Altturkische Handschriften, pt. 11: Die uiguirischen Blockrucke der Berliner Turfansammlung. Pt. 1: Tantrische Texte.

• Author: Kara, Gyorgy
• Position: Book review

Altturkische Handschriften, pt. 11: Die uiguirischen Blockrucke der Berliner Turfansammlung. Pt. 1: Tantrische Texte. Described by ABDURISHID YAKUP and MICHAEL KNUPPEL. Verzeichnis der orientalischen Handschriften in Deutschland, vol. 13, pt. 19. Stuttgart: FRANZ STEINER VERLAG, 2007. Pp. 258.

This is the nineteenth part of the thirteenth volume of the great series describing the Oriental manuscripts and xylographs kept in German libraries. The numerous "parts" of the thirteenth "volume" describe the Turkic books. The present "part nineteen" is also "part eleven" of the sub-series "Alt-turkische Handschriften," describing the Old Turkic manuscripts and block prints. Actually, each "part" is itself a quarto volume, and the volume under review is the first part of the descriptive catalogue of the Turfan fragments of Uygur-script xylographs, which represent an interesting chapter and an important part of the history of medieval printing in Inner and East Asia.

According to the short foreword signed by the co-authors (p. 7), the thoughtful introduction (pp. 9-26) comes from the pen of M. Knuppel, while the catalogue (detailed description of the 282 fragments, their place of origin, format, size, paper, definition of contents, identification of the works they belonged to, indication of parallel Turkic, Chinese, or Tibetan texts, if any, etc., pp. 27-222) is the painstaking work of A. Yakup. The final form was given by M. Knuppel.

The introduction offers a new overview of medieval Uygur printing, discusses the (not too great) probability of an early usage of movable wooden type, deals with the problem of how manuscripts imitated prints, deals with the kinds of paper, with the usual difference of the place where the print was unearthed and the place where it was manufactured. Discussed are the formats, the pagination, the title line, the frame of the text, monochrome or hand-colored illustrations and ornaments, glosses in Brahmi script, colophons, dates, and corrections. The rest of the introduction (pp. 24-26) lists the six identified Tantric Buddhist scriptures of which fragments 1-280 contain parts, folios or pages, full lines or parts of lines. These are the "Spell of the Goddess with the White Umbrella" (Sitatapatra), the "Sutra of the Wisdom of Boundless Bliss" (Aparamitayur-jnana), the "Spells of the Goddess Uspisavijaya," the "Eulogy of Manjugri" (Namasanigiti), an Avalokitesvara-ritual (sadhana) from 1333, and the "Praise of the...