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Calling the Soul: A Mongolian Litany

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 December 2009

Extract

The examination and cataloguing of Mongol manuscripts and prints in European libraries in recent years has brought to light a considerable number of books whose subject matter is the occurrence and treatment of sickness by magical means, and the magical ceremonies to be performed after a person's death in order to counteract the prolongation of the evil influences which were responsible for the occurrence.

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Articles
Copyright
Copyright © School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London 1962

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References

page 81 note 1 Principally in the Royal Library, Copenhagen, and the Hedin Collection of Mongolian Literature in Statens Etnografiska Museum, Stockholm, catalogued by Pentti Aalto in Publication 38 of the Reports from the Scientific Expedition to the north-western provinces of China under the leadership of Dr. Sven Hedin, 1953. In his preface, Professor Aalto remarked that many of the works could not be identified; in particular several of those which he classed as ‘astrological’ might belong to other branches of lamaistic divination. Texts concerned with the non-medical diagnosis and treatment of sickness and with death-ceremonies are: H 66, H 68, H 1191C and H 1191E (which together form a complete MS), H 5821, and H 5822. P. S. Pallas long ago pointed out the existence of texts concerning death-ceremonies and translated two in his Sammlungen historischer Nachrichten über die mongolischen Vōlkerschaften, part 2, St. Petersburg,1801,249 ff., under the title๣ Altan Saba and Jerrien-Gassool. Similar texts to these are to be found in H 66 and H 68, Stockholm, and in MSS Mong. 299 and 375, Copenhagen.

page 81 note 2 For one possible reference cf. Mong. 301, Copenhagen, fol. 8r, and the parallel passage in H 1191E, fol. 22v: nigen sinede ebedbesü: ōrōne odču ebedbeiduyun ongyod amu: ese bügesü eliye ebedgeyü ‘If sickness occurs on the first of the month…the local spirits are holding (? the patient or his soul). If that is not so, a ghost is causing the sickness’. For a discussion of the termsiduyun ongyod and eliyesee my article ‘The supernatural elements in sickness and death according to Mongol tradition’, Asia Major, NS, vIII, 2, 1961, 215–57.

page 81 note 3 Mircea Eliade, Le chamanisme et les techniques archaïques de l'extase,Paris, Payot, 1951,197 f. Similar beliefs prevail among the Black Tai (H. Maspero, Les religions chinoises, Paris,1950, 218).

page 81 note 4 cf. MS Louvain 35, fol. 5r: -un kiged -un , and fol. 5v qan kiged oytaryui-yin eliye adalaba. Also H 5822, fol. 2v: ükügsen keüken eliye adalamu ‘the ghost of a dead child is possessing him’.

page 81 note 5 See in particular H 68, fol. 2v. Thus death occurring under the mengge One, white, indicates that black water-spirits, qara luus, have taken the life away. Later in the same manuscript, fol. 8r–8v, where the classification is by the 28 asterisms, the expressions amin-i abuba and sünesün-i abuba are used apparently alternatively.

page 82 note 1 For this function of a shaman see for example H. Findeisen, Schamanentum (Urban Bücher,28), Stuttgart, 1957, ch. xii, ‘Die verschiedenen Arten von Schamanen und ihre Tätigkeit’. For prayers for the destination of a soul see MS Louvain 39, entitled . This lamaist ritual contains prayers for the release of the soul from the realm of Erlig Khan and its safe conduct to the Sukhāvatī paradise. (Fol. 3r: sünesün-i oytoluyči erlig-ün ayul-ača aburan soyorqa: ayul-tu -yin qabčayai-ača getülgen soyorqa: tesküi-e berke mayu -u qalil-ača tatan soyorqa: oron-u degedü tegün-dür kötelün soyorqa.)

page 82 note 2 See his biography, Cay-a bandida-yin saran-u gerel kemekü ene metü bolai (Corpus Scriptorum Mongolorum, v, 2), Ulan Bator, 1959, and extracts in Damdinsuren's chrestomathy Mongyol uran bilig orusibai (CSM, xiv), 1959. Cf. p. 17 and p. 325 respectively: Boyda zaya bandida: basa busu gelung: gecul: bandi: ubasi: -du nige edür-ün bačay abisig uduriyulsun nuyud-i ōgbei: ken kümün: ongyod takiysan-i anu ongyod-i tülin: mori; qoni-yi inu ab: bōge-e: udayan-i udayalayuluyči nuyud-ača mori abuyad: bōge-e: udayan-i anu noqai-yin bayasu-bar uta kemen tungqay : qamuy bügüde-yi čayan burqan-u üileddün. Thus Jaya Pandita's instructions to his disciples for missionary work among the Oirad involved burning the onggods of anyone found worshipping them, together with the confiscation of his horses and sheep. The horses of anyone instigating male or female shamans to shamanise were likewise to be confiscated, while the shamans and shamanesses were to be fumigated with dog-excrement. Thus the people were to be turned to the White Direction and the religion of the Buddha exalted. This passage has also been quoted from the Kalmuck biography of Jaya Pandita by Banzarov, ‘Chernaya vera’, in Sobranie sochinenii, Moscow, 1955, 99. (For this method of exorcism see also my article ‘The supernatural element in sickness and death according to Mongol tradition’, Part 2, Asia Major, NS, ix, 1, note 51.)

page 82 note 3 Biography, p. 5: tayisung qatun nōgčigsen-ü sünesü-yi : nom-i delgerenggüi üiledbei.

Biography, p. 21: čečen qan-u eke qatun qaliysan-du: sünesü-yi : nom-i delgerenggüi üileddilbei.

