Khotan Factors Research. Tang And Song Dynasties, Dunhuang Grottoes

As one of the most important stops on the southern route of the Silk Road, Kotan maintained substantial political, cultural, and religious contacts with the Han regimes in central China. During the time period between Han and Tang dynasties, especially when Dunhuang was ruled by Tibet and the Guiyijun of Cao, given the close and direct ties between Shazhou and Kotan, a plethora of images bearing traces of Kotan culture appeared in the caves of Dunhuang.These Kotan images may be categorized into two groups. Group one refers to stereotyped images imported from Kotan, such as auspicious images of Kotan, guardian deities of Kotan, and Vaisravana. These images were partially transformed when arrived in Dunhuang, but the original stylistic features remained prominent. The other group of images was generated by the arrival of Kotan sutras and the imagination of Kotan by the Han area populace. One example in case is the representation of the Khotan king leading a lion modeled after Manjusri Bodhisattva.The agenda of this dissertation is to study the latter group of images. Through comparing a diversity of images and researching textual sources,I aim to locate the origin of their styles and cultural features, and to explain why they appeared in Dunhuang caves. Based on my research focused on these images, I argue that Buddhist ideas of Kotan, especially Buddhist eschatology, were influential when introduced into the Dunhuang area at the time of the Tibetan rule and the Guiyijun of Cao. Local people borrowed auspicious images and guardian deities from Kotan as guardians of Dunhuang.On the other hand, the absorption of Kotan Buddhism by the Dunhuang and central China areas had produced Kotan as an important Buddhist kingdom in the imagination of the ordinary people. They in turn started to imagine the kingdom and king of Kotan. At the time of the Guiyijun of Cao, local rulers married the royal house of Kotan and brought a large number of Kotan people into Dunhuang. Images of the Kotan royal family as patrons of Buddhism appeared in Dunhuang caves. Through investigating these patronage images and other images of Kotan traces at the time of the Guiyijun of Cao, I demonstrate that Sinocizing tendencies could be observed in the late history of the Kotan royal house. I also argue that Sinocization originated in Dunhuang, which interacted with Kotan closely.