Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 25, 1914.djvu/430

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Uer Traumschlussel des Jagaddeva. Ein Beitrag zur indischen Mantik. Von Julius von Negelein, \^Religiotis- geschichtliche Versuche wid Vorarbeiten, xi. Band, 4 Heft]. Pp. xxiv + 428. i"] m. Giessen : Alfred Topelmann. 191 2. 8vo.

This volume is worthy of the well-known series to which it belongs, and is eminently successful in the accomplishment of its purpose. The author does not set out to write a disquisition on Indian divination, but undertakes the more laborious and useful task of collecting and sifting material and reducing it to such order as is practicable in the case of subject matter so chaotic and confused.

The kernel of the work is a complete guide to the interpreta- tion of dreams by Jagaddeva the son of Durlabharaja, of whom little seems to be known. The two books, the first of which deals with dreams of good import and the second with dreams of bad import, are worked through item by item, text and translation. To each verse Negelein has added parallel material from Sanskrit sources both printed and manuscript, so that the whole forms a representative corpus of Indian dream lore. Indeed -the homo- geneity of the parallel texts quoted show that our document contains sound doctrine. Throughout there is an admirably efficient system of cross references which, together with an index to the most important items, gives the student effective control over the material which the author's learning has collected. There is also a verbal index to the Sanskrit text.

In the introduction there are some brief but suggestive notes on the direct relation of Indian, Arabic, Greek, and modern European dream love. It would be interesting to know how far the dream books of Modern India, (presumably literate superstition in India possesses them), correspond to the ancient tradition. I have bought one or two dream books in Greece, and there habitually Artemidorus is invoked as the authority, and large portions of the dream prognostications are taken bodily from his pages. I sus- pect that similar methods may condition the production of modern dream books in India.

The Key of Dreams, however, hardly caters throughout for the