox; George W. Grace; Toichi Mabuchi; Kenneth Maddock; Andrew Pawley. "Early Austronesian Social Organization: The Evidence of Language [and Comments and Reply]," Current Anthropology, Vol. 21, No. 2., Apr., 1980, 205-247.

Dandekar, Ramchandra Narayan . Proceedings of the All-India Oriental Conference, Oriental Philology, 1972, 397.

De Joesslin de Jong, P. E. Minangkabau and Negri Sembilan: Socio-political structure in Indonesia. Leiden, 1951.

Headley, Stephen C. Durga's Mosque: Cosmology,. Conversion and Community in Central. Javanese Islam, Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2004, 124-25.

Morrell, Elizabeth. Securing a Place: Small-scale Artisans in Modern Indonesia, SEAP Publications, 2005, 45.

Parmentier, Richard J. The Sacred Remains: Myth, History, and Polity in Belau, Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 1987.

Reuter, Thomas Anton. Sharing the earth, dividing the land : land and territory in the Austronesian world, Canberra : ANU E Press, 2006, 25.

Van Wouden, F. A. E. Types of social structure in eastern Indonesia. Translated by Rodney Needham, The Hague:Martinus Nijhoff, 1968.

__. "Local groups and double descent in Kodi, West Sumba," in Structural anthropology in the Netherlands, Edited by P. E. de Josselin de Jong, The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1977, 184-222.