Notes on the Small Collections of Turfan Manuscripts in Japan

So far,we have had a relatively clear understanding of the spread and collection of Dunhuang manuscripts,but it is far from clear for us to know the whole story of the spread of unearthed Turfan documents.On one hand,Turfan manuscripts from various sites began to spread before the opening of Dunhuang Literary Cave and its release was far more complicated than that of Dunhuang.On the other hand,the Dunhuang Literary Cave was the main source of Dunhuang manuscripts though later some other documents were found from the Northern Grottoes,while the bits and pieces of Turfan manuscripts,most of which were not unearthed in official archaeological excavations but rather were snatched,sold and plundered by treasure hunters to other places,were found from various sites in Turfan Basin,including townsites and Thousand Buddhas Caves.Therefore,it is far more difficult to search for the scattered Turfan manuscripts than to trace down the Dunhuang manuscripts.In addition,owing to war or short of funds,some collections as Otani documents and Germany Turfan collections originally belonging to the same expedition team were separated once again,and as a result some collections were scattered into smaller ones.For years the author has kept tracking down both the Dunhuang and Turfan manuscripts at home and abroad. After he found out that the collection of Dunhuang documents was comparatively explicit,he began to turn his attention to the collection of Turfan documents, especially to those smaller collections.The″small collections of manuscripts″in this paper refers to those collections excluded from the systematically-collocated and publicized maj or collections in Japan,including the Tokyo National Museum,the Taito Ward Calligraphy Museum in Tokyo, the Seikado Bunko Art Museum,the Fuj ii Saiseikai Yurinkan Museum of Art in Kyoto,the National Diet Library of Japan,the National Museum of Japanese History,the University of Tokyo Library System, the Kyo-U Library of Takeda Science Foundation in Osaka, Ueno Junichi's private collections,and so on.The basic connotations,the origins of the collection,the sorting out and publishing of the documents,with the value of some classics and documents,are elaborated in the paper.For example,the history book contains The Record of the Pre-Han Dynasty:Emperor Xiaowu in official history books;Emperor Wu of Liang Dynasty's the UnificationofThreeReligions — Coufucianism,BuddhismandTaoism,TheShupuHallin Tian'an Temple(poems),Xiao Gang's(Emperor Jianwen of Liang Dynasty)poems of Responseto theInvitationoftheVisittoNewPavilion,PassingthroughthePipaGorge,andOffering Sacrifices to Gods in Hangao Temple,ancient poems and miscellaneous notes,the fragments of the poem EnteringQinchuanfortheFirstTimeandSeeingColdFoodServedonRoad made by Emperor Xuanzong of Tang Dynasty,and the long text Friends Book Instrument written by Tang people;Taoist classics as Prefaceof Lao Tzu's Moral Classics,LaoTzu's Moral Classics,etc.;Buddhist Literature besides Tripitaka, like Scripture of Dharma King,The Twenty-two Dialogues on Mahayana Buddhism,etc.The new materials of documents contain The Document fromPuHongshuaionFebruary 1st(leapmonth,lunarcalendar)oftheSecondYearofTang Kaiyuan,TheDocumentforSomeOfficialinJune(lunarcalendar)oftheSecondYearof TangKaiyuan,ThePriceListoftheMarketinJiaoheCountyintheSecondYearofTang Tianbao,some Documents of the Kitchen of North Posthouse,and so on.Besides,there are Manichaean classics in Persian and in Sogdian,and numerous fragments of engraved Buddhist Sutras of Khitan Tripitaka,which are all important references to the study on the history of Buddhist Sutras transmission and printing.