Producing Buddhist Sutras in Ninth-Century Tibet
The ‘Sutra of Limitless Life’ and its Dunhuang Copies Kept at the British Library
Language
EnglishAbstract
In Dunhuang in the 820s, scribes, editors, and administrators produced thousands of Tibetan and Chinese copies of the Sutra of Limitless Life. Drawing on the 1,500 such Tibetan copies now kept at the British Library, this study explores the people and practices that created these manuscripts, surveys the various Tibetan and Chinese versions of the sutra, and documents how they were employed, stored, conserved, and catalogued up to the present.
Keywords
Tibet; China; buddhism; manuscript studies; social history; thema EDItEUR::1 Place qualifiers::1F Asia::1FP East Asia, Far East::1FPC China; thema EDItEUR::1 Place qualifiers::1F Asia::1FP East Asia, Far East::1FPC China::1FPCT Tibet; thema EDItEUR::3 Time period qualifiers::3K CE period up to c 1500::3KH c 500 to c 1000 CE::3KHW 9th century, c 800 to c 899; thema EDItEUR::D Biography, Literature and Literary studies::DS Literature: history and criticism::DSB Literary studies: general::DSBB Literary studies: ancient, classical and medieval; thema EDItEUR::G Reference, Information and Interdisciplinary subjects::GL Library and information sciences / Museology::GLP Archiving, preservation and digitization; thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History::NHF Asian history; thema EDItEUR::Q Philosophy and Religion::QR Religion and beliefs::QRF Buddhism::QRFF Buddhism: sacred texts and revered writingsISBN
9783111569550, 9783111569307, 9783111570099Publisher
De GruyterPublisher website
http://www.degruyter.com/Publication date and place
Berlin/Boston, 2024Grantor
Imprint
De GruyterSeries
Studies in Manuscript Cultures,Pages
408
Except where otherwise noted, this item's license is described
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open access