Biography, p. 49: čečen qan burqan bolbai: čečen qan-u sünesü-yi lobsangyombo terigüten degere medegülügsen-dü.

page 82 note 4 See H 66, fols. 5r–7v.

page 82 note 5 See Mong. 219, Otači burqan-a mörgümü, fol. 9v: siltayan inu emüne -tür araki uyuysan soytayu kümün-ü sünesün učiraysan bui.

page 83 note 1 A soul, sünesün, is not only the vital part of a human being, but it is apparent that cattle, the house, and the ground also possess a ‘soul’. The human soul is said to reside in a different part of the body on each of the 30 days of the month. It is important to know these locations since the body should not be bled or cauterized at the spot on the associated day. (See for example Mong. 234, fol. 53r–v; Mong. 375, fol. 35r, and Mong. 299, fol. 20v, and also H 5821, fol. 5v. Pallas, op. cit., 310, was aware of this belief.) The soul of the ground spends four days of the twelve animal cycle in the firmament, four in the earth, and four in the middle area. On the four days when it is in the earth one should not dig the ground, or marry off one's daughter or take a daughter-in-law, or become a sworn friend (Mong. 375, fols. 35v–36r). More especially, on days designated as -un sünesün-ü edür, one should not dispose of dead bodies since if one does, further deaths will occur, unless a ceremony is performed to counter the influences of the lords of the earth and water. From mud should be made the figures of a human being and four oxen, and with these rice, cloth of five colours, the meat of a whole sheep, foods of all sorts, hen's eggs and five lamps should be set out and sacrificed for this purpose (Mong. 299, fol. 67v). The expulsion of figurines with other offerings is a well-known type of ritual. The house soul resides in a different part of the house on the ten successive days of each of the three divisions of the month, and one should be careful not to harm the appropriate part. The parts of the house as listed would indicate that this superstition belongs to the nomadic culture, since they refer to a felt tent rather than a fixed dwelling, including as they do felt-coverings (tuyurya) and smoke-outlet (erüke) (Mong. 375, fol. 35v). I am doubtful whether sünesün in this context is to be associated with sür sünesün, the inner power or vital principle, which according to the Mongol fire-rituals and other shamanist invocations, inhabits beings of all sorts. For this see Poppe, ‘Zum Feuerkultus bei den.Mongolen’, Asia Major, II, 1, 1925, 141, 144, and rituals in the chrestomathy of Damdinsuren.

page 83 note 2 Poppe, ‘Opisanie mongol'skix “shamanskix” rukopisei Instituta Vostokovedeniya’,Zapiski IVAN, 1932, describes some Mongol manuscripts concerned with the practice of calling the soul. This description, mentioned in Anthropos, XLvIII, 1953, 329, was not available to me. Lessing, ‘Calling the soul: a Lamaist ritual’, Semitic and oriental studies: a volume presented to William Popper, University of California Press, 1951, 263–84, analyses on the basis of a Chinese translation a Tibetan ritual for calling back the soul composed in the eighteenth century in the Kukunor area. This ceremony, he says, pertains to a custom ‘still extant among the Tibetan and Mongolian Lamaists. It does not belong to the customary set of last rites but is rather a type of life-prolonging magic’. Lessing gives various Tibetan names for the rite, including ’c‘i-bslu‘Ransoming from Death’. There are striking similarities between Lessing's ritual and the one to be considered below, so, for example, the use of a piece of meat as a ritual object, and the use of scales to discover whether or not the soul has returned, but a closer parallel exists with the ritual čiblud-un üihdküi yosun, Louvain MS. 38. For an account of this fragmentary text see my article ‘The supernatural element’, Part 2, note 66.

page 83 note 3 3 No. 24a in the numbering assigned in Heissig's article, ‘The Mongol manuscripts and xylographs of the Belgian Scheut Mission’, Central Asiatic Journal, III, 3, 1958, 161–89.

page 84 note 1 W. Heissig, ‘A Mongolian source to the lamaist suppression of shamanism in the 17th century’, Anthropos, XLVIII, 1953, 1–29, 493–536. See also the references to Mergen Gegen in the same author's book Die Pekinger lamaistischen Blockdrucke in mongolischer Sprache, Wiesbaden, 1954, pp. 127–31,139–41,150–4. Rintchen, Les matériaux pour l'étude du chamanisme mongol, I, Wiesbaden, 1959, pp. vii–viii.

page 84 note 2 The title-page is missing from my photographs. For permitting me to examine this and other books in Louvain and to have photographs made I am most grateful to the Reverend J. Mullie, C.I.C.M., whose kindness I would like to acknowledge here.

page 84 note 3 Fol. 7r:nasun urtu ebečin ügei küsegsen kereg-üd bütügeged: ed tavar qotala tegüskün amur -i arbidqan : boydas-un nom-i bütügekü-yin -un siltayan ebečin ada todqar keregür temeč;el qudqulan /v/ kimuraqui ülü -yi arilya.

page 84 note 4 In particular: 1/60 Oron-u tngri-dür baling ergükü yosun.

1/63 Qatun yool-un sang tümen qutuytu.

IV/11 Tangyariy-tu nom-un qayan gñčin n tanglha: ramčin : muna qan: delekei-yin baling ergükü.

