Indian Antiquary Vol 42

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Devadatta Ramkrishna Bhandarkar
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 349

CHAPTER 1]
BOWER MANUSCRIPT
undertaken with the object of archeological exploration. Their main object was scientific, ie., geographical, geological, zoological, and the like, and any antiquities which they, brought home had been gathered, as it were, accidentally and by the way. The first expedition to Eastern Turkestan which was undertaken avowedly for the purpose of exploring the country archeologically, and excavating ancient sites, was the Russian of M. D. Klementz in 1898.13 As in the case of the expedition* of Sir Aurel Stein, it owed its inception directly to the stimulus imparted originally by the discovery of the Bower Manuscript. A series of archæological expeditions now followed in rapid succession. It comprised the first German expedition, led by Professor Grünwedel, in 1902-3; a Japanese expedition, in 1902-3, under Count Otani; the second German (or first Prussian) expedition, under Dr. A. von Le Coq, in 1904-7; and the second Prussian expedition led again by Professor Grünwedel, in 1905-7. These were followed, in 1936-8, by the second British expedition of Sir Aurel Stein, which was extraordinarily successful; and fruitful of archæological results, and of which a preliminary account was published in the Geographical Journal (for July and September 1909). The last of the series was the French expedition, under M. Paul Pelliot in 1907, which has recently (autumn 1909), returned to Europe. As it made a particular point of thoroughly exploring the district of Kuchar, where the Bower Manuscript was found, its full and final report when it appears may be hoped to set at rest any still remaining doubts regarding the exact locality and time of its discovery.15
In the meantime the publication of the Bower Manuscript steadily pursued its course. The proposal to prepare a complete edition of its text, illustrated with facsimile Plates, and accompanied by an annotated English Translation, was a corded, in 1892, the sanction of the Government of India through the cordial support of Sir Charles Elliott, the then Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal. The first part of the edition appeared in 1893; the Second Part (in two fasciculi) in 1894-5, and the remaining Parts III to VII in 1897This completed the edition of the text and translation. After an interruption of several years, caused by my retirement from India and engagement in other time-absorbing work on subsequent finds of ancient Central Asian Manuscripts, the Sanskrit Index, being a complete vocabulary of the Bower Manuscript, was published in 1908, and a Revised Translation of its medical portions, in Parts I, II and III, in 1909. The Introduction, benefiting by the long delay and the attendant material increase of information, now brings the laborious work of the edition to its long-desired completion.
The Bower Manuscript itself, which till the completion of the edition of the text in 1897 had remained in the hands of the editor, was returned, in April 1898, to its owner, Colonel Bower. By him it was taken to England, where it was finally purchased, in 1898, by its present possessor, the Bodleian Library in Oxford, 16
It remains to determine, so far as it is possible with the evidence at present available, the exact locality and the exact time of the discovery of the Bower Manuscript.
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Since the above list was written, two new expeditions have been undertaken, and are now in progress: a German under Dr. A. von Lecoq which left Berlin in April, 1913, and a British, under Sir Aurel Stein, which started from Kashmir, in August, 1913.
13 A report was published in the Transactions of the Imp. Russian Archeol. Soc., Vol. XIII. of 1899; transl. into German by O. v. Haller.
14 A summary report appeared in the Century Magazine for October, 1906.
15 A preliminary report, read in the séance of the French Academy, on the 22nd of March 1907, is referred to in the sequel (No. x. p. viii). The preliminary sketch map of the Kuchar district, which illustrates this chapter, was, in response to a request from me, most kindly prepared by Dr. Vaillant, who had accompanied M. Pelliot on his expedition.
16 In the Second Part (1905) of the Library Catalogue it is No. 1090, p. 110.