Yahia Bihram, a pivotal figure in the Mandaean community of the 19th century, composed several autobiographical texts. This article presents a new edition of one of his lengthiest works, incorporating numerous corrected readings based upon close examination of the original manuscript. With the aid of recent linguistic research into Neo-Mandaic and contemporary documents, the article proposes many new interpretations and the correct identifications of historical names and places.

Buṭrus al-Bustānī (1819–1883) was one of the leading figures of the Nahḍa period. In most studies on the Nahḍa, his activities, work and projects are seen as having made an important contribution to the revival of the Arabic language by transforming it to meet the needs of modern times. Although his lexical contribution has been researched there is no comprehensive research on his grammatical contribution to the Arabic language. This article shows that al-Bustānī's Encyclopedia reflects a conservative approach toward grammar in that he confined himself to abridging the grammatical rules enshrined by traditional grammarians. However, he took a liberal and reformist approach to the lexicon that drew on both classical and Western sources.

The article provides an edition and translation of eight early Islamic acknowledgment (iqrār) deeds written in Early New Persian, which are preserved in the National Library of Israel. The acknowledgment deeds are part of a rich trove of manuscripts known as the “Afghan Genizah”, reportedly found in the area of Bāmiyān in central Afghanistan. Dated between the years 395–430/1005–1039, the eight discussed acknowledgment deeds are probably the earliest extant legal documents written in New Persian. This implies that Islamic legal documents were drawn up in New Persian in the area of Bāmiyān—and perhaps in other eastern Iranian territories—as early as the beginning of the 5th/11th century. Furthermore, a thorough examination of the formulaic structure of these acknowledgment deeds reveals their reliance on Arabic legal formulae, which may reflect an early stage of legal writing in New Persian.

In the last years of the eighteenth century, an Indian woman authored a work in Persian intended for the entertainment and guidance of students of that language. Entitled Miftāḥ-i Qulūb-i Mubtadiyān (‘The Key of the Hearts of Beginners’), the work comprised of stories from vernacular oral traditions as well as extracts from well-known Persian poetic, historical and ethical works. Although the work was translated into English in 1908 by Annette Beveridge, it has received no serious scholarly attention. Drawing upon recent scholarship offering new ways of thinking about India's multilingual literary past, this article examines the intersection of multiple vernacular and generic traditions as translated and manifested in Miftāḥ-i Qulūb al-Mubtadīyān. While vernacular languages followed different, and in relative terms, more limited routes of circulation and exchange in comparison with cosmopolitan languages such as Persian, their paths of movement were no less significant. Through a close reading of this work and its context, this article seeks to understand how Bībī Ḥashmat al-Daula crafted a distinct, cosmopolitan voice for herself through her deployment of both Persianate and regional Indian traditions.

The ancient site of Babylon has long attracted the interest of European visitors. With the expansion of British geopolitical interests into the Middle East and India during the eighteenth century those in the service of the East India Company were afforded new opportunities to examine and explore regional antiquities. The historiography of archaeological exploration has traditionally focused on the contributions of key Orientalists such as Claudius James Rich and Paul Émile Botta. This has been at the expense of other equally significant individuals who also undertook a range of supporting scholarly, archaeological and museological activities. This article will redress that balance by considering the work of one of these unsung heroes of the East India Company, Captain Robert Mignan.

The article surveys the views of Pashtun military-administrative elite on governance in the works of Khushḥāl Khān Khaṫak (d. 1689) and Afżal Khān Khaṫak (d. circa 1740). The texts under discussion pertain to the universal literary genre of “Mirrors for Princes” (naṣīḥat al-mulūk) and include the Khaṫak chieftains’ didactical writings in prose and verse, as well as still poorly studied documents on real politics from Afżal Khān's historiographical compilation “The Ornamented History” (Tārīkh-i muraṣṣaʿ). Rooted in the medieval Persian classics, early modern Pashto “mirrors” are distinguished by local ethnocultural peculiarities which manifest in shifting the very subject from statesmanship to chieftaincy and declaring regulations of the Pashtun unwritten Code of Honour. The study proves that the outlook and behavioural patterns of Pashtun tribal rulers stemmed from a combination, partly eclectic and contradictory, of Islamic precepts, feudal ideologies of the Mughal administrative system, and norms of the Pashtun customary law (Pashtunwali).

It has been claimed that the ninth-century shipwreck found near the island of Belitung, Indonesia, is that of an Arabian ship. The evidence for this is examined in detail, and found to be less than convincing. The identifications of samples of wood from the wreck are shown to be unreliable at species level. The construction technique of the ship appears to resemble that of the eastern Indian Ocean, not the western Indian Ocean. Various items from the wreck connect it with Southeast Asia: a piloncito coin probably came from Java. Very little from the ship suggests any link at all with the western Indian Ocean. Overall, the strongest probability is that the ship was built in Southeast Asia.

The ‘discovery’ of early Chinese, and its subsequent reconstruction, have allowed the modern linguist to reach a wide range of firm conclusions about the Chinese language and its position within the Tibeto-Burman family. Reverend Joseph Edkins (1823–1905) should be credited with initial work on early Chinese as the ancestor language of the various Sinitic languages, and with its first partial reconstruction. This article is an attempt to supply at least a first historical guide for those interested in obtaining a better understanding of the implicit discovery of Sinitic and the first reconstructions of early Chinese.