Part 16

The name is derived from the Persian _yásmín_. Linnaeus obtained a fancied etymology from [Greek: ia], violets, and [Greek: osmê], smell, but the odour of its flowers bears no resemblance to that of the violet. The common white jasmine, _Jasminum officinale_, one of the best known and most highly esteemed of British hardy ligneous climbers, is a native of northern India and Persia, introduced about the middle of the 16th century. In the centre and south of Europe it is thoroughly acclimatized. Although it grows to the height of 12 and sometimes 20 ft., its stem is feeble and requires support; its leaves are opposite, pinnate and dark green, the leaflets are in three pairs, with an odd one, and are pointed, the terminal one larger and with a tapering point. The fragrant white flowers bloom from June to October; and, as they are found chiefly on the young shoots, the plant should only be pruned in the autumn. Varieties with golden and silver-edged leaves and one with double flowers are known.

[Illustration: _Jasminum grandiflorum_; flower, natural size.]

The zambak or Arabian jasmine, _J. Sambac_, is an evergreen white-flowered climber, 6 or 8 ft. high, introduced into Britain in the latter part of the 17th century. Two varieties introduced somewhat later are respectively 3-leaved and double-flowered, and these, as well as that with normal flowers, bloom throughout the greater part of the year. On account of their exquisite fragrance the flowers are highly esteemed in the East, and are frequently referred to by the Persian and Arabian poets. An oil obtained by boiling the leaves is used to anoint the head for complaints of the eye, and an oil obtained from the roots is used medicinally to arrest the secretion of milk. The flowers of one of the double varieties are held sacred to Vishnu, and used as votive offerings in Hindu religious ceremonies. The Spanish, or Catalonian jasmine, _J. grandiflorum_, a native of the north-west Himalaya, and cultivated both in the old and new world, is very like _J. officinale_, but differs in the size of the leaflets; the branches are shorter and stouter, and the flowers very much larger, and reddish underneath. By grafting it on two-year-old plants of _J. officinale_, an erect bush about 3 ft. high is obtained, requiring no supports. In this way it is very extensively cultivated at Cannes and Grasse, in the south of France; the plants are set in rows, fully exposed to the sun; they come into full bearing the second year after grafting; the blossoms, which are very large and intensely fragrant, are produced from July till the end of October, but those of August and September are the most odoriferous.

The aroma is extracted by the process known as _enfleurage_, i.e. absorption by a fatty body, such as purified lard or olive oil. Square glass trays framed with wood about 3 in. deep are spread over with grease about half an inch thick, in which ridges are made to facilitate absorption, and sprinkled with freshly gathered flowers, which are renewed every morning during the whole time the plant remains in blossom; the trays are piled up in stacks to prevent the evaporation of the aroma; and finally the pomade is scraped off the glass, melted at as low a temperature as possible, and strained. When oil is employed as the absorbent, coarse cotton cloths previously saturated with the finest olive oil are laid on wire-gauze frames, and repeatedly covered in the same manner with fresh flowers; they are then squeezed under a press, yielding what is termed _huile antique au jasmin_. Three pounds of flowers will perfume 1 lb. of grease--this is exhausted by maceration in 1 pt. of rectified spirit to form the "extract." An essential oil is distilled from jasmine in Tunis and Algeria, but its high price prevents its being used to any extent. The East Indian oil of jasmine is a compound largely contaminated with sandalwood-oil.

The distinguishing characters of _J. odoratissimum_, a native of the Canary Islands and Madeira, consist principally in the alternate, obtuse, ternate and pinnate leaves, the 3-flowered terminal peduncles and the 5-cleft yellow corolla with obtuse segments. The flowers have the advantage of retaining when dry their natural perfume, which is suggestive of a mixture of jasmine, jonquil and orange-blossom. In China _J. paniculatum_ is cultivated as an erect shrub, known as _sieu-hing-hwa_; it is valued for its flowers, which are used with those of _J. Sambac_, in the proportion of 10 lb. of the former to 30 lb. of the latter, for scenting tea--40 lb. of the mixture being required for 100 lb. of tea. _J. angustifolium_ is a beautiful evergreen climber 10 to 12 ft. high, found in the Coromandel forests, and introduced into Britain during the present century. Its leaves are of a bright shining green; its large terminal flowers are white with a faint tinge of red, fragrant and blooming throughout the year.

