STONE WITH A HISTORY.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19254, 19 August 1924, Page 8

STONE WITH A HISTORY.

WITNESS TO CHRISTIANITY A man has just left England who has made more than one effort t,6 get for tbo British Museum perhaps the earliest relic that is known of the spreading power of Christianity through the Far Eastern world. This is Mr Holm, who sought out a number of years ago the great atone tablet in the province of Shensi, in Northern China, whereon it is recorded that the Nestorian Christians reached that place in the year 685 A - n ‘ , , Til© Nestorian had a peculiar belief though they were Christians, and were even persecuted for it. Their fervour is shown by the way in which they penetrated into Asia. They must have stopped long near Sian-Fur. where the stone tablet is set up, for it was not raised tilt 731 A.D. Its inscription tolls of their faith. The tablet was first found and translated by another traveller. Alexander Wylie, and it was the study of Wylie’s translation at the British Museum that sent Mr Holm out to Imd it. He found it, and wanted to bring it back and present it to the British Museum. This the Chinese would not allow. So then Mr Holm had a replica made of it, which weighed two tons With immense difficulty Mr Holm got the replica away; and, after being in the Metropolitan Museum in Now York for eight years, it has now been removed to the Vatican. 'The Chinese have now removed the original Nestorian tablet from the lonely place •where it rested to the town of Sian-Fu, where it is hoped it may bo safe from brigands.