(Ikegami Jirō 池上二郎: “常置国際アルタイ学会議第二三回集会“, 東洋学報第六十二巻 Tōyō gakuhō, Vol. 62, pp. 232–236 [448–452])

The 23^rd Meeting of the Permanent International Altaistic Conference

by Ikegami Jirō

tr. by Oliver Corff

When the 24^th International Congress of Orientalists was held in Munich in 1957, the Altaic Section decided—in light of the insufficient time given for presentations on Altaic subjects during the Congress—to conduct an international meeting of Altaic Studies, and Professor Walther Heissig was entrusted with organizing such a meeting. In the following year, 1958, the meeting was convened in Mainz, Germany, for a duration of four days. It was decided that in order to further the scholarly exchange between all Altaic scholars, a yearly meeting lasting between three and five days should be convened under the title „Permanent International Altaistic Conference“ (abbrev. PIAC). This background was personally conveyed to the author by the above-mentioned professor, and a record to this effect can also be found in Ural-Altaische Jahrbücher XXX, S. 249–251.) Soon after, Prof. Denis Sinor became Secretary General. Meetings were convened mainly in Europe, on a yearly basis. More than 20 years have passed since the inauguration, and the 23^rd Meeting took place in Strebersdorf, in the outskirts of Vienna, in Austria, from July 27 to August 1, 1980. The President of this Meeting was Prof. Karl Jahn of the University of Vienna, who, by the way, also presided over the 15th Meeting, held at the same place in 1972.

The author of this report had previously participated in the 4^th Meeting, held in Cambridge in 1961, and the 12^th Meeting, held in Berlin in 1969. This time, the author was sent as a delegate of the Group for International Research under the Ministry of Education, Science and Culture [monbushō] [of Japan] which is the context for this report.

The Central Theme of this Meeting was The Culture of Nomads and City-Dwellers in Inner Asia.

The Meeting took place in the Gymnasium of Strebersdorf, and participants were lodged in the students’ dormitory.

Arriving on July 27, the participants registered, paying a fee for participation and accomodation of 2,000 Austrian schilling. After settling in the dormitory (in individual rooms, by the way), the participants gathered in the dining room for a get-together and dinner.

A list of the approximately 60 participants is given here:

Árpád Berta (Szeged, Hungary), James Bosson (Berkeley USA), Peggy Boyle (Manchester, England), Yuri Bregel (Israel), Bert Brendemoen (Oslo, Norway), Bess Brown (München BRD), Chieh-hsien Ch’en 陳捷先 (Taipei Taiwan), Ching-lung Chen 陳慶隆 (Taipei Taiwan), Boris Chichlo (Champigny-sur-Marne, France), J. G. Coates (Norwich, England), Francis Cooley (Cambridge, England), Mark van Damme (Utrecht, Netherlands), Abdullah T. Emiloglu (Taipei Taiwan), Marcel Erdal (Jerusalem, Israel), Ambassador S. Esin und Dr. E. Esin (Istanbul, Turkey), Magdi Tatar-Fosse (Oslo, Norway), Bert Fragner (Freiburg i. Br., BRD), A. von Gabain (Anger, BRD), G. Hazai (Berlin, GDR), W. Heissig (Bonn, BRD), P. Hyer (Provo, Utah, USA), Jirō Ikegami 池上二郎 (Sapporo, Japan), Fahir Iz (Bebek-Istanbul, Turkey), Sechin Jagchid 札奇斯钦 (Provo, Utah, USA), Gunnar Jarring (Stockholm, Sweden), A. Karahan (Istanbul, Turkey), Barbara Kellner-Heinkele (Beirut, Lebanon), Hisao Kimura 木村肥佐生 (Bellingham, Washington, USA), Dick Koopman (Leiden, Netherlands), Cornelia Melles (Budapest, Hungary), K. H. Menges (Wien, Austria), Eddy Moerloose (Gent, Belgium), Ádám Molnár (Budapest, Hungary), Ane Nauta (Leiden, Holland), Lars-Erik Nyman (Bonn, BRD), Rashidonduk (Bonn, BRD), J. Richard (Dijon, France), Klaus Röhrborn (Giessen, BRD), A. Róna-Tas (Szeged, Hungary), Claus Sagaster (Bonn, BRD), Alice Sarközi (Budapest, Hungary), C. Schaendlinger (Wien, Austria), H. Scheinhardt (Germersheim, BRD), Peter Schulz (Frankfurt am Main, BRD), Osman Sertkaya (Istanbul, Turkey), D. Sinor (Bloomington, Indiana, USA), Giovanni Stary (Mestre-Venezia Italy), János Szerb (Szeged, Hungary), T’ang Ch’i 唐訖 (Taipei, Taiwan), Talât Tekin (Beytepe-Ankara, Turkey), Ahmet Temir (Ankara, Turkey), Semih Tezcan (Ankara, Turkey), Ingeborg Thalhammer (Kleinzell, Austria), Alois van Tongerloo (Louvain, Belgium), Edward Tryjarski (Warszawa, Poland), Catharine Uray-Kőhalmi (Budapest, Hungary), I. Vásáry (Budapest, Hungary), Veronika Veit (Bonn, BRD), Hans-Peter Vietze (Berlin GDR), Mary Francis Weidlich (Maryland, USA), Nuri Yüce (Istanbul, Turkey).

