By the Selenga; on a third (north), by the
'great river called Angara, which flows on the confines of Ibir-Sibir'
(i.e. of Siberia); on a fourth side by the territory of the Naimans. This
great country contained many towns and villages, as well as many nomad
inhabitants." Dr. Bretschneider's Chinese Traveller speaks of it as a
country where good iron was found, where (grey) squirrels abounded, and
wheat was cultivated. Other notices quoted by him show that it lay to the
south-east of the Kirghiz country, and had its name from the Kien or
Ken R. (i.e. the Upper Yenisei).
The name (Kienkien), the general direction, the existence of good iron
("steel and ondanique"), the many towns and villages in a position where
we should little look for such an indication, all point to the identity of
this region with the Chingintalas of our text. The only alteration called
for in the Itinerary Map (No. IV.) would be to spell the name Hinkin, or
Ghinghin (as it is in the Geographic Text), and to shift it a very
little further to the north.
(See Chingin in Kovalevski's Mongol Dict., No. 2134; and for
Baron-tala, etc., see Della Penna, Breve Notizia del Regno del Thibet,
with Klaproth's notes, p. 6; D'Avezac, p. 568; Relation prefixed to
D'Anville's Atlas, p. 11; Alphabetum Tibetanum, 454; and Kircher, China
Illustrata, p. 65.)
Since the first edition was published, Mr. Ney Elias has traversed the
region in question from east to west; and I learn from him that at Kobdo
he found the most usual name for that town among Mongols, Kalmaks, and
Russians to be SANKIN-hoto.
