1 Introduction1
The topic of practice and ritual in Uyghur Buddhism is a vast field with various layers and complex interconnections that is not well understood in its entirety.2 Eyewitness accounts of ritual practice, such as the one Faxian (ca. 340–before 423,
It is possible that the focus of early Buddhist literature in Old Uyghur was different, on the one hand, in Dunhuang, where texts were translated mainly from Chinese and, on the other, in Turfan and in the Hami region, where the first phase of translation activity centered on works in Tocharian A.7 As for apotropaic literature, there is evidence that the narrative cycle of stories called Daśakarmapathāvadānamālā [Garland of Legends Pertaining to the Ten Courses of Action]—the Old Uyghur version is a translation from Tocharian A—made use of some sources with an affinity to the rakṣā genre.8 The Maitrisimit [Meeting with Maitreya]—one of the earliest specimens of Uyghur Buddhist literature and also a translation from Tocharian A—is not only a kind of compendium of Buddhist knowledge and a biography of the future Buddha Maitreya, but also a text that possibly relates to visualisation techniques. The stock phrase at the beginning of each chapter that ‘one has to understand’ the scene treated therein and which replaces ‘stage directions’ depending on the (semi-)theatrical character of the Tocharian original could mean that the reader has to ‘imagine’ or ‘visualise’ the locality in his mind. Lists of the 32 marks of the Buddha (Skt. lakṣaṇa) or the very detailed scenes in the chapters dedicated to the description of the major and minor hells might also point to such an understanding. Other passages are likely only literary themes, such as the reference to the festival commemorating Bodhisattva Maitreya cutting off his hair knot (Skt. cūḍāmaha) in Chapter 13.9 This event is, in any case, envisioned for the future.
Some Turkologists proposed that the Maitrisimit was performed for public entertainment during a specific feast, in the wake of which Buddha Maitreya would manifest himself during the performance of the very same spectacle.10 This assumption turned out to be groundless.11 The misunderstanding followed from an erroneous interpretation of the key term yaŋı kün, which literally means ‘new day’, but really shows a semantic spectrum ranging from ‘festival, feast’ and ‘ceremony, rite’ to ‘spectacle, wonder’.12 Georges-Jean Pinault recently presented a detailed study of its Tocharian A equivalent opṣäly together with the Tocharian B cognate ekṣalye, in which he proves that the same semantic range applies for the two Tocharian terms, and that “the notion is not related to any special Buddhist festivity or ritual”.13 The Old Uyghur and Tocharian terms can thus apply to any kind of feast, ritual, ceremony, spectacle, or wonder. A specific Maitreya festival with alleged Iranian antecedents—as Geng and Klimkeit surmise14—is out of the question.
It is difficult to tell which Buddhist festivals really had practical importance within Uyghur Buddhism. This topic needs further research. There is, for instance, very scarce evidence for the quinquennial festival (Skr. pañcavārṣika).15 Besides a fragmentary reference in the Maitrisimit,16 there is one mention of the term in an avadāna collection.17 In both texts, we find a connection with alms-giving. The festival is, in all likelihood, only a literary motif without any historical significance.18 Further examples are found in a Sanskrit-Old Uyghur bilingual manuscript in Brāhmī script19 and in an alliterative poem, where the term is used as a substantive and as an adjective respectively.20 The bilingual text and the first instance of the term in the poem combine the Sanskrit term pančav(a)ršik with the Chinese term taičuŋ, which is also recorded in the spelling taičo.21 This last term and its adjectival derivative occur every now and then in Old Uyghur, for instance, in the translation of the biography of Xuanzang, (Da Tang da Ci’ensi sanzang fashi zhuan
Other texts relate to a ceremony that was actually performed, the pravāraṇā,25 the ceremony concluding the annual monastic retreat during the rainy season.26 The most peculiar textual specimen is the Insadisūtra, a late composite text in cursive script, the title of which is, so far, unexplained.27 The second part of the text refers directly to the pravāraṇā and contains Chinese characters that correspond to Chinese versions of the Pravāraṇāsūtra.28 It is conceivable that the Uyghurs used a Sanskrit text to perform the ritual itself, because the pravāraṇā is a monastic ceremony. A confirmation of this assumption could be found in two manuscripts in Uyghur script in which the corresponding Sanskrit parts are given in Brāhmī script.29 A letter containing instructions to carry out Buddhist ceremonies mentions also the recitation of the Pravāraṇāsūtra.30 Recently, a bilingual text (Sanskrit and Old Uyghur) in Uyghur script related to the pravāraṇā ritual was also discovered.31 The liturgical formulas are in Sanskrit, whereas the ritual instructions are in Old Uyghur.
The poṣadha ~ posatha day was of particular importance for Buddhist practice. One can deduce from various dated sources that this day was considered as especially auspicious and was chosen deliberately by practitioners who commissioned the printing or writing of a text32 or by pilgrims who left an inscription on the walls of Buddhist caves.33 Perhaps the day was considered auspicious for making a pilgrimage or a visit to Buddhist shrines. An otherwise unknown scholar named Nomkulı Šabi K(ı)ya checked the meanings of the terms in ten volumes of the Old Uyghur translation of the Abhidharmakośabhāṣya on this day.34 A remarkable colophon to a block-printed collection of sūtras35—containing, among others, the Vajracchedikāprajñāpāramitāsūtra [Diamond Sūtra] and the Prajñāpāramitāhṛdayasūtra (Chin. Xinjing
Another aspect of Uyghur Buddhism related to practice has to be mentioned here. Annemarie von Gabain provides a rather detailed description of a Buddhist festival held on the 15th day of the first month of the year. She mentions confessions, material offerings, spiritual gifts, symbolic gifts, liturgical ceremonies for the benefit of the departed, readings of edifying tales, pictures on display, and performative arts.38 However, an analysis of von Gabain’s method reveals that this particular festival is nothing but her fictional construct, in which she combines observations based on texts from different periods and totally unrelated contexts.39 Nevertheless, some scholars take her fictitious account for granted.
2 Practice and Rituals as Mirrored in Old Uyghur Texts
2.1 Blessings
Blessing texts are a genre connected with practice and ritual.40 One example of this type of literature is the Dišastvustik (Skt. *Diśāsauvāstika) [Blessing of the Cardinal Points] from the Krotkov Collection in the Institute of Oriental Manuscripts of the Russian Academy of Sciences, in which the legend of the merchants Trapuṣa and Bhallika provides the narrative frame.41 The incomplete text—apparently from the late classical period of Old Uyghur (ca. 12th c.)—is a booklet in European style and—on account of its rather small format—probably intended for personal use. The glosses in Brāhmī script are unusual for a manuscript. In essence, the text is a blessing of the cardinal points with copious names of yakṣas and minor female divinities and interspersed with dhāraṇīs. The text is also supposed to offer basic protection. The whole setting is Indian, and Central Asian place names are not mentioned.
In Old Uyghur literature, there are additional examples of blessing texts that are likely native Uyghur compositions rather than translations, for example, extant texts include two New Year’s blessings,42 two harvest blessings,43 and a blessing of a sacrifice, which mentions it is intended to heal several ailments and ward off demonic beings.44 The formulas used are, in part, spell-like.
