Note 5 — Chapter III

35. “Among the many names, in different languages, designating wandering people, as, e.g., Scytha (probably from the Sclavonian: Skitati, ‘to wander’), Heber, or Eber, Aavor, Bunger (all from the Hebrew or Arabic, Vandal, &c., there is also a Sanskrit word, ‘Geta,’ signifying walking, going, wandering, the English ‘to go,’ the German ‘gehen,’ are derived probably from the same source). The Getæ are mentioned and described by ancient writers in Central Asia, the modern Chinese Tartary, near the Oxus and the Caspian Sea, the Massagetæ, farther on the north-western shores of the Black Sea, in Thrace (now Rumelia), on both sides of the Danube. Hence Ovid, in his banishment at Tomi, near the Black Sea, in modern Bulgaria, says, ‘Jam didici getice sarmaticeque loqui!’ ‘I have already learnt to speak the Getic and the Sarmatic (Sclavonian) languages.’ The modern Indians do not use the word ‘geta’ as a participle noun; they have changed it into ‘jata;’ but they form the preterite of the same verb, ‘giya,’ regularly from ‘jata’ (the jat tribes in India). Among the attributes of the Supreme Being, or his representative, the Buddha, the first name is ‘Bhagvan’ (overcomer, a Sanskrit word), the second ‘Tatha-gata,’ walking on the same road, i.e., the ‘Just.’ Both these names also highly confirm every adopted opinion respecting Buddhism and the Sanskrit words in Europe. From the frequent mention of the Bhagvan (God) by the Buddhists, I think bigoted Christians, by way of contempt, called them Pagans, and the second word, ‘Tathagata,’ confirms the proper signification of ‘geta,’ mentioned above.5