Dunhuang Tibetan Chinese- Tibetan Pronunciation Dictionary

Author: Zhou Jiwen
Publisher:
Publishing Date: 2006-06-01
Features: In Tibetan written scrolls, there are two types of scrolls that are relatively special. One is written in Tibetan with phonetic annotations next to Chinese characters, known as "transliteration scrolls." The other is entirely or partially written in transliterated Chinese characters, known as "transliteration scrolls" (or "transliteration and phonetic scrolls"). These transliteration and transliteration scrolls are extremely valuable materials for studying the phonetics, history of Chinese language, Chinese dialects, and phonology of ancient Chinese; as well as the phonetics, history of Tibetan language, and Tibetan dialects of ancient Tibetan.
Table of Contents
Preface
Explanation of Style
Main Text
(1) Comparative Table of Ancient and Modern Phonetic Values of Chinese and Tibetan Characters
(2) Comparative Table of Ancient and Modern Phonetic Values of Tibetan and Chinese Characters
(3) Annotations on the Transliteration Materials of Chinese and Tibetan
Appendix I: Ancient Phonetic Identification Table of Chinese Characters
Appendix II: Comparative Table of Tibetan, Transcription Symbols, Amdo Pronunciation, and Lhasa Pronunciation
References
Index
Postscript
Facsimiles of Original Scrolls (Partial) [View More Table of Contents]
Preface
The Dunhuang Cave System is world-famous. In the representative cave group of Mogao (Thousand Buddha Caves), Cave 16, which contains the Tibetan Manuscript Cave (now numbered as Cave 17), once preserved nearly ten thousand six-century, Sui, Tang, and Song Dynasty manuscripts and woodcuts, as well as various cultural relics for almost a thousand years. The content covers ancient Chinese politics, economy, military, history, philosophy, religion, ethnicity, language, literature, art, science, and technology, as well as many aspects of cultural exchange between East and West along the Silk Road. The languages and scripts used in the manuscripts and woodcuts, in addition to Chinese, also include Tibetan and ancient Western Regions languages. The manuscripts and woodcuts from the Manuscript Cave have attracted the attention of scholars and experts worldwide. They have been actively engaged in research on this topic, thereby forming a new discipline—Dunhuang Studies.
The research objects of Dunhuang Studies, in addition to the architecture, murals, sculptures of the Dunhuang Cave System and related historical and cultural issues, are the manuscripts and woodcuts unearthed from the Manuscript Cave, with the manuscripts being the primary focus. Since the content of the manuscripts covers many aspects, scholars from various disciplines have naturally approached them from their respective fields. This demonstrates that Dunhuang Studies is essentially an interdisciplinary field. The language used in the manuscripts includes both Chinese and other languages, including Tibetan. The study of Tibetan manuscripts naturally intersects with another interdisciplinary field—Tibetan Studies. As a result, over the past eighty years, scholars from both China and abroad have shown great interest in this field and have conducted rigorous, meticulous, and productive research. While studying these materials, the Tang-Tibet Alliance Stele, which shares the same era and similar characteristics, has also been included as a transliteration manuscript in the research.
Those who have studied these materials include linguists and Tibetan scholars. Some of the main researchers who have worked on these materials in the past include: Paul Pelliot and Henri Maspero, who cited parts of the transliteration manuscript "Thousand Character Classic" (1920). Hisashi Hayashi wrote "Fragmentary Manuscripts of Chinese and Tibetan Thousand Character Classic" (1923). F. W. Thomas and G. L. M. Clauson identified the transliteration manuscript "Diamond Sutra," annotating all corresponding Chinese characters (1926). Clauson identified the "Sutra of Amida Buddha," annotating all corresponding Chinese characters (1927). Clauson created two bilingual Tibetan-Chinese indexes for the "Diamond Sutra" and the "Sutra of Amida Buddha" (1929). Thomas meticulously collated two manuscripts—the transliteration manuscript of "The Middle Way of the Great Vehicle" (Ch. 9, II, 17) and its transliteration manuscript (Ch. 80, XI)—by comparing the blank Tibetan phonetic references in the transliteration manuscript with the corresponding characters in the transliteration manuscript, filling most of the gaps to create a coherent text (1929). Luo Changpei wrote "Northwest Dialects of the Tang and Five Dynasties" based on materials such as the "Thousand Character Classic," "The Middle Way of the Great Vehicle," "Sutra of Amida Buddha," "Diamond Sutra," the Tang-Tibet Alliance Stele, and the "Essential Training for Beginners" (Chinese transliteration manuscript) (1933). This is a comprehensive monograph on the study of Tibetan-Chinese transliteration. The book compares the transliteration materials with "Qieyun," proposes the phonological system of Northwest Dialects during the Tang and Five Dynasties, and explores the evolution of these dialects using modern Northwest Dialect data.