The purpose of this paper is to explain the reason why in the sixteenth century Paraguay the Spaniards or their descendants quarrelled between themselves in court, sometimes for five or six years, about the rights over yanaconas, who served them while living in their residences or farms; it is not aim to discuss the inter-Spanish relations but to search for the cause of trying to get a few of yanaconas in exchange for many efforts and expense. This discussion proposes to rethink the relationship between the Spaniards, the colonizer, and the Indios, the colonized, and to make clear the image of the Paraguayan colonial society as it appeared in the middle of sixteenth century. The results of the analysis based on judicial documents, reserved but not yet put in order in the Archivo Nacional de Asuncion, Paraguay, are as follows. 1) The yanaconas were situated under a specific legal system differentiated from that of the colonial institution, encomienda system. 2) The real image of the yanaconas is not similar to that described in previous studies, in which historians and anthropologists have supposed that they were indios who lived near Asuncion, the first and capital colonial city of the Paraguayan region, or the captured indios who resisted to Spaniards or the Spanish colonization. 3) In colonial Paraguay under the condition of a partially functioning encomienda system, the yanaconas filled the role of connection between the Spaniards and the conquered or unconquered indios by receiving visits of their relatives, a common practice in their native society. This resulted in the Spaniards or their descendants competing to get or not lose yanaconas.

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In 2005, a tomb of a man by the name of Li Dan 李誕 from a place called Jibin 〓賓 who died during the Northern Zhou 北周 Period was unearthed in Xi'an 西安, China. We know from the tomb's epitaph that Li Dan was from Jibin and that he obtained his official position because he was a kind of "Brahman" 婆羅門種. From this information the consensus seems to be that Li Dan was of Indian (Kashimere) origin, but since there are various theories as to the exact location of Jibin, it is difficult to conclude anything about his origins. In the present article, the author attempts to clarify exactly where Jibin, where Li Dan was born, was located and considers what Li Dan intended to do in China. First, the author does a work up of the content of Li Dan's epitaph, and then introduces newly discovered epitaphs of Li Da 李陀 and his wife An 安 and of Li Xu 李吁. Judging from the content of all three epitaphs, the author concludes that 1) the men were father, son and grandson, respectively and 2) by her family name, An, the wife of Li Da, was of Sogdian origin. The existence of close marital ties between Li Dan and the Sogdians, which has already been speculated about, because of the proximity of Li Dan's tomb to and the tombs of contemporaries, An Jia 安伽, Kang Ye 康業 and Shi Jun 史君, is now a matter of historical fact. Secondly, the time when Li Dan's epitaph was engraved coincides with the time in which the location of the placename Jibin in Chinese was moved from Gandhara to Kapisi, because Gandhara had lost its position of importance due to the decline of Ephthal. Kapisi lies within the linguistic sphere of Bactrian, which is an eastern dialect of Iranian, like Sogdian. Dasa 陀娑, which is Li Dan's adult name (zi 字), can be found among common Bactrian names. Considering these facts within the context of the close relationship between the Li clan and the Sogdians, the author concludes that the Jibin mentioned in Li Dan's epitaph in fact refers to Kapisi, which was populated by Iranian Bactrians. Furthermore, since the Bactrians were well-known as traders, it can be assumed that Li Dan came to China for the purpose of commerce. And thus, the three epitaphs of the Li clan are important historical sources for unfolding the ways in which a group of Bactrians and Sogdians, tied together by marriage, extended their trading activities in the far away eastern land of China.

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This article inquires into the narrative court poem, Candimangal: Dhanapati upakhyan (Auspicious ballad of the Goddess Chandi: The story of a wealthy merchant), written by Mukundaram Cakrabarti at the end of 16^<th> century, which provides details about medieval trading activities conducted between Bengal and Sinhala by the gandhabaniks, a Hindu caste dealing in aromatics and other spices. The author begins by examining the title of the father figure in the poem and concludes that it corresponds with some mentions in the caste history of the gandhabaniks compiled in Bengal and Orissa around the latter half of the 15^<th> century focusing on a mythological theme suggesting their reorganization at the hands of a Hindu king. According to this history, the father may be identified as a high-ranking trader working for the Kesari kings. Although the story reflects the traditional plots of the mangalkabya (auspicious ballads) genre by having the father, a votary of Shiva, meet with many calamities, which his son overcomes through the protection of Chandi, it also lays emphasis on salvation by reciting the names of Vishnu. More importantly for this article, the poem provides a backdrop of scenes portraying trade routes in the Bay of Bengal during the 16^<th> century, which were influenced by the European powers and Gauriya Vaishnavas, a sect founded by Chaitanya. Secondly, attention is focused on the various trade goods mentioned, comparing them with goods traded during period dominated by Buddhism, especially such animals as horses, elephants and rare species. Through an examination of the trade routes, the author surmises that it was feudal lords who encouraged the gandhabaniks to expand their trading activities along the aromatic routes in order to obtain more prestige goods for themselves. However, the arrival of Portuguese traders and the rise of the Mughals during the 16^<th> century brought about significant changes in Indian Ocean commerce, causing a cessation of trade between Bengal and Sinhala. Finally, the dispute which arose within the gandhabanik community over dealing in saline earth suggests that despite their overall declining status, some gandhabaniks were still eager to pursue new commercial ventures.

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