EAP756/4

The collection of the Phvat‘ lhuiṅ‘ʺ ’A rheʹ kyoṅʻʺ monastery (pron. Hput-hlaing Ashay-kyaung) represents the remains of a sizeable and well-resourced archive of Buddhist texts. It goes beyond what is ordinary for an average village site and includes all major components that might be found in collections at historically prominent locations, that is scriptural, curricular, liturgical, ritual, and preaching texts. At the same time, no historical documents or specialized works on astrology, medicine, divination, etc. are currently found in the collection suggesting a possibility of their removal by visiting manuscript collectors.

If the timeline of surviving manuscripts is representative of the collection as a whole, then the monastery must have seen several major acquisitions datable to the mid- and late eighteenth century, the 1840s, and early twentieth century. Arguably, the focus of these acquisitions was more on curricular and Vinaya texts at the earlier stages of collecting and heavily biased towards scriptural texts at a later one. This is largely due to a single large-scale donation of scriptural canon sponsored by a local family around 1908-09.

The highlights of collection include bundles originally produced for royal scriptural library by King Mindon-min (r. 1853-78) and his chief queen (items WL-PH-ASK 020, 041, 042) and a range of eighteenth-century manuscripts (WL-PH-ASK 004, 008, 013, 022, 028, 031, 038, 040, 067, 068, 073). A copy of scriptural canon mentioned above is also quite interesting in the context of overall dynamics of manuscript circulation in Upper Burma.

The monastery’s profile as an educational institution is reflected in the archive quite unevenly, with a trend towards curricular titles being more frequent among earlier manuscripts. Also, despite the acquisition of some curricular and liturgical manuscripts intended for memorization by novices in the early twentieth century, there is little evidence that these were in active use. Instead, their condition suggests that their donation might have had an equally symbolic or merit-making-related nature as the sponsorship of scriptural canon had (All these manuscripts show only accidental damage and have no signs of tear and wear on their gilding. On the contrary, manuscripts that were frequently retrieved and handled usually do show such deterioration of gilding). Perhaps, this might have been caused by some issues with monastery incumbency in the first decade of the twentieth century, soon after the arrival of the last batches of manuscripts. If that was the case, that certainly could have hindered the monastery’s ability to function as an educational institution.

A peculiar feature of ’A rheʹ kyoṅʻʺ manuscripts is that they continued to be accessed and used sporadically by the abbots of the monastery from the 1930s to the 1950s. This fact, established by a few ownership inscriptions added to manuscripts at later stages of their life and confirmed in interviews with our informants, is quite unusual, as all our previous, contemporaneous, and later research on Burmese manuscript collections suggests that since the 1930s the owners’ interest in scriptural or curricular manuscripts was rare or even exceptional.

Creation dates: Securely dated manuscripts in this collection range between August 1743 and April 1925. Several fragmentary bundles with their copy dates missing might predate 1743 by a couple of decades.

Custodial history: The composition and condition of collection as witnessed by the project team in the late 2014 results mostly from incumbency of Ūʺ Uttara, a learned monk who has been the abbot from c. 1950 to c. 2007. His as well as his predecessors’ interest in the manuscripts might have contributed to collection’s survival in the mid-twentieth century, yet his tenure had some shortcomings of its own.

As a rule, the abbots of village monasteries who assumed incumbency from the 1940s onwards knew fairly little about the contents of their collections and understood them in very generic terms. Their approach to manuscripts was somewhat pragmatic and guided rather by assessments of condition, than by insights into textual or historical significance of the manuscripts. As a result, items seen as damaged or too fragile were often discarded or disposed of in several respectable ways.

According to Ūʺ Sobhaṇa, a monk who as of 2014 resided at Shwebo but studied at ’A rheʹ kyoṅʻʺ since c. 1944 and witnessed the tenure of Ūʺ Uttara and three of his predecessors, a part of the collection that was fragmented, mixed up, or damaged by rats was burned in the early 1950s. This appears the last conscious attempt to reorganize and preserve the collection that we managed to identify.

