232 wilkens
· meditation,196
· worship,197
· or even more specific: burning of incense,198
· purification of offenses,199
· the attainment of buddhahood,200
· or the performance of a ritual offering.201
Some pilgrimages seem to have had a Tantric background. Inscription S was
first written in Old Uyghur and then in Tibetan. A single person coming from
Hami (OU kamıllıg) expresses his worship; he bears the Tibetan title ‘Venerable’
(OU tsunpa, < Tib. btsun pa).202
Important Uyghur epigraphic sources relating to Tantric and Esoteric
Buddhism in the Gansu corridor have been discovered. Some inscriptions
bear some similarities with colophons as regards contents and form. There
is one bilingual inscription from the Mañjuśrī monastery (Chin. Wenshu si,
文殊寺, Southwest of present-day Jiuquan 酒泉 in Gansu) dated to the year
1326. The recto of the stone tablet contains an inscription in Chinese consist-
ing of 26 lines. The verso bears the Uyghur version also in 26 lines written in
alliterative verses beginning with the Sanskrit introductory formula oṃ svasti
196 Inscription B, ed. Hamilton, Niu, “Inscriptions ouïgoures,” 131.
197 Inscription C, ed. Hamilton, Niu, “Inscriptions ouïgoures,” 133, inscription F, ed. Hamilton,
Niu, “Inscriptions ouïgoures,” 142, inscription I, ed. Hamilton, Niu, “Inscriptions
ouïgoures,” 146–147, inscription K, ed. Hamilton, Niu, “Inscriptions ouïgoures,” 150–151,
inscription N, ed. Hamilton, Niu, “Inscriptions ouïgoures,” 156, inscription O, ed. Hamilton,
Niu, “Inscriptions ouïgoures,” 156–157, inscription Q, ed. Hamilton, Niu, “Inscriptions
ouïgoures,” 160–161, inscriptions S and T, ed. Hamilton, Niu, “Inscriptions ouïgoures,” 166.
On the worship of Mañjuśrī in the pilgrim inscriptions from Dunhuang cf. Matsui, “Tonkō
shosekkutsu,” 30–37.
198 Inscription E, ed. Hamilton, Niu, “Inscriptions ouïgoures,” 139, inscription P, ed. Hamilton,
Niu, “Inscriptions ouïgoures,” 158, inscription J, ed. Matsui, “Revising the Uighur
Inscriptions,” 22.
199 Inscription P, ed. Hamilton, Niu, “Inscriptions ouïgoures,” 158, inscription Q, ed. Hamilton,
Niu, “Inscriptions ouïgoures,” 160–161.
200 Inscription Q, ed. Hamilton, Niu, “Inscriptions ouïgoures,” 160–161.
201 Here in inscription J the Tibetan term for ‘ritual offering’ (Tib. mchod pa, > OU čodpa) is
used. See Matsui, “Revising the Uighur Inscriptions,” 22 (line 6) and commentary on pp.
24–25.
202 Ed. Hamilton, Niu, “Inscriptions ouïgoures,” 166.