Dickens M., Smelova N. A Rediscovered Syriac Amulet from Turfan in the Collection of the Hermitage Museum // Written Monuments of the Orient. Vol. 7, No. 2(14), 2021. P. 107–147.
Item ВДсэ-524 in the State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg is an amulet
scroll written in Syriac which was discovered by the Second German Turfan Expedition
(1904–1905) and kept afterwards in the Museum of Ethnology (Museum für Völkerkunde)
in Berlin. The artifact originates in the Turkic-speaking Christian milieu of the
Turfan Oasis, probably from the Mongol period. The text, however, reflects a long tradition
of magical literature that goes back to ancient Mesopotamia and can be categorised
as a piece of apotropaic (protective) magic. The article contains an edition of the Syriac
text with translation and a discussion of its place of discovery, its overall composition
and specific words and expressions found in the text. The authors point out likely connections
between the Hermitage amulet and the Turfan fragments SyrHT 274–276 kept
in the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin — Preußischer Kulturbesitz and briefly discuss its similarity
with amulet H彩101 discovered in Qara Qoto by the 1983–1984 expedition of the
Institute of Cultural Relics, Inner Mongolia Academy of Social Sciences.
On November 22–24, 2023, the international conference for young scholars “Modern Buddhist education, historical, cultural and philosophical studies” will be held in Saint Petersburg. The program of the conference is now available.
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