IV/12Sülde tngri-yi yosun tusa -un gegen-i delgeregülügči naran.

page 85 note 1 -i uriqui anu: blama idam daginis nom-un sakiyulsun ba orod ba delekei-yin qaničan nōküčekü-yin tabun tngri terigüten ariyulqui takil-un bükün: dürbel ügegüi-e ende ōgede boluyad bayasqui debisker-e sayutuyai. For a comparable invitation cf. the ritual for the worship of the gods and water spirits, Tngri luus-i takiqu čindamani erike (IV/18), fol. 3r: blama congkaba: bodatu ba ündüsülegsen: blama kiged yidam burqan ba: bodisadu kiged bayatud: daginis ba norn-i sakiyčin: yeke nigülesküi-yin erke-ber:iren soyorqa … biden-ü buyan quriyaqu-yin oron-a: bayasqui-bar sayun soyorqa. A closer parallel to the phrase bayasqui debisker-e sayutuyai of the Louvain MS occurs in the incense-ritual for the mountain Muna Qan (IV/20), fol. 2r: tegüs čoytu muna qan nöküd-lilge selte ba: ridi-yin erke tegüsügsen qatun yool-un ba: busu basa čayan -ten tngri luus-i jalamui: tayalaqui debisker-tür bayasqui-bar sayuytun. (The invitation here is extended also to the gods of the Yellow River.)

page 85 note 2 Küsel-ün tabun erdem-lüge masi tegüsügsen öber öber-ün bayasqulang egüskekü-yin takil-un egüles-i: kiged qočorli ügegüi-e oyuyata : bisireküi-ber ergümüi: bayasuysayar soyorqa: ariyulqui takil-un boda-tu anu: eldeb/3r/em erdeni eldeb modun yuril tosun ba: eldeb üre kib toryan idegen terigüten sang-un ed-nügüd-i tülegsen utayan egülen ükül ügei-yin mör dügürügsen-iyer: -nuyud ariyutuyad qamuy gem-üd arilaqu boltuyai. For the offering of the smoke of a burned sacrifice see also the Muna Qan ritual (IV/19), fol. 5v: ünür tegüs bsangs-un ed-i/6r/ tülegsen-ü uniyar: kiged gegen oytaryui-yi tügemel: dügürügsen egüled-ber ariyulan takimui.

page 86 note 1 For a very similar list compare the first of the two rituals for the worship of Sayang Sečen in the Reverend A. Mostaert's article ‘Sur le culte de Sayang Sečen et de son bisaïeul Qutuytai Sečen chez les Ordos’, HJAS, xx, 3–, 1957, 534–66, esp. 545–6 and 550–1.

page 86 note 2 Včara dara terigüten tegüs -un beye-ten-ü čyulyan nuyud-i ariyulamui. Cf. also the Muna Qan ritual (IV/20), fol. lv: včir dhara terigüten beye-ten.

page 86 note 3 Sumadi injana is presumably the equivalent of Tib. bLo-bzaṇ ye-, which I cannot identify with certainty.

page 86 note 4 This is the name of the lama Mergen Gegen as given by Heissig, Blockdrucke, p. 151, but positive identification is difficult since the name of the first Jebtsundamba Khutukhtu of Urga is also given variously as: (MS biography, Mong. 519, Royal Library, Copenhagen; MS blama-yin uy eki -iyar nere čolo yabiya bayiyulyusan seyiregülügsen , Ulan Bator; MS Sayisiyaltu irügeltü-yin qoyaduyar on-du quluy-tu-yin uy eki-yi ergügsen debtor dangsa, Ulan Bator): in the corresponding Tibetan form bstan-pa'i rgyal-mts‘an (Schulemann, Geschickte der Dalai Lamas, 1st ed,,1911, 122): and as (MS blama-yin angqan töröl-ün nere, Ulan Bator). For a further holder of this name, the eighteenth abbot of , who also served a second time, 1710–14, see Klaus Sagaster, Leben und historische Bedeutung des 1. (Pekinger) skya khulukhtu, Bonn, 1960.

page 86 note 5 Probably to be equated with the bSod-nams grags-pa who was sent on in advance to Nilum Tala by the Dalai Lama when the latter was delayed by the press of the multitude on his way there. See Schmidt, Geschichte der Ostmongolen, 236. For a series of reincarnations of this name see Nebesky-Wojkowitz, Oracles and demons of Tibet, 134.

