Written
Monuments
of the Orient

2(4), 2016

Issued twice a year

The entire issue as a *.PDF file

Nikolai Pchelin, Simone-Christiane Raschmann. Turfan Manuscripts in the State Hermitage — a Rediscovery — 3
Abstract: The article presents the results of a close cooperation of colleagues from the State Hermitage and the Göttingen Academy of Sciences (Union Catalogue of Oriental Manuscripts). 23 fragments of manuscripts and block prints in five different languages (Chinese, Old Uighur, Sanskrit, Tibetan, and Syriac) are described in detail. Almost all of them could be identified. They stem from the four German Turfan expeditions (1902– 1914) and were housed in the Museum für Völkerkunde (Berlin) for exhibition reasons, i.e. they belong to the most important findings of these expeditions. Nevertheless some of these fragments have never been published before. For a long time it was thought that they belong to the losses during World War II. Now they have been re-discovered in the depot of the State Hermitage. In the appendix an Old Uighur fragment of the Säkiz Yükmäk Yaruk is edited. It belongs to the re-discovered texts and was known up-to-now only from some quotations in an early edition.
Key words: State Hermitage, German Turfan expeditions, Museum für Völkerkunde (Berlin), manuscript, block print, scroll, folded book, amulet, illumination, Chinese, Old Uighur, Sanskrit, Tibetan, Syriac, Säkiz Yükmäk Yaruk

Ogihara Hirotoshi, Ching Chao-jung. SI 3656 and other Kuchean tablets related to the Kizil grottoes in the St. Petersburg Collection — 44
Abstract: This paper introduces five wooden tablets written in Kuchean (Tocharian B) and kept in the Institute of Oriental Manuscripts, Russian Academy of Sciences (IOM, RAS), namely SI 3656 (SI P/136в), 3669 (SI P/139д), 6385 (SI Strelkov-D/3), 1931 (SI Strelkov-D/51) and 6456 (SI Strelkov-D/85). THT4063, an unedited tablet kept in Berlin, the text of which is largely parallel with SI 6456, is also introduced here. According to the joint authors’ investigation, which has been ongoing since 2009, these tablets are economic and administrative documents, and some of their features are comparable with the Kuchean sale contract THT4001. The severely damaged SI 1931 is particularly valuable because it proves that three currencies circulated in pre-Tang Kucha. Together with THT4063, the other four tablets are closely related to the Yurpāṣka Monastery, which is repeatedly mentioned in the findings from the Kizil grottoes as well as the graffiti surviving there. Therefore, the content of these tablets helps scholars to restore the history of this important Buddhist site as well as the activity of foreign expeditions in Chinese Turkestan.
Key words: Kucha, Tocharian, Kizil, Buddhism, Central Asia

Li Gang, Matsui Dai. An Old Uighur Receipt Document Newly Discovered in the Turfan Museum — 68
Abstract: This article introduces an Old Uighur document, which had been excavated seemingly in the Bezeklik Caves and was recently re-discovered in the Turfan Museum. It is supposed to be a receipt for the payment of the poll tax (qupčir) of the Mongol period, and to be closely related to the Old Uighur administrative orders of the St. Petersburg collection (SI 6544).
Key words: Old Uighur document, Turfan, receipt, taxation, qupchir, Mongol Empire

Ekaterina Shukhman. Hebrew Palaeotypes in the Collection of the St. Petersburg IOM, RAS — 76
Abstract: The present paper is actually a review of Hebrew palaeotypes (i.e. books printed in a Hebrew font between January 1, 1501 and January 1, 1551) kept at the IOM, RAS. It gives a brief description of the ways in which the collection was formed along with the numbers and genres of the books, while also identifying particularly noteworthy items.
Key words: Palaeotypes, publishing, Hebrew literature, incunabula, the Friedland collection, 16th-century printing houses

Reviews

M. Sergeev. Theory of Religious Cycles: Tradition, Modernity, and the Baha’i Faith. Leiden-Boston: Brill, 2015. — 161 p. Value Inquiry Book Series. Contemporary Russian Philosophy. Ed. by R. Ginsberg, L. Donskis. Vol. 284, by Youli A. Ioannesyan — 89

Bodies in Balance. The Art of Tibetan Medicine. Ed. by Theresia Hofer. Rubin Museum of Art, New York & University of Washington Press, Seattle and London 2014. ISBN-13: 978-0-295-99359-1 (hardcover), by Alexander Zorin — 95

Peng Xiang-qian 彭向前. Xi xia wen “Mengzi” zhengli yanjiu 西夏文 ≪孟子≫整理研究 (The complex study of the Tangut translation of the Mengzi). Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 2012. — 295 p., by Tang Jun, Yu.S. Mylnikova — 102