S.M. Iakerson. The Identification of the Origin of A Biblical Manuscript from the Collection of Baron Gunzburg

Russian collections are one of the foremost resources for the research of medieval Hebrew manuscripts. It is in these repositories that the most comprehensive examples of Hebrew book production can be found. These holdings include the earliest dated manuscripts from most of the regions of significant Jewish settlements from this period. They also contain many of the most complete codices, which serve as the foundation for the study of the codicology of Hebrew books.

The most noteworthy codices in Russian libraries are examples of the Oriental manuscript tradition. The purpose of the present article, however, is to bring to light for scholars an interesting example of the European (or, to be precise, Sephardic) Hebrew book culture. One of the goals is to create a multi-faceted description of a Hebrew Bible from the Collection of the Russian State Library (formerly the Baron Gunzburg Collection). The article includes a discussion of the manuscript's history and codicology, and the author's hypothesis as to the possible localization and dating of this work. It will prove, in fact, that the Bible was created in Castile, Spain around the end of the thirteenth to the beginning of the fourteenth century and will suggest the manuscript was copied by Castilian masters of the school of Ibn Gaon.

S.V. Pakhomov. The Hindu Tantric Literature

The Hindu Tantric Literature or "Tantras" are specific complex of texts which have been forming and developing during many centuries since roughly Gupta era (4 - 5 c.) in different parts of India. These texts varied for their influence, genre, nature, volume and other aspects, but in their totality they form an important domain of Indian religious literature wholly sharing its fate. Without studies of these compositions one difficult understand particularities of Indian religious consciousness as in its past manifestations as in its present ones.

V.F. Vydrin. Sulemana Kante, a Philopher-Utopist, Creator of the Maninka "Innovation Traditionalism"

Sulemana Kante, the author of the Nko alphabet for the Maninka language (invented in 1949), is at the same time creator of the Maninka literature and Maninka literary language in Guinea. In his historical and literary writings Kante builds an idealistic image of ancient West African states of Ghana, Soso, Manding/Mali as a model to be taken.

Yu.N. Tikhonov. The Activities of Gulyam Siddik-khan Charkhi in 1930 - 1945

Analyzing the attempts made by Afghanistan's king Amanullah-khan to come back to power in his country the author of the article shows that the main obstacle in the realization of this plan had become the "usurping" of the Afghan throne by Nadir-khan, who had managed to suppress the Amanullists' conspiracies and the revolts of the border Pushtu tribes. In this struggle for power the strong Afghan clan of Charkhi was at the head of the Amanullists' struggle against the new king. Afghanistan's former foreign minister of the period of Amanullah's rule Gulyam Siddik-khan Charkhi was the Amanullists' leader acknowledged in the world. Owing to his energy and broad personal contacts the plan of overthrowing the allegedly pro-English dynasty of Yakhia-khel was periodically discussed on the highest level in the USSR, Germany, Italy and Turkey. In the 1939 - 1940 the Third Reich tried to carry out the "Aman-ullah" operation with the help of the USSR in order to turn Afghanistan into a springboard for a subversive activity against British India. Siddik-khan was always in the center of diplomatic intrigues of the great powers around Afghanistan in 1930 - 1945.

Fam Thi Ngok Bik, D.V. Mosyakov. Vietnam's Foreign Policy During the Years of the Second Indo-Chinese War (1964 - 1975)

The authors show that Vietnam's foreign policy during the Second Indo-Chinese war was built around several main directions which had decisive importance for attaining a victory in the Indo-Chinese conflict. These directions included a negotiation process with the main opponent - the USA; reaching agreements with the governments of Laos and Cambodia concerning assistance in the military operations against the US troops on the South Vietnam territory; keeping a certain balance in Vietnam's relations with its main allies in the Indo-Chinese war - the USSR and China.

L.A. Aslanov, O.A. Sergeeva. Labour Immobilism in African Societies: the Quest for an Alternative Model of Development?

The article is devoted to an analysis of the sources and specificity of African labour immobilism. The authors of the article, having set it as their task to find out what has after all brought to the conscious narrowing of the sphere of production labour in Africa south of Sahara, the restricting of its intensification and why it proved to be fixed on the level of the local culture, come to a conclusion that working activity must not be hypertrophied; it is only one of the components of human vital functions and it cannot by itself ensure a society's existence. No less important is the structuring of the free time of the society's members, which ensures its being integrated, prevents the breaking of social ties, does not allow the creation of antagonistic groups on the basis of multifactor parameters (both in the sphere of

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production and in the sphere of leisure-time and in the sphere of culture on the whole). In spite of all the drawbacks of today's African reality Africa is, perhaps, the only region preserving the traditional structuring of non-production time and realizing the filling of this time with real sense-containing forms of behaviour in the plan of cultural orientation. It is especially important in the light of the possible future challenges. The modernization epoch has already shown that crises are connected not only with economic causes, but also with the losing of the balance in the system of social ties in a society. It is not excluded that the African form of a society's existence in the epoch of the crisis of the modern model of the industrial world will be the most viable because of the developed socially integrating ties.

L.Z. Zevin, N.A. Ushakova. Russia and Central Asia: The Problems and the Prospects of Economic Relations

In the context of a lively discussion, which has gathered momentum in Russia, the authors of the article are considering the ways of realizing the ambitions task of doubling the GDP during 10 years and increasing the competitiveness of the national economy on which the processes outside the country are exerting a growing influence in the epoch of globalization. This influence can be used to accelerate the economic growth and to improve its quality. At the same time an inadequate reaction to the global challenges, they believe, may lead to serious problems, the conservation of inefficient structures and the delay in the modernization of national economy; without a proper reaction the transformation period cannot be considered completed. In this context it becomes possible to understand why great attention in the discussion is paid to the state and prospects of interaction with the external world when looking for the ways of solving the internal economic and social problems by Russia, of how to closely link the external economic strategy and policy with the programme of economic and social development of the country.

E.E. Baldanmaksarova. The Development of the Medieval Mongolian Poetry in the XIII-XIV centuries

The article is devoted to one of the complex problems of the study of Mongolian peoples' literature, to the research into the genesis of poetic forms, the historical and cultural conditions of their development, their tie with out-of-literature material. For instance, much attention is paid to the study of the sources of Mongolian peoples' poetry.

The questions discussed in the article are the genre and the idea and subject wealth of the medieval Mongolian poetry in the XIII-XIV centuries. The high level of the medieval poetry, its genre and subject rendering demonstrate not only the existence of ancient poetic tradition, but also a lively interest in it on the part of the people, which stimulated its development. The distinguishing feature of the medieval Mongolian literature is the fact that poetry, the lyrical elements were always part of the works of any genre and kind. Of all the variety of secondary (literary) speech genres of the medieval Mongolian poetry it is the magtals (odes) and gamshil (elegy) that are discussed in the article as the central prevalent genres, in which the principles of the kind and genre are quite mature and developed.

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