Carmen Meinert and Henrik Sorensen : Buddhism in Central Asia I, Patronage, Legitimation, Sacred Space, and Pilgrimage

The ERC-funded research project BuddhistRoad aims to create a new framework to enable understanding of the complexities in the dynamics of cultural encounter and religious transfer in pre-modern Eastern Central Asia. Buddhism was one major factor in this exchange: for the first time the multi-layered relationships between the trans-regional Buddhist traditions (Chinese, Indian, Tibetan) and those based on local Buddhist cultures (Khotanese, Uyghur, Tangut, Khitan) will be explored in a systematic way. The first volume Buddhism in Central Asia (Part I): Patronage, Legitimation, Sacred Space, and Pilgrimage is based on the start-up conference held on May 23rd–25th, 2018, at CERES, Ruhr-Universität Bochum (Germany) and focuses on the first two of altogether six thematic topics to be dealt with in the project, namely on “patronage and legitimation strategy” as well as “sacred space and pilgrimage.”

Max Deeg

is Professor in Buddhist Studies at Cardiff University, Wales, U.K. His research focuses on the history of Buddhism in the medieval period with a particular interest in Sino-Indian exchange. At the moment he is preparing a translation and commentary of Xuanzang’s (600/602–664, 玄奘) Datang Xiyu ji 大唐西域記 [Records of the Western Regions of the Great Tang Dynasty]. His recent publications include: Max Deeg, Die Strahlende Lehre: Die Stele von Xi’an (Vienna: LIT, 2018), and Max Deeg, Miscellanae Nepalicae: Early Chinese Report on Nepal—The Foundation Legend of Nepal in its Trans-Himalayan Context(Lumbini: Lumbini International Research Institute, 2016).

Erika Forte

is an expert on Buddhist Archaeology and Art in Eastern Central Asia and China. She has been working as a Research Associate of the ERC project BuddhistRoad at Ruhr University until July 2019. In August 2019 she started to work at the IKGA—Institute for the Cultural and Intellectual History of Asia, Austrian Academy of Science (Vienna, Austria), at her FWF stand-alone project “Contextualizing Ancient Remains: Networks of Buddhist Monasteries in Central Asia.” Her research interests include issues of cultural flow and dynamics of Buddhist visual communication across Central Asia, with focus on the cultural history of Khotan oasis during the 1st millennium CE. Her recent studies include: Erika Forte, “A Journey ‘to the Land on the Other Side’: Buddhist Pilgrimage and Travelling Objects from the Oasis of Khotan,” in Cultural Flows across the Western Himalaya (Vienna: Austrian Academy of Sciences, 2015) and Erika Forte, Liang Junyan, Deborah Klimburg-Salter, Zhang Yun and Helmut Tauscher, Crossing Borders: Tibet in Dialogue with its Neighbors: History, Culture and Art of Central and Western Tibet, 8th to 15th Century(Beijing, Vienna: China Tibetology Publishing House, 2015).

Yukiyo Kasai

is a Research Associate of the ERC project BuddhistRoad at Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Germany, and as a Turcologist she specialises in Old Uyghur Buddhist Studies. Her recent publications include: Yukiyo Kasai, Die altuigurischen Fragmente mit Brāhmī-Elementen (unter Mitarbeit von Hirotoshi Ogihara). Berliner Turfantexte XXXVIII (Turnhout: Brepols, 2017) and Yukiyo Kasai, “The Old Uyghur Extract of the Za ahanjing (T. 99). The Third of Three Folios Preserved in the Hedin Collection (1935.52.0011),” in The Old Uyghur Āgama Fragments Preserved in the Sven Hedin Collection, Stockholm, ed. Yukiyo Kasai et al., 177–196 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2017).

Carmen Meinert

is Professor for Central Asian Religions and PI of the ERC project Buddhist­Road at CERES, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Germany. Trained in Buddhist Studies, Tibetan Studies, and Sinology, she aims to develop the field of Central Asian religions more systematically and to integrate Central Asian and Tibetan Studies in the larger framework of Comparative Religious Studies. Her recent publications include: Ann Heirman, Carmen Meinert, and Christoph Anderl, eds., Buddhist Encounters and Identities across East Asia (Leiden: Brill, 2018) and Carmen Meinert, ed., Transfer of Buddhism across Central Asian Networks (7th to 13th Centuries) (Leiden: Brill, 2016).

