buddhism in the west uyghur kingdom and beyond 241
Mongol emperor248 Tuγ Temür (reigned from 1329–1332) and his wife desig-
nated as belonging to the lineage of bodhisattvas:
May the emperor and empress who belong to the lineage of the
bodhisattvas live many tens of thousands (of years).249
Similarly, in the text known under the title “Uyghur Hymn”, an unidentified
ruler is designated as belonging to the lineage of the bodhisattvas.250 The
expression ‘belonging to the lineage of bodhisattva(s)’ (OU bodis(a)t(a)v
ugušlug) is found many times in the cycle of stories Daśakarmapathāvadā-
namālā as an epithet of animals and persons when they are identified as for-
mer births of the Buddha. It is attested as an epithet of the Mongol or Uyghur
ruler in several colophons.251 In Mongolian texts, we find the calque ‘belonging
to the lineage of the bodhisattva(s)’ (Mong. bodistw törölkitü).252
The image of the ruler as being close to the future Buddha Maitreya can be
expressed by another epithet, which emphasises the fact that he descended
from the tuṣita heaven.
[.. .] [the Mongol emperor] by showing once again favour to our ruler
who descended from the tuṣita heaven [.. .],253 (CI V, 13)254
Different is the statement found in an inscription that members of the
Chagataids ascended to the tuṣita heaven (i. e., after their death, in order to
stay with the future Buddha Maitreya):
248 On the Mongol emperor as bodhisattva see Zieme, Religion und Gesellschaft, 76–77.
249 Kasai, Kolophone, 57 [text no. 6.19(68–69)].
250 (OU bodis(a)t(a)v ugušlug hagan hatun tüg tümän yašazun) Cf. Zieme, Buddhistische
Stabreimdichtungen, text no. 39.17: “O our [ruler], who belongs to the lineage of the
bodhisattvas” (OU bodis(a)t(a)v ugušlug [han]ım(ı)[z-a]).
251 Zieme, “Bemerkungen zur Datierung,” 394 (reprint: 521) quotes two more attestations in
colophons (Rājāvavādaka-colophon, a Buyan ävirmäk to the 圓覺經 Yuanjue jing). The
first colophon was reedited in Kasai, Kolophone, 207 [text no. 109], the second in Kasai,
Kolophone, 116 [text no. 41]. See the hymn to the Uyghur ruler (han) and to the Uyghur
realm edited in Zieme, Buddhistische Stabreimdichtungen, text no. 39.17.
252 E.g., as an epithet of Altan Qan in the Erdeni tunumal neretü sudur (Elverskog, Jewel
Translucent Sūtra, 242).
253 (OU tušittın enmiš t(ä)ŋrikänimizni yänä soyurka[p][.. .])Balati, Liu, “Yiduhu gaochang
wang,” 69 (line 219) read soyurkadıp.
254 Geng, Hamilton, “Stèle commémorative,” 22.