In Cochin China a decoction of the leaves and branches of _J. nervosum_ is taken as a blood-purifier; and the bitter leaves of _J. floribundum_ (called in Abyssinia _habbez-zelim_) mixed with kousso is considered a powerful anthelmintic, especially for tapeworm; the leaves and branches are added to some fermented liquors to increase their intoxicating quality. In Catalonia and in Turkey the wood of the jasmine is made into long, slender pipe-stems, highly prized by the Moors and Turks. Syrup of jasmine is made by placing in a jar alternate layers of the flowers and sugar, covering the whole with wet cloths and standing it in a cool place; the perfume is absorbed by the sugar, which is converted into a very palatable syrup. The important medicinal plant known in America as the "Carolina jasmine" is not a true jasmine (see GELSEMIUM).

Other hardy species commonly cultivated in gardens are the low or Italian yellow-flowered jasmine, _J. humile_, an East Indian species introduced and now found wild in the south of Europe, an erect shrub 3 or 4 ft. high, with angular branches, alternate and mostly ternate leaves, blossoming from June to September; the common yellow jasmine, _J. fruticans_, a native of southern Europe and the Mediterranean region, a hardy evergreen shrub, 10 to 12 ft. high, with weak, slender stems requiring support, and bearing yellow, odourless flowers from spring to autumn; and _J. nudiflorum_ (China), which bears its bright yellow flowers in winter before the leaves appear. It thrives in almost any situation and grows rapidly.

JASON ([Greek: Iasôn]), in Greek legend, son of Aeson, king of Iolcus in Thessaly. He was the leader of the Argonautic expedition (see ARGONAUTS). After he returned from it he lived at Corinth with his wife Medea (q.v.) for many years. At last he put away Medea, in order to marry Glauce (or Creusa), daughter of the Corinthian king Creon. To avenge herself, Medea presented the new bride with a robe and head-dress, by whose magic properties the wearer was burnt to death, and slew her children by Jason with her own hand. A later story represents Jason as reconciled to Medea (Justin, xlii. 2). His death was said to have been due to suicide through grief, caused by Medea's vengeance (Diod. Sic. iv. 55); or he was crushed by the fall of the poop of the ship "Argo," under which, on the advice of Medea, he had laid himself down to sleep (argument of Euripides' _Medea_). The name (more correctly Iason) means "healer," and Jason is possibly a local hero of Iolcus to whom healing powers were attributed. The ancients regarded him as the oldest navigator, and the patron of navigation. By the moderns he has been variously explained as a solar deity; a god of summer; a god of storm; a god of rain, who carries off the rain-giving cloud (the golden fleece) to refresh the earth after a long period of drought. Some regard the legend as a chthonian myth, Aea (Colchis) being the under-world in the Aeolic religious system from which Jason liberates himself and his betrothed; others, in view of certain resemblances between the story of Jason and that of Cadmus (the ploughing of the field, the sowing of the dragon's teeth, the fight with the Sparti, who are finally set fighting with one another by a stone hurled into their midst), associate both with Demeter the corn-goddess, and refer certain episodes to practices in use at country festivals, e.g. the stone throwing, which, like the [Greek: ballêtys] at the Eleusinia and the [Greek: lithobolia] at Troezen (Pausanias ii. 30, 4 with Frazer's note) was probably intended to secure a good harvest by driving away the evil spirits of unfruitfulness.

See articles by C. Seeliger in Roscher's _Lexikon der Mythologie_ and by F. Durrbach in Daremberg and Saglio's _Dictionnaire des antiquités_; H. D. Müller, _Mythologie der griechischen Stämme_ (1861), ii. 328, who explains the name Jason as "wanderer"; W. Mannhardt, _Mythologische Forschungen_ (1884), pp. 75, 130; O. Crusius, _Beiträge zur griechischen Mythologie una Religionsgeschichte_ (Leipzig, 1886).