page 86 note 6 The name of a Jaya Pandita, as is confirmed later (fol. 9r) by the text caya bandida sumadi garma (=’p‘rin-las). There is some confusion over the personages known as Jaya Pandita which present information does not entirely dispel. The personal name of the celebrated Oirad translator and author of the Kalmuck alphabet (1599–1662) is given in his biography (p. 82, n. 2, above) as (= Nam-mk‘a'i rgya-mts‘o, Mongol Oytaryui-yin dalai). For this see the introduction to the biography, p. 39 of the biography, and p. 326b of Damdinsuren's chrestomathy. Pozdneev, Mongoliya i Mongoly, i, 411–12, does not supply a name for this Jaya Pandita, but indicates that he is to be considered as the first of the line of incarnations known as Jaya-yin Gegen, who had their seat subsequently at Jaya-yin Küriye, in the Savin Noyan Khan Aimak, the present city of Tsetserlig. Pozdneev says that his name is as inseparable from the holders of the title Jaya-yin Gegen as is that of Tāranātha (the historian, and fifteenth and last of the pre-existences of the Jebtsundamba Khutukhtu of Urga) from the names of the latter. (There is plenty of written evidence that it is the Tibetan historian Täranātha who is meant in this connexion, and Schulemann, Geschichte der Dalai Lamas, 1st ed., 123, is himself in error in denying this and explaining Tārāntha here as an epithet of Maitreya.) Pozdneev gives the name Lobsangprinlai(’p‘rin-las) to the first reincarnation of the Oirad Pandita, and indicates that he was born in 1662 or 1663. The date as given in the Jaya Pandita's biography (p. 39) is an undefined dragon-year, probably 1664, but the incarnation is not stated to have been called ’p‘rin-las. Further information about ’p‘rin-las is to be found in a history of the first Jebtsundamba Khutukhtu, Öndür Boyda-yin translated from Tibetan into Mongol by the Dooramba a member of the Mongolian Literary Committee (Sudur bičig-ün küiriyeleng). (The translation dates probably from the early twenties of this century. The Committee was founded in 1921. Several translations by are extant, and show him to have been active c. 1925.) The first mention of the Jaya Pandita is on fol. 13r: Qutuytu bio bzang ’prin las (’p‘rin-las)-dur kündüleng sayin noyan kemekü-yin töröl kemen aldarsiysan-u učir noyan qutuytu kemegsen-ü čolo soyorqabai: caya (dzaya) bandida kemen qoyina tabdayar dalai blama-tan soyorqaysan bolai. This occurrence is dated 1653, and it was after this that the name of Jaya Pandita was conferred by the Dalai Lama. Now the Oirad Pandita had received his title of Jaya Pandita as early as 1642 (biography, p. 7, chrestomathy, p. 321b), not from the Dalai Lama but on the occasion of a meeting with Jasaytu Khan of the Khalkha. Hence there can be no doubt of the correctness of Damdinsuren's statement (chrestomathy, p. 327b), and Heissig's (Erdeni-yin erike (Monumenta Linguarum Asiae Maioris, Series Nova, II), p. xx, n. 153), that the Jaya Pandita of the Oirad and the Jaya Pandita ’p‘ rin-las are not to be confused. (Their identification, as given by Posch, CAJ, in, 3, 1958, 209, and in Sagaster, op. cit., would appear to be erroneous.) It is equally certain that the Jaya Pandita ’p‘rin-las mentioned in the life of the first Jebtsundamba cannot be identical with the rebirth of the Jaya Pandita of the Oirad either. On the one hand the recorded dates speak against such an identity, while on the other hand the former is said to be of the line of Kündüleng Sayin Noyan, while the latter was born in the Tangut country (biography, p. 40). The life of the Jebtsundamba further records that the Jaya Pandita ’p‘rin-las expressed the wish to go and study in Tibet in 1660 (fol. 18v:bükün tegüs kemekü temür quluyuna qabur-a qubilyan bio bzang ’prinlas möngke suryuli-du sayuqu-yin čilüge kiged) and records his return to Mongolia in 1680 (fol. 21r). Thus his stay there covers the period of the death and rebirth of the Jaya Pandita of the Oirad. Pozdneev's statement (p. 412) that the Tushetu Khan studied in Tibet with ’p‘rin-las in 1673 (quoted from the record of Erdeni : Mongol text, Engke amuyulang qayan-u arban qoyaduyar on usun üker -dür tüsiyetü qayan čenggün ber barayun tabuduyar dalai blama terigüten-eče caya bandida lobsangpringlai-luya qamtu nigen wang terigüten nom ayui yeke sonusuyad) is by no means in conflict with this chronology, though the successor of the Jaya Pandita of the Oirad was also making his early studies in Tibet at this time, receiving the status of in 1670 at the age of seven (biography, p. 42). The biography of the Jaya Panditas, F 189 of the Library of the Oriental Institute in Leningrad, described by Puchkovskii, Mongol'skie rukopisi i ksilografy Instituta Vostokovedeniya, 1957, nr. 48, and the account mentioned by Heissig, loc. cit., both inaccessible to me, may hold the correct explanation, but it is safe at least to assert that two dignitaries entitled Jaya Pandita, the Oirad Pandita and the Khalkha Pandita, were alive concurrently until the death of the former in 1662, and it appears most probable that it is the latter rather than the former who headed the line of the Jaya-yin Gegen in Sayin Noyan Khan Aimak. The legend quoted by Pozdneev, op. cit., II, 146, and given a documentary source by Heissig, ‘Some glosses on recent Mongol studies’, Studia Orientalia, xix, 4, 1953, 6, concerning the visit of a Jaya Pandita to Köke qota, coming from Jasaytu Khan's territories, in 1662, is still hard to reconcile with the facts as given above.

page 87 note 1 Fol. 4v: tobčilabasu nadur sanvar abisig ubadis-i: boydas-un nom-un ač-yi soyorqaysan lama-nar-i.

page 88 note 1 Thus the ritual for offering tormas to the local divinities (1/60) begins with an invocation to the third Dalai Lama: Qamuy ilayuysan bügüde-yin nigülesküi düri qubilyan getülgegči bunya sagara yeke adistid-i bayulya. The Muna Qan ritual (IV/20) includes an invocation addressed to the Buddha Śākyamuni, to Padmasambhava, and to -k‘a-pa.

page 88 note 2 For the place of these deities in the cult propagated by the missionary Neyiči toyin in substitution for outlawed shamanist deities, see Heissig, ‘A Mongolian source’, 526.

page 88 note 3 Dörben aimay dandaris-un idam mandal-un burqad-un čiyulyan bükün-i ariyulamui: bayatud bayatur eke maqa gala erlig qayan ökin tngri kiged: /5r/ ?kuvera kiged: čoytu maqa gala dörben mudur-tu nayaču tüsimel bisman tngri: aqa degüü terigüten nom-un sakiyulsun ba: dalan tabun čoytu maqa gala urtu nasutu tabun egeči dui: kiged sasin-u arban qoyar eke yeke ?qangyai tngri terigüten: yurban mingyan-u oron tngri bükün-i ariyulamui. For gods of the heroic type, Mo. bayatur, Tib. dpa'-bo, see Nebesky-Wojkowitz, Oracles and demons of Tibet, 8 and other references. Nebesky-Wojkowitz notes that mountain gods especially belong to this type. Cf. the ritual Tangyariy-tu nom-un qayan gñin iin tanglha (IV/11), fol. lv: sasin erdeni-yi sakiyči ñin cin tanglha yeke bayatur. Heissig, ‘A Mongolian source’, 514–15, notes the substitution of the worship of Maqagala, Bisman Tngri, and Ökin Tngri, amongst others, for the worship of onggods.

page 88 note 4 Fol. 5v: Mongyol-un oron-u tngri luus buti-nar-un čiyulyan-i ilangyui-a köke qota-yin keyid bayising-a orusiysan ba: ongyon ?-yin ayula mören eke aday-un oron-u tngri delekei-yin yerü kiged ilangyui-dur čabčimal čayan ayui-yin sakiyulsun kiged oron-u tngri dclekei-yin terigülen ene keyid oron-i sakiyad /6r/ ibegegči oron-u tngri delekei-yin čayan tedkügči kiged: emüne qoyina-ki ayula mören dalai modun sitügen: oi čečeglig selte čügürüm bulay yarqui dörben yarqui-dur: orusiysan tngri luus asuri buti-nar-i ariyulamui: tobčilabasu sansar-un omoy-tan naiman aimay kiged ba bürin baysi /6v/ nökur selle-dür: nöküčen ömüg sadun bolun üiledugči tngri-yin čiyulyan-nuyud: ariyulqui takil-iyarbayasqu boltuyai.