The harvest blessings in particular reflect a local form of Buddhism. I will discuss briefly the two extant examples of harvest blessing texts. The first includes a lengthy description of agricultural activities, mentions a libation of wheat beer (OU sorma) to the god of wealth (Skt. dhanyadeva), Kubera.45 It also mentions the sacrifice of a he-goat and a pig in order to prepare a banquet.46 The goal of the rituals referred to in the text is to produce an outstanding crop yield.47 The last part of the harvest blessing is a detailed depiction of an evil spirit with certain animal characteristics, whom one intends to ban by means of the text.48 The second text is on the whole quite similar. A blessing for a vineyard, which has not been edited yet, is reported in a catalogue description.49
2.2 Confessions
One of the most striking features of Uyghur Buddhism and, one may add, one of its enigmas, is the popularity of confession texts intended to be used by lay disciples. Despite several studies, the possibility of a historical connection with a Manichaean pattern is still unclear.50 While confessions often have a preparatory and cathartic function within the wider context of complex Buddhist rituals, especially of the esoteric type, the work known as the Kšanti kılmak atl(ı)g nom bitig [The Book Called Making a Confession] is self-contained. Although many manuscripts are extant, the title of this text is preserved in only a few of them.51 The Book Called Making a Confession is either a group of similar texts with sets of matching lines or, in fact, only one work that was open to additions and alterations, depending on the specific requirements of the sponsors. We have examples of manuscript copies of the text, typically in the form of scrolls but also in the Indian pustaka format, characterised in this case by long vertically oriented folios with string holes.52 It is certainly not by sheer accident that the majority of the manuscripts were found at Yarkhoto. The rather short text, consisting of only one scroll, was intended for lay people who were in need of a text dealing with their various offences. The names of these people are recorded in the manuscripts. Ritual formulas and merit making are important in this text. It was particularly important that the work consisted of only one scroll, so that ordering a copy was not as expensive as copying works in many fascicles. While what Willi Bang and Annemarie von Gabain refer to as Part A and Part B in their edited text seem to belong to the Śrāvakayāna tradition—since they name as addressees of the confession Maitreya and several koṭis of arhats—the first scroll that Friedrich Wilhelm Karl Müller edited,53 (The Confession of the Lay Female Buddhist Üdrät)54 is directed to the 496 Bodhisattvas of the fortunate aeon (Skt. bhadrakalpa) beginning with Maitreya.55 The second scroll Müller edited56 also mentions the 496 bodhisattvas and Maitreya, but at the end, the lay woman Kutlug mentions that she commissioned not only the confession text in one scroll but also the Zun sheng jing
One of the most relevant chapters of the Suvarṇaprabhāsasūtra [Sūtra of Golden Light] in terms of practice and ritual is certainly the fifth chapter, dedicated to confession.58 In Old Uyghur, this section is also rendered as a separate text on its own in poetical form, and as such, is an independent reworking in strophic alliteration. It is preserved in handwritten and block-printed form.59 An independent prose version of this chapter was also recently identified in the fragment U 2585.60 Over the course of centuries, the text of the Suvarṇaprabhāsasūtra grew more and more. Nobel observes that the dhāraṇī portions in particular were added.61 Gradually, the literary character transformed into a typical specimen of an Esoteric Buddhist text.62 The Old Uyghur version contains several independent texts in the preface, one of which is a ritual offering to the four Great Kings (Skt. mahārāja), which is most likely based on a Tibetan model, because the term torma (Tib. gtor ma) is one of the key words in the manual.63
The most important ritual work in Old Uyghur, judging from the great number of manuscripts identified so far, is the Kšanti kılguluk nom bitig [The Book on How One Should Practice Confessions],64 a translation from the Chinese Cibei daochang chanfa
Peter Zieme achieved an important discovery because he identified a confession text he had originally published in the year 2001 in the reprint of his selected articles on Uyghur Buddhist studies.67 The confession text in this unique manuscript, which also includes a remarkable version of the Araṇemijātaka, is a translation of the Chinese Cibei shui chanfa
A late poem in strophical alliteration is dedicated to a glorification of the 35 Buddhas of Repentance to whom the practitioner bows.68 Although there are similarities in this poem to other Buddhist works, the Old Uyghur work has some unique features regarding structure and wording.69
Occasionally, the Uyghurs used their own script to write down texts in Sanskrit, although the Uyghur alphabet is ill-suited to such an endeavour. One example of a Sanskrit text written in the Uyghur script is a particular confession text to which parallel passages exist in Sanskrit texts from Central Asia in Brāhmī script. A single fragment contains parts in Uyghur script and in Sanskrit in Brāhmī script.70 The text mentions that the person making the confession, Indrasena, has a monastic background, because it states that he is a saṃghasthavira, a community leader or abbot.71 The Sanskrit verse text was likely produced in Central Asia.72
2.3 Amitābha Worship
Pure Land Buddhism73—characterised by its visualisation techniques—had a deep impact on Uyghur followers. After groups of Uyghurs—who fled from Mongolia after the demise of the East Uyghur Khaganate in 840 and settled in the Turfan area—converted to Buddhism on a large scale around the turn of the first millennium, some of them must have subsequently encountered Chinese Buddhist visualisation practices. The Toyok Cave Temple complex was definitively a hub of meditative practices centered on visualisation techniques of Amitābha and his paradise, so the Uyghurs who settled there must have had access to this tradition. Nobuyoshi Yamabe highlights the importance of this site by combining textual and pictorial evidence—especially Cave 20 and 42—to tracing the history of the Guan wuliangshou jing
The early history of Uyghur Pure Land Buddhism has not been investigated in detail yet. The three foundational scriptures in Pure Land Buddhism, the Smaller Sukhāvatīvyūhasūtra, Larger Sukhāvatīvyūhasūtra and the Guan wuliangshou jing
2.4 Worship of Bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara
There are several Old Uyghur texts of ritual or practical background related to Avalokiteśvara,82 the most popular of which is the translation of the Guanyin jing
Other manifestations of Avalokiteśvara were also popular, which is reflected in Old Uyghur literature and art. There is also a composite manuscript including the Ruyi lun tuoluoni shenzhou jing
Only very few lines and the colophon of an Avalokiteśvarastava text are preserved.96 Two Avalokiteśvarasādhana texts based on the tradition of mature Tantric Buddhism and translated from Tibetan are still not identified with any known Tibetan text.97 Two block prints of the first text date to the years 1333 and 1336 respectively.98
It should be mentioned that a sizeable number of fragments of votive banners from the Museum für Asiatische Kunst (Berlin) found in the Turfan region relate to different aspects of this bodhisattva.99 One example (inv. no. III 6355) of the Thousand-armed and Thousand-eyed Avalokiteśvara is well-known.100 Three banners show only the eyes of the bodhisattva.101 Two banners (III 7307 and III 7308) were found in Toyok, the one from Murtuk (III 7787) is painted in a crude way. One banner from Toyok (III 7307) is inscribed on both sides in a late form of Old Uyghur.102 It is tempting to see a connection with the Eye-Healing Avalokiteśvara known from Tibet and Mongolia, but this is perhaps too speculative, because this cult developed later.103 One inscription identifies the main deity as Cintāmaṇicakra Avalokiteśvara, to whom a lay person, together with his wife, dedicated the banner.104
Female manifestations of Avalokiteśvara have to be mentioned as well, the most famous of which is Tārā. The Tārā-ekaviṃśatistotra was probably translated from a Tibetan original, but it is also possible that the translator consulted more than one version. Most of the extant copies are from different block-prints, while the stotra part is also preserved in handwritten form.105 Another aspect of Avalokiteśvara is Cuṇḍī.106 An Old Uyghur translation of a dhāraṇī dedicated to her has not been identified with any known version so far,107 although it has similarities to the Cuṇḍīdevīdhāraṇīsūtra (T. 1075.20). What makes this text particularly interesting is that it is rich in ritualistic details (the construction of a maṇḍala, the position of the image of the deity, the description of various ritual tools, the sequence of the vaśīkāraṇa and abhicāraka rituals, the accomplishment of the painting of Cuṇḍīdevī, etc.).
2.5 Ritual Texts of Mature Tantric Buddhism
There was a new religious dynamic in Uyghur Buddhism under Mongol rule. The growing interest the Mongol elite took in mature Tantric Buddhism also affected the Uyghurs. This coincided with the spread of the block-printing technique, which enabled the production and distribution of a large number of texts. The efficacy of these texts was probably thought to be enhanced by the glosses in Brāhmī script sometimes added to the Indic elements in the text. One of the most widespread block-printed texts with glosses in Brāhmī script is certainly the Sitātapatrādhāraṇī.108 Some scholars claim that next to various block-printed editions—most of them found at Murtuk—there should also be a handwritten manuscript109 but this assumption is groundless. The exact version from which the Old Uyghur translation was made has yet to be determined. It is generally assumed that it must have been a Sanskrit text.110 In a colophon, the initiator Kamala Ačari, also known as Kamala Anantaširi (fl. 14th c.), mentions that he commissioned the printing of 108 copies of the text.111 The colophon expressly states that longevity of the Mongol imperial family is one of the intended goals of printing the text. There is one additional colophon of a block-printed text called the Sitātapatrāsūtra, which states that a Sanskrit and an Old Uyghur version of this text were printed in an edition of 10,000 copies.112 The colophon also mentions the Mongol emperor. Since the Mongol emperors venerated Sitātapatrā as a powerful divinity in military conflicts,113 imperial patronage and distribution of this important text was probably encouraged with respect to the Uyghurs. Mythologically, Sitātapatrā is said to have originated from the Buddha’s Uṣṇīṣa.114 Another text held in high esteem among the Uyghurs during the Yuan Dynasty was the Uṣṇīṣavijayādhāraṇī.115 It also exists only in block-printed editions,116 which are quite similar to those of the Sitātapatrādhāraṇī.117 Here, glosses in Brāhmī script are likewise found. In all likelihood, it is significant that glosses in Brāhmī script are—in most cases, though not exclusively—found with texts that have a ritualistic character. Also the majority of the block-printed fragments were found during the third Turfan expedition in Murtuk. Where the Turfan expedition code of folios or fragments of the Uṣṇīṣavijayādhāraṇī points to another site such as Dakianusšahri (= Kočo) or, specifically, ruin µ in Kočo this often coincides with the information that can be gleaned from the fragments belonging to the Sitātapatrādhāraṇī. Both texts were found at the same sites, obviously. Additionally, there is a handwritten fragment from Toyok (U 2378a) that contains an Old Uyghur explanation of the (inflected) Sanskrit terms in the Uṣṇīṣavijayādhāraṇī on its verso.118
