KALI-KUTKI. HIND. Picrorhiza kurrooa, in most books on Indian medicine kali - kutki, is termed Helleborus niger, but it is, in the druggists' shops, exactly similar to Kaur, the produce of the Picrorhiza, while the Asarun, which even in the native name attests its resemblance to the Asarum Europeutn, is probably a species of valerian. —Powell, i. p. 318.
KALILA-wa-DAMNA, an ethical work, which had its origin in the Sanskrit Hitopadesa, which was brought by Barzuyeh from India to the court of Nushirwan, king of Persia, was translated into Arabic during the khalifat of Mamun, afterwards into Persian by Abu-'l'-Maali with the title of Anwar-i-Suhaili, and revised by Hasan Kashafi, who was also the author of the Persian Com mentary on the Koran. Professor Max Muller says (chap. iv. p. 108), Abdallah-ibn-al-Mokaffah, a Persian, after the fall of the Omeyyades, became a convert to Muhammadanism, and rose to high office at the court of the khalifs. During the reign of al-Mansur, he wrote the Kalila-wa-Danina, a famous collection of fables, which he says were translations from the Pehlavi of Barzuyeh. Being impossession of important the state, he became dangeroo in the eyes of al-Mansur, and was foully murdered A.D. 760. The Arabic
version was known as Kalila wa Damna, after the names of two jackals who play conspicuous parts in the first story of the collection, and the Arabian translator ascribed the work to the sage Bedpai. This version became a prime favourite with the story-loving Arabs, and thus came into contact with Europe. Greek, Ilebrew, and Latin translations of it were made, from the 11th to the end of the 13th century, and the Fables of Bedpai soon became famous over all Europe, and were done into Spanish, German, Italian, French, and Eng lish, whilst a Persian version, the is a standard book. Tho second Latin version bore tho title Alter ./Esopus, or the New /Esop. The collection of moral tales commonly known as il-:sop's Fables is the work of a Byzantine monk of the 14th century, named Planudes- and thus the Latin version of Kalila and Damna had bean done half a century before )Esop's Fables came into the world. Many of Planudes' tales have been traced to Indian sources, and enable us to assert that /Esop's Fables, as we now have them, are not Greek at all, but are the descendants of Indian folk-stories of very great antiquity.