_Later Versions of the Legend._--_Les fais et prouesses du noble et vaillant chevalier Jason_ was composed in the middle of the 15th century by Raoul Lefèvre on the basis of Benoît's _Roman de Troie_, and presented to Philip of Burgundy, founder of the order of the Golden Fleece. The manners and sentiments of the 15th century are made to harmonize with the classical legends after the fashion of the Italian pre-Raphaelite painters, who equipped Jewish warriors with knightly lance and armour. The story is well told; the digressions are few; and there are many touches of domestic life and natural sympathy. The first edition is believed to have been printed at Bruges in 1474.

Caxton translated the book under the title of _A Boke of the hoole Lyf of Jason_, at the command of the duchess of Burgundy. A Flemish translation appeared at Haarlem in 1495. The Benedictine Bernard de Montfaucon (1655-1741) refers to a MS. by Guido delle Colonne, _Historia Medeae et Jasonis_ (unpublished).

The _Histoire de la Thoison d'Or_ (Paris, 1516) by Guillaume Fillastre (1400-1473), written about 1440-1450, is an historical compilation dealing with the exploits of the _très chrétiennes maisons_ of France, Burgundy and Flanders.

JASON OF CYRENE, a Hellenistic Jew, who lived about 100 B.C. and wrote a history of the times of the Maccabees down to the victory over Nicanor (175-161 B.C.). This work is said to have been in five books and formed the basis of the present 2 Macc. (see ch. ii. 19-32).

JASPER, an opaque compact variety of quartz, variously coloured and often containing argillaceous matter. The colours are usually red, brown, yellow or green, and are due to admixture with compounds of iron, either oxides or silicates. Although the term jasper is now restricted to opaque quartz it is certain that the ancient _jaspis_ or [Greek: iaspis] was a stone of considerable translucency. The jasper of antiquity was in many cases distinctly green, for it is often compared with the emerald and other green objects. Jasper is referred to in the _Niebelungenlied_ as being clear and green. Probably the jasper of the ancients included stones which would now be classed as chalcedony, and the emerald-like jasper may have been akin to our chrysoprase. The Hebrew word _yashefeh_ may have designated a green jasper (cf. Assyrian _yashpu_). Professor Flinders Petrie has suggested that the _odem_, the first stone on the High Priest's breastplate, translated "sard," was a red jasper, whilst _tarshish_, the tenth stone, may have been a yellow jasper (Hastings's _Dict. Bible_, 1902).

Many varieties of jasper are recognized. Riband jasper is a form in which the colours are disposed in bands, as in the well-known ornamental stone from Siberia, which shows a regular alternation of dark red and green stripes. Egyptian jasper is a brown jasper, occurring as nodules in the Lybian desert and in the Nile valley, and characterized by a zonal arrangement of light and dark shades of colour. Agate-jasper is a variety intermediate between true jasper and chalcedony. Basanite, lydite, or Lydian stone, is a velvet-black flinty jasper, used as a touchstone for testing the purity of precious metals by their streak. Porcelain jasper is a clay indurated by natural calcination. (F. W. R.*)

JASSY (_Iasii_), also written JASII, JASCHI and YASSY, the capital of the department of Jassy, Rumania; situated on the left bank of the river Bahlui, an affluent of the Jijia, about 10 m. W. of the Pruth and the Russian frontier. Pop. (1900), 78,067. Jassy communicates by rail with Galatz on the Danube, Kishinev in Bessarabia, and Czernowitz in Bukowina. The surrounding country is one of uplands and woods, among which rise the monasteries of Cetatuia, Frumoasa, and Galata with its mineral springs, the water-cure establishment of Rapide and the great seminary of Socola. Jassy itself stands pleasantly amid vineyards and gardens, partly on two hills, partly in the hollow between. Its primitive houses of timber and plaster were mostly swept away after 1860, when brick or stone came into general use, and good streets were cut among the network of narrow, insanitary lanes. Jassy is the seat of the metropolitan of Moldavia, and of a Roman Catholic archbishop. Synagogues and churches abound. The two oldest churches date from the reign of Stephen the Great (1458-1504); perhaps the finest, however, are the 17th-century metropolitan, St Spiridion and Trei Erarchi, the last a curious example of Byzantine art, erected in 1639 or 1640 by Basil the Wolf, and adorned with countless gilded carvings on its outer walls and twin towers. The St Spiridion Foundation (due to the liberality of Prince Gregory Ghika in 1727, and available for the sick of all countries and creeds) has an annual income of over £80,000, and maintains hospitals and churches in several towns of Moldavia, besides the baths at Slanic in Walachia. The main hospital in Jassy is a large building, and possesses a maternity institution, a midwifery school, a chemical institute, an inoculating establishment, &c. A society of physicians and naturalists has existed in Jassy since the early part of the 19th century, and a number of periodicals are published. Besides the university, founded by Prince Cuza in 1864, with faculties of literature, philosophy, law, science and medicine, there are a military academy and schools of art, music and commerce; a museum, a fine hall and a theatre; the state library, where the chief records of Rumanian history are preserved; an appeal court, a chamber of commerce and several banks. The city is the headquarters of the 4th army corps. It has an active trade in petroleum, salt, metals, timber, cereals, fruit, wine, spirits, preserved meat, textiles, clothing, leather, cardboard and cigarette paper.

