[15] _Description ... d'une collection ... d'anciens manuscrits ... réunis par les soins de M. J. Techener_, pt. i. (Paris, 1862), p. 159 (referred to by Pannier, pp. 193-194).
[16] Respecting this, see David Murray, _The Black Book of Paisley_, &c. (1885), and _John de Burdeus_, &c. (1891).
MANDHATA, a village with temples in India, in Nimar district of the Central Provinces, on the south bank of the Narbada. Pop. (1901), 832. It is a famous place of Hindu pilgrimage, as containing one of the twelve great _lingas_ of Siva; and as late as the beginning of the 19th century it was the scene of the self-immolation of devotees who threw themselves from the cliffs into the river.
MANDI, a native state of India, within the Punjab. It ranks as the most important of the hill states to which British influence extended in 1846 after the first Sikh War. The territory lies among the lower ranges of the Himalaya, between Kangra and Kulu. The country is mountainous, being intersected by two great parallel ranges, reaching to an average height of 5000 to 7000 ft. above sea-level. The valleys between the hill ranges are fertile, and produce all the ordinary grains, besides more valuable crops of rice, maize, sugar-cane, poppy and tobacco. Iron is found in places, and also gold in small quantities. Area, 1200 sq. m.; pop. (1901), 174,045; estimated revenue, £28,000; tribute, £6666. The chief, whose title is raja, is a Rajput of old family. Considerable sums have been expended on roads and bridges. An important product of the state is salt, which is mined in two places.
The town of Mandi is on the Beas, which is here a mountain torrent, crossed by a fine iron bridge; 2991 ft. above sea-level; 88 m. from Simla. Pop. (1901), 8144. It was founded in 1527, and contains a palace of the 17th century and other buildings of interest. It is a mart for transfrontier trade with Tibet and Yarkand.
See _Mandi State Gazetteer_ (Lahore, 1908).
MANDINGO, the name currently given to a very important division of negro peoples in West Africa. It is seemingly a corruption of a term applied to an important section of this group, the Mande-nka or Mande-nga. The present writer has usually heard this word pronounced by the Mandingo themselves "Mandiña," or even "Madiña." It seems to be derived from the racial name _Mande_, coupled with the suffix _nka_ or _nke_, meaning "people," the people of Mande. Then again this word Mande seems to take the varying forms of _Male_, _Meli_, _Mane_, _Madi_, and, according to such authorities as Binger, Delafosse and Desplagnes, it is connected with a word _Mali_, which means "hippopotamus" or else "manati"--probably the latter. According to Desplagnes, the word is further divisible into _ma_, which would have meant "fish," and _nde_, a syllable to which he ascribes the meaning of "father." In no Mandingo dialect known to the present writer (or in any other known African language) does the vocable _ma_ apply to "fish," and in only one very doubtful far eastern Mandingo dialect is the root _nde_ or any other similar sound applied to "father." This etymology must be abandoned, probably in favour of _Mani_, _Mali_, _Madi_, _Mande_, meaning "hippopotamus," and in some cases the other big water mammal, the manati.[1]