Creation of Tantric Sacred Spaces in Eastern Central Asia

Abstract

The spread of Tantric Buddhism in Eastern Central Asia between the 10th and early 13th centuries is well documented in textual and visual evidence from various sites. Among the earliest dateable textual evidences of Tantric Buddhism in Eastern Central Asia are the Tibetan Dunhuang manuscripts from the second half of the 10th century, as recent palaeographic research by Sam van Schaik and Jacob Dalton shows.1 So far, these manuscripts have been used mostly by scholars of Tibetan Studies, for whom they are seen as constituing auxiliary materials to the reconstruction of early Tibetan Buddhist history— particularly valuable due to the lack of equivalent materials for this period deriving from Tibet itself. However, to my knowledge none have so far looked at Eastern Central Asian Buddhism as an integrated system in itself, which also influenced the development of Buddhism in Tibet (and in the Sinitic world as well). As an example, in my earlier work, I examine individual interesting manuscripts from the Dunhuang Collection, without addressing the larger context in which these were actually produced. I failed to question what these manuscripts actually meant for the local Eastern Central Asian communities themselves.2 However, here I suggest that with a deeper knowledge of the spread of