One should also mention a translation made by Puṇyaśrī (fl. 14th c.) around the year 1330 from the Tibetan version of the Śrīcakrasaṃvaramaṇḍalābhisamaya.119 This is clearly one of the most important ritual texts in Old Uyghur of tantric content. Another translation made from Tibetan during the Yuan Dynasty is a nearly complete booklet with square leaves, which contains Sakya Paṇḍita’s (1182–1251, Tib. Sa skya paNDi ta Kun dga’ rgyal mtshan) Lam zab ma bla ma’i rnal ’byor [The Profound Path of Guru Yoga].120 Further texts of mature Tantric Buddhism are the following: a Vajrapāṇisādhana,121 a fragmentary description of Ratnasambhava122 as well as part of a description of the five tathāgatas of which only sections on Ratnasambhava and Amoghasiddhi are preserved,123 two fragmentary maṇḍala descriptions one of which relating to Amoghasiddhi and his consort,124 a ritual instruction for a offering cake (Tib. gtor ma) ritual to Heruka,125 a visualisation of Cakrasaṃvara,126 two fragments of a yet unknown visualisation text including a dhāraṇī of a boar-headed Tejomahākāla,127 a fragment of a visualisation of several buddhas located on the body parts of the practitioner,128 a colophon to an unidentified text,129 a fragment of a praise of Vajrasattva130 as well as two fragments of block-prints of the Vajrasattva mantra,131 a Mañjuśrīsādhana that was translated from Tibetan (’Phags pa ’Jam dpal gyi sgrub pa’i thabs) by Saṃghaśrī (fl. 14th c.) around the year 1300,132 a fragmentary double leaf of Vajravidāraṇānāmasādhana, presumably translated from Tibetan,133 a ritual manual mentioning several gurus with Tibetan names,134 and a text relating to Tibetan Buddhism of unknown content.135 A composite ritual manual of four texts related to the Cakrasaṃvara cycle of Nāropa’s (1016–1100) teachings, which dates to around the year 1350 and begins with a text that is similar to the so-called Book of the Dead (Tib. Bar do thos grol),136 was discovered in Dunhuang.137 The three other mature Tantric Buddhist texts of this book are an instruction based on Nāropa’s teachings138 by Mahāguru Dharmadhvaja (1108–1176, Tib. Chos kyi rgyal mtshan) from Amdo, a text on the six dhyānas of Caṇḍālī, and a sacrifice text for Cakrasaṃvara. This collection of four texts assembled in one book is a fascinating example of the late phase of Uyghur Buddhism and its complex relationship to Tibetan culture and yogic instruction in this region. We now know that in Gansu (
One of the most popular texts of mature Tantric Buddhism was certainly the Mañjuśrīnāmasaṃgīti.140 There is not only the block-printed Old Uyghur translation but also a block-printed version of the Sanskrit version in Uyghur characters with accompanying interlinear Brāhmī text (fig. 13.1). A single manuscript sheet featuring the mantravinyāsa [The Arrangement of the Mantra] in Sanskrit in Uyghur script is a recent discovery.141
Block print of the Sanskrit text of the Mañjuśrīnāmasaṃgīti in Uyghur characters with interlinear Brāhmī text
U 4705A and U 4704C Depositum der Berlin-Brandenburgischen Akademie der Wissenschaften in der Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin—Preussischer Kulturbesitz Orientabteilung
Zieme is preparing an edition of fragments related to the Guhyasamājatantra.142 The scroll of a text known in Old Uyghur studies as bahšı ögdisi [Praise of the Teacher] in the Turfan Collection in Berlin (U 5678) is believed to be related to Tibetan Buddhism.143 It mentions the Buddha Vairocana in one line (l.9). As mentioned above, the Amṛtadundubhisvaradhāraṇī, which is related to the worship of Amitābha, is known from only three fragments.144 The Mārīcīdhāraṇī145 is a text that was most likely based on a Tibetan version and translated in the Mongolian period.146 Because she was associated with warfare,147 Mārīcī was perhaps attractive as a goddess to support the Mongol Empire and their vassals. In the dhāraṇī she is invoked to protect against enemies and dangerous wild beasts. Text A, which is edited in Türkische Turfantexte V, is still enigmatic. It contains several ritual instructions including visualisations, a dhāraṇī, and several mudrās.148 The manuscript contains some archaic spellings, which point to a rather early translation probably made from a Chinese original, if a loan word such as hwašin from the Chinese hua shen (
2.6 Amulets and Talismans
The use of amulets and talismans is widespread in Esoteric Buddhism.149 The first amulet made known to the public is dedicated to Avalokiteśvara and was published by Wilhelm Radloff in 1911.150 In the same year, Müller—who referred to Radloff’s publication in his supplement to Uigurica II—added further examples, such as an amulet for easy childbirth and one for removing a headache.151 In 1937, Gabdul R. Rachmati published several other specimens—one for a person ill with fever, one to avert evil spirits, and one to avoid delivering a female child, among others.152 Zieme published them again in 2005.153 An apotropaic work with the still-enigmatic title Garbaparimančanisūtra is preserved in printed and handwritten form.154 The text, which includes a dhāraṇī and is unusually replete with metaphors, even for Old Uyghur standards, says that the apsarases Śaśī, Urvaśī, and Tilottamā continuously recite the sūtra.155 The Buddha entrusts Ānanda with the task of helping a doe, heavy with young, in the throes of birth. Another apotropaic text which Radloff edited could be supplemented with further pieces by Zieme, who identified it as dedicated to the group of the Seven Guanyins, that is Avalokiteśvaras, and related to Amoghavajra’s (705–774, Chin. Bukong
2.7 Astrological and Astronomical Works
Uyghur astrology relies heavily on Chinese paradigms.157 A small number of fragments that definitely are from the pre-Mongolian period testify to the cult of Tejaḥprabha Buddha among the Uyghurs. They correspond to the Foshuo daweide jinlun foding Chishengguang rulai xiaochu yiqie zainan tuoluoni jing
Old Uyghur Block Print of The Yetikän Sudur
U 496_01, Depositum der Berlin-Brandenburgischen Akademie der Wissenschaften in der Staatsbibliothek zu berlin—Preussischer Kulturbesitz Orientabteilung
The Modingqie jing
In case of the Grahamātṛkadhāraṇī, the Old Uyghur fragments show corresponding parts to the Zhuxingmu tuoluoni jing
Literature of astrological content must have been substantial at some point among the Uyghurs. The introductory part of a treatise housed in the Beijing National Library on the portents of meteors, depending on their outward appearance, was recently identified.171 So far, the text as a whole has no matching Chinese parallel, although the editor identifies similar descriptions in Chinese astrological or divinatory texts. Matsui identified fragments of almanac divination texts related to the Yuxiaji
In the late phase of Uyghur Buddhism, other astrological and hemerological works (fig. 13.3) flooded the scene, as did amulets devised for protection against various influences (illness, evil spirits, groundless accusations, death of livestock etc.) and for application in different aspects of life (childbirth, combat, and so on).173 A new evaluation of these texts that takes the progress in Dunhuang studies into account is a desideratum.
Old Uyghur astrological text
U 494 Recto, Depositum der Berlin-Brandenburgischen Akademie der Wissenschaften in der Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin—Preussischer Kulturbesitz Orientabteilung
2.8 Spells and Incantations
The Āṭānāṭikasūtra and Āṭānāṭikahṛdaya were first known from Sanskrit-Old Uyghur bilingual texts,174 but later, monolingual Old Uyghur versions of both texts were also discovered.175 Two leaves (U 3831, U 3832) of a Āṭānāṭikasūtra manuscript in gold letters on indigo paper are remarkable because the text is presented in a particularly prestigious way (fig. 13.4). The translation of the Āṭānāṭikasūtra was, in all likelihood, made from a Sanskrit text (version from Xinjiang).176
Old Uyghur leaf of the Āṭānāṭikasūtra
U 3831 Recto, Depositum der Berlin-Brandenburgischen Akademie der Wissenschaften in der Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin—Preussischer Kulturbesitz Orientabteilung
Three different versions of a snake charm entitled Maitrīsūtra that is related to the Upasenasūtra were identified:177 first, a complete scroll containing a transliteration of the Sanskrit text in Uyghur script; second, one leaf of a small booklet with a Sanskrit-Old Uyghur bilingual text; and third, a pustaka manuscript in Old Uyghur. Only the first and the second text are independent works,178 while the third is embedded in a manuscript that is a composite text with a basic narrative structure and formulaic parts.179 As the title indicates and as is explicitly stated at the beginning of the third text, an important practical aspect of the snake charm is the perfecting of maitrī.
The practice of rainmaking with a special kind of stone is widespread in Inner Asia. There are a few fragments in Old Uyghur that mention this stone.180 One of these fragments (U 3004) mentions a maṇḍala on the verso.181 Interestingly, the word mantal (Skt. maṇḍala) is used together with the verb ba- ‘to bind’, which here means ‘to construct’ or ‘to make use of in the context of a magical ritual’.182
An unidentified manuscript contains a quote from a ritual text along with two contracts and scribbles. In lines 13–15, the quote mentions that the practitioner should make a water maṇḍala in order to cause rain to fall.183
There are further fragments of spell-related literature. The Uyghurs knew the Pañcarakṣā quite well, as one can infer from extant mantras in Uyghur script. There are also fragments pertaining to individual works of the Pañcarakṣā collection.184 And there is an archaic text that the editors interpreted as containing rhymed sayings,185 but which I prefer to treat as an incantation. In line 10, the word savıš ‘jinx, incantation, spell’ appears in the phrase ačgu savıš ‘revealing spell’.186 However, the overall impression is that the incantation is not Buddhist in content. In the last three lines, the speaker announces that he wants to collect taš of certain animals, which the editors take to mean ‘testicles.’187 But the literal meaning of the word is ‘stone’, and because all the animals mentioned are ruminants (sheep, bovines, goats, and stags), I take it to mean ‘bezoar’ (a concretion in the stomach or intestines of some animals).
2.9 Consecration Rituals
The stake inscriptions are a highly important group of local Buddhist sources, four of which are in Old Uyghur (nos. I, III, IV, and V) and one in Chinese (no. II).188 These stakes made of wood are clearly connected to consecration rituals of Buddhist buildings. In the inscribed texts of stake inscriptions I and III, members of the Uyghur nobility appear as a group of faithful Buddhists. It is possible that there is a connection between these wooden stakes—either driving them into the earth or placing them into walls—and the use of khadirakīlakas (pegs made of khadira wood) in Buddhist rituals of India and elsewhere. It is possible that the mention of a harpist (OU kuŋhaučı) in an enumeration of persons from different walks of life in stake inscription I indicates that the consecration ritual itself was accompanied by music.189
3 Concluding Remarks
The appropriation of ritualistic literature took a long time in Uyghur Buddhism and served various purposes, from individual needs to imperial demands. The history of this process still has to be reconstructed on the basis of the extant sources. Such an endeavour would also have to take local varieties of Buddhism into account. The secular documents provide interesting materials, such as naming the four mahārāja kings and the seven sisters as witnesses in contracts.190 What seems to be certain now is that Dunhuang was a source of new text-related ritual systems, such as the one exemplified in the Shiwang jing
A further line of enquiry is ascertaining the ritual implications of why various works serving ritual purposes were combined in one manuscript.199 To give one example, the last part of the confession text Kšanti kılmak nom bitig [The Book Called Making a Confession] mentioned above is extant in fragmentary form in one specific piece of a scroll from the Turfan Collection in Berlin (U 5033).200 The first part of the fragment refers apparently to the misdeeds of other people. It is followed by a colophon which remarks that two lay persons commissioned the copy of one scroll each of the Yamarājasūtra (OU y(a)mlaŋwaŋ-ke, Chin. Yanluowang jing
I would like to express my thanks to Jens-Uwe Hartmann (Munich) for his response to my paper during the BuddhistRoad Mid-project Conference in Bochum.
