"BMAC writing"

[Yaroslav Vassilkov]

        I would consider a PROTO-Chinese connection or Shang dynasty
parallels worthy of discussion, but in NYTimes' 2nd article the accent
is made on the parallels with "not an early script, but one that was
not used until about 200 B.C.", that is a script "practiced in the
Western Han dynasty of 206 B.C. to A.D. 9".
        Probably all this is due to typical journalistic distortion
of scholarly opinions. You are quite right: we shall better wait not
only for new excavations, but also for a regular publication of the
seal in a scholarly magazine and its first scientific interpretations.

                                                                Ya.V.

Mon, 06 Aug 101 23:20 +0300 MSK John C. Huntington wrote to INDOLOGY at LISTSERV.LIV.AC.UK:

> >The second article by J.W.Wilford contains some wild
> >phantasies, like suggestions of "a possible Chinese connection" (that
> >is, imaginary links between the Anau script and Chinese writing dated
> >by at least 2000 years later!).
>
>
> I must note that this in not so wild a fantasy,   The Shang dynasty
> definitely had writing in the second millenium bce and  Ho Ping-ti in
> his Cradle of the East, points out that there are markers scratched
> on the bases of Yang Shao pottery that easily date to mid fifth
> millenium. I am certainly no expert in these fields, but it appears
> that the Chinese had a notation system of some sort long before the
> "seal" came into existence.  Victor Maier,  who was cited by Wilford,
> certainly is however, and deserves a fair hearing.
>
> I must also note that the cutting of the marks on the seal are so
> unlike Harappan seals, that it simply cannot be of that area.
> Perhaps a "blank" was traded cut with someone elses marks?
>
> In my opinion, we shoud all wait u;ntil the corpus is a bit bigger than "one"
>
> John
>

---
Yaroslav Vassilkov (yavass at YV1041.spb.edu)
Institute of Oriental Studies
Tue, 07 Aug 101 13:08 +0300 MSK