2007 Fiscal Year Final Research Report Summary
Decipherment of unpublished Sogdian text
| Project/Area Number |
18520325
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| Research Category |
Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
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| Allocation Type | Single-year Grants |
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| Section | 一般 |
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| Research Field |
Linguistics
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| Research Institution | Kyoto University |
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Principal Investigator |
YOSHIDA Yutaka Kyoto University, Graduate Scool of Letters, Professor Letters (30191620)
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| Project Period (FY) |
2006 – 2007
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| Keywords | Sogdian / Linguistics / Silk Road / Iranian / Historical Linguistics / Philology / Otani Expedition / Turfan material |
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| Research Abstract |
During the last two years of 2006-2007, unpublished Sogdian texts housed at the Trufanforschung (Berlin) and St. Petersburg Branch of the Vostoko Vedenie Institute of Russian Academy of Science were investigated and deciphered by me. For the former, I read from the photographs available through internet, while those belong to the latter institution I spent a week there and read the texts in situ. Fortunately, I was able to transcribe the all the Buddhist Sogdian and Manichaean Sogdian texts belongng to the two institutions during the two years. Apart from them I was given an unexpected opprtunity to study Sogdian materials newly discovered in Milan, China and I have already published my result both in English and Japanese. While I was staying in Turfan August 2007, I discovered a Sogdian inscription which has not so far been recognized as suck I alai read the text but my reading has not been published properly. In December 2006, a small group of Turfan documents was re-discovered among the old file of one scholar who was acquainted with a certain member of the Otani Expedition dispatched in the early 20th century. Among them one finds about forty Sogdian fragments and the list of the entire collection was produced by me in collaboration with the staff of Ryukoku University, which has looked after the collections of the Otani Expedition for the last 50 years. I was asked by the staff of the Ryukoku University to accompany them in examining those Turfan texts now housed in the Museum of Port Arthur; I found several interesting Sogdian fragments among them. They will hopefully be studied during the coming years when the museum in question and Ryukoku University collaborate in studying them.
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