Interestingly enough, this (or some other) intervention must have been, at least, partially cautious, for the manuscript WL-PH-ASK 041 sponsored by king Mindon-min and his chief-queen was retained and measures were taken to preserve it. Though the bundle was heavily damaged, someone has reinscribed the foliation gnawed away by rats and restored the binding. Normally, heavy damage resulting in the loss of parts of text led to disposal, but, apparently, the person who took the decision to preserve the manuscript understood its exclusive nature and value.

Later on, Ūʺ Uttara’s advanced age and inability to monitor the developments at his monastery led to further losses to the collection. As estimated by Ūʺ Pāmokkha, the abbot of the Toṅʹ kyoṅʻʺ monastery in the same village, amidst Ūʺ Uttara’s tenure the collection was stored in at least three manuscript cabinets. Such storage might have contained up to two hundred bundles or more. Later on, certain manuscripts were taken away and sold to antique dealers in Mandalay by various persons having connection with the monastery.

Apparently, the transition from Ūʺ Uttara to Ūʺ Tikkhindriya, the present incumbent, had a further negative impact on the collection. During our first visit to the monastery, the project team found the manuscripts kept in an uninhabited building standing to the southeast of the present monastery. The better-preserved part of the collection was stored in a small manuscript cabinet. Another, more damaged part was found wrapped in a monastic robe and placed on a bier or display case used for the funeral of Ūʺ Sujāta, the abbot from c. the 1920s to c. 1942-44. The manuscripts in both containers were damaged. Those kept in the cabinet still had their binding, but many were partly destroyed by rats who built a nest there. Wrapped in a robe was essentially a heap of mixed fragmented folios without binding. This portion was damaged even more heavily as the heap was found to contain another rats’ nest with a dam and four pups (no damage was inflicted to them and we believe that parent female managed to transport her infants to another, safer location overnight).

One of the junior resident monks explained to us that the manuscripts were wrapped in a robe because that was how they were retrieved from someone who attempted to steal them. According to that story, a burglar broke in the ordination hall, grabbed some manuscripts kept there bundling them up in a robe, and tried to escape. As the miscreant was spotted and chased, he dropped his load which was then picked up by the chasers and brought to the building where we found it.

This sounds extremely implausible, given that manuscripts were clearly disorganized at the time of wrapping. It seems totally counterintuitive that someone might be tempted to steal fragmented and mixed folios. A more likely scenario could be hypothesized in the following way. I assume that the detail of the story involving the ordination hall might be factual. The ordination hall was rebuilt several years before our visit. Most likely, prior to this renovation a damaged collection kept there was relocated to its later storage. Those manuscripts that were still tied up went into a cabinet, while damaged ones were collected, bundled up in a robe, and placed atop of the bier to hinder rats’ advances somehow. This precaution, however, failed to deter the rodents and further damage was inflicted to manuscripts in the building where we found them.

Administrative context: The collection of ’A rheʹ kyoṅʻʺ is owned by the monastery and administered by the abbot. ’A rheʹ kyoṅʻʺ appears to be the primary manuscript archive existing in Phvat‘ lhuiṅ‘ʺ historically. It also received some inputs of elite manuscripts from elsewhere. Unfortunately, we know excruciatingly little to offer any quality explanation of how this condition came about.

Extent and format of original material: The holdings of Phvat‘ lhuiṅ‘ʺ ’A rheʹ kyoṅʻʺ include seventy two palm-leaf manuscripts or manuscripts fragments as well as fragments of two lacquer manuscripts. Eleven manuscripts were digitized as a part of the project. 11 series.

Owner(s) of original material: The current custodian is Ūʺ Tikkhindriya, the abbot of Phvat‘ lhuiṅ‘ʺ ’A rheʹ kyoṅʻʺ. Former owners and custodians were the predecessors of Ūʺ Tikkhindriya since the mid-eighteenth century.