On the Inscription and Custody Battle of the Stele Inscribed with a Six-Syllable Mantra at the Mogao Grottoes
The stele inscribed with a six-character Buddhist mantra that was erected at the Mogao Grottoesin the eighth year of the Zhizheng era during the Yuan dynasty(1348)is a rare artifact among historical relics because the mantra was inscribed in Sanskrit,Tibetan,Phags-pa,Uighur,Western Xia,and Chinese.In addition,due to the small size of the inscription,rubbings of the text were also easy to procure which allowed copies of the mantra to become a gift shared between scholars,as well as a pop-ular souvenir for tourists.However,the stele was too fragile for rubbings of the inscription to be taken too often.When the Dun-huang Art Research Institute was initially established,it was determined that this stele was not to be opened for casual copying,and that only fifty rubbings could be made by the institute per month for sale.Due to the high profits from selling the rubbings,the local Dunhuang County Council began to compete for custody of the stele,and submitted a proposal to the Dunhuang County Government on December 1st,1948,requesting that jurisdiction of the relic be granted to the council.Lu Ling,the governor of Dunhuang County at the time,did not support the proposal and wrote a letter to the institute informing them of the council's in-tentions.The institute responded by clearly stating that the custody rights of the stele should not under any circumstances be trans-ferred,and then proceeded to submit a special report to the Ministry of Education on March 18th,1949.As the Chinese war of liberation was still ongoing at this time,many of the institutions of the government were not working as efficiently as could be ex-pected,and it was not until June 2nd,1949 that the Ministry of Education issued an order from Guangzhou stating that custody of the stele was to be permanently entrusted to the Dunhuang Art Research Institute.As a result,the stele has been preserved in the Dunhuang Art Research Institute(now known as the Dunhuang Academy)ever since.
stele inscribed with a six-character mantra at the Mogao Grottoesinscription rubbingscustody of the steleLu Ling,governor of Dunhuang County
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