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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Video: The Dunhuang Star Chart

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This film from bonnetbidaud.tv features the medieval Chinese manuscript Or.8210/S.3326 discovered in 1907 by the archaeologist Aurel Stein at the Silk Road town of Dunhuang and now housed in the British Library. This set of sky maps displaying the full sky visible from the Northern Hemisphere, is up to now the oldest complete preserved star atlas known from any civilisation. It is also the earliest known pictorial representation of the quasi-totality of Chinese constellations.

Director : BLUMBERG Jérôme
Scientific direction : BONNET-BIDAUD Jean-Marc
Producer : CNRS Images (2009)
Duration [20'00]

Further reading on IDP:
The Dunhuang Chinese Sky: A Comprehensive Study of the Oldest Known Star Atlas by Jean-Marc Bonnet-Bidaud, Dr Françoise Praderie and Susan Whitfield.
Star Atlas: Translation by Imre Galambos.
Chinese Astronomy, an educational resource by Abby Baker.

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