Dunhuang Manuscript Culture: End of the First Millennium

Imre Galambos

Open Access Published by De Gruyter 2020

Dunhuang Manuscript Culture

End of the First Millennium

Imre Galambos

Volume 22 in the series Studies in Manuscript Cultures

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110726572

Overview
Contents

About this book

Open Access

“Dunhuang Manuscript Culture” explores the world of Chinese manuscripts from ninth-tenth century Dunhuang, an oasis city along the network of pre-modern routes known today collectively as the Silk Roads. The manuscripts have been discovered in 1900 in a sealed-off side-chamber of a Buddhist cave temple, where they had lain undisturbed for for almost nine hundred years. The discovery comprised tens of thousands of texts, written in over twenty different languages and scripts, including Chinese, Tibetan, Old Uighur, Khotanese, Sogdian and Sanskrit. This study centres around four groups of manuscripts from the mid-ninth to the late tenth centuries, a period when the region was an independent kingdom ruled by local families. The central argument is that the manuscripts attest to the unique cultural diversity of the region during this period, exhibiting—alongside obvious Chinese elements—the heavy influence of Central Asian cultures. As a result, it was much less ‘Chinese’ than commonly portrayed in modern scholarship. The book makes a contribution to the study of cultural and linguistic interaction along the Silk Roads.

Author / Editor information

Imre Galambos, University of Cambridge, UK.

Topics

Frontmatter Open Access Download PDF	I
Contents Open Access Download PDF	V
Acknowledgements Open Access Download PDF	VII
Introduction Open Access Download PDF	1
1 Multiple-text Manuscripts Open Access Download PDF	23
2 Manuscripts Written by Students Open Access Download PDF	85
3 Writing from Left to Right Open Access Download PDF	139
4 Circulars and Names Open Access Download PDF	195
Concluding Remarks Open Access Download PDF	248
References Open Access Download PDF	255
Index Open Access Download PDF	285
About the Author Open Access Download PDF	290

(Deutsch)

Language: English
Publisher: De Gruyter
Audience: Medievalists, scholars of Chinese studies, Dunhuang and manuscript studies, Silk Road and Buddhist studies
Pages
- Front matter: 8
- Main content: 290
Illustrations
- Coloured Illustrations: 75
Keywords: Chinese manuscripts; Dunhuang manuscripts; Silk Road; Central Asia

eBook

Published: December 7, 2020
ISBN: 9783110726572

Hardcover

Published: December 7, 2020
ISBN: 9783110723496