I am uncertain of the significance of the phrase ongyon ?-yin ayula mōren. Fr. Mostaert has, in his article ‘Sur le culte de Sayang Sečen’, 559–60, an interesting note on ongyon ‘burial mound’, in which he mentions the ongyonof Köke qota. The phrasečabčimal čayan ayui is also not clear to me—literally, ‘hewn white cavern’.

page 89 note 1 Thus the ritual for offering tormas to the local deities (I/60), already noted as containing an invocation to the third Dalai Lama, directs its offerings to the resident gods, water-spirits, and sprites and demons of all places in the earthly world in general ‘and in this place in particular’: yerü cambudiib-un oron ba: ilangyui-a ene oron-a: aysan tngri: luus ba albin teyireng: bhuti-nari: bügüde-de ergümü. The most extensive list of localized deities is to be found in the Obo ritual, for which see Bawden, ‘Two Mongol texts’, 36. In the ritual for the gods and water spirits Tngri luus-i takiqu čindamani erike (IV/18), the local divinities are qualified by the epithet‘having the nature of the vajra’:masi batu včir činar-tu ketter doysin beye düri-tü ayulas-un yeke qantürgen qurdun včir činar-tu doysin -un düri-tü usun yool-un yeke qan.

page 89 note 2 For such invocations see Banzarov, op. cit., p. 67 and note.

page 89 note 3 That textual similarities between one ritual and another are intended is evidenced by the fact that passages may be actually taken over from one ritual to another and be referred to by the original context only, without being written out again. Thus in Tangyariy-tu nom-un qayan (IV/11), fol. lv: itegel sedkil-i urida : hum: öber-iyen nigen gsan-dur: kemekü terigüten adislaqu-yin üges kiged: hum: masi ariluysan oytaryui-yin kemekü-eče: ödtör büged olqu boltuyai: kemeküi kürtele sülde takiqui-yin ekin-dür aysan metü. The passage here identified as like one at the beginning of the worship of the Sülde is to be found in IV/12, fols. lv–2v.

page 89 note 4 kemen ariyulqui takil qutuy-un qura-yi oruyuluyč kemekü egün-i anu öber-ün dergede sidar ayči bičikü kelemürči terigüten-e ?oyun-u nidün-lüge tegüsügsen erdeni bilig-tü jaruyči ber basa basa simdan duraduysan-u fsiltayan degedü -un qaraliy-ud-un tangqai caya bandida, sumadi garma nayirayuluysan bičigeči inu ayuu /9v/ bilig-lüge tegüsügsen nom-un dalai bolai.

page 89 note 5 Mostaert,‘Sur le culte de Sayang Sečen’, 543.

page 90 note 1 op. cit., 199.

page 90 note 2 The Monguors of the Kansu-Tibetan border (Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, New Series, Vol. 47, Pt. 1, 1957). See part II, p. 141.

page 90 note 3 op. cit., 218.

page 90 note 4 Schram, loc. cit., describes a further custom among the Monguor whereby lamas and members of the family do their best to banish the third soul of the departed from its former surroundings, through fear of the harm which the dead person might cause. A contemporary account of the ceremony of calling back the soul at the moment death has occurred as performed by the Chinese of Kansu is given by Fr. J. Dols in his article ‘La vie chinoise dans la province de Kan-sou (Chine), III partie, les funérailles’, Anthropos, x–xi, 1915–16, 728 ff.

page 90 note 5 For further details see for example Eliade and Findeisen, loc. cit.

page 90 note 6 Heissig's description of the Louvain MSS identifies those books which belonged to the lama. They include only one text which Heissig classifies as; canonical. For the rest, there are nine (including the present text)‘non-canonical’, two ‘popular religious beliefs’, and six‘divination’. The non-canonical books include a White Mahākāla sutra, invocations to the White and the Green Tārā, a eulogy of Čayan Sikürtei, and Pañcarakṣa. Of these, the two last, and especially Čayan Sikürtei, are mentioned over and over again in MSS as texts to be recited as part of the ceremonies necessary to avert misfortune, to cure sickness, or to settle the unquiet dead. See, for instance, Bawden, C. R., ‘On the practice of scapulimancy among the Mongols’, CAJ, IV, 1, 1958, 25, 26, 27Google Scholar, etc. The same two texts are recommended as a cure for sickness in MS Louvain 37, fols. 2v and 3r, and in H 66, together with others including a Mahākāla text, as parts of ceremonies to block the influence of the erligs which have removed the souls of dead persons, and (Čayan Sikürtei alone) to help pacify an unquiet spirit. In the course of scapulimancy, recitation of a Dara eke text and construction of the Data eke thread-cross is advised in certain circumstances (op. cit., 26). The lama's library also included a fire ritual, yal-un takilya, and various manuals of popular rituals, thus: MS 35, a manual of divination by means of nine coins, together with a further text concerning the magical investigation and healing of illness; MS 37, already mentioned, a text for investigating sickness by means of observation of the behaviour of the horse ridden by the practitioner or of the man who has come to summon him; MS 38, a ritual for performing a ‘life-ransom’; MS 39, a manual for conducting a departed soul safely on its other-worldly journey; MS 40, a manual for drawing up horoscopes; and MS 41, a manual for matching birth-years with different personal planets (sünesün gray ‘soulplanet’; amin gray ‘life-planet’; and ukül-ün gray ‘death-planet’). Thus the lama's little library contained the folk-rituals and manuals of divination he was likely to need as a practitioner of magic among the populace, together with the most usual texts for recitation. This collection sheds welcome light on the problem of who the practitioners were who performed such services as the magical investigation of illness, and who are often referred to in the texts themselves by such appellations as baysi, kigči, kigči baysi, tarniči, kigči blama, , baysi, kiimun, and . Such texts are studied in more detail in my article in Asia Major, NS, VIII, 2, 1961, mentioned on p. 81, n. 2 above.

