Turkic and Sino-Tibetan languages and literatures
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Calling the Soul of the Dead
Research of Mongolion folk-religion has been the subject of special attention in recent years. Editions and translations of extant texts have appeared providing detailed descriptions of the rituals. This book examines a very special ritual of folk-religion the ceremony of calling back the soul of the dead. Among the Mongols it was commonly believed that illness and death were caused by the absence of the soul so a special ritual was required to call back the wandering soul. The research for this volume has been based on texts preserved in the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences in St. Petersburg. A background is given by observations of researchers who have visited the relevant areas and personal communications of Mongols. These rituals are still living and carried out by Mongolians and their neighbouring peoples. The very old ceremony must have belonged to an early layer of folk-religion. It has now become a ritual of the Lamaist church. Influence of Tibetan Buddhism is found. A special chapter is devoted to evil spirits. The volume is richly illustrated.
Nomads, Traders and Holy Men Along China's Silk Road
This collection of papers formed part of the symposium “Nomads Traders and Holy Men Along China’s Silk Road” held at the Asia Society in New York on November 9-10 2001. Although the Silk Road has inspired several important museum exhibitions none had focused on the Hexi Corridor nor attempted to analyze the complexity of the cross-cultural relationships within China’s borders. Nor had any exhibition focused on the nearly four hundred years of political disunity nomadic incursions and social upheaval brought about by the collapse of the great Han dynasty (206 B.C.E.-220 C.E.) that then after a series of short-lived dynasties culminated in the reunification of China under the Tang empire (618-906).
Uygur Buddhist Literature
This first volume of the Silk Roads Studies is a reference manual of the published Uygur Buddhist literature. Uygur Buddhist Literature creates a complete inventory of the published Uygur Buddhist texts along with a bibliography of the pertinent scholarlyliterature. The work includes an introduction that outlines the history of the discovery of the Uygur Buddhist Literature and a short history of the Buddhist Uygurs and their translation activities. The survey of the literature itself is divided into six sections: (1) Non-Mahayana Texts including Sutra Vinaya Abhidarma Biographies of the Buddha (including Jatakas) and Avadana; (2) Mahayana Sutras; (3) Commentaries; (4) Chinese Apocrypha; (5) Tantric Texts (6) Other Buddhist Works. Included under each title of a text is a brief synopsis of the text and an explanation of the Uygur manuscript including where known: origin of translation the translator and the place of translation the place it was found and any other interesting points. After this brief survey of the manuscript the signature of the manuscript with references to the editions of the text is provided as well as additional references to the secondary literature. The survey concludes with an index to titles translators scribes and sponsors. This manual is an essential tool not only for specialists in the field of Altaic especially Turcological or Monogolian Iranological Sinological or Buddhological Studies but is also written for a larger public of students interested in Asian religions and cultural history in general. This book provides in a systematic and exhaustive way the most recent information on the places where the documents are kept a synopsis of the text editions and secondary literature.