Fa-Hien’s Records of Buddhistic Kingdoms

An excerpt from the original work of that prolific writer James Legge: "......It is for the Translation that I hold myself more especially responsible. Portions of it were written out three times, and the whole of it twice. While preparing my own version I made frequent reference to previous translations:—those of M. Abel Rémusat, “Revu, complété, et augmenté d’éclaircissements nouveaux par MM. Klaproth et Landress” (Paris, 1836); of the Rev. Samuel Beal (London, 1869), and his revision of it, prefixed to his “Buddhist Records of the Western World” (Trübner’s Oriental Series, 1884); and of Mr. Herbert A. Giles, of H.M.’s Consular Service in China (1877). To these, I have to add a series of articles on “Fa-Hsien and his English Translators,” by Mr T. Watters, British Consul at Î-Chang (China Review, 1879, 1880). Those articles are of the highest value, displaying the accuracy of Chinese scholarship and extensive knowledge of Buddhism. I have regretted that Mr Watters while reviewing others, did not himself write out and publish a version of the whole of Fâ-Hien’s narrative. If he had done so, I should probably have thought that, on the whole, nothing more remained to be done for the distinguished Chinese pilgrim in the way of translation. Mr Watters had to judge the comparative merits of the versions of Beal and Giles, and pronounce the many points of contention between them. I have endeavoured to eschew those matters, and have seldom made remarks of a critical nature in defence of renderings of my own. The Chinese narrative runs on without any break. It was Klaproth who divided Rémusat’s translation into forty chapters. The division is helpful to the reader, and I have followed it except in three or four instances. In the reprinted Chinese text the chapters are separated by a circle in the column. In transliterating the names of Chinese characters I have generally followed the spelling of Morrison rather than the Pekinese, which is now in vogue. We cannot tell exactly what the pronunciation of them was, about fifteen hundred years ago, in the time of Fâ-Hien; but the southern mandarin must be a shade nearer to it than that of Peking at the present day. In transliterating the Indian names I have for the most part followed Dr Eitel, with such modification as seemed good and in harmony with growing usage..." JAMES LEGGE. Oxford June 1886.