Page:Sagas from the Far East; or, Kalmouk and Mongolian traditionary tales.djvu/255

Rh existence as marvellous in itself as the events of which it is composed. On the other hand, he found that native writers made out the number variously from four to nine, though he could not find that they determined with precision the existence of more than two. An additional difficulty arises from this, that the very distinctive super-appellations derived from their deeds by heroes bearing the name seem to have passed over to others along with the name itself; as, for instance, Gardabharâpa = "donkey-form," given to one of them on account of his being temporarily transformed into a donkey by his father; the name of Sakjaditja is similarly given indiscriminately to others who lived at different periods, though the origin of the word can only be found in an exploit of one of them, who with the aid of Shêsa, the serpent-god, destroyed an oppressor named Sâkja. While the name Vikramâditja itself seems rather a descriptive appellation than a name, being composed of the two Sanskrit words, vikrama and âditja—the sun, or bright exposition of heroic virtue.

You may form some idea of the uncertainty thus created if you imagine the Roman historians to have been silent, and suppose, that nothing remained to us of the lives of the Emperors, for instance, but certain panegyrics of bards and traditions of the people, eked out by a little scanty assistance from inscriptions and coins, and unsystematic and untrustworthy chronicles.