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Friends,

In the late 80s, I spent many weeks walking in between various jungle villages in Xishuangbanna 西双版纳傣族自治州, staying with different groups of "minority people", like the Bulang 布朗族 (also called Blang).

In one of the Bulang villages, an old scribe gave me a number of handwritten manuscripts as a present. We both communicated in Chinese (not great on my behalf) and from what I understood they were Buddhist texts. He spoke several languages besides Chinese, like Blang and Tai.

One of the texts is older than the others, and I include two images of this text and one of the other manuscripts (written during the 20th century) as a reference.

Any further input is greatly appreciated!

I include a link to some of the images from the time in Xishuangbanna.

With warm regards!

Stefan







Link :Xishuangbanna gallery

Buddhist texts typically would be written in Pali, the language of Buddhism, but I gather that Buddhist countries in Asia have adapted their local alphabetic scripts for writing in Pali. This includes Thai language and its close relative Lao, which may be spoken in one dialect or another by the Dai/傣 people, the Tai relatives living in Xishuangbanna.

Khmer and Burmese also have their own Pali scripts, and there's a certain fluidity, as some Khmer Pali documents found in my online search were attributed to Thailand, which is home to a number of Khmer archeological ruins. However, with patience, you may be able to coax enough examples out of Google to identify which language is used in your documents. Just watch out for those scripts with secondary attributions.

Best regards,

Bill H.

Dear Bill,

Thank you for input and suggestions, I appreciate that!

All the best!

Stefan

Here are a couple of script examples from an earlier post, beginning with the Khmer/Cambodian style document and then a 20th century repro of an old Thai horoscope.

Best regards,

Bill H.

mea culpa, failed to load the link

URL Title :Thai & Khmer script

Coming into this late. Bill H. is on the right track. Bulang and adjacent Dai (Shan in Burma / Myanmar) communities all read the Dai script, which is split into Old Dai and New Dai in China. It is known internally as 'dai tham' or some variation thereof, 'tham' referring to dhamma. When studying these texts, it is common for ritualists or monks to keep a Pali dictionary near at hand.

In China, the Cultural Revolution had a dramatic impact on textual transmission. Revival began in the 1980s and included efforts to restore manuscript collections by way of sourcing across the border in Myanmar. Elders who possess knowledge of these texts have been passing away over the last decade, leaving younger practitioners capable of recitation yet lacking in comprehension. There is a small but growing body of scholarly literature around all of this.

Stefan, if there is a way for us to connect outside of the forum, I would love to learn more about the texts passed along to you and could likely provide you with more information.

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