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Note on a Manuscript from the Tucci Collection in the IsIAO LibraryAuthor(s): Elena De Rossi FilibeckReviewed work(s):Source: East and West, Vol. 46, No. 3/4 (December 1996), pp. 485-487Published by: Istituto Italiano per l'Africa e l'Oriente (IsIAO)Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/29757292 .Accessed: 04/04/2012 10:17

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Note on aManuscript from the Tucci Collectionin the IsIAO Library

by Elena De Rossi Filibeck

Several years ago, a dozen or sopackages were found lying in a room at IsMEO at PalazzoBrancaccio by Professor Lionello Lanciotti, who had them taken to the Institute library. Here,after opening the packages, the then director, Mr Mario Fiorentini, kindly let me see thecontents. It consisted of a set of voluminous Tibetan manuscripts, some of which in a goodstate of preservation, while others had ragged edges and showed signs of mould. A place wasfound in the Library for these Tibetan manuscripts, all rather large but uniform in size, althoughlocated in a section physically separate from the Tucci Collection, both because of the amountof space they required and because at that time they were deemed not to belong to it.

Following my participation in the combined scientific expedition by IsMEO ? Institutf?r Tibetologie und Buddhismuskunde der Universit?t of Vienna to Tabo-Spiti, in the Indian

Union, in 1991, where I was able to examine a large number of manuscripts, I began to takean interest in the study of the external appearance of the manuscripts, that is, in codicology.I very quickly discovered the absence of any general works on this topic, only monographiesin

whichsome indications

concerningancient

orthographyand

palaeographywere to be found.

A first study, presented at the Graz Seminar in 1995, was made by Christina Anna ScherrerSchaub i1). After concluding the cataloguing of existing texts in the Tucci Collection, I turnedto the examination of the above manuscripts that were not part of the Collection and which,after my visit to Tabo, had begun to take on an increasingly familiar appearance inmy eyes.

It seemed plausible that, like all the other Tibetan texts, these had been brought backto Italy by Prof. Giuseppe Tucci and thus saved from loss and destruction. The confirmationthat, like the other Tibetan texts, these were the fruit of Tucci's missions to Tibet came fromthe examination of their content, as they all proved to be manuscript texts of the TibetanbKa' 'gyur. In his 'Tibetan notes' (2)Prof. Tucci writes: '[...] I also possess many volumesof amanuscript bKa' 'gyur found in the ruins of upper Toling'. And again the 'Cronaca della

Missione Scientifica Tucci nel Tibet Occidentale' (3),contains a precise reference to ancient

handwritten copies of the bKa} 'gyur nd the bsTan 'gyur ound in the caves above Toling, which

0) CA. Scherrer Schaub, 'The Need of aMethodological Tool in Studying the Corpus of theTibetan Old Manuscripts', forthcoming nEW.

(2) G. Tucci, 'Tibetan Notes', in Opera Minora, vol. II, Roma 1971, p. 474.

(3)G. Tucci & E. Ghersi, Cronaca dellaMissione Scientifica ucci nel Tibet Occidentale, Roma 1939,p. 306.

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had formerly been used by the monks as their winter residence. The hypothesis that thesenon-Collection manuscripts were actually those found and saved by Prof. Tucci and by Col.Ghersi in the Toling caves is highly probable and not without importance. In the first place,since one of the scientific research projects promoted by IsIAO and presented to the National

Research Council refers to the codicological study of the Tibetan manuscripts from the TucciCollection, and as the identification of the origin of the manuscript itself was, for this kindof study, one of the most important aspects, the research projects seems to have a good andsolid underlying basis. In the second place, the identification of these texts is relevant to the

investigation of the Tibetan bKa* 'gyur, particularly the manuscripts, as is shown by H.Eimer's fundamental studies, followed up by P. Harrison (4) and other scholars, amongwhom we must mention Prof. Steinkellner and Dr H. Tauscher in connection with the TabobKa' 'gyur 5).

One of these manuscripts, marked TTl, possesses a further significant characteristic.Each recto side contains an illuminated image of the Buddha Sakyamuni. Confirmation ofthe

hypothesisof the western Tibetan

originwas also

kindly given byProf. Deborah

KlimburgSalter, to whom I was able to show the manuscript during her recent stay in Rome when sheoffered tomake a further study of these small images. Comparative examination with anotherTucci Collection manuscript that Iwas able to date as about the second half of the 16th centuryand which also came fromWestern Tibet (6),enabled me to set amaximum post quern timelimit for TTl since it displays characteristics that indicate that it is certainly older than the

manuscript from the second half of the 16th century.

