the fortifications as an indication that the mountains and rivers are blocked.'"[1]
Moreover Tsuratari, Adzumi no Muraji, of Lower Shōkwa rank, who had gone as Envoy to the Western Sea, returned from Pèkché and reported that Pèkché had returned after a successful expedition against Silla. At this time a horse of his own accord went round the Golden Hall[2] of a temple night and day without ceasing, and only stopping to graze.
A.D. 659. 5th year, Spring, 1st month, 3rd day. The Empress arrived from the hot springs of Ki.
3rd month, 1st day. The Empress visited Yoshino[5] and held a banquet there.
3rd day. The Empress visited Hira-ura in Afumi.
10th day. The man of Tukhāra[6] with his wife, a woman of S‘râvastî, arrived.
17th day. A Mount Sumi was constructed on the river-bank east of Amakashi no Oka, and the Yemishi of Michinoku and Koshi were entertained.
- ↑ This entry comes in a wrong place. Pèkché's destruction took place later—in A.D. 660. Vide "Tongkam," VII. 25.
- ↑ The Hall in which the image of Buddha is enshrined. The Chinese characters for "went round" are 行道, a term which is applicable to any religious procession. But doubtless the interlinear gloss meguri, "to go round," is right here. It is clearly a case of religious circumambulation. This term is also applied to the "orbit" of heavenly bodies.
The more usual characters for "circumambulation" are 循環. The Sanskrit word is pradakchina, which is defined by Eitel as "the (Brahmanic and Buddhist) ceremony of circumambulating a holy object with one's right side turned to it." This practice is still kept up. Rockhill mentions it in his travels in Thibet, and during Lord Dufferin's viceroyalty of India, Lady Dufferin was on one occasion "circumambulated" by some tribesmen as a mark of the very highest respect.
- ↑ i.e. an omen.
- ↑ A.D. 660. Under this year, the "Tongkam" has the following:—"The wells in the Royal capital of Pèkché turned red as blood, multitudes of fish on the coast of the Western Sea died, so that the people could not eat them, and the waters of a river turned red like blood."
- ↑ A beautiful spot in Southern Yamato. See Murray's "Handbook," 3rd ed. p. 336, et seqq.
- ↑ See above, XXV. 57.