On the following day, the Meeting opened with the so-called Confessions. All participations gave a short account of their recent research activities. The Confessions lasted well into the afternoon. For instance, A. Róna-Tas reported about his new Chuvash Etymological Dictionary and his Dictionary of Chuvash Toponyms. H. Kimura reported about his research on the descendants of those Mongolians who had come to Java during the Yuan Dynasty. P. Hyer reported on the unknown whereabouts of the posthumous manuscripts by S. M. Shirokogoroff. R. R. Arat of the Türk Dili Kurumu, Ankara, reported on the publication of the Kutagdu Bilig I (Metin). During the Meeting, most of the communications were conducted in English, followed by German.

On the same day, the scholarly presentations began and continued until July 31. Some of the research presentations that were included in the program distributed before the opening were canceled, and many new presentations were added on the day of the event. With these removed and added, the presenters and titles are listed below.

July 28

• Röhrborn: Zum elliptischen Gebrauch einiger Verben im Alttürkischen
• Nyman: Modernisierungsversuche in Tibet während der Zwischenkriegszeit, 1918–1934
• Tryjarski: Zur Frage einiger Parallelen zwischen den Bestattungsritualen der Alt-Türken und Chinesen
• Berta: Die Terminologie der Siedlung und des Hauses bei den getauften Tataren im Wolga-Gebiet

July 29

• von Gabain: Ohnmacht und Macht der Kazakin
• Bregel: Nomadic and Sedentary Elements among the Turkmen
• Jagchid: The Kitans and their Cities
• Ikegami: Expressions Referring to Nomadism in Chinese and Manchu
• Iz: The Beginnings of Eastern and Western Turkish Literature: the City Dwellers and Nomads
• Sinor: On the word balik city
• Hyer: The Historical Significance of Köke-Khota City, Mongolia
• Uray-Kőhalmy: Daurien: Burgen von Nomaden in Gebieten von Bauern
• Esin, Emel: Balik, The Early Turkish City
• Ch’en, Ch’ing-lung: Trading Activities of Turkic Peoples in China
• T’ang: Agrarianism and Urbanism and Their Relationship to the Hsiung-nu Empire
• Molnár: The Plough and Ploughing among the Altaic Peoples

July 30

• Menges: Über den gegenwärtigen Stand der Erforschung des altaischen Schamanismus
• Sertkaya: Probleme der köktürkischen Geschichte: Der Name Groß-Rom = Byzanz in den köktürkischen Inschriften
• Tongerloo: The Structure of the Manichaean Community in the Light of Middle Iranian Loanwords in Old-Turkish
• Chichlo: La religion urbaine dans la steppe sibérienne
• Vásáry: A Contact of the Crimean Khan Mängli Giräy with the inhabitants of Qïrg-yer from 1478/79
• Tekin — see below
• Vietze — see below
• Kellner: Anmerkungen zu einer bisher unbeachteten Turkmenenchronik
• Ch’en Chieh-hsien: A Study of the Manchu Posthumous Titles of the Ch’ing Emperors
• Weidlich: The Status of the Word Ulger in Modern Mongolian
• Tatár-Fosse: Volkslieder und Radio-Musik der Mongolischen Volkskultur

