Select Contents of Oriental Journals

Summary

This feature lists noteworthy articles from contemporary Oriental journals, providing abstracts that highlight recent advances in Asian studies. It begins with the Journal of the Greater India Society, summarising P. C. Bagchi’s discussion of a Chinese Sūtra on the twelve years of Buddha’s wandering life and R. C. Majumdar’s study of a Sukhodaya inscription that sheds light on the rise of the Thai state and the Thai general Pha Muang. Another note establishes that the Khmer king Jayavarman II probably ascended the throne in 802 A.D., contrary to earlier dating. A supplement by I. N. Ghoshal surveys a quarter century of Greater Indian research and provides a region‑wise bibliography. From the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, summaries include Alfred Master’s article debunking the idea that the Pīśācas were a distinct tribe and emphasising that the term meant people whose speech was unintelligible; C. A. Kincaid’s defence of Lakṣmībai, Rāni of Jhansi, portraying her as a reluctant rebel rather than a mutineer; and A. K. Coomaraswamy’s philological note on the term prāṇaciti. Notices from other journals mention T. J. Kepar’s reinterpretation of a chronological expression in the Gargasamhitā, pushing the end of Yudhiṣṭhira’s reign to 1174 B.C.; H. C. Ray’s identification of the historical figure Kharavela with the Jain character Gardabhila; and Hiralal Jain’s descriptions of newly discovered Apabhramśa manuscripts containing Jain narrative poems. Together, these abstracts illustrate the diversity of subjects being explored in wartime scholarship—from Buddhist texts and Southeast Asian epigraphy to Indian chronology and linguistic theory—and point readers toward articles of broader interest.