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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IDP Wikipedia Editathon

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During this coming October 23-26, IDP will host a Wikipedia editathon at the British Library. IDP staff at the British Library, and at other IDP centres worldwide, will spend a week creating and editing Wikipedia pages on Central Asian archaeological sites, explorers and artefacts. There will also be a public day in which the wider Wikipedia community will be invited to participate. The event is part of the AHRC-funded project Contextualising Texts: Enhancing the Research Potential of Buddhist Manuscript Material, and is being organized with the help of the British Library's Wikipedian in Residence, Andrew Gray. More information about the event will be posted here in the near future.

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