Introduction 15
the Kashmir Kārkoṭa power. The Zangskari might have impressed their neigh-
bours with their degree of Kashmiricisation. From a macro-level perspective,
however, the subject of transfer is of interest: the production of Maitreya
sculptures. In fact, the Mahāyāna Buddhist bodhisattva cult of Maitreya was
a then widespread trend not only in the Western Himalayas but also in Eastern
Central Asia (and beyond). A particularly well-known example from around the
same time as the Zangskar sculptures is found in the West Uyghur Kingdom at
Kočo in the Turfan region where the cult was flourishing between the 9th and
13th centuries.24 Among the Uyghur materials the best known and certainly
most elaborate textual evidence is the Meeting with Maitreya (Maitrisimit)
in Old Uyghur dating from the second half of the 10th century.25 Just as the
Maitreya sculptures in Zangskar served local ends in negotiating Buddhist, cul-
tural and political alliances and identities, the Maitreya figure equally did so
in the Uyghur context where it even produced hybrid forms at the Buddhist-
Manichean interface.26
This brings us to the last section, on transfer agents. It looks at transfer
processes from the angle of different ethnic groups and their impacts on
the Buddhist field. Two case studies are provided, namely chapter six on the
unfolding of Buddhism at large in the West Uyghur Kingdom, the major node
around the Turfan region, and chapter seven, on Chinese Esoteric Buddhism
at the major node Dunhuang.27 In chapter six Jens Wilkens provides a detailed
overview of Uyghur Buddhist culture, its characteristics and the relationship of
Buddhism to the rulers and other important members of Uyghur society. The
major impact of Buddhism among the Uyghurs occurred with their migration
into the Turfan region upon the demise of the East Uyghur Empire and the
founding of the West Uyghur Kingdom (847) with the capital first at Solmı
24 The Maitreya cult was widely spread in Eastern Central Asia. Depictions of Maitreya
are visible in Dunhuang murals from the 5th to the 13th centuries. The Uyghurs in Kočo
were most likely influenced through the neighbouring oasis of Dunhuang around the
10th century. See Kasai, Yukiyo, “Der Ursprung des Alttürkischen Maitreya-Kults,” in
Die Erforschung des Tocharischen und die alttürkische Maitrisimit, ed. Yukiyo Kasai,
Abdurishid Yakup and Desmond Durkin-Meisterernst (Turnhout: Brepols, 2013), 67–104.
25 Ibid., 69. For this text see also the chapter by Jens Wilkens in this volume.
26 Hans-Joachim Klimkeit (Hymnen und Gebete der Religion des Lichts. Iranische und
türkische liturgische Texte der Manichäer Zentralasiens (Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag,
1989), 191) quotes the example of the Central Asian Manichean Bema liturgy where Mani,
identified as Maitreya, is descending from paradise.
27 Originally, two further case studies on Tibetan and Tangut perspectives in Eastern Central
Asia were planned for this volume, yet could not be realised in time. These topics will be
dealt with within the larger envisioned research project.