Month: September 2009

In the fifth installment of The Book of the Nisan Shaman there is a word “caise” mentioned as being a kind of food that is prepared for Sergudai Fiyanggo’s funeral.  Pawel looked up the word in P. Schmidt, “Chinesische Elemente im Mandschu. Mit Wörterverzeichnis” in: Asia Major volume 7, 1932, and found a strange Chinese character.  He referred me to the entry in the dictionary:

I couldn’t find that character anywhere, and neither could several people I asked, so I sent the entry to Victor Mair.  After several days of hunting, he finally tracked it down.  He says that when he finally spotted it in Hanyu Da Zidian, 5.3164, he “laughed / sobbed bitterly / mournfully”.  The following is a guest post by Victor Mair: Continue reading Caise