page 91 note 1 pp. 2676–7.

page 91 note 2 Though the Chinese line here equates sünesü with hun, the ‘yang’-soul, and there exists another Mongol term süg (Manchu oron) for Chinese p'o , the ‘yin’-soul or animal-soul (Pentaglot, p. 1322), I have so far never come across the latter outside dictionaries. Thus Kowalewski, p. 1431, has the meaning ‘chyle, esprit’, Tib. , for which word Jäschke offers only very cautiously an explanation ‘spirit, soul’ (p. 249). Apart from this series I find the word also in Mongyol üsüg-ün dürim-ün toli bičig (Inner Mongol Publishing Bureau, 1951), p. 867, with the explanation: bilig-un sime ‘essence of the yin’. Though the belief in a plurality of souls is current amongst the Mongols, this word süg would seem to require careful study before the meaning as given in the Pentaglot is accepted.

page 91 note 3 cf. Pentaglot, p. 1585, dalalumui, Manchu elkimbi (Hauer, ‘(herbei)winken’), Chin. . The notion of ‘beckoning the soul’ obtains in early Chinese shamanistic songs preserved in the Ch‘u tz‘u . Cf. in particular the poems Chao hun and Ta-chao . (See Erkes, E., Das ‘Zurilckrufen der Seek’ (Chao-Hun) des Sung yüh, Leipzig, 1914Google Scholar, and Hawkes, David, Ch‘u Iz‘u, the songs of the south, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1959Google Scholar.)

page 91 note 4 Dictionnaire Ordos, p. 114b. Dalalya is also listed in dictionaries as the name of an arrow used in certain ceremonies. Thus Kowalewski, p. 1634, and Pentaglot, p. 661, where the Manchu equivalent is debse, explained in Hauer's dictionary as ‘bei Opfern verwendeter hanfumwundener Pfeil’, Chin. . The trilingual dictionary Meng Han Man san wen ho (Peking, 1913, VIII/51v) gives the explanation ‘an arrow bound with white threads for use in entering into a trance’. (I render t‘iaoshen as ‘entering into a trance’ on the basis of Granet's discussion of the term in his ‘Remarques sur le taolsme ancien’, Asia Major, II, 1, 1925, 146 ff. Modern dictionaries, e.g. Simon and Mathews, give the meaning ‘to exorcize’ while Tz‘u hai describes masked dances held in Tibetan, Manchurian, and Mongolian temples. This is a question of Chinese semantics outside my scope.) Cf. Ibid., dalalta, dalalyan-u sumu, . In the Pentaglot these phrases, all with the one Chinese equivalent (though the two last have a different Manchu rendering desilku,‘mit weissem Hanf umbundener Opferpfeil’), all fall within a group of entries at the end of the section on ritual objects, Tayiqu tabiylaqui-dur kereglekü yayuman-u where are listed other names of pieces of equipment used by shamans: thus sorbi, the magic knife (see Hauer, p. 415, s.v.halmari); toli, the mirror; seter, the ribbons to be attached to devoted animals, and others. The previous section, on sacrifices, Tayiqu tabiylaqu (p. 632), is equally outspokenly shamanist towards the end: cf. the occurrence of such entries as bögelemüi, ‘to shamanize’ (p. 646), and the interesting presence of taboo expressions to cover the slaughtering and death of sacrificial animals. This transition from the shamanist world of ideas and terminology can be observed elsewhere in the Pentaglot. For instance, the chapter on healing, Emčlen the single chapter in the division devoted to doctors and shamans, emči böge-yin quriyangyui, which, significantly, follows directly upon the chapter devoted to demons, čidkür simnu-yin . Here (pp. 2670 ff.) occur together with such neutral terms as em ‘medicine’, sudasu barimui ‘to take the pulse’, others such as those meaning ‘to call the soul’ already quoted, which belong to the vocabulary of the magical treatment of illness.

page 92 note 1 MS biography, Royal Library, Copenhagen, Mong. 519, fol. 12v.

page 92 note 2 Heissig, Blockdrucke, p. 153, IV/15.

page 92 note 3 Fol. 16r. Kib-tü sumun terigüten aliba nigen dalalyaqui ?selte-ber eyin kemen: om: degedü esrua terigüten tngri-ner: degere cagravardi terigüten qayan ba:doora nandi ubanandi terigüten-ü buyan kesig qurui qurui gsang-dur iretügeikemen dalalya üiled. Arrows adorned with silk tissue (kib) and mirrors have already been listed on fol. 3v amongst the sacrificial necessities. It is worth noting that among Mongols and Kalmucks the invitation of good fortune has been subject to systemization. Thus MS Mong. 375, Copenhagen, Kedün orusibai, a manual of astrology and magic, lists astrological moments when it is suitable to invite good fortune?thus the different planets are detailed under which one may invite good fortune for the emperor, princes and ministers, members o f the clergy and males (sanggisba bumbu kümün), soothsayers and females (ekener), mules, horses, and donkeys, sheep, goats, yaks, cross-bred yaks, cities, localities, and crops. For similar beliefs among the Kalmucks cf. a manuscript fragment 770 c of the Westdeutsche Bibliothek, Marburg: qorin yurban erdeni kesig qorin tabun-du arbai amuni kesig buu ab buu ög. Complete lists of days designated as morin-u kesig, kümün-ü kesig, mal-un kesig, idegen-ü kesig, tariyan-u kesig, qonin-u kesig, imayan-u kesig, etc., are to be found in an astrological handbook of the Royal Library, Copenhagen, Mong. 299, Lo zla dus gza’skar t‘ams cad blta ba’ bya ba so, fol. 22v.