The inscription by which the existence of a _Jassiorum municipium_ in the time of the Roman Empire is sought to be proved, lies open to grave suspicion; but the city is mentioned as early as the 14th century, and probably does derive its name from the Jassians, or Jazygians, who accompanied the Cumanian invaders. It was often visited by the Moldavian court. About 1564, Prince Alexander Lapusneanu, after whom one of the chief streets is named, chose Jassy for the Moldavian capital, instead of Suceava (now Suczawa, in Bukowina). It was already famous as a centre of culture. Between 1561 and 1563 an excellent school and a Lutheran church were founded by the Greek adventurer, Jacob Basilicus (see RUMANIA: _History_). In 1643 the first printed book published in Moldavia was issued from a press established by Basil the Wolf. He also founded a school, the first in which the mother-tongue took the place of Greek. Jassy was burned by the Tatars in 1513, by the Turks in 1538, and by the Russians in 1686. By the Peace of Jassy the second Russo-Turkish War was brought to a close in 1792. A Greek insurrection under Ypsilanti in 1821 led to the storming of the city by the Turks in 1822. In 1844 there was a severe conflagration. For the loss caused to the city in 1861 by the removal of the seat of government to Bucharest the constituent assembly voted £148,150, to be paid in ten annual instalments, but no payment was ever made.

JATAKA, the technical name, in Buddhist literature, for a story of one or other of the previous births of the Buddha. The word is also used for the name of a collection of 547 of such stories included, by a most fortunate conjuncture of circumstances, in the Buddhist canon. This is the most ancient and the most complete collection of folk-lore now extant in any literature in the world. As it was made at latest in the 3rd century B.C., it can be trusted not to give any of that modern or European colouring which renders suspect much of the folk-lore collected by modern travellers.

Already in the oldest documents, drawn up by the disciples soon after the Buddha's death, he is identified with certain ancient sages of renown. That a religious teacher should claim to be successor of the prophets of old is not uncommon in the history of religions. But the current belief in metempsychosis led, or enabled, the early Buddhists to make a much wider claim. It was not very long before they gradually identified their master with the hero of each of the popular fables and stories of which they were so fond. The process must have been complete by the middle of the 3rd century B.C.; for we find at that date illustrations of the Jatakas in the bas-reliefs on the railing round the Bharahat tope with the titles of the Jataka stories inscribed above them in the characters of that period.[1] The hero of each story is made into a Bodhisatta; that is, a being who is destined, after a number of subsequent births, to become a Buddha. This rapid development of the Bodhisatta theory is the distinguishing feature in the early history of Buddhism, and was both cause and effect of the simultaneous growth of the Jataka book. In adopting the folk-lore and fables already current in India, the Buddhists did not change them very much. The stories as preserved to us, are for the most part Indian rather than Buddhist. The ethics they inculcate or suggest are milk for babes; very simple in character and referring almost exclusively to matters common to all schools of thought in India, and indeed elsewhere. Kindness, purity, honesty, generosity, worldly wisdom, perseverance, are the usual virtues praised; the higher ethics of the Path are scarcely mentioned. These stories, popular with all, were especially appreciated by that school of Buddhists that laid stress on the Bodhisatta theory--a school that obtained its chief support, and probably had its origin, in the extreme north-west of India and in the highlands of Asia. That school adopted, from the early centuries of our era, the use of Sanskrit, instead of Pali, as the means of literary expression. It is almost impossible, therefore, that they would have carried the canonical Pali book, voluminous as it is, into Central Asia. Shorter collections of the original stories, written in Sanskrit, were in vogue among them. One such collection, the Jataka-mala, by Arya Sura (6th century), is still extant. Of the existence of another collection, though the Sanskrit original has not yet been found, we have curious evidence. In the 6th century a book of Sanskrit fables was translated into Pahlavi, that is, old Persian (see Bidpai). In succeeding centuries this work was retranslated into Arabic and Hebrew, thence into Latin and Greek and all the modern languages of Europe. The book bears a close resemblance to the earlier chapters of a late Sanskrit fable book called, from its having five chapters, the _Pancha tantra_, or Pentateuch.

