THT 90
| Known as: | THT 90; B 90 |
|---|---|
| Cite this page as: | Melanie Malzahn. "THT 90". In A Comprehensive Edition of Tocharian Manuscripts (CEToM). Created and maintained by Melanie Malzahn, Martin Braun, Hannes A. Fellner, and Bernhard Koller. https://cetom.univie.ac.at/?m-tht90 (accessed 17 Jul. 2026). |
Edition | |
| Editor: | Melanie Malzahn |
Provenience | |
| Main find spot: | Shorchuk |
| Expedition code: | T III Š 93.14 |
| Collection: | Berlin Turfan Collection |
Language and Script | |
| Language: | TB |
| Linguistic stage: | classical |
| Script: | classical |
Text contents | |
| Title of the work: | Araṇemijātaka |
| Text genre: | Literary |
| Text subgenre: | Jātaka/Avadāna |
| Verse/Prose: | prose; verse |
Object | |
| Manuscript: | Araṇemi α |
| Material: | ink on paper |
| Form: | Poṭhī |
| Number of lines: | 6 |
Images
Images from idp.bl.uk by courtesy of the International Dunhuang Project, the Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften, and the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin – Orientabteilung.
Transliteration
| a1 | /// ta twā ṅkau ta po vaṃ va rtto śya |
|---|---|
| a2 | /// [ka] [r]y(·) (·)t(·) [¯]ñcä a llo ka kca stā na sa ā |
| a3 | /// llā wra mno [ā] rw[a] ka rsnā ma ne ści re naṃ |
| a4 | /// ya ne a ru ṇ[ā] v[a] ti ri¯ ¯ś so rro¯ ¯mp ka |
| a5 | /// – yo¯ ¯k e nte nai kca ne sta ñke ñi ssa |
| a6 | /// [wa] rtto yne ma [ne] re ske¯ ¯ñä ysā ra : a |
| b1 | /// [ñ][ra]¯ ¯mt• ści ri – [•] ta ññe cau yai tko |
| b2 | /// [m](·) lā nt[n]e mai yyā cce we¯ ¯r• e pi ya¯ ¯c |
| b3 | /// – ko rmeṃ i [s](·)a¯ ¯k• trai ka ne || tu meṃ |
| b4 | /// || śle tre meṃ (–) hma ṇe we s̝s̝aṃ hai ma |
| b5 | /// (·)·[e] kau [na] kauṃ pa rki a ksau ne mā śwā tsi |
| b6 | /// – t[e] sne wā ṣpi nnau ya nnai |
Transcription
| a1 | n1 /// tatwāṅkau tapovaṃ varttoś ya(ṃ) |
|---|---|
| a2 | n2n3 /// käry(ort)t(a)ñc allokä kca stānasa ā¬ |
| a3 | ¬(rwa) /// (ta)llāw ram no ārwa kärsnāmane ścirenäṃ |
| a4 | n4 /// yane aruṇāvati riś sorromp ka¬ |
| a5 | ¬(klāyau)n5n6n7n8 /// (ñäkte)-yok ente nai kca nesta ñke ñissa |
| a6 | n8 /// wartto ynemane reske{ṃ}-ñ ysāra : a° |
| b1 | n8n9 /// (me)ñ ramt ściri(nne) • taññe cau yaitko¬ |
| b2 | ¬(rsa) /// (araṇe)m(iṃ) lāntne maiyyācce wer epiyac |
| b3 | n10n11 /// – kormeṃ is(t)a-k traika-{n→t}e ॥ tumeṃ |
| b4 | n12 /// ॥ śle tremeṃ (brā)hmaṇe weṣṣäṃ hai ma¬ |
| b5 | ¬(ṇiśvara) /// (r)ekauna kauṃ-parki aksau-ne mā śwātsi |
| b6 | n13 /// te sne wā ṣpinnau yan nai |
Translation
| a1 | .... wrapped in ... he go(es) to the ascetic-grove. |
|---|---|
| a2 | ... the merchants ... some other ... (cutting woo)d from trees |
| a3 | ... like a (miser)able one cutting wood, (with?) hard ... |
| a4 | ... to the town Aruṇāvatī. (Having) fallen down ... |
| a5 | ... [you] (divine?)-looking one, wherever you are now, by me ... |
| a6 | ... while walking into the forest, blood (pl.) is running from me. ... |
| b1 | ... like the (mo)on (below) the stars. (By) this your command |
| b2 | ... remember(ing) the strong hatred against king (Araṇe)mi, |
| b3 | ... after having ..., he immediately fainted. Thereupon |
| b4 | .... Full of wrath the (Bra)hmin speaks: “Hey, Ma(ṇīśvara)! ... “ |
| b5 | ... (w)ords I will announce him at sunrise. No food ... |
| b6 | ... |
Other
| b5 | [These] words I will announce to him at sunrise: «Not eating …» (cf 320) (Peyrot 2013b: 655) |
|---|
Commentary
Philological commentary
| The translation basically follows Schmidt 2001: 320. | |