page 93 note 1 Dictionnaire Ordos, p. 373a. Mostaert has refrained from adding the written Mongol form qurui in this article, but its occurrence in both prints and manuscripts can now be affirmed.

page 93 note 2 op. cit., n, 329.

page 93 note 3 ‘Zum Feuerkultus’, 141, 144.

page 93 note 4 Damdinsuren, 112–16. Rintchen, , Les materiaux pour Petude du chamanisme mongol, I, Wiesbaden, 1959, 69Google Scholar.

page 93 note 5 For example, in the prayers for the sür sünesün of children, pp. 115–16: qusun modun ōlōgei-tü quriyan-u arisun qučilya-tu buryasun modun ōlōgei-tü bulayan-u arisun qučilya-tu kegüken-ü sür sünesün-i yuyunam: e qurui qurui: kig modun ōlōgei-tü keremün arisun qučilya-tu üye ügei modun ōlčgei-tü ünegen-ü arisun qučlya-tu kegüken-ü sür sünesün-i yuyunam: e qurui qurui: siluyun modun ōlōgei-tü silügüsün-ü arisun qučlya-tu kig modun ōlōgei-tü kirsan-u arisun qučilya-iu kegüke.n-ü sür sünesün-i yuyunam: e qurui qurui

‘We beg for the sür sünesün of the infant in the birch-wood cradle, with a covering of lamb-skin, in the willow-wood cradle, with a covering sable-skin: e qurui qurui. We beg for the sür sünesün of the infant in the cradle of kig-wood, with a covering of squirrel skin, in the cradle of joint-less wood, with a covering of fox skin: e qurui qurui. We beg for the sür sünesün of the infant in the cradle of straight (siluyun) wood, with a covering of lynx-skin, in the cradle of kig-wood, with a covering of steppe-fox skin: e qurui qurui.

page 93 note 6 op. cit., 144.

page 93 note 7 Dictionnaire Ordos, p. 598a, with further references.

Heissig, , ‘Mongolisches Sehrifttum im Linden-Museum’, Tribus, Nr. 8, 1959, 42Google Scholar, limits the significance of the word sülde too closely in saying that it is always a military banner (Feldzeichen), though this definition certainly applies to the text and cult he discusses. For sülde meaning ‘happiness, prosperity, benediction; protective genius; military standard in which a protective genius resides’ cf. Mostaert, ‘Sur le culte de Sayang Sečen’, p. 548, n. 37, and for the meaning ‘soul, one of the souls’ see Rumyantsev's note 120 to D. Banzarov, Sobranie sochinenii. Haenisch's dictionary records only one occurrence in the meaning ‘lucky sign’, , and three in the meaning ‘dignity, majesty’, . Of these, the first occurs in the passage relating the meeting of Yisügei and Dei Sečen. The corresponding passage in Erdeni-yin tobči (Schmidt, 62) has: tan-u sülde aysan , most probably to be understood ‘This was the protective genius of you, the Borjigin’. Rumyantsev, loc. cit., says that the sülde of a famous person may, in the belief of the Mongols, become the protective genius of a tribe, or a people, or an army. For litanies addressed also to mountains, begging them to become the sülde of a group of people, see Bawden, ‘Two Mongol texts’, p. 28, n. 24.

page 94 note 1 Poppe, 141, not quoting an original text, writes of ‘die Bitte urn Glück für “das sür sünesün der Rosse …”’,etc. The litany as given in Damdinsuren's fire sūtra quoted above would seem however to require a slightly different interpretation, thus barim kökü-lü gegüü üniyen-ü sür sünesün-i yuyunam ‘we beg for the sür sünesün of the wide-uddered mares and cows’. I take this to mean that the sür sünesün or inner virtue of the animals itself is being called for, rather than good luck for it. Poppe mentions too a prayer for the buyan kesig, or good fortune, of the ‘loud-baying dog’. Cf. a similar prayer in Damdinsuren's text, using the compound sür sünesün: dayu yeke-tü noqai-yin sür sünesün-i yuyunam.

page 94 note 2 Fol. 9r. ene dayisun-i /9v/ tüsig-nügüd-ece salyaytunsülde sünesün-i : üre ündüsün-i tasuču ödtör büged tobray bolyaytun ‘Separate these enemies from all support… put to flight their sülde sünesün, cut off their posterity and turn them quickly into dust’. Other rituals in this collection present a group of deities, sülde tngri, of whom there are nine referred to as brothers and which have the nature of protectors (IV/12 and IV/13). The compound sülde sünesün may be taken in a similar sense, but it may rather be the equivalent of the sür sünesün of the fire rituals and refer to the inner virtue of the beings concerned, by which they are themselves, and which may, as thus appears, be both summoned and put to flight by prayer.

page 100 note 1 For nigen köl miqa see Dictionnaire Ordos, p. 426a: ‘une jambe de devant ou de derrière d'un animal abattu’. Cf. Leasing, op. cit., 267. For the sheep in Tibetan mythology, and especially as a sacrificial animal see Fr. D. Schröder, Aus der Volksdichtung der Monquor, I (Asiatisohe Forschungen, 6), Wiesbaden, 1959, p. 26. Fr. Schröder mentions the desirability of a monograph upon this subject.

page 100 note 2 A balance or scales, denśe činglegür (Chin. ), is also part of the equipment for carrying out the ‘life-ransom’ ceremony. See MS Louvain 38, čblud-un üiledküi yosun, and also Lessing, op. cit., 274, for the weighing of the clothes of the patient to see if the soul has returned.

