• Henry T. Colebrooke to August Wilhelm von Schlegel

  • Place of Dispatch: London GND · Place of Destination: Bonn GND · Date: 12.07.1825
Edition Status: Newly transcribed and labelled; double collated
    Metadata Concerning Header
  • Sender: Henry T. Colebrooke
  • Recipient: August Wilhelm von Schlegel
  • Place of Dispatch: London GND
  • Place of Destination: Bonn GND
  • Date: 12.07.1825
  • Notations: Absendeort erschlossen.
    Printed Text
  • Bibliography: Rocher, Rosane und Ludo Rocher: Founders of Western Indology. August Wilhelm von Schlegel and Henry Thomas Colebrooke in correspondence 1820–1837. Wiesbaden 2013, S. 140–142.
  • Incipit: „[1] 12th July 1825
    My dear Sir
    I had the pleasure to acknowledge Your letter of 19th June by return of post; intending [...]“
    Manuscript
  • Provider: Dresden, Sächsische Landesbibliothek - Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek
  • OAI Id: DE-1a-33441
  • Classification Number: Mscr.Dresd.e.90,XIX,Bd.5,Nr.60
  • Number of Pages: 3S. auf Doppelbl., hs. m. U. m. Adresse
  • Format: 22,9 x 18,7 cm
    Language
  • English
    Editors
  • Bamberg, Claudia
  • Müller, Bianca
  • Varwig, Olivia
1 2 3 4
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[1] 12th July 1825
My dear Sir
I had the pleasure to acknowledge Your letter of 19th June by return of post; intending to have written more fully on the next post day: but have since been so much occupied with business of rather an anxious nature, that I have not since found time to sit down again to write to you, until today: though I have purposely had your letter in my pocketbook, during my recent peregrinations, intending to take the earliest opportunity of answering it.
I omitted to say that my son was vaccinated at Calcutta when very young. As it is surmised that the efficacy of vaccination in preventing small pox, may not be permanent, it is perhaps prudent to vaccinate anew from time to time. So there has been no harm done by repeating it now
I beg again to say that I am much gratified by the accounts you give me of my son in all respects. His shyness, I hope, will wear off.
The articles, to which you allude in the Journal Asiatique & Journal des Scavants, had not escaped me. I regretted to observe the tone of them [2] Such is not the spirit which fellow laborers on the great Cause of Oriental literature should evince towards each other
I have had an acknowledgment from Calcutta of the order for the commentaries on the Gítá, which we commissioned. They were put in hand But I have yet no advice of their completion and dispatch It is however possible that they may arrive soon: and I shall lose no time in forwarding them to you when received
Many thanks for your renewed invitation But I fear I have no chance of paying you a visit this year. I am going into Scotland next month on urgent business.
Yours very sincly
HColebrooke

I proceed to answer your queries
1: It does not occur to me that there has been any evidence yet adduced as to the period when the division of time into weeks and the designation of days by names of planets was introduced. The reckoning by lunar days & division of the month into two parts wane and increase – is undoubtedly ancient. The week was probably introduced by the astrologers, who set a planet over every hour of the day; & the one who presides over the first hour, as leading regent for that day See As. Res. 5. p. 108.
[3] 2 The difference between the Samvat of Vicramaditya and Saca of Sahivahana, as reckoned in the North of India, is 135 Years but as they commence in a different month from the year of the Christian, (vzt march or April) the difference is 56 1/4 subtraction from the one and 78 3/4 addition to the other. The discrepancies, which you remark, have been probably occasioned by neglecting the fractions. I am conscious of that oversight on one or two occasions myself.
3 The Drĭshadvati is as I recollect understood to be the modern Khagan River – It is N.W. from Delhi, & near the Saraswa[ti] into which I believe it falls. But the map of [it] that now lies before me has omitted the name & assigned to the River a different one. I will defer giving the source and the confluence until I have verified them on another map.
4 I have not the Durga Mahatmya at hand. But I will take the first opportunity of consulting it, to answer your fourth query
[4] A Monsieur
Monsieur A. W. De Schlegel
à Bonn Bonn
Sur Rhin
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[1] 12th July 1825
My dear Sir
I had the pleasure to acknowledge Your letter of 19th June by return of post; intending to have written more fully on the next post day: but have since been so much occupied with business of rather an anxious nature, that I have not since found time to sit down again to write to you, until today: though I have purposely had your letter in my pocketbook, during my recent peregrinations, intending to take the earliest opportunity of answering it.
I omitted to say that my son was vaccinated at Calcutta when very young. As it is surmised that the efficacy of vaccination in preventing small pox, may not be permanent, it is perhaps prudent to vaccinate anew from time to time. So there has been no harm done by repeating it now
I beg again to say that I am much gratified by the accounts you give me of my son in all respects. His shyness, I hope, will wear off.
The articles, to which you allude in the Journal Asiatique & Journal des Scavants, had not escaped me. I regretted to observe the tone of them [2] Such is not the spirit which fellow laborers on the great Cause of Oriental literature should evince towards each other
I have had an acknowledgment from Calcutta of the order for the commentaries on the Gítá, which we commissioned. They were put in hand But I have yet no advice of their completion and dispatch It is however possible that they may arrive soon: and I shall lose no time in forwarding them to you when received
Many thanks for your renewed invitation But I fear I have no chance of paying you a visit this year. I am going into Scotland next month on urgent business.
Yours very sincly
HColebrooke

I proceed to answer your queries
1: It does not occur to me that there has been any evidence yet adduced as to the period when the division of time into weeks and the designation of days by names of planets was introduced. The reckoning by lunar days & division of the month into two parts wane and increase – is undoubtedly ancient. The week was probably introduced by the astrologers, who set a planet over every hour of the day; & the one who presides over the first hour, as leading regent for that day See As. Res. 5. p. 108.
[3] 2 The difference between the Samvat of Vicramaditya and Saca of Sahivahana, as reckoned in the North of India, is 135 Years but as they commence in a different month from the year of the Christian, (vzt march or April) the difference is 56 1/4 subtraction from the one and 78 3/4 addition to the other. The discrepancies, which you remark, have been probably occasioned by neglecting the fractions. I am conscious of that oversight on one or two occasions myself.
3 The Drĭshadvati is as I recollect understood to be the modern Khagan River – It is N.W. from Delhi, & near the Saraswa[ti] into which I believe it falls. But the map of [it] that now lies before me has omitted the name & assigned to the River a different one. I will defer giving the source and the confluence until I have verified them on another map.
4 I have not the Durga Mahatmya at hand. But I will take the first opportunity of consulting it, to answer your fourth query
[4] A Monsieur
Monsieur A. W. De Schlegel
à Bonn Bonn
Sur Rhin
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