Journal of the Siam Society; 38

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VOLUME XXXVIII, PT. 1

January 1950

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GlANT EARLY MAN FROM JAVA AND SOUTH CHINA By

• Under the above tit.le tbe late pt·n[essor Franz \Veidenreich, formerly of the Peking U nivorsit,y, has writt.en a rnost interesting paper which has been published as vol. '.1:0. Part. I of: ''Antlu:opological Papers of tht-: Amel'ican Mnsoum of Natural History", Now York, 194:!'}. It, is illust,rated with 1;2 piat(~S, showing skeletal reutains and teeth of primitive hornini­ stance of law was not entirely taken from Hindu codes. rrhey introd need, as was natural, n few eustomary rules prevalent, among the indigonons population, but. only in the forrn of principles of a very general character.

'rho result was that tho now li'Lerature was completely deprived o( religious support, a perfect civil or lay co dEl. One may be surprised that their authors, belonging as most of them did to the Buddhist order, did not try to introduce into their codes prescriptions taken from their Sacred Scriptures. As a matter of fnct, they did, but in an almost imperceptible measure.

'rhe probable reason

is that Bucldism, aiming at the formation of a monas tical body, lay clown constructive rules for the community of rnonks only. n will take a long time, as we shall see, before Buddhist law-givers will realize that there are in Buddi8t canonical books and commentories many ethical exhortations having a juridical bearing, More-

EVOLUTION OF LAW IN BUBMA AND SIAM

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ovel' C1l11' Mon authors wnnted to retnin and to attach to their works the name of Mann, associated in all Indian infinenced nat,ions with the origin of law. THE BUDDHIST MANU.

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Fnr that pnrpose they invented ~t curious story wltieh haR met

wit.h a geeat success arnong Bn(ldhist peoples of Indochina, for it is

found as a preamble to every specimc-n of dlutmmrt8ettthmn literature we know. 'Jlltey first honowcd from Buddhist Scriptures the wellknown legend of king Mahfi,sammata, who was a Bodhisattva whom the original inhabitants of the world had entreatell to become "Lh