Description of theManuscript

The manuscript is a copy of a part of the Prajn?p?ramit? in one hundred thousand verses

'Shes rab kyi pha rold tu phyind stong phrag brgya' pa' or Satas?hasrik?.It is incomplete: it begins with the f. 5a and ends with the f. 408b.Sheets 83 to 99 are missing.In f. 20a2 we find the first division with the: dum bu gnyis pa/bam po gnyis pa'o which

continues with the following division into bam bo: 42a, 61a, 81b, 103a, 122a, 141b, 158a,173b, 189a, 208b, 223a, 236a, 252b, 273b, 288a, 306a, 325b, 347b, 369b, for a total of 21

bam po. The only chapter indication is in 157b, 'Ide'u bzhi pa'o' chapter four.

(4)P. Harrison, 'Meritorious Activity orWaste of Time? Some Remarks on the Editing of Texts

in theTibetan Kanjur', inTibetan Studies, roceedings f the th Seminar of the nternational ssociationfor Tibetan Studies,Narita 1989, ed. Iharara Shoren & Yamaguchi Zuiho, vol. I, pp. 77-93; Tn Searchof the Source of the Bka' 'gyur', n Tibetan Studies, Proceedings f the 6th Seminar of the nternationalAssociation for Tibetan Studies, Fagernes 1992, ed. P. Kvaerne, Oslo 1994, vol. I, pp. 295-317. In these

articles the importance f the handwritten copies of the Tibetan bKa' 'gyur swell pointed out for thestudies into Buddhist canonical literature.

(5) See EW, 44, 1, 1994, dedicated to the result of the scientific expedition to Tabo 1991.

(6)Seemy forthcoming rticle inEW, 'AManuscript of the Sutra of Golden Light from esternTibet'.

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The indication of the bam po-s aswell as the chapter end ismarked by a black line withgold letters written on it. In the sheet margin, top left, we find the letters:

Kha naKha ma

Kha ngaKha baKha 'a

up to 100101-200201-300301-400401-408

The letter 'Kha' is red, the letters 'na, ma, nga, ba, V, are blue.Near the folio number the hundreds are marked with crosses: + + + + + + + + + +It measures 26.50 x 68.50 cm, while the dimensions of written space, marked simply

by two red lines at the side, measures 12 x 54.50 cm.The ink is black and the ductus is regular.Each sheet contains eight lines except for f. 267a, which has 9.There are two circles at the height of lines 4-5, at the centre of which a point is visible,

which sometimes actually becomes a true hole. Sometimes, as in f. 34a, the following signsare found near the point: ().

The presence of the two circles is regular and only in f. 39a are they double, that is, theyform a concentric circle pattern.

The illuminated figure isusually found in the centre of the sheet, on the front side (exceptfor f. 242, which contains it on the reverse side and of f. 237, which contains none) andranges from the largest size of 7 x 7 cm to the smallest 3.50 x 4 cm.

It is generally found lying below the second line, except in f. 138a, in which it startson top of the written space.

In the sheets containing the end of the bam po-s, there are two images, situated either

at the sides of the f. or in the middle.The paper is light brown in colour, of medium weight, and shows signs of mould on theedges and of local restoration in the case of torn sheets. This restoration work is of two kinds:1) small paper rectangles placed over the damaged part, as in the case of ff. 114a-b and 138b;2) yellow wool stitches, as in the case of ff. 77, 162, 178 (white thread), 181, 200, 278, 305,344, 382, 383.

A preliminary orthographic and palaeographic examination reveals the following features:the initial mgo yig is double from f. 5a to f. 158a, and then becomes single and vertical; useof horizontal links as in s-pyod; regular use of da drag; use of socalled compendiosus writingin words containing final ma but which is regularly indicated as an anusvara: ses, bco (i.e.serns, bcom); very limited use of the gi gu log generally used when there is lack of space;abbreviation of the number forty into zhi and not zbe; use of regular va zur in numberingthe folios in fifteen and eighteen.

A more detailed study on this and other manuscripts will be presented on the occasionof the 8th Seminar of the Association for Tibetan Studies, July 1998 in Bloomington.

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