Shaping the Stein collection’s Dunhuang corpus (2): the items from Cave 17’s ‘miscellaneous’ bundles

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In a previous blog post , we looked at the instrumental role played by Wang Yuanlu during the selection of the items from the Cave 17. Wang, who directly chose from the small repository what to hand over to Stein for inspection, was very keen to divert his attention from the so-called ‘regular’ bundles, which were composed for the most part of Buddhist sutras in Chinese and Tibetan. During their first ever transaction, which took place between 21 May and 6 June 1907, Wang Yuanlu therefore began by handing over the ‘miscellaneous’ bundles, which he seemed to hold in low estimation. To Stein’s delight, these contained mixed and diverse materials, such as manuscripts in non-Chinese languages, illustrated scrolls, paintings, drawings, ex-votos, textiles, etc. Stein picked out any of the items that jumped at him as being particularly interesting and made sure to put them aside for ‘further examination’, the phrase that he used to refer to their removal in his transaction with Wang. This
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Conservation and Digitisation Studio Open Day

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There are still a few places remaining for the IDP Conservation and Digitisation Open Day on 12 March. Places are free but restricted owing to space and so please book your place through the British Library’s What’s On page.

MORNING: IDP STUDIO
(meet in front hall of British Library 5 mins. before the start time)

In the morning the team from the IDP studio will take visitors through the process from selecting a scroll for photography through to its appearing on the web, including digitisation, post-production and metadata and cataloguing.

Each visit is scheduled for 45 minutes. There are visits available at:
10am
11am

AFTERNOON: CONSERVATION CENTRE
(meet in front hall of British Library 5 mins. before the start)

In the afternoon staff from IDP and conservation will be available to show visitors some of the work that goes on behind the scenes to make the manuscript available both for digitisation and for readers.

Visitors will be shown a range of the manuscript material, from 20 m scrolls on paper to wooden documents, along with the range of conservation and storage solutions used to ensure this material is safe for handling and preserved for future generations. Visitors will also be able to look at the structure of ancient paper through a microscope and learn about some of the scientific projects that take place alongside conservation and cataloguing.

Each visit is scheduled for 30 minutes. There are visits available at:
1pm
2.45pm
3.30pm

Make sure not to miss the Diamond Sutra during your visit. The frontispiece will be newly on display from March 8th as part of an 18 month programme to show the whole text for the first time. In the John Ritblat Gallery – admission free.

For full details of IDP’s 20th anniversary events visit our programme page.

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