Movable Sutra Wrappers in Dunhuang and the Shōsōin
The “White Horse Carrying Sutras Legend”, a story about a white horse that carried Buddhist sutras from India to China, lacks clear descriptions of the carriers in the pre-Sui dynasty. Later images, however, show the carriers. So, what actually carried sutras during the manuscript era?
You can attend this lecture online via Zoom or in person in the Herta Mohr Building, room 0.28. All are welcome; registration is required due to limited seating and to receive the Zoom link.
The Lecture
The sutra wrappers function far more than protecting and maintaining the sutra scrolls during storage. They also served as protective containers for the scrolls and accompanied them during transportation and dissemination. The sutra wrappers in the Shōsōin collection (Japan) were officially produced during the Nara period (710-794 CE). They extensively adopted craftsmanship from the Tang dynasty and contain precious textual information. Thus, the sutra wrappers stored at the Shōsōin offer an invaluable primary source for studying wrappers of the Tang Dynasty. However, they have received relatively little scholarly attention. This topic conducts a comparative analysis of the Shōsōin wrappers and those discovered at Dunhuang based on the main material of their outer surface. This enables the formulation of a renewed classification criterion and provides new insights into the structural design, craftsmanship, and textual aspects of sutra wrappers. This research reveals that specific features such as the edges, mountain-shaped straps, and internal straps were all designed to serve the wrapper's inherent transportive function. The diverse textual information carried by these wrappers directly or indirectly documents the varied historical contexts in which they traveled while encasing the Buddhist scriptures. From daily use to transporting them inside or outside the temple, sutra wrappers consistently accompanied scrolls on their journey. Thus, they engaged in and witnessed the material and cultural exchanges across East Asian nations.
The Speaker
Zhang Meiqiao received her PhD in 2022 from the International College for Postgraduate Buddhist Studies in Tokyo, Japan, with a dissertation on the transmission and transformation of the Mahāprajñāpāramitāsūtra 大般若波羅蜜多經. She is currently a postdoctoral researcher at Zhejiang University in Hangzhou, China. Her research concentrates chiefly on manuscript and ancient woodblock editions of the Chinese Buddhist literature. Her research interests include the history of Buddhism in Medieval China, Dunhuang studies, Old Buddhist manuscripts in Japanese collections, Chinese Buddhist canons, and the cultural history of communication between China and her neighbors.
Registration
You can attend this lecture online or in person in the Herta Mohr building, room 0.28 (IIAS Conference Room), Witte Singel 27A, Leiden. Please use the registration form on this page.