Drangsong 126: Yul btsan bchod[mchod] pa zhugs+ho[bzhugs+ho]
This dataset contains photographs of the manuscript pages with handwritten text. It is a part of the royal Drangsong collection from Mustang, Nepal.
This offering ritual is performed if one vomits blood as a result of an encounter with a btsan deity. Staring from the land of Lo, all the btsan deities are worshipped throughout all the Tibetan world, the three districts in upper Tibet (mnga’ ris skor gusm), the four horns in central Tibet (dbus gstang ru bzhi), and the six ranges in lower Tibet (mdo khams sgang drug), where they usually live on red mountains or rocky cliffs.
It is composed of 8 folios.
File naming convention within Drangsong_126.zip archive:
Drangsong_126_001r.jpg
Drangsong_126 → collection name and number
001 → page number
r / v → recto / verso
DRANGSONG PROJECT
The data included here were produced by the members and collaborators of the Drangsong project conducted in the years 2019-2024. Translations of titles and colophons were done by Charles Ramble and Naljor Tsering, transcriptions of selected texts by Nyima Drandul. The features such as bookbinding style, format and layout of manuscripts, as well as the type of paper illustrated with close-up and microscopic images, were taken by Agnieszka Helman-Ważny. The illustrations were described by Nils Martin, and the photographic documentation taken in situ was done by Thomas Schrom and Rinchen Loden Lama. Detailed studies and laboratory analyses of paper samples were carried out by Agnieszka Helman-Wazny in collaboration with the Interdisciplinary Laboratory of Archaeometric Research at the University of Warsaw (Barbara Wagner, Agata Szubartowska, Alicja Święcicka, and Bartłomiej Witkowski) and Warsaw University of Technology (Grażyna Zofia Żukowska), using integrated methods such as microscopic fibre analysis, Reflectance Transformation Imaging/Polynomial Texture Maps (RTI / PTM), and X-ray fluorescence spectrometry (XRF). The C14 analyses were performed at the Poznań Radiocarbon Lab (Tomasz Goslar).
PROJECT DETAILS
The Project No. UMO-2018/30/M/HS3/00372 funded by The National Science Centre, Poland, in the framework of the HARMONIA 10 program, hosted by the Faculty of Journalism, Information and Bibliology, Department of Books, and Media History, University of Warsaw, Poland in a partnership with the École Pratique des Hautes Études and the Centre de recherche sur les civilisations de l'Asie orientale (CRCAO), Paris.
Title: Protecting the Kingdom with Tibetan Manuscripts: codicological and historical analysis of the royal Drangsong collection from Mustang, Nepal.
Project PI: Agnieszka Helman-Ważny hagniwaz@gmail.com
Project co PI: Charles Ramble
The aim of this project was to carry out a codicological and text-historical study of a unique collection of manuscripts, named Drangsong, belonging to the Bön religion of Tibet. It is named after the lineage of Bönpo priests in whose house it is kept. The collection, consisting of 340 different items with a total of 3,477 folios, cards, or individual sheets of paper, represents the ritual repertoire of the priests of the kings of Mustang, once a Tibetan kingdom and now a district of Nepal. The manuscripts exemplify the variety of forms, scripts, decorations, materials and other codicological features. The texts have not been used since the priestly line ended in the 1950s or 60s. The value of this collection is twofold: first, the collection was assembled from different parts of Tibet and the Himalaya over six centuries, and offers a rich body of material which can be retrieved by material and codicological analyses that will contribute to our understanding of book and paper making traditions in the region, as well as social aspects of Tibetan manuscript production; and secondly, in terms of its content, it offers a window onto the nature of royal religion in a Tibetan kingdom. These manuscripts were used in rituals for the protection and prosperity of the kingdom of Mustang, its subjects and members of royal lineage; knowledge of the materials and ritual practices involved in the creation of physical objects will help to understand the interaction between religion, patronage and political authority in Tibetan society.
DATASET FILES
The dataset contains files:
• Drangsong_126.zip (master scans of the manuscript pages with color checker),
• Drangsong_126.pdf (containing presentation images of the manuscript pages),
• Drangsong_126_001v.png (manuscript page sample),
• Drangsong_126_backlites.zip (backlit samples),
• Drangsong_126_macros.zip (in close-up samples),
• Drangsong_126_XRF_analysis.png (X-ray fluorescence spectrometry).
DESCRIPTION OF THE MANUSCRIPT
Detailed information on writing, materials, format, and layout is provided in a Readme.txt file attached to this dataset.
(2024)
