Catalogue of Drakmar Collections Published

A detailed catalogue of the precise textual contents of the canonical collections from Drakmar Monastery in Dolpo has just been published along with the digital images of the manuscripts on the rKTs archive (under “handlist” or “viewer”) and also shared with BDRC.

The manuscripts comprise altogether 116 volumes, with larger sets or individual volumes being produced and added to the collection at different times. A substantial part of the collection is constituted by a Sūtra collection (30 volumes) and a Tantra collection (18 of 20 volumes are present). Further, there are different sets of Prajñāpāramitā and other larger sūtras as well as collections of dhāraṇīs and related volumes. While the collection thus contains many of the typical building blocks of a Kangyur, it was clearly not produced as a coherent set in this sense. It rather reflects a phase prior to the formation of structured Kangyurs, when larger text collections of a similar type were transmitted independently. These collections feature individual works but also alternative textual versions not found in later mainstream Kangyurs.

Reports on the documentation of the manuscripts in 2023 and 2022 including images of the site were already published.

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