Some important aspects of practice and ritual have been addressed before. The practice of giving, merit making, and merit transfer is a central concept within Uyghur Buddhism that remains an important issue from the early phase of Uyghur Buddhism until the late period (14th c.). Merit transfer was a ritual means to strengthen the power of certain protective deities who would thus be equipped with further strength in order to protect the country of the Uyghurs. On merit transfer, especially in a group of unrelated Old Uyghur colophons, see Peter Zieme, “The West Uigur Kingdom: Views from Inside,” Horizons 5.1 (2014): 6, 10–11. Pilgrimage is another issue that has become an important object of study. For an overview of pilgrimage, see Tibor Porció, “Some Peculiarities of the Uygur Buddhist Pilgrim Inscriptions,” in Searching for the Dharma, Finding Salvation: Buddhist Pilgrimage in Time and Space, ed. Christoph Cueppers and Max Deeg (Lumbini: Lumbini International Research Institute, 2014), 157–178. Very important new materials from the Dunhuang region, i.e. the Yulin Caves (Chin. Yulin ku
See Max Deeg, Das Gaoseng-Faxian-Zhuan als religionsgeschichtliche Quelle: Der älteste Bericht eines chinesischen buddhistischen Pilgermönchs über seine Reise nach Indien mit Übersetzung des Textes (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2005), 511–516; and Giuliana Martini, “Bodhisattva Texts, Ideologies and Rituals in Khotan in the Fifth and Sixth Centuries,” in Multilingualism and the History of Knowledge, Vol. I: Buddhism Among the Iranian Peoples of Central Asia, ed. Matteo de Chiara, Mauro Maggi, and Giuliana Martini (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2013), 13–69.
As to processions and rituals, some chapters of the Old Uyghur translation of the biography of Xuanzang (600/602–664,
See Johan Elverskog, Uygur Buddhist Literature (Turnhout: Brepols, 1997).
See the analysis of orthographic features of this particular scroll in Jens Peter Laut, Der frühe türkische Buddhismus und seine literarischen Denkmäler (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1986), 78–88. A complete facsimile is provided in volume two of James Hamilton, Manuscrits ouïgours du ixe–xe siècle de Touen-Houang (Paris: Peeters, 1986), 331–350. For a comprehensive edition of various manuscripts and a translation of this important text, which is extant in different recensions, see BT XXXIII. It gives a list of manuscripts and prints in other languages. Ibid., 284–286.
This assumption would only be valid if it could be ascertained that the London scroll of the Säkiz Yügmäk Sudur was actually produced in the Dunhuang region.
BT XXXVII, vol. 1, 68.
Geng Shimin, Hans-Joachim Klimkeit, and Jens Peter Laut, “‘Die Weltflucht des Bodhisattva’: Das 13. Kapitel der Hami-Handschrift der Maitrisimit,” Altorientalische Forschungen 18 (1991): 283.
See especially Geng Shimin and Hans-Joachim Klimkeit, Das Zusammentreffen mit Maitreya: Die ersten fünf Kapitel der Hami-Version der Maitrisimit, vol. 1 (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1988), 7.
Jens Wilkens, “Der ‘Neutag’ und die Maitrisimit—Probleme der zentralasiatischen Religionsgeschichte,” in Die Erforschung des Tocharischen und die alttürkische Maitrisimit: Symposium anlässlich des 100. Jahrestages der Entzifferung des Tocharischen Berlin, 3. und 4. April 2008, ed. Yukiyo Kasai, Abdurishid Yakup, and Desmond Durkin-Meisterernst (Turnhout: Brepols, 2013), 375–401.
Wilkens, “Der ‘Neutag’ und die Maitrisimit,” 375–401.
Georges-Jean Pinault, “The Tocharian Background of Old Turkic yaŋı kün,” in Kutadgu Nom Bitig: Festschrift für Jens Peter Laut zum 60. Geburtstag, ed. Elisabetta Ragagnin and Jens Wilkens with the assistance of Gökhan Şilfeler (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2015), 399.
Geng and Klimkeit, Das Zusammentreffen mit Maitreya, vol. 1, 7.
See especially Max Deeg, “Origins and Developments of the Buddhist Pañcavārṣika—Part I: India and Central Asia,” Nagoya Studies in Indian Culture and Buddhism: Saṃbhāṣā 16 (1995): 67–90.
BT IX, vol. 1, 215.
BT XXXVII, vol. 2, 522 (line 05691).
As Deeg observes, in the legend of Aśoka (r. ca. 268–232 BCE) and especially in the Avadānaśataka (T. 200.4), the term pañcavārṣika “[…] lost its connection to the historical facts and was only understood as an event of donations to the saṅgha by a donator—not even necessarily a king.” Deeg, “Origins and Developments,” 74. This observation is true for other specimens of avadāna literature, where the term is used without any reference to Aśoka or the legend pertaining to him.
Dieter Maue and Klaus Röhrborn, “Ein zweisprachiges Fragment aus Turfan,” Central Asiatic Journal 20 (1976): 213 (line recto 5).
Aydar Mirkamal
On Chinese phonetic transcriptions of the Sanskrit term, see Deeg, “Origins and Developments,” 68.
In the fifth chapter, the festival is mentioned in connection with King Śīlāditya (= Harṣa). See Siglinde Dietz, Mehmet Ölmez, and Klaus Röhrborn, Die alttürkische Xuanzang- Biographie V, nach der Handschrift von Paris und St. Petersburg sowie nach dem Transkript von Annemarie v. Gabain ediert, übersetzt und kommentiert (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2015), 126 (line 1012). In chapter four, the term is likewise used with reference to King Śīlāditya. See John Peter Claver Toalster, “Die uigurische Xuan-Zang-Biographie: 4. Kapitel mit Übersetzung und Kommentar” (PhD diss., University of Gießen, 1977), 90 (line 854).
Masahiro Shōgaito, “Drei zum Avalokiteśvara-sūtra passende Avadānas,” in Der türkische Buddhismus in der japanischen Forschung, ed. Jens Peter Laut and Klaus Röhrborn (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1988), 90 and 98, lines 234–235, 333: taičuŋlug tapıgın tapınıp udunup “regaling and feasting with a pañcavārṣika regalement.”
Chen Jinhua, “Pañcavārṣika Assemblies in Liang Wudi’s Buddhist Palace Chapel,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 66.1 (2006): 45.
See Jin-Il Chung, Die Pravāraṇā in den kanonischen Vinaya-Texten der Mūlasarvāstivādin und der Sarvāstivādin (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1998).
See the study by Peter Zieme, “Das Pravāraṇā-Sūtra in alttürkischer Überlieferung,” in Barg-i sabz—A Green Leaf: Papers in Honour of Jes P. Asmussen, ed. Jacques Duchesne- Guillemin, Fereydun Vahman, and Werner Sundermann (Leiden: Brill, 1988), 445–453.
The edition and translation are in BT III.
Zieme, “Das Pravāraṇā-Sūtra,” 446.
These manuscripts are dealt with in Zieme, “Das Pravāraṇā-Sūtra”. See also the enlarged edition in BT XXXVIII, 89–109.
Simone-Christiane Raschmann and Osman Fikri Sertkaya, Alttürkische Handschriften Teil 20: Alttürkische Texte aus der Berliner Turfansammlung im Nachlass Reşid Rahmeti Arat (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner, 2016), 101–102 (cat. no. 063).
Jens Wilkens, “Buddhist Monastic Life in Central Asia—A Bilingual Text in Sanskrit and Old Uyghur Relating to the Pravāraṇā Ceremony,” International Journal of Old Uyghur Studies 2.2 (2020): 137–152.
BT VII, 66 (lines 105–108) = BT XXVI, 209 (No. 111b line 1); BT XIII, 124 (lines 46–48) = BT XXVI, 56 (line 1); BT XIII, 164 (lines 2–3) = BT XXVI, 240 (line 1); BT XXIII, 148 (lines G324–325) = BT XXVI, 132 (lines 4–5); BT XIII, 161 (lines 1–3) = BT XXIII, 148 (line G337) = BT XXVI, 133 (line 1). Peter Zieme, “Donor and Colophon of an Uighur Blockprint,” Silk Road Art and Archaeology 4 (1995/96): 412 (section C); reedited in BT XXVI, 245 (lines 7–8).
For the Yulin Caves, see Matsui, “Tonkō sekkutsu uigurugo mongorugo,” 88, 89, 102.
BT XXVI, 136 (lines 2–4). This statement made by Nomkulı Šabi K(ı)ya refers apparently to a revision of the translation in which he was involved.
Edited in BT XIII, 163–170 (text 46). Reedited in BT XXVI, 239–243 as text 129.
I argue this in Jens Wilkens, “Hatten die alten Uiguren einen buddhistischen Kanon?” in Kanonisierung und Kanonbildung in der asiatischen Religionsgeschichte, ed. Max Deeg, Oliver Freiberger, and Christoph Kleine (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2011), 366.
Stephen F. Teiser, The Ghost Festival in Medieval China (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996).
Annemarie von Gabain, Das uigurische Königreich von Chotscho 850–1250 (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 1961), 73–74.
Jens Wilkens, “Performanz vs. Perspektive: Narratologische Anmerkungen zu einer altuigurischen Erzählungssammlung,” Türk Dilleri Araştırmaları. Researches in Turkic Languages 24.2 (2019): 281–304.
On this literary genre, see Zieme, “The West Uigur Kingdom,” 11–12.
