LECTURE> Dr. Marciniak (Warsaw), “From the palm-leaf manuscript ‘Sa’ to a new edition of the Mahāvastu,” March 2

Dear Colleagues,

On behalf of the Department of Religious Studies, I am pleased to announce an online lecture on “From the palm-leaf manuscript ‘Sa’ to a new edition of the Mahāvastu” by Dr. Katarzyna Marciniak for the REL Distinguished Lecture Series at the University of the West in Rosemead, California.

Time: Thursday, March 2, 2023, at 2 pm Pacific Time

Please click on the link below to register for the talk

https://form.jotform.com/230386023968158

From the palm-leaf manuscript ‘Sa’ to a new edition of the Mahāvastu 

Dr. Katarzyna Marciniak

Research Centre of Buddhist Studies, University of Warsaw, Poland

Abstract

The Mahāvastu, a Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit biography of the Buddha belonging to the Vinayapiṭaka of the Mahāsāṃghika-Lokottaravādins, is an extremely important text for several reasons. In recent years a new edition of the text has been published (vol. III, 2019; vol. II, 2020, vol. I is still under preparation) on the basis of the oldest palm-leaf manuscript, ‘Sa’ of the text dated to ca. 12th c—CE, which has been preserved in Nepal. The proposed talk outlines the process of the preparation of the new edition of the Mahāvastu, beginning with the research on the preserved manuscripts and their paratexts (colophons and post-colophons, in particular), through the construction of the stemma codicum, the examination of the language (Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit) attested in the oldest extant manuscript ‘Sa’ and its relation to that preserved in all the later copies of the text, mostly in the oldest paper manuscript ‘Na’, ending with the final result of the research – the new edition of the Mahāvastu and its importance for Buddhist philology. 

Bio

Dr. Katarzyna Marciniak is the head of the Research Center of Buddhist Studies, the Faculty of Oriental Studies of the University of Warsaw, Poland. She obtained a doctorate degree at the Faculty of Oriental Studies, University of Warsaw, in 2013. She was a research fellow at the International Research Institute for Advanced Buddhology at Soka University, Japan, from 2016-2020, where she published two volumes of a new edition of the Mahāvastu. Her research interests include narrative literature (particularly jātakas), Mahāvastu, Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit, manuscriptology, and paleography (Nepalese manuscripts of Buddhist Sanskrit texts, in particular).

This event is free and open to the public. The lecture will be conducted over Zoom.

Warm regards,

Dr. Miroj Shakya

Associate Professor and Chair

Department of Religious Studies

Director, Digital Sanskrit Buddhist Canon Project

University of the West

Tel.: (626) 571 8811 Ext. 3321

www.dsbcproject.org