There Is No Great
Objection To Its Adoption, Except That It Is Unintelligible To The
Inhabitants Of The Banks, And Is Liable To Mislead Travellers In
Search Of Indigenous Information, But At Any Rate It Should Not Be
Supposed To Asperse Marco Polo's Accuracy.
Gold River is the local
name from the junction of the Yalung to about P'ing-shan; below
P'ing-shan
It is known by various designations, but the Ssu-ch'uanese
naturally call it 'the River,' or, by contrast with its affluents, the
'Big River' (Ta-ho)." I imagine that Baber here makes a slight
mistake, and that they use the name kiang, and not ho, for the
river. - H.C.
[Mr. Rockhill remarks (Land of the Lamas, p. 196 note) that "Marco
Polo speaks of the Yang-tzu as the Brius, and Orazio della Penna
calls it Biciu, both words representing the Tibetan Dre ch'u. This
last name has been frequently translated 'Cow yak River,' but this is
certainly not its meaning, as cow yak is dri-mo, never pronounced
dre, and unintelligible without the suffix, mo. Dre may mean
either mule, dirty, or rice, but as I have never seen the word
written, I cannot decide on any of these terms, all of which have
exactly the same pronunciation. The Mongols call it Murus osu, and
in books this is sometimes changed to Murui osu, 'Tortuous river.'
The Chinese call it Tung t'ien ho, 'River of all Heaven.' The name
Kin-sha kiang, 'River of Golden Sand,' is used for it from Bat'ang
to Sui-fu, or thereabouts." The general name for the river is
Ta-Kiang (Great River), or simply Kiang, in contradistinction to
Ho, for Hwang-Ho (Yellow River) in Northern China.
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