This text is edited and translated in Abdurishid Yakup, Dišastvustik: Eine altuigurische Bearbeitung einer Legende aus dem Catuṣpariṣat-sūtra (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2006). Parallel passages in Sanskrit and Chinese texts are listed on pp. 10–28. See also the survey of the different versions of this legend in Mark Allon, “A Gāndhārī Version of the Story of the Merchants Tappusa and Bhallika,” Bulletin of the Asia Institute New Series 23 (2009): 9–19, here: 10–11.
For the first text, see the first edition in Peter Zieme, “Zur Verwendung der Brāhmī-Schrift bei den Uiguren,” Altorientalische Forschungen 11.2 (1984): 331–346. It is reedited with additional fragments in BT XXXVIII, 192–203. For the second text, see Peter Zieme, “Mängi bulzun! Ein weiterer Neujahrssegen,” in Dr. Emel Esin’e Armağan, ed. Şükrü Elçin (Ankara: Ankara Üniversitesi Basımevi, 1976), 131–139. This fragment is combined with a prayer for forgiveness. In its final part, the prayer evokes images from nature to strengthen the efficacy of the liturgy.
For editions and translations of the two texts, see Peter Zieme, “Ein uigurischer Erntesegen,” Altorientalische Forschungen 3 (1975): 109–143 (pls. 19–20); and Ádám Molnár and Peter Zieme, “Ein weiterer uigurischer Erntesegen,” Altorientalische Forschungen 16.1 (1989): 140–152 (pl. I).
Zieme, Peter, “Ein fast vollständiger altuigurischer Opfer-Segen,” February 2015, accessed January 29, 2020. https://www.academia.edu/11093961/Ein_fast_vollständiger_altuigurischer_Opfersegen.
Zieme, “Ein uigurischer Erntesegen,” 118.
Ibid., 118.
For a recent edition of a very elaborate ritual manual on agriculture, see Gergely Hidas, A Buddhist Ritual Manual on Agriculture: Vajratuṇḍasamayakalparāja—Critical Edition (Berlin, Munich, Boston: de Gruyter, 2019).
Zieme, “Ein uigurischer Erntesegen,” 119.
Raschmann and Sertkaya, Alttürkische Handschriften Teil 20, 232–233 (cat. no. 250).
See especially Claudia Weber, Buddhistische Beichten in Indien und bei den Uiguren unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der uigurischen Laienbeichte und ihrer Beziehung zum Manichäismus (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1999).
Willi Bang and Annemarie von Gabain, “Türkische Turfan-Texte IV. Ein neues uigurisches Sündenbekenntnis,” Sitzungsberichte der Preußischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philosophisch-historische Klasse 24 (1930): 444 (text B, lines 67–68). The title of this work in the scroll Masahiro Shōgaito edited is tsui ayıg kılınčlarıg ökünüp bošunup kšanti kılmak [Making a Confession by Regretting the Misdeeds and Asking for Forgiveness]. Masahiro Shōgaito, “Ein uigurisches Fragment eines Beichttextes,” in Scholia: Beiträge zur Turkologie und Zentralasienkunde Annemarie von Gabain zum 80. Geburtstag am 4. Juli 1981 dargebracht von Kollegen, Freunden und Schülern, ed. Klaus Röhrborn and Horst Wilfrid Brands (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1981), 163–169. The colophon was reedited in BT XXVI, 227–228.
See, e.g., the copy edited in Peter Zieme, “Ein uigurisches Sündenbekenntnis,” Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae 22.1 (1969): 107–121.
Müller’s edition (see the next footnote) comprises several texts. Nos. 7 and 8 are both confession texts of lay female Buddhists in the form of scrolls. The first one was commissioned and used for her own spiritual benefit by a certain Üdrät, the second by a woman named Kutlug.
The edition and translation are in Friedrich Wilhelm Karl Müller, Uigurica II (Berlin: Verlag der Königlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1911), 76–81. The colophon was reedited in BT XXVI, 224. The scroll that was reported to be lost in World War II was rediscovered. Nikolai Pchelin and Simone-Christiane Raschmann, “Turfan Manuscripts in the State Hermitage,” Written Monuments of the Orient 2.2 (2016): 11–12.
In the scroll edited in Shōgaito, the goal is for the relatives to whom merit is transferred to achieve rebirth in Tuṣita heaven. Shōgaito, “Ein uigurisches Fragment eines Beichttextes”.
The edition and translation are in Müller, Uigurica II, 84–89. The colophon was reedited in BT XXVI, 247.
The correct reading is in BT XXVI, 247.
For a slightly outdated edition and translation of the Old Uyghur version of this section, see Willi Bang and Annemarie von Gabain, “Uigurische Studien,” Ungarische Jahrbücher 10 (1930): 194–207.
The standard edition and translation are found in BT XIII, 86–103, which supersedes Bang and von Gabain “Uigurische Studien,” 208–210. Zieme was the first scholar who correctly identified the text as a versification of the fifth chapter of the Suvarṇaprabhāsasūtra.
Simone-Christiane Raschmann, “What Do We Know About the Use of Manuscripts among the Old Uighurs in the Turfan Region?,” Eurasian Studies 12 (2014): 526.
Johannes Nobel, Suvarṇaprabhāsottama-Sūtra: Das Goldglanz-Sūtra, ein Sanskrit-Text des Mahāyāna-Buddhismus; I-Tsing’s chinesische Version und ihre tibetische Übersetzung. Erster Band: I-Tsing’s chinesische Version übersetzt, eingeleitet, erläutert und mit einem photomechanischen Nachdruck des chinesischen Textes versehen (Leiden: Brill, 1958), xx. Nobel even surmises that, originally, the text did not contain dhāraṇīs at all.
Except for the narrative of the hungry tigress, the chapters with marked ritual content are represented most often in the Chinese fragments from Dunhuang of Yijing’s (635–713,
Edition and translation are in BT XVIII, 112–119.
Edition and translation are in BT XXV.
BT II, 7. The German title “Totenmesse”, too, was deliberately chosen to strengthen this characterisation of the text. The designation is a bit misleading because it evokes Christian motifs. This edition comprises fragments of the eighth and ninth scrolls.
Charles Orzech recently highlighted the concept of liturgical ‘subjects’. He writes, “[…] [i]n this view, ‘subjects’ are socially produced in ritual and discourse. The subject then can be understood as an institutional construct, typical, rather than unique and fully autonomous—a subject produced socially for institutional ends. Thus, liturgy, performed in congregation, produces a liturgical subject that is primarily constructed in a social performance.” See Charles D. Orzech, “Tantric Subjects: Liturgy and Vision in Chinese Esoteric Ritual Manuals,” in Chinese and Tibetan Esoteric Buddhism, ed. Yael Bentor and Meir Shahar (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2017), 21. He continues, “[…] we can see in such confessional liturgies a communal process through which the worshipper is created as a criminal subject in need of purification.” Ibid., 23.
Peter Zieme, “Araṇemi-Jātaka und ein Sündenbekenntnistext in einer alttürkischen Sammelhandschrift,” in De Dunhuang à Istanbul: Hommage à James Russell Hamilton, ed. Louis Bazin and Peter Zieme (Turnhout: Brepols, 2001), 401–433 (pl. 36–53). Identification on p. 321 of the reprint.
The poem is edited and translated into Modern Turkish in Reşid Rahmeti Arat, Eski türk şiiri [Old Turkic Poetry] (Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu Basımevi, 1965), 80–101.
See the analysis in Peter Zieme, Die Stabreimtexte der Uiguren von Turfan und Dunhuang: Studien zur alttürkischen Dichtung (Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 1991), 219–228.
Edited in Jens-Uwe Hartmann, Klaus Wille, and Peter Zieme “Indrasenas Beichte,” Berliner Indologische Studien 9–10 (1996): 203–216.
Hartmann, Wille, and Zieme “Indrasenas Beichte,” 206–208.
Ibid., 212.
For a recent anthology on Pure Land Buddhism, see Georgios T. Halkias and Richard K. Payne, ed. Pure Lands in Asian Texts and Contexts: An Anthology (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2019).
Nobuyoshi Yamabe, “Practice of Visualization and the Visualization Sūtra: An Examination of Mural Paintings at Toyok, Turfan,” Pacific World: Journal of the Institute of Buddhist Studies 4 (2002): 123–152.
There is also a well preserved Old Uyghur poetic adaptation edited in Kudara Kōgi
On this literature, see Peter Zieme, “Local Literatures: Uighur,” in Brill’s Encyclopedia of Buddhism. Vol. 1: Literature and Languages, ed. Jonathan A. Silk, et al. (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2015), 875b–876a.
For an edition and translation, see BT XXXVI, 41–121 (text A).
Edition and translation in BT XXXVI, 75–136 (text B).
BT XXXVI, 125.
Zhang Tieshan and Peter Zieme, “Two Old Uigur Fragments from Dunhuang Connected with the Pure Land Belief,” Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae 71.3 (2018): 253–256.
Edited in BT XIII, 64 (text 7).
On Avalokiteśvara in Esoteric and Tantric Buddhism, see George A. Keyworth, “Avalokiteśvara,” in Esoteric Buddhism and the Tantras in East Asia, ed. Charles D. Orzech, Henrik H. Sørensen, and Richard K. Payne (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2011), 525–528. For the cult of this particular bodhisattva in Uyghur Buddhism, see also Yukiyo Kasai’s paper in this volume.
A nearly complete scroll of the Saddharmapuṇḍarīkasūtra is edited and translated in Wilhelm Radloff, Kuan-ši-im Pusar: Eine türkische Übersetzung des XXV. Kapitels der chinesischen Ausgabe des Saddharmapuṇḍarīka (St. Petersburg: Imprimerie de l’Académie Impériale des Sciences, 1911). See also the edition and translation of a Saddharmapuṇḍarīkasūtra scroll formerly housed in Berlin published the same year in Müller, Uigurica II, 14–20. This piece was rediscovered in the St. Petersburg Collection. Pchelin and Raschmann, “Turfan Manuscripts in the State Hermitage,” 21–23. Fragments from other manuscripts are found in various collections.
