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Art. III.—Preliminary Notice of the Tibetan Manuscripts in the Stein Collection

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 March 2011

L. D. Barnett
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Extract

Among the treasures brought to light by Dr. Stein in his excavations in Chinese Turkestan and lodged by him last summer in the British Museum, not the least interesting was a collection of fragmentary Tibetan manuscripts. These were found in the ruins of a Buddhist shrine buried in a site beyond the Endere stream, at the extreme eastern limit of the region explored, under circumstances which have already been detailed in Dr. Stein's “Preliminary Report,” pp. 55—56. It suffices here to say that the conditions under which the fragments were discovered were such as to make it practically impossible to date them later than the eighth century; and the evidence of a Chinese sgraffito in the same building has since proved this conclusion to be right. Hence they came to us as the earliest known relics of Tibetan literature.

Type
Original Communications
Information
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society , Volume 35 , Issue 1 , January 1903 , pp. 109 - 114
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 1903

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References

page 111 note 1 See J.A.S.B., 1893, vol. Ixii, pt. 1, p. 6Google Scholar.

page 112 note 1 1 The work of Atīśa, who preached Mahāyāna in Tibet during the latter half of the eleventh century, now appears in its true light. He was merely a reviver of the Mahāyāna that had been taught there three or four centuries earlier.

page 113 note 1 The Sanskrit documents from this collection recently at British Museum could only be consulted after a promise not to make known their contents.