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Legends of Khotan and Nepal

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 December 2009

Extract

It has already been noted by Professor F. W. Thomas 1 that there are several striking coincidences in religious topography between Buddhist Khotan and Nepal. In addition to place–names, however, there is also a considerable body of legendary tradition common to the two countries.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © School of Oriental and African Studies 1948

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References

1 Tibetan Literary Texts and Documents from Chinese Turkestan, vol. i, p. 6

2 E.g. Dpag–bsam–ljon–bzan (ed. Sarat Chandra Das), pp. 147, 148.

3 Stein, Ancient Khotan, p. 160; Rājataranginī, vol. ii, pp. 388 f. (text, i, 25 ff.).

4 Thomas, Texts, i, 12–35; ef. also pp. 95, 307.

5 The work is known in three recensions, of which only the Brhat–sv.–p. has been published (Haraprasad Sastri, Bibl. Ind., 1900), and in default of anything better, references are given here to this edition.

6 Cambridge Univ. Lib. Add. 1952a. The History of Nepal edited by D. Wright (1877) is a translation of this work.

7 pp. 166 ff.

1 p. 174. The text is very corrupt at this point, but the general sense seems certain.

2 Ancient Khotan, pp. 185 ff. See also Lévi, BEFEO., iv, 31, 40

3 Thomas, Texts, i, 15.

4 pp. 8–9.

5 Wright, History of Nepal, p. 79.

6 The synonymous Ku–stana, which is one of the forms of the name found in the Central Asian Kharosthi documents (in the derivative Icustanaga–), has usually been employed by modern writers. But Gostana, already argued for by Lévi, BEFEO., v, 258 f., has since been established as the indigenous form, Bailey, BSOS., IX, 541; X, 919.

7 Wright, p. 111. The text in Camb. Univ. Lib. Add. 1952a, fol. 39a, reads: śok rājā, āphnā sahar jāū bhani, nepāl bāta jādā, tisya–laksmī rānī lāl nepāl āyā pachi, garbhadhān [sic] bhayā kī hunā le, nepāl bāta pharkī jādā bāta mā putra janma bhayo ra, bātai mā ban dud pilāya, las nimitta, tyo rājkumār ko nām mahipan bhani prakhyāt bhai gayā, tas jaggā ko nām pani mahīpan bhani prakhyāt bhai gayā.

1 Thomas, Texts, i, 97 ff.

2 i, 17 f.

3 pp. 141 fF., 147.

4 pp. 247 fF.

5 Wright, p. 83.

6 Svayambhū–purāna, pp. 321 ff.; Wright, pp. S4–5.

1 Thomas, Texts, i, 133; of. also Bailey, BSOAS., X, 023.

2 Wright, p. 110.

3 Cambridge Univ. Lib. Add. 1366, fol. 99b. I hope shortly to publish an edition and translation of this text.

4 Asia Major, ii, 256. Cf. also Bailey, BSOAS., X, 923–4.

5 So R. Mitra, Buddhist Literature of Nepal, p. 257, probably correctly. The Bibl: Indica edition, p. 487, has the unintelligible reading, gurum garitam.

6 Stein, Ancient Khotan, pp. 186 ff.

1 Cf. Bailey, BSOAS., X, 923.

1 p. 157.

2 pp. 322, 324.

3 JASB., 50 (1881), p. 223.

4 hdzam–glin–rgyas–bśad.

5 JASB., 55, p. 201.

6 Life of the Buchlha, p. 230.

7 Ed. Schiefner, p. 27.

1 Ed. S. C. Das, p. 170.

2 Cf. also Hodgson, Essays on the Languages, Literature and Religion of Nepal and Tibet, p. 21, note–:The temples of Kasachit and of Swayambhu Natha though situated in the valley of Nepaul, are almost exclusively in the keeping of the Tibetans, and Lamas are the permanent ministering functionaries.