July 31

• Yüce: Neu festgestellte Wörter im Chworesmtürkischen
• Karahan: Réflexions sur Khiwa, Boukhara et Samarkand dans le livre de Vámbéry intitulé »Voyage d’un Darwich prétendu en Centrale Asie«
• Tezcan: Bezeichnungen für Siedlung im Türkischen
• Temir: Über Siedlungsgebiete der Wolga-Bulgaren bis z. 13. Jh.

The titles of the most of the presentation matched with the Central Theme of this Meeting. Among the presentations stated above, Y. Bregel reported on the change in size and and area of the settlings of the Turkmen people between the 16th and 20th centuries. J. Ikegami reported that the Manchu equivalent for the Chinese term 遊牧 [nomad] originally only had the connotation of movement whereas the idea of 牧 cattle was absent (similar observations can be made in other Altaic languages), and it appears that the term 遊牧 [nomad] was coined in order to differentiate the nomadic lifestyle in contrast to the sedentary lifestyle of people living on agriculture. C.Uray-Kőhalmy presented important materials on the tribal and clan names of the Solon and Khamnigan people and compared historical and modern toponyms of the Solon people. Á. Molnár reported on the vocabulary for the agricultural tool called plough, i. e. Mongolian anǰasun (this word also entered the Southern Tungusic languages), the Turkic terms saban, amač and boqursï as well as Chuvash term aka, and the geographical distribution of these terms as well as related vocabulary, e.g. yokes. Ch’en chieh-hsien talked about the elements of Chinese culture absorbed by the Manju nation with regard to the posthumous titles of the Qing emperors. O. Sertkaya identified the Old Turkic term PVRM, or ạpạ urụm, as meaning Rome. With regard to A. Karahan’s presentation, D. Sinor commented that it was based on Vambéry’s translation and should rather be based on the original text. There was no coordination of the thematic presentations.

There is a small risk that the above-mentioned titles of the reports were perhaps not rendered correctly. There was also a presentation by T. Tekin, and when P. Vietze spoke about the German-Mongolian dictionary he edited, he was asked by D. Sinor whether the dictionary was targeted at German or Mongolian users. In addition, A. Róna-Tas spoke about the origins of the words for city in the Altaic languages. The author of this article commented that the Southern Tungusic languages have loan words of the same meaning, and pointed out the Ainu term kotan. Unfortunately, the author failed to record the titles of these presentations. Furthermore, he was sometimes away from my desk, so would like to ask for your forgiveness if the names of presenters and titles mentioned above are still missing, or if some presentations which had been cancelled are still included. The papers of the above-mentioned presentations are to be published in the Central Asiatic Journal.

The importance of small conferences like the PIAC lies in the opportunity for international scholars to meet in person and to speak to each other. The author had the opportunity to meet Prof. von Gabain, Prof. Menges and others again after a long time. On the other hand, there will be fewer scholars of the same field who meet each other for the first time. Meeting with young German researchers of Tungusic languages, the author was asked many questions. Also, listening to Professor Röhrborn’s voice during the Confession reminded the author of the time twenty years ago when he took his class for a year in Hamburg.

The Soviet scholar N. A. Baskakov was awarded with the PIAC Medal. D. Sinor also solicited for contributions to the PIAC Newsletter, the publication of which is supported by the Uralic and Altaic Department of Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana.

On the evening of July 30, a reception hosted by the Austrian Academy of Sciences was organized in the historical building of the Academy, to which all participants were invited. On the afternoon of July 31, a bus tour of Vienna took place, followed by an evening reception hosted by the Mayor of Vienna in the „Au-Restaurant“ situated in the Donaupark. With breakfast on the following day, August 1, it was time for departure.