The Bajaur Collection of Buddhist Kharosthi Manuscripts (DFG)

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June 27, 2008, 11.00 AM: Another Collection of Kharoṣṭhī Manuscripts from Gandhāra (Harry Falk)

XVth Congress of the International Association of Buddhist Studies , Emory University, Atlanta

06/27/2008, 11:00 AM Uhr

23.6. - 28.6.2008

Abstract

A few years back a small collection of birch-bark mss was located in a private collection. The texts are written in  Kharoṣṭhī script and comprise

- about 50 stanzas of a new version of the Dharmapada, which, when compared to the one published by Brough, display the wide range of tolerated orthographical variations. It also contains a substantial number of verses not yet found in such collections, some taken from the canonical literature, a few obviously composed anew.

- a fragment of the Suttanipāta, showing 5 verses from the Aṭṭhakavagga

- parts of a Prajñāpāramitā, being very close to chapters 1 and 5 of the Aṣṭasāhasrikā not showing some paragraphs which are also missing in Lokakṣema's translation.

- a series of Avadānas for which parallels have not yet been found.

  Two fragments have been dated through C14 methods; the results are either surprising or proof of the unreliability of this technique.
  Although the local origin of the collection is unknown, the script puts it in a line with the BL collection, pointing to the core area of Gandhāra, in the first centuries AD.