THE MUSTANG ARCHIVES: ANALYSIS OF HANDWRITTEN DOCUMENTS VIA THE ETHNOGRAPHIC STUDY OF PAPERMAKING TRADITIONS IN NEPAL

该项目旨在通过微观研究，对尼泊尔马斯塘当地村庄和家庭档案中以前编目和注明日期的文件的纸质品种进行识别和分类。它也将有助于重建纸的历史在非常特殊的环境野马。总的来说，我的目标是通过对撰写文本的论文进行科学分析，建立一个坚实的地理和期刊目录和数据库，至少涵盖过去两个世纪，并为早期的作品提供数据。在这组有日期的文件中，将有选择地从鲁巴克、戈林、下措格南社区的档案、贾科特、洛蒙塘的私人收藏和其他可能的以前编目的收藏中抽样和检查总共200篇论文。这些作品大多是世俗性质的，信件，社区文件等。数据将根据申请人以前对中亚手稿的工作制定的法典模板进行记录。从手稿中收集的信息将与该地区仍在使用的书籍制作方法进行比较，使用二手文献和对工匠的采访。在野马和邻近地区的实地考察中，将研究书籍生产、造纸和印刷的活跃场所。造纸技术和方法、工具和所用材料将被记录。造纸厂等图书文化资源将被绘制成地图。这个跨学科的项目，结合了档案文献的文本和法典分析，民族志和植物学田野调查，以及对野马地区手稿文化的探索，将对藏学研究人员具有极其重要的意义。由此产生的纸张和数据库的时间顺序类型将立即用于世界各地的纸张历史学家和保护人员。最后，对于野马族的当地人来说，这个项目有可能改变他们对藏文写作、文献和书籍制作技术的看法，同时对我们了解曾经独立的野马族王国的文化历史做出重大贡献。

This project aims to identify and classify, through microscopic study, the paper varieties of previously catalogued and dated documents from local villages and family archives in Mustang, Nepal. It will also contribute to reconstructing the history of paper in the very special environment of Mustang. Overall, my aim is to build, via scientific analysis of the paper on which the texts are written, a solid geographical and periodical catalogue and database that will cover at least the last two centuries, and provide data for earlier works as well.Of the group of dated documents, all together two hundred papers will be selectively sampled and examined from the archives of the communities of Lubrak, Geling, Lower Tshognam, a private collection in Jharkot, Lo Monthang, and other possible collections previously catalogued. These works are mostly of a secular nature, letters, community documents, etc. Data will be recorded according to the codicological template developed by previous work of the applicant on manuscripts from Central Asia. Information gathered from the manuscripts will be compared with book production practices still used in the region, using secondary literature and interviews with craftsmen. Active places of book production, papermaking, and printing will be researched during fieldwork in Mustang and neighbouring areas. Papermaking technology and methods, tools, and materials being used will be documented. Papermaking plants and other resources on book culture will be mapped.This interdisciplinary project, combining textual and codicological analysis of archival documents with ethnographic and botanical fieldwork and exploration of manuscript cultures in Mustang, will be of extreme importance for researchers in Tibetan Studies. The resulting chronological typology of paper and database will be of immediate use to paper historians and conservators around the world. And finally, for the local people of Mustang, this project has the potential to change perceptions of Tibetan writing and techniques of documents and book production, as well as to make a major contribution to our understanding of the cultural history of the once-independent kingdom of Mustang.