page note 3 For the exclamation ge-e see Mostaert, ‘Sur le culte de Sayang Sečen’, p. 545, n. 30.

page 100 note 4 Supplying the word sünesün-i which has been omitted between kümün-ü and yuyinam. Mostaert, op. cit., 544, refers to the difficulty of language of this type of popular literature, quoting Poppe's similar remarks in the same vein. He also mentions grammatical irregularities and repetitions due to the negligence of copyists. Grammatical exigencies and a comparison of the context with similar passages make some emendations, as here or as in fol. 17r, line 9, where ügei has been omitted after dürbel, straightforward, but reconstruction is not always obvious. In the present context the dots in the translation after the words ‘white-coloured ones’ have been supplied in order to make the pattern conform to what follows, that is, statement of the divinity addressed, terminating in the particle ber, then a request that the divinity should enjoy the sacrifice, terminating in , then a demand for the return of the soul. I assume an omission in fol. lOv, line 6, after ber, and also after ber in line 11.

page 100 note 5 Seven Rahu, associated with different times of the day, are listed in the Copenhagen MS Mong. 301, which is concerned with magic and illness. An eighth, luus-un raqu, is also mentioned. Of these, the name of the first is given in the Copenhagen MS as toyona-a raqu, which may perhaps be a miswriting of toyos ‘peacock’.

page 101 note 1 The reading Tsanggün is uncertain, and is suggested by the name tsang-kun k‘yab-pa of a sa-bdag or lord of the earth given by Nebesky-Wojkowitz, Oracles and demons of Tibet, 292. For another writing see MS Mong. 299, Copenhagen, fol. 67r, line 16: -un činggün.

page 101 note 2 The names and attributes of the four protectors of the world are listed, inter alia, in Waddell, The Buddhism of Tibet, 84, and in Filchner, Kumbum Dschamba Ling, p. 13 and notes by Unkrig. For the Mongol names as given in our text cf. the Tibetan names: yul ’k‘or (= Dhṛtarāṣṭra), ’p‘ags skyes po (= Virūḍhaka), spyan mi (= Virūpākṣa) and rnam t‘os sras (= Vaiśravaṇa). The element sras of the latter (Tib. rnam t‘os sras usually gives Mo. namsarai) has been translated literally as -yin köbegün, giving the pleonastic sense ‘son of Bisman tngri’. For the figure of the ‘yellow Jambhala’, Jambhala being a form of Kuvera ~ Vaiṣrāvana, see Mostaert, op. cit., p. 560, n. 95. For the attribute of a rat see Mostaert, and Filchner, op. cit., n. 95.

page 101 note 3 Kowalewski, p. 487, s.v. ünür ‘odour’.

page 101 note 4 Nebesky-Wojkowitz, op. cit., 32, 309. Also Waddell, op. cit., 84, 369.

page 101 note 5 Mo. ?mamiša, meaning uncertain.

page 101 note 6 Apparently the usual refrain has been omitted here after terigüten ber, though there is no + to mark a repetition as occurs to mark the recurrence of the word qurui.

page 101 note 7 Reading for .

page 101 note 8 The sense is not clear. I read nōgüdel for negüdel instead of üküdel ‘corpse’.

page 102 note 1 Identification uncertain. The text from fol. 13v, line 5, yeke, to line 12, buu od, is difficult to interpret, and my translation is only a tentative suggestion.

page 102 note 2 The MS reading seems certainly to be qung as transcribed. I render this tentatively as an exclamation. Cf. the Ordos pronunciation qun in the spell um ā qun (Dictionnaire Ordos, p. 732a, simplified orthography). Though Mongol prints and MSS generally represent this syllable as °huu or , the spelling gung, though rare, is not unknown. See for an example the Obo ritual (IV/16), fol. 5r: -dür °huu: -deki qung-ača gerel yarun. The possibility that gung may represent a miscopying of gedeg ‘called’, and that originally the names of the relatives mentioned would be inserted immediately before it, cannot be proved. But see Eliade, op. cit., 199 for the naming of relatives in a similar ceremony among the Buriats.

page 102 note 3 Mo. činu-deki, which I take as a double case suffix plus derivative suffix -ki with the meaning ‘which are at your place’. The possibility exists that deki is a miscopying for degel ‘robe’.

page 102 note 4 Translation of the word transcribed as qadalaysan is uncertain. There may be a connexion with a word ḥadalḥu ‘nachgehen, untersuchen’ of the ‘Secret history’ (Haenisch, Wörterbuch, 55).

page 103 note 1 Translation into English requires the pronoun ‘it’ in the following, referring back to ‘your soul’, sür sünesün činu, but the sense should probably rather be that of direct address in the second person.

page 103 note 2 For uruy sadun see Dictionnaire Ordos, p. 742b.

page 103 note 3 Mo. tayalyasu, derivative in -yasu(n) from tayala- ‘to be pleased’.

page 103 note 4 The form of this litany, detailing to the dying man all those people and things in which he has taken pleasure, inevitably calls to mind the so-called elegy of Genghis Khan, as it is to be found in both Allan tobči and Erdeni-yin tobči, especially in the passage beginning on fol. 41v, line 22, of the Urga MS of the latter, p. 106, line 8, of Schmidt's edition. Whereas the section of the elegy immediately preceding this is introduced by the words Kilüken bayatur eyin maytarunKilüken bayatur praised him thus’, this section begins simply basakü eyin ōčirün ‘furthermore begged thus’, lacking the idea of praising. The textual similarity apparent in the listing of beloved persons and objects, followed in the text of Erdeni-yin tobči by the phrase tende bülüge, in our text by ende bui (buyu), permits the supposition that the elegy of Genghis Khan may equally be a ritual for the calling of the soul, or a reminiscence of such.