The edition and translation in BT XIII, 121–130 replaces Georg Hazai, “Ein buddhistisches Gedicht aus der Berliner Turfan-Sammlung,” Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae 23.1 (1970): 1–21.
Keyworth, “Avalokiteśvara,” 526.
While the edition is still to be expected, it remains unclear whether the Old Uyghur version is based on T. 1057, T. 1060, or both texts.
Zieme, “Local Literatures: Uighur,” 876b. For a re-edition of two preserved colophons, see BT XXVI, 125–129.
The identification of a fragment in Brāhmī script that belongs to this text in Zieme, “Local Literatures: Uighur,” 872b, is highly important. See the catalogue entry (no. 43) in Dieter Maue, Alttürkische Handschriften Teil 1: Dokumente in Brāhmī und tibetischer Schrift (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner, 1996), 174. The text is edited in Annemarie von Gabain, Türkische Turfan-Texte VIII: Texte in Brāhmīschrift (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 1954), 61–62. For an in-depth study of the Chinese original, see Maria Dorothea Reis-Habito, Die Dhāraṇī des Großen Erbarmens des Bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara mit tausend Händen und Augen: Übersetzung und Untersuchung ihrer textlichen Grundlage sowie Erforschung ihres Kultes in China (Nettetal: Steyler, 1993).
An edition and translation of two leaves of one manuscript are in Klaus Röhrborn, “Fragmente der uigurischen Version des ‘Dhāraṇī-Sūtras der großen Barmherzigkeit’,” Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft 126 (1976): 87–100. Raschmann and Sertkaya describe one partly preserved scroll that bears on the recto what is probably a short dhāraṇī of the Thousand-armed and Thousand-eyed Avalokiteśvara. See Raschmann and Sertkaya, Alttürkische Handschriften Teil 20, 168–169 (cat. no. 147).
The edition and Japanese translation of the St. Petersburg fragments are in Shōgaito Masahiro
Zieme, “Local Literatures: Uighur,” 876b. One leaf was already identified and published by Shōgaito, Roshia shozō uigurugo bunken no kenkyū, 196–199.
See the edition and translation in Georg Kara and Peter Zieme, “Die uigurische Übersetzung des apokryphen Sūtras ‘Fo ding xin da tuo luo ni’,” Altorientalische Forschungen 13.2 (1986): 318–376. A fragment of a block-printed folded book that was preserved only as a transcript when the edition was made was rediscovered in the St. Petersburg collection. Kara and Zieme, “Die uigurische Übersetzung,” 320, 329–330. See also Pchelin and Raschmann, “Turfan Manuscripts in the State Hermitage,” 16–18 (with some improved readings in fn. 20). For a lost fragment from the Arat Estate, which is nearly fully transcribed, see Raschmann and Sertkaya, Alttürkische Handschriften Teil 20, 282–284 (cat. no. 339). Newly identified fragments from the Northern Section of the Mogao Caves (Chin. Mogao ku beiqu
Herbert Franke, “Zu einem apokryphen Dhāraṇī-Sūtra aus China,” Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft 134 (1984): 318–336.
Li Ling and Ma De, “Avalokiteśvara and the Dunhuang Dhāraṇī Spells,” in Chinese and Tibetan Esoteric Buddhism, ed. Yael Bentor and Meir Shahar (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2017), 343–348. The authors discuss two further texts extolling Avalokiteśvara’s role as a helper with childbirth, namely the Jiuchannan tuoluoni
Li and Ma, “Avalokiteśvara and the Dunhuang Dhāraṇī Spells,” 345.
The first edition and translation are in Georg Hazai, “Ein uigurisches Kolophon zu einem Avalokiteśvara-Lobpreis,” in Tractata Altaica: Denis Sinor sexagenario optime de rebus altaicis merito dedicata, ed. Walther Heissig, et al. (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1976), 273–276. A new edition is provided in BT XXVI, 229–231.
See BT VII, 63–67 (text B = block-prints) and 67–68 (text C = manuscript).
Peter Zieme, “Bemerkungen zur Datierung uigurischer Blockdrucke,” Journal Asiatique 269 (1981): 397–398. For the colophons, see also BT XXVI, 208–210.
Chhaya Bhattacharya-Haesner, Central Asian Temple Banners in the Turfan Collection of the Museum für Indische Kunst, Berlin: Painted Textiles from the Northern Silk Route (Berlin: Dietrich Reimer, 2003), 174–231.
Ibid., 59 (colour plate).
Ibid., 203–205 (cat. no. 203–205). During the BuddhistRoad Mid-project Conference in Bochum, several participants mentioned a wooden panel covered all over with depictions of eyes that was found in 2010 in the vicinity of Domoko (Chin. Damagou
See the edition and translation in Takao Moriyasu in collaboration with Peter Zieme, “Uighur Inscriptions on the Banners from Turfan Housed in the Museum für Indische Kunst, Berlin,” Appendix to: Chhaya Bhattacharya-Haesner, Central Asian Temple Banners in the Turfan Collection of the Museum für Indische Kunst, Berlin: Painted Textiles from the Northern Silk Route (Berlin: Dietrich Reimer, 2003), 466b–466c.
Olaf Czaja, “The Eye-Healing Avalokiteśvara: A National Icon of Mongolia and its Origin in Tibetan Medicine,” in Tibetan and Himalayan Healing: An Anthology for Anthony Aris, ed. Charles Ramble and Ulrike Roesler (Kathmandu: Vajra, 2015), 125–139.
Moriyasu and Zieme, “Uighur Inscriptions,” 463a (line 10).
Geng Shimin, “Qädimqi uyġurčä buddhistik äsär ‘Ārya-trāta-buddha-mātrika-vimsati- pūjā-stotra-sūtra’din fragmentlar [Fragments from the Old Uyghur Buddhist Work ‘Ārya- trāta-buddha-mātrika-vimsati-pūjā-stotra-sūtra’],” Journal of Turkish Studies 3 (1979): 295–306. Peter Zieme, “Zum uigurischen Tārā-Ekaviṃśatistotra,” Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae 36.1–3 (1982): 583–597 (reprinted in FBU 474–488 with additions and corrections on 489–490, including newly identified fragments). One of the new fragments is part of the Chinese stotra written in Uyghur script. In Zieme’s article, we find corrections to Geng’s publication and the identification of text M in BT VII, 78. Later on, two fragments (U 4145, U 4135) are identified as part of the Sitātapatrādhāraṇī. See Peter Zieme, “Zum mehrsprachigen Blockdruck des Tārā-Ekaviṃśatistotra,” Altorientalische Forschungen 16.1 (1989): 196–197. Cf. also Peter Zieme, “Further Notes on the Uigur Blockprints of the Tārā-Ekaviṃśatistotra,” in Shouju zhongguo shaoshu minzu guji wenxian guoji xueshu yantaohui lunwenji
Henrik H. Sørensen, “Central Divinities,” in Esoteric Buddhism and the Tantras in East Asia, ed. Charles D. Orzech, Henrik H. Sørensen, and Richard K. Payne (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2011), 99–100.
Edition and translation are in BT XXIII, 65–79. On p. 77, Zieme points out that the Cuṇḍīdevīdhāraṇī is also attested in Arat, Eski türk şiiri, 9 (lines 78–81).
The masterly first edition cum translation is Müller, Uigurica II, 50–75 (with parallel Chinese text). Müller already identified the majority of the extant fragments. Subsequent publications are Sergej Malov, “Sitātapatrā-dhāraṇī v ujgurskoj redakcii,” Doklady Akademii Nauk SSSR 1930-B (1927): 88–94 and Albert von Le Coq, “Kurze Einführung in die uigurische Schriftkunde,” Mitteilungen des Seminars für Orientalische Sprachen an der Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität zu Berlin. Westasiatische Studien 11 (1919): 105–107. See also Zieme “Zum uigurischen Tārā-Ekaviṃśatistotra,” 591–592. The standard (re)edition is Klaus Röhrborn and András Róna-Tas, Spätformen des zentralasiatischen Buddhismus: Die altuigurische Sitātapatrā-dhāraṇī, herausgegeben, übersetzt und kommentiert (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, 2005), 237–321. Two further fragments from the Bibliothèque Nationale de France, reported to originate from Cave 181 in Dunhuang, were later edited by Ayşe Kılıç Cengiz, “Bibliothèque Nationale de France’ta muhafaza edilen Sitātapatrādhāraṇī fragmanları üzerine. On the Sitātapatrādhāraṇī Fragments which are Conserved in Bibliothèque Nationale de France,” Hacettepe Üniversitesi Türkiyat Araştırmaları Dergisi 26 (2017): 239–252. For catalogue information on the block-printed fragments in Berlin, some of which are duplicates of the ones in Müller’s first edition, see Abdurishid Yakup and Michael Knüppel, Alttürkische Handschriften Teil 11: Die uigurischen Blockdrucke der Berliner Turfansammlung. Teil 1: Tantrische Texte (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner, 2007), 33–93. Two fragments of folded books from Berlin (ed. Müller, Uigurica II, 57–59), which were considered lost during World War II, were recently rediscovered in the St. Petersburg Collection. See Pchelin and Raschmann, “Turfan Manuscripts in the State Hermitage,” 13–14, 23–24. On the Chinese versions in vol. 19 of the Taishō tripiṭaka, see Rolf W. Giebel, “Taishō Volumes 18–21,” in Esoteric Buddhism and the Tantras in East Asia, ed. Charles D. Orzech, Henrik H. Sørensen, and Richard K. Payne (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2011), 31.
