Tangut Manuscripts with Tibetan Phonetic Glosses

British Library Or.12380/3495

IDP : British Library Or.12380/3495

Description

This is a single sheet of a Tangut Buddhist manuscript held at the British Library in London. It has the pressmark Or.12380/3495 (originally K.K.II.0280.s), and was collected by Aurel Stein from Khara-Khoto during his expedition to Central Asia of 1913–1916. It has been studied by Arakawa Shintarō (Arakawa2008) and Tai Chung Pui (TCP2008), and is available online at the International Dunhuang Project.

The Tangut text comprises five columns of clear and neatly-written characters inside a double-lined frame, giving it the appearance of being a faithful manuscript copy of a printed text. The Tibetan phonetic glosses, which are written in a rather untidy and not very legible cursive headless script, are written in lighter coloured ink, and do not appear to be contemporary with the copying of the Tangut text. For some reason the glosses only cover the inner three columns of the Tangut text, in total 27 characters.

At the top left of the page is a line of Tibetan text in the same ink and calligraphy as the phonetic glosses, unfortunately missing its beginning as the top left corner of the sheet is torn off, reading ... ?se 'dzwar 'jo ste སེ་འཛྭང་འཇོ་སྟེ or ... ?se 'dzwang 'jo ste སེ་འཛྭར་འཇོ་སྟེ (Arakawa reads it as s[t?]e / 'dzwang / 'jo / te). The meaning of this is unclear to me. On the top right of the page, in the same ink as the Tibetan glosses, is a drawing of a flame-crowned "wish-fulfilling jewel" (ཡིད་བཞིན་ནོར་བུ), presumably in illustration of the "precious jewel burning bright and dignified" that is described in the fourth line of the Tangut text.

Transcription

Notes

1. There are no Tibetan glosses on the right hand side of the first column of Tangut text.
2. The reading of the Tibetan gloss is uncertain. Arakawa reads it as nag ནག, but Tibetan transcriptions of Tangut do not normally indicate a final ‑g. On the other hand, Tai Chung Pui reads it as gna གན, but without an expicit final letter 'a (i.e. གནའ) this would normally be read as gan which makes this reading dubious. Neither of these readings (nag or gna) closely refelects the reconstructed reading of the corresponding Tangut character (njɨ̱), so I suspect that the gloss is a mistake for gni གནི, with a missing vowel sign.
3. The Tibetan letter under the vowel sign is an illegible blob, but from the reconstructed reading of the Tangut character (dźjiar) it is probably a j ཇ, giving the reading 'ji འཇི.
4. This is the same phonetic gloss as discussed in Note 2, but for a Tangut character with a quite different reading (nwə). Arakawa again reads it as nag, but Tai Chung Pui does not provide a reading. I suspect that the gloss is a mistake for gne གནེ, with a missing vowel sign.
5. The Tangut character could plausibly be either L3240 "complete" or L3266 "host" (both reconstructed as reading dzju). Arakawa and Tai Chung Pui both prefer to read it as the latter character.
6. The Tibetan gloss is unclear. Arakawa reads it as glu གླུ, but I tentatively read it as ldi ལྡི with a black smudge of ink above the vowel sign.
7. The reading of brnu for the Tibetan gloss is uncertain, and the vowel does not match the reconstructed reading of the Tangut character (nji). Another possible reading is bdwu བདྭུ, but that would be an even poorer match for the Tangut reading.
8. The reading of the Tibetan gloss is not certain as there is a black smudge at the bottom of the letter d. I follow Arakawa, who takes the smudge to be a subjoined letter w and reads the gloss as 'dwar.
9. The reading of the Tibetan gloss is not at all certain. Arakawa reads it as 'rbu འརྦུ or possibly 'dwu འདྭུ, neither of which correspond to the reconstructed reading (dźja̱) or the Tibetan phonetic gloss given in other manuscripts ('ja' འཇའ).
10. There are no Tibetan glosses on the right hand side of the last column of Tangut text. The top left corner of the page is torn off, so all but the right edge of the top three Tangut characters are missing. Arakawa plausibly reconstructs the first two characters as L1543 and L2373.

References

• Arakawa2008. Arakawa Shintarō 荒川 慎太郎, "大英図書館所蔵夏蔵対音資料Or. 12380/3495 について" [Tangut Buddhist fragment with Tibetan transcriptions: Or. 12380/3495 preserved in the British Library]; in Kyoto University Linguistic Research [京都大学言語学研究] vol. 27 (2008) pages 203–212.
• LFW2008. Li Fanwen 李范文, Tangut-Chinese Dictionary 夏汉字典. Beijing, 2008.
• TCP2008. Tai Chung Pui 戴忠沛, A Study of Tibetan Phonological Transcription in Tangut Buddhism Fragments 西夏文佛经残片的藏文对音研究. PhD dissertation, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (中国社会科学院), May 2008. See §2.3.15 残片18.

Published: 2011-12-07. Last modified: 2011-12-19.

Tangut Manuscripts with Tibetan Phonetic Glosses

BabelStone Home Page