| Between THT 89 and THT 91 there is a gap of 18 leaves. Into this gap belongs this fragment, which might follow THT 89 immediately (pace Schmidt 2001: 319), as well as the Uyghur text Mainz 223, which is taken from a manuscript collection of the Berlin Turfan collection (cf. U 2293). In the meantime, King Araṇemi has given everything that he has been asked for — not only his children, but also his wife and, eventually, himself also. As a result, Araṇemi has fallen into the hands of his vindictive arch enemy Rudramukha. The Mainz text is also translated in Schmidt 2001: 321. In English, it runs as follows: | |
| Onto [ ] he looked. Thus he suffered. But he did not let his mind desist from [torturing] this [king]. Continuing to drag (him) up and down on the unclean ground the tortured and tormented him. Sometimes he shamelessly kicked him against [his] head with [his] feet. The body of the noble one turned altogether black. (Yet still) the king looked with his eyes beautiful as purple-blue lotuses at the Brahmin. At this time the Brahmin Rudramukha’s wife saw the king [Araṇe]mi and spoke thus to her husband, the Brahmin: “As a very noble and mild man with good deeds he appears. Do not torment him more! If he is useless to you, sell him to someone else!” At this time the king Araṇemi entered into in such humiliation and bitter sufferings through the Brahmin, his heart and his mind, however, grew friendly and cheerful. Why? For through the Brahmin he had accomplished the pāramitā of patience. Then he let him don a very (?) bad, dingy gown fit for a slave, and they led him through the streets to sell him. When they reached the gate of Caṇḍālas a man holding a sword in [his] hand asked the Brahmin: “Are you selling this man?” | |
| The storyline of this small fragment is less clear. | |
| n1 | Schmidt 2001: 320 seem to restore ya〈ṃ〉. |
| n3 | Thomas Sieg and Siegling 1983: 244 proposes the restoration ā(rwa kärsnāmane), parallel to line a3. |
| n4 | Thomas Sieg and Siegling 1983: 244 correctly points out that Krauses's restoration (wā)ya-ne 'he went' in Krause 1952: 219 cannot be correct, because we would expect (wa)yā-ne. |
| n7 | Schmidt 2001: 320, fn. 118 correctly points out that the restoration (lare)-yok proposed in Sieg and Siegling 1953 and again by Thomas in Sieg and Siegling 1983: 244 cannot be correct, because the damaged akṣara looks like either 〈ka〉 or 〈na〉. Schmidt himself thinks about an attribute meaning 'base, common', but no such form known yet fits here. Since the context is not so clear, I would rather propose ñäkte-yok ‘divine looking'. |
| n8 | The passage is metrical; according to Sieg/Siegling the meter has 4x18 (7/7/4) syllables. The metrical subdivision in line a 5 is not too certain; Thomas Sieg and Siegling 1983: 244 proposes yok ; ente nai kca nesta ñke ; ñissa, but if nesta is a genuine disyllabic form, it ought to stand at the end of a colon (see also below). |
| n9 | For the simile Thomas Sieg and Siegling 1983: 244 refers to the parallel THT 389 b 2. |
| n10 | At the beginning of the line, Schmidt 2001: 320, fn. 120 proposes to restore [pru]kormeṃ 'after he had done (?) a leap', and while the remains of the upper part of the akṣara may belong to a 〈pa〉, the lower part is too edgy for a second-element 〈ra〉. |
| n11 | It is likely that the finite verbal form means ‘fainted', in which case it ought to be a middle (see Schmidt 2001: 320, fn. 121 wit ref.). Accordingly, traikane has to be corrected into traikate, as already proposed by Sieg/Siegling. |