Röhrborn and Róna-Tas, Spätformen, 244–245.
Ibid., 246–247. An important comparative study of the terminology of one particular passage is found in Louis Ligeti, “Le sacrifice offert aux ancêtres dans l’Histoire Secrète,” Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae 27.2 (1973): 155–159.
The colophon is edited and translated into Modern Turkish in Arat, Eski türk şiiri, 233–235. This first edition was later superseded by BT XIII, 170–172.
BT XIII, 172.
Robert E. Buswell Jr. and Donald S. Lopez Jr., The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism (Princeton, Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2014) s.v. Sitātapatrā.
Uṣṇīṣavijayā and Tārā are also connected with this lakṣaṇa.
For the edition and translation, see Müller, Uigurica II, 27–50 (with parallel Chinese text). On the Chinese versions in vol. 19 of the Taishō, see Giebel, “Taishō Volumes 18–21,” 32.
There is one block-printed folded book that contains not only this dhāraṇī but also the Āryāparimitāyurjñānanāmamahāyānasūtra. See BT XXXVI, 46.
Catalogue information, including newly identified parallels to the first edition, is provided in Yakup and Knüppel, Alttürkische Handschriften Teil 11, 151–178. One fragment of a block-printed folded book formerly thought to be lost during World War II was rediscovered. See Pchelin and Raschmann, “Turfan Manuscripts in the State Hermitage,” 10–11.
Uğur Uzunkaya, “A Fragment of Old Uyghur Uṣṇīṣavijayā-nāma-dhāraṇī from the Berlin Turfan Collection,” Erdem 75 (2018): 223–250. See also BT XXIII, 9.
Friedrich Wilhelm Karl Müller, “Ein uigurisch-lamaistisches Zauberritual aus den Turfan-Funden,” Sitzungsberichte der Preußischen Akademie der Wissenschaften (1928): 381–386. An analysis and edition (with German translation) are in BT VII, 5–63 (text A). A parallel is BT VII, 69 (text E).
An Edition, translation, and comparison with the Tibetan original are in BT VIII, 17–79.
Edition and translation are in BT VII, 68–69 (text D).
Edition and translation in BT VII, 70 (text F).
Edition and translation in BT XXXVI, 145–149 (text D).
Edition and translation in BT VII, 70 (text G), 71–72 (text H).
Edition and translation in BT VII, 72 (text I).
Edition and translation in BT VII, 73–74 (text J). As shown in BT XXXVI, 159, this fragment might belong to text A in BT VII, because the fragment U 5689 runs parallel to parts of text A and parts of text J. But there are still some differences in the sequence of sentences. For an edition U 5689 and two further Cakrasaṃvara texts, see BT XXXVI, 159–171 (text F). The very late fragment Beida Fu T1 V (232, 4012, 483642) found on pp. 165–168 is an improved re-edition of Abdurishid Yakup, “A New Cakrasaṃvara Text in Uighur,” Kyoto University Linguistic Research 19 (2000): 43–58.
Edition and translation in BT XXXVI, 151–157 (text E).
Edition and translation in BT VII, 74–75 (text K).
Edition and translation in BT VII, 75–77 (text L).
Edition and translation in BT VII, 78 (text M).
Edition and translation in BT XXXVI, 137–143 (text C).
Edited in Oda Juten
Edition and translation in BT XXXVI, 174–177 (text G).
Edition and translation in BT VII, 78–79 (text N).
Edition and translation in BT VII, 79 (text O). Further unidentified tantric fragments, including a description of a Mañjuśrī visualisation are edited and translated in BT XXXVI, 179–195 (text H).
For a recent evaluation of the Bar do thos grol [Liberation through Hearing in the Bardo], see Yoshiro Imaeda, “The Bar do thos grol: Tibetan Conversion to Buddhism or Tibetanisation of Buddhism?” in Esoteric Buddhism at Dunhuang: Rites and Teachings for This Life and Beyond, ed. Matthew T. Kapstein and Sam van Schaik (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2010), 145–158.
Edition and translation in Peter Zieme and György Kara, Ein uigurisches Totenbuch: Nāropas Lehre in uigurischer Übersetzung von vier tibetischen Traktaten nach der Sammelhandschrift aus Dunhuang British Museum Or. 8212 (109) (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1979). For improved interpretations of the first text, see Georg Kara, “Some Passages of the Uyghur Antarābhava-Treatise Revisited,” in Splitter aus der Gegend von Turfan: Festschrift für Peter Zieme anläßlich seines 60. Geburtstags, ed. Mehmet Ölmez and Simone-Christiane Raschmann (Istanbul, Berlin: Mehmet Ölmez, 2002), 93–101. See also the article by Siglinde Dietz, “Definitionen der ‘Zwischenexistenz’ im tibetischen und uigurischen ‘Totenbuch’,” Ural-Altaische Jahrbücher Neue Folge 24 (2010/2011): 82–94. Similar fragments from the Northern Section of the Mogao Caves (B 160:7, B 161:9) are mentioned in BT XXIII, 10.
See Ulrich Timme Kragh, “Prolegomenon to the Six Doctrines of Nā ro pa: Authority and Tradition,” in Mahāmudrā and the Bka’-brgyud Tradition: PIATS 2006: Tibetan Studies: Proceedings of the Eleventh Seminar of the International Association for Tibetan Studies, Königswinter 2006, ed. Roger R. Jackson and Matthew T. Kapstein (Andiast: International Institute for Tibetan and Buddhist Studies, 2011), 131–177.
Yang Fuxue and Zhang Haijuan, “Mongol Rulers, Yugur Subjects, and Tibetan Buddhism,” in Chinese and Tibetan Esoteric Buddhism, ed. Yael Bentor and Meir Shahar (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2017), 377–386, especially 378.
Edition and translation in BT VIII, 91–121. Further fragments are edited in Georg Kara, “Weiteres über die uigurische Nāmasaṃgīti,” Altorientalische Forschungen 8 (1981): 227–236. New identified pieces are listed in BT XXIII, 9.
Jens Wilkens, “A Sanskrit Fragment of the Mañjuśrīnāmasaṃgīti in Uyghur Script,” International Journal of Old Uyghur Studies 2.1 (2020): 27–35.
BT XXIII, 9.
Edition and translation into Modern Turkish in Mehmet Ölmez, “Tibet Buddhizmine ait eski Uygurca Bahşı Ögdisi [An Old Uyghur Bahşı Ögdisi Related to Tibetan Buddhism],” in Bahşı Ögdisi: Festschrift für Klaus Röhrborn anläßlich seines 60. Geburtstags / 60. Doğum Yılı Dolayısıyla Klaus Röhrborn Armağanı, ed. Jens Peter Laut and Mehmet Ölmez (Freiburg, Istanbul: Simurg, 1998), 261–293.
See BT XXIII, 9, and the edition and translation in BT XXXVI, 124–136.
Edition and translation in BT XXIII, 89–114 (with corresponding Tibetan text).
BT XXIII, 89.
Sørensen, “Central Divinities,” 119.
Edition and translation in Willi Bang and Annemarie von Gabain, “Türkische Turfan- Texte V,” Sitzungsberichte der Preußischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philosophisch- historische Klasse 14 (1931): 324–340.
James Robson, “Talismans in Chinese Esoteric Buddhism,” in Esoteric Buddhism and the Tantras in East Asia, ed. Charles D. Orzech, Henrik H. Sørensen, and Richard K. Payne (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2011), 225–229. See also Paul Copp, “Altar, Amulet, Icon: Transformations in Dhāraṇī Amulet Culture, 740–980,” Cahiers d’Extrême Asie 17 (2008): 239–264; Paul Copp, “Manuscript Culture as Ritual Culture in Late Medieval Dunhuang,” Cahiers d’Extrême Asie 20 (2011): 193–226.
Radloff, Kuan-ši-im Pusar, 110.
Müller, Uigurica II, 99–100.
Gabdul R. Rachmati, Türkische Turfan-Texte VII, mit sinologischen Anmerkungen von W[olfgang] Eberhard (Berlin: Verlag der Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1937), 73.
BT XXIII, 182–184. A large fragment of a scroll from the collection in Berlin (The Seven Guanyins), which was considered lost during World War II, was rediscovered in the St. Petersburg Collection. See Pchelin and Raschmann, “Turfan Manuscripts in the State Hermitage,” 8–9. Further amulets, some of which are connected with certain stars, are edited in BT XXIII, 184–185.
Edition and translation in BT XXIII, 151–177.
BT XXIII, 164 (lines H025–027).
Edition in BT XXIII, 179–182.
See Jeffrey Theodore Kotyk, “Buddhist Astrology and Astral Magic in the Tang Dynasty” (PhD diss., University of Leiden, 2017). On astrology in Esoteric Buddhism see Henrik H. Sørensen, “Astrology and the Worship of the Planets in Esoteric Buddhism of the Tang,” in Esoteric Buddhism and the Tantras in East Asia, ed. Charles D. Orzech, Henrik H. Sørensen, and Richard K. Payne (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2011), 230–244. Astrology and planetary worship in the art of China and Central Asia are dealt with in Lilla Russell-Smith, “Stars and Planets in Chinese and Central Asian Buddhist Art in the Ninth to Fifteenth Centuries,” Culture and Cosmos 10.1–2 (2006): 99–124. Uyghur art is one of the main subjects of this important study.
There is also one temple banner inscribed with the dhāraṇī of this text. See Moriyasu, Zieme, “Uighur Inscriptions,” 466a–468a. On Tejaḥprabha see Sørensen, “Astrology and the Worship of the Planets,” 239–241.
BT XXIII, 85.