Simone-Christiane Raschmann

is a Turcologist. She is an employee of the research project The Union Catalogue of Oriental Manuscripts in German Collections at the Göttingen Academy of Sciences, Germany, specialised in Old Uyghur Studies with the focus on Old Uyghur Philology. Among her main research interests is the study of the Old Uyghur official and private documents. Her recent publications include: Simone-Christiane Raschmann, “New Traces of an Old Uyghur Extract of the Za ahanjing (T. 99). The First of Three Folios Preserved in the Hedin Collection (1935.52.09),” in The Old Uyghur Āgama Fragments Preserved in the Sven Hedin Collection, Stockholm, ed. Yukiyo Kasai et al., 139–162 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2017), and Simone-Christiane Rasch­mann and Osman-Fikri Sertkaya, eds., Alttür­kische Handschriften. Teil 20: Alttür­kische Texte aus der Berliner Turfansammlung im Nachlass Reşid Rahmeti Arat (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner, 2016).

Kirill Solonin

is Professor at the School of Chinese Classics at Renmin University, China. His current research concentrates on the issues of Tangutology, Tangut language, and Sino-Tibetan Buddhism. His recent publications include: Kirill Solonin, “Dīpaṃkara in the Tangut Context. An Inquiry into the Systematic Nature of Tibetan Buddhism in Xixia,” Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae 68.4 (2015): 425–451 (part 1) and Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae 69.1 (2016): 1–25 (part 2) and Kirill Solonin, “Local Literatures: Tangut/Xixia,” in Brill’s Encyclopedia of Buddhism, vol. 1, ed. Jonathan A. Silk, Oskar von Hinüber, and Vincent Eltschinger, 844–859 (Leiden: Brill, 2015).

Henrik H. Sørensen

is the Research Coordinator of the ERC project BuddhistRoad at Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Germany. His field of interest covers East Asian Buddhism broadly defined with special emphasis on the relation between religious practice and material culture including religious art. His recent publications include: Henrik H. Sørensen, “Buddhist Pilgrimage and Spiritual Identity: Korean Sŏn Monks Journeying to Tang China in Search of the Dharma,” in Buddhist Encounters and Identities Across East Asia, ed. Ann Heirman, Carmen Meinert, and Christoph Anderl, 283–300 (Leiden: Brill, 2018) and Henrik H. Sørensen, “Spells and Magical Practices as Reflected in the Early Chinese Buddhist Sources (c. 300–600 CE) and their Implications for the Rise and Development of Esoteric Buddhism,” in Chinese and Tibetan Tantric Buddhism, ed. Yael Bentor and Meir Shahar, 41–71 (Leiden: Brill, 2017).

Sem Vermeersch

is Associate Professor at the Department of Religious Studies at Seoul National University, South Korea, and concurrently serves as the Director of the International Center for Korean Studies at the Kyujanggak Institute for Korean Studies. His major field of interest is the history of Korean Buddhism, focusing particularly on the organisational aspects of the religion, its social and political contexts, and its position within East Asian Buddhism. His recent publications include: Sem Vermeersch, A Chinese Traveler in Medieval Korea: An Illustrated Account of the Xuanhe Embassy to Koryŏ(Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2016), and Sem Vermeersch, “Views on Buddhist Precepts and Morality in Late Koryŏ,” Journal of Korean Religions 7.1 (2016): 35–65.

Verena Widorn

is an Art Historian. She is Director of the Western Himalaya Archive Vienna and lecturer at the University of Vienna and specialises in material culture, art, and architecture along the pilgrimage routes in the Himalayas. Her recent publications include: Verena Widorn, Ute Franke, and Petra Latschenberger, eds., Contextualizing Material Culture in South and Central Asia in Pre-Modern Times. South Asian Archaeology and Art: Papers from the 20th Conference of the European Association for South Asian Archaeology and Art held in Vienna from 4th to 9th of July 2010 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2016), and Verena Widorn, “Traversing the Land of Siddhas and Dakinis—Art Historical Evidence along the Buddhist Pilgrimage Routes through Lahul,” in Cultural Flows across the Western Himalaya, ed. Patrick McAllister, Christina Scherrer Schaub, and Helmut Krasser, 189–235 (Vienna: Austrian Academy of Sciences, 2015).

Jens Wilkens

is based at the Academy of Sciences at Göttingen, Germany. He works for the project Dictionary of Old Uyghur. His field of interests covers Central Asian Buddhism and Old Uyghur Studies. His recent publications include: Jens Wilkens, Bud­dhistische Erzählungen aus dem alten Zentralasien: Edition der altuigurischen Daśa­karma­pathāvadānamālā (Turnhout: Brepols, 2016), and Jens Wilkens, “Buddhism in the West Uyghur Kingdom and Beyond,” in Transfer of Buddhism Across Central Asian Networks (7th to 13th Centuries), ed. Carmen Meinert, 191–249 (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2016).

​Hardcover, 244 pages, Leiden 2020, new