The introduction to the old Jataka book gives the life of the historical Buddha. That introduction must also have reached Persia by the same route. For in the 8th century St John of Damascus put the story into Greek under the title of _Barlaam and Josaphat_. This story became very popular in the West. It was translated into Latin, into seven European languages, and even into Icelandic and the dialect of the Philippine Islands. Its hero, that is the Buddha, was canonized as a Christian saint; and the 27th of November was officially fixed as the date for his adoration as such.

The book popularly known in Europe as _Aesop's Fables_ was not written by Aesop. It was put together in the 14th century at Constantinople by a monk named Planudes, and he drew largely for his stories upon those in the Jataka book that had reached Europe along various channels. The fables of Babrius and Phaedrus, written respectively in the 1st century before, and in the 1st century after, the Christian era, also contain Jataka stories known in India in the 4th century B.C. A great deal has been written on this curious question of the migration of fables. But we are still very far from being able to trace the complete history of each story in the Jataka book, or in any one of the later collections. For India itself the record is most incomplete. We have the original Jataka book in text and translation. The history of the text of the Pancha tantra, about a thousand years later, has been fairly well traced out. But for the intervening centuries scarcely anything has been done. There are illustrations, in the bas-reliefs of the 3rd century B.C., of Jatakas not contained in the Jataka book. Another collection, the _Cariyâ pitaka_, of about the same date, has been edited, but not translated. Other collections both in Pali and Sanskrit are known to be extant in MS; and a large number of Jataka stories, not included in any formal collection, are mentioned, or told in full, in other works.

AUTHORITIES.--V. Fausböll, _The Jataka_, Pali text (7 vols., London, 1877-1897), (Eng. trans., edited by E. B. Cowell, 6 vols., Cambridge, 1895-1907); _Cariyâ pitaka_, edited by R. Morris for the Pali Text Society (London, 1882); H. Kern, _Jataka-mala_, Sanskrit text (Cambridge, Mass., 1891), (Eng. trans. by J. S. Speyer, Oxford, 1895); Rhys Davids, _Buddhist Birth Stories_ (with full bibliographical tables) (London, 1880); _Buddhist India_ (chap. xi. on the Jataka Book) (London, 1903); E. Kuhn, _Barlaam und Joasaph_ (Munich, 1893); A. Cunningham, _The Stupa of Bharhut_ (London, 1879). (T. W. R. D.)

FOOTNOTE:

[1] A complete list of these inscriptions will be found in Rhys Davids's _Buddhist India_, p. 209.

JATH, a native state of India, in the Deccan division of Bombay, ranking as one of the southern Mahratta jagirs. With the small state of Daphlapur, which is an integral part of it, it forms the Bijapur Agency, under the collector of Bijapur district. Area, including Daphlapur, 980 sq. m. Pop. (1901), 68,665, showing a decline of 14% in the decade. Estimated revenue £24,000; tribute £700. Agriculture and cattle-breeding are carried on; there are no important manufactures. The chief, whose title is deshmukh, is a Mahratta of the Daphle family. The town of JATH is 92 m. S.E. of Satara. Pop. (1901), 5404.