Lilla Russell-Smith, Uygur Patronage in Dunhuang: Regional Art Centres on the Northern Silk Road in the Tenth and Eleventh Centuries (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2005), 104–110. Cf. also Russell-Smith, “Stars and Planets,” 103–113 and Takao Moriyasu, “Chronology of West Uighur Buddhism: Re-examination of the Dating of the Wall-paintings in Grünwedel’s Cave No. 8 (New: No. 18), Bezeklik,” in Aspects of Research into Central-Asian Buddhism: In memoriam Kōgi Kudara, ed. Peter Zieme (Turnhout: Brepols, 2008), 196. In an article Russell-Smith describes the Uyghur painting as follows: “This Tejaprabhā composition is an important example of the links between the Uygurs, Dunhuang, the Tanguts and central China” (Russell-Smith, “Stars and Planets,” 112).
On the Chinese version, see Herbert Franke, “The Taoist Elements in the Great Bear Sūtra (Pei-tou ching),” Asia Major 3 (1990): 75–111.
On the connection between the worship of the Big Dipper and procuring longevity, see Kotyk, “Buddhist Astrology,” 202–204. See also Sørensen, “Astrology and the Worship of the Planets,” 237.
See Sørensen, “Astrology and the Worship of the Planets,” 230.
BT XXIII, 128–129.
See the edition and translation in BT XXIII, 115–149, which supersedes all previous work on the Old Uyghur version.
See also Robson, “Talismans in Chinese Esoteric Buddhism,” 228. The Chinese goddesses of the Big Dipper and their seals are depicted in Kotyk, “Buddhist Astrology,” 203.
See Johan Elverskog, “The Mongolian Big Dipper Sūtra,” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 29.1 (2008): 90: “The opening passage of the Mongolian text provides a history of its translation: it was translated from Chinese into Mongolian, which in turn was used as the basis for the Tibetan translation. The colophon also notes that an Old Uygur translation was prepared and printed, but it never states explicitly whether it was used as an intermediary in the translation from Chinese into Mongolian.”
For the colophons, see BT XXIII, 148–149.
Edition and translation in BT XXIII, 47–60. The fragments U 1580 and U 1581 are actually part of the narrative cycle of stories called the Daśakarmapathāvadānamālā. See Jens Wilkens, Alttürkische Handschriften Teil 10: Buddhistische Erzähltexte (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner, 2010), 191 (no. #232), 275–276 (no. 370).
Edition and translation in BT XXIII, 61–64.
Abdurishid Yakup, “An Old Uyghur Fragment of an Astrological Treatise Kept in the Beijing National Library,” in Zur lichten Heimat: Studien zu Manichäismus, Iranistik und Zentralasienkunde im Gedenken an Werner Sundermann, ed. Team “Turfanforschung” (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2017), 711–717.
Matsui Dai, “Uighur Almanac Divination Fragments from Dunhuang,” in Dunhuang Studies: Prospects and Problems for the Coming Second Century of Research, ed. Irina Fedorovna Popova and Liu Yi (St. Petersburg: Slavia, 2012), 154–166.
Most texts are edited in Rachmati, Türkische Turfan-Texte VII. Some fragments are based on the system of the nine palaces (Chin. jiu gong
Dieter Maue, “Sanskrit-uigurische Fragmente des Āṭānāṭikasūtra und des Āṭānāṭikahṛdaya,” Ural-Altaische Jahrbücher Neue Folge 5 (1985): 98–122.
Edition and translation in BT XXIII, 31–45.
BT XXIII, 37.
Peter Zieme, “Indischer Schlangenzauber in uigurischer Überlieferung,” in Tibetan and Buddhist Studies Commemorating the 200th Anniversary of the Birth of Alexander Csoma de Kőrös, ed. Louis Ligeti (Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 1984), 425–440. The story of Upasena is contained in the Daśakarmapathāvadānamālā as well.
Zieme, “Indischer Schlangenzauber,” 427.
For this manuscript, see Wilkens, Alttürkische Handschriften Teil 10, 302–306.
Peter Zieme, “Appendix: Alttürkische Fragmente über den Regenstein,” in Weather Magic in Inner Asia, ed. Ádám Molnar (Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Research Institute for Inner Asian Studies, 1994), 147–151.
Zieme, “Regenstein,” 148.
Ibid., 148.
Raschmann and Sertkaya, Alttürkische Handschriften Teil 20, 170–171 (cat. no. 149, especially fn. 6).
Edition and translation in Peter Zieme, “Uigurische Fragmente aus der Pañcarakṣā,” in The Black Master: Essays on Central Eurasia in Honor of György Kara on His 70th Birthday, ed. Stéphane Grivelet, et al. (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2005), 151–164. A fragment of an Old Uyghur translation of the Mahāmāyūrī, which is not only a transliteration of the mantras as in case of the other known pieces, is edited in Wilhelm Radloff, Uigurische Sprachdenkmäler: Materialien nach dem Tode des Verfassers herausgegeben von S[ergej] Malov (Leningrad: Verlag der Akademie der Wissenschaften der USSR, 1928), 109–112. It was later identified and reedited with parallel Sanskrit, Tibetan, and Mongolian, in Pentti Aalto, “Prolegomena to an Edition of the Pañcarakṣā,” Studia Orientalia 19.2 (1954): 29–34. Aalto also points out that the text published in Radloff, Uigurische Sprachdenkmäler, 194–196 is likely a commentary to the Pañcarakṣā, although it was—in Aalto’s words—“very clumsily edited”. However, Aalto’s assumption that the text is a commentary cannot be confirmed. In the first text Radloff edited, the deity is conceived of as male. Zieme identified a fragment of the Mahāpratisarā from the Northern Section of the Mogao Caves (B 464:146) as the Mahāpratisarā (BT XXIII, 9). On the Mahāpratisarā, see Gergely Hidas, Mahāpratisarā-Mahāvidyārājñī, the Great Amulet, Great Queen of Spells: Introduction, Critical Editions and Annotated Translations (New Delhi: International Academy of Indian Culture and Aditya Prakashan, 2012). A reference to the Old Uyghur version is on p. 10.
For this interpretation see the edition in Semih Tezcan and Peter Zieme, “Alttürkische Reimsprüche. Ein neuer Text,” Journal of Turkology 2.2 (1994): 259–271.
Tezcan and Zieme, “Alttürkische Reimsprüche,” 262. The editors think that the keyword savıš means ‘Reimspruch’. Tezcan and Zieme, “Alttürkische Reimsprüche,” 259. For a discussion of the verb sav- “to bewitch” and its derivatives (savıš etc.), see Georges-Jean Pinault, Michaël Peyrot, and Jens Wilkens, “Vernaculars of the Silk Road—A Tocharian B—Old Uyghur Bilingual,” Journal Asiatique 307.1 (2019): 81b–82a.
Tezcan and Zieme, “Alttürkische Reimsprüche,” 264.
See the article by Takao Moriyasu, “Uighur Buddhist Stake Inscriptions from Turfan,” in De Dunhuang à Istanbul: Hommage à James Russell Hamilton, ed. Louis Bazin and Peter Zieme (Turnhout: Brepols, 2001), 148–223, in which stake inscriptions I and III are edited and translated. According to Moriyasu (ibid., 157), stake inscription V is from the Yuan Dynasty.
Jens Wilkens, “Buddhism in the West Uyghur Kingdom and Beyond,” in Transfer of Buddhism Across Central Asian Networks (7th to 13th Centuries), ed. Carmen Meinert (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2016), 202.
Nobuo Yamada, Sammlung uigurischer Kontrakte, ed. Juten Oda, et al., vol. 2 (Osaka: Osaka University Press, 1993), 130–131 (document Em01 l. 17), 136–137 (document WP02 lines 17–18). See also Raschmann, Sertkaya, Alttürkische Handschriften Teil 20, 113 (cat. no. 074, fn. 6).
Annemarie von Gabain, “Kṣitigarbha-Kult in Zentralasien: Buchillustrationen aus den Turfan-Funden,” in Indologen-Tagung 1971: Verhandlungen der Indologischen Arbeitstagung im Museum für Indische Kunst Berlin 7.–9. Oktober 1971, ed. Herbert Härtel and Volker Moeller (Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner, 1973), 47–71, especially 53–56.
Kudara Kōgi
Stephen F. Teiser, The Scripture on the Ten Kings and the Making of Purgatory in Medieval Chinese Buddhism (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 1994).
Peter Zieme, “Old Turkish Versions of the ‘Scripture on the Ten Kings’,” in Proceedings of the 38th PIAC; Kawasaki, Japan: August 7–12, 1995, ed. Giovanni Stary (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1996), 401–425. Zieme (p. 402) underlines that it is difficult to ascertain which Chinese recension the Old Uyghur fragments parallel, given their poor state of preservation.
Simone-Christiane Raschmann, “The Old Turkish Fragments of The Scripture on the Ten Kings (
Li Lin, “Esoteric Buddhist Relics of the Uighur Kingdom Period in Bezeklik Temple,” Zentralasiatische Studien 36 (2007): 61–78.
Koichi Kitsudo, “Historical Significance of Bezeklik Cave 20 in the Uyghur Buddhism,” in Torufan no bukkyō to bijutsu: Uiguru bukkyō o chūshin ni
Kitsudo, “Historical Significance,” 147.
See also the colophon by Bodhidhvaja Śīla mentioned above.
Edited and translated in Peter Zieme, “Colophons to the Säkiz yükmäk yaruq,” Altorientalische Forschungen 10.1 (1983): 146–147.
A re-edition and translation of the colophon is in BT XXVI, 246.
Moriyasu and Zieme, “Uighur Inscriptions,” 464c–465a.
Zsuzsanna Gulácsi, “The Manichaean Roots of a Pure Land Banner from Kocho (III 4524) in the Asian Art Museum, Berlin,” in Language, Society, and Religion in the World of the Turks: Festschrift for Larry Clark at Seventy-Five, ed. Zsuzsanna Gulácsi (Turnhout: Brepols, 2018), 337–376.
Dolkun Kämbiri