| n12 | The personal name of the merchant already met in THT 89 is restored by Schmidt 2001: 320. |
| n13 | Word separation and interpretation of line b6 is completely unclear. |
Remarks
| Fragment from the right side of a leaf, possibly directly following THT 89, in which case it was originally leaf 24 of the manuscript. |
Linguistic commentary
| n2 | It is unclear to what form the fem.sg. allonkä kca is referring to. The word-final -ä is preservered because of the following clitic. |
|---|---|
| n5 | nesta seems to stand for nestä with preservation of the word-final -ä; since such forms with preserved schwa usually stand at the end of a sentence/pāda/colon (see Malzahn 2012a: esp. p. 75f.), it is likely that we also have a pāda/colon end here; note that inside one single colon the correct meter could also have been achieved by nest ñake. |
| n6 | Note the gemination in the pronoun ñisa ‘by me'. |
Alternative linguistic/paleographic classifications
| Tamai 2011 | C5 |
| Tamai 2011 | C14 |
References
Online access
Edition
Sieg and Siegling 1953: 27-28
Translations
Carling 2000: a6 (55, 112); Peyrot 2013b: b5 (655); Schmidt 2001: a1 a2 a3 a4 a5 a6 b1 b2 b3 b4 b5 b6 (320); Thomas 1983: a6 (11)
Bibliography
Carling, Gerd. 2000. Die Funktionen der lokalen Kasus im Tocharischen. Berlin/New York: de Gruyter.
“The International Dunhuang Project: The Silk Road Online.” n.d. http://idp.bl.uk.
Krause, Wolfgang. 1952. Westtocharische Grammatik, Band I. Das Verbum. Heidelberg: Winter.
Malzahn, Melanie. 2012a. “Now you see it, now you don’t — Bewegliches –o in Tocharisch B.” In Linguistic developments along the Silk Road: Archaism and Innovation in Tocharian, edited by Olav Hackstein and Ronald I. Kim, 834:33–82. Sitzungsberichte der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philosophisch-historische Klasse. Wien: Verlag der ÖAW.
Peyrot, Michaël. 2013b. The Tocharian subjunctive. A study in syntax and verbal stem formation. Vol. 8. Brill’s Studies in Indo-European Languages & Linguistics. Leiden/Boston: Brill.
Schmidt, Klaus T. 2001. “Die westtocharische Version des Araṇemi-Jātakas in deutscher Übersetzung.” In De Dunhuang à Istanbul. Hommage à James Russell Hamilton, edited by Louis Bazin and Peter Zieme, 299–327. Silk Road Studies 5. Turnhout: Brepols.
Sieg, Emil, and Wilhelm Siegling. 1953. Tocharische Sprachreste. Sprache B, Heft 2. Fragmente Nr. 71-633. Edited by Werner Thomas. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht.
Sieg, Emil, and Wilhelm Siegling. 1983. Tocharische Sprachreste. Sprache B. Teil I: Die Texte. Band 1. Fragmente Nr. 1-116 der Berliner Sammlung. Edited by Werner Thomas. Neubearbeitet und mit einem Kommentar nebst Register versehen v. Werner Thomas. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht.
Tamai, Tatsushi. 2011. Paläographische Untersuchungen zum B-Tocharischen. Innsbrucker Beiträge zur Sprachwissenschaft 138. Innsbruck: Institut für Sprachen und Literaturen.
Thomas, Werner. 1983. Der tocharische Obliquus im Sinne eines Akkusativs der Richtung. Abhandlungen d. Geistes- und Sozialwissenschaftlichen Klasse 6. Mainz: Verlag d. Akad. d. Wissenschaften und d. Literatur.
Gippert, Jost, Katharina Kupfer, Christiane Schaefer, and Tatsushi Tamai. n.d. “Thesaurus Indogermanischer Text- und Sprachmaterialien (TITUS): Tocharian Manuscripts from the Berlin Turfan Collection.” http://titus.fkidg1.uni-frankfurt.de/texte/tocharic/thtframe.htm.
