The Third Ōtani Expedition at Dunhuang: Acquisition of the Japanese Collection of Dunhuang Manuscripts

Abstract

Aurel Stein’s 1907 visit to the hidden cave library at the Thousand Buddha Caves near Dunhuang, and especially his acquisition of a large number of manuscripts there, came as exciting news to archaeologists and researchers worldwide. Paul Pelliot’s visit a few months later yielded an equally impressive collection of documents, which was soon to stir the interest of leading Chinese intellectuals. As a result of their efforts, the Chinese Ministry of Education issued a government directive to transport the remaining manuscripts to the capital in 1909, with this effectively putting an end to the sale of these to foreign explorers. However, the two members of the third Ōtani expedition were still able to acquire a significant number of documents in Dunhuang in 1911-1912. Japan was a relatively new participant in the exploration of Central Asia. It had recently demonstrated its economic and military strength by unexpectedly defeating the Russians in the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905 and emerged as a major player in East Asia. As was the case with European imperialistic powers, Japan’s colonial ambitions were accompanied by an increased interest in the Qing empire, especially its non-Han regions of Manchuria, Mongolia, Xinjiang, and Tibet. The archaeological exploration of North-West China, however, was conducted as a private enterprise rather than a government-sponsored project. The man behind these ambitious plans was Count Ōtani Kōzui (1876-1948), leader of the powerful Nishi Honganji Branch of the Jōdo shinshū sect, who sponsored a series of expeditions with the specific aim of exploring the Buddhist sites of the region. While staying in London in 1900-1902, the young Ōtani was fascinated by the discoveries of Buddhist remains in Western China by European explorers such as Sven Hedin and Aurel Stein. He believed that as a Buddhist priest thoroughly trained in the Chinese tradition he would be able to make a contribution to the exploration of the spread of Buddhism in this region. In 1902, when it was time for him to leave London, he decided to return home to Japan with a handful of followers by taking the overland route via Central Asia. Although his own participation in the journey was cut short by the death of his father, his men stayed behind to continue the exploration for a total of two years. In 1908, four years after the end of the first trip, Ōtani sent two young explorers to Mongolia and Xinjiang for a second round of exploration. The two men traversed the Gobi desert and entered Western China from the north. The team leader was the eighteen-year old Tachibana Zuichō (18901968) who on this trip discovered the famous fourth century Li Bo manuscript in the vicinity of Loulan, a find that shortly made his name known in academic circles in the West. The expedition ended in India from where Tachibana travelled with Ōtani to London. During the six months in Europe, Tachibana was elected a member of the Royal Geographical Society and was able to meet in person a number of eminent European explorers, including Aurel Stein and Albert von Le Coq. He left London in August 1910 to begin the next expedition, accompanied by his English assistant A.O. Hobbs. This trip is known today as the third Ōtani expedition. After travelling through Russia and crossing into Chinese Central Asia, the party began excavations near Turfan. After this, Tachibana chose a difficult and rough road to proceed towards Loulan and then farther down to the southern Taklamakan route. In order to travel light and to spare his companion, he instructed Hobbs to transport the bulk of their baggage to Kucha and wait there. In a stroke of bad luck, however, the Englishman contracted smallpox and died shortly before the two of them had a chance to reunite. Under the arrangements of George Macartney, the British Consul General, his body was moved to Kashgar and buried there in March 1910. Tachibana arrived just in time for the funeral, shortly after which he departed for Khotan and then launched an ill-fated attempt to penetrate into Tibet. Ōtani was keenly following Tachibana’s movements, with a series of instructions and reports being mailed and telegrammed back and forth between Kyōto and Xinjiang. However, communication with the young explorer was cut after his departure from Kashgar and his whereabouts remained unknown for many months to come. In the meantime, Ōtani dispatched from Japan another young man by the name of Yoshikawa Koichirō (1885-1978) with a caravan to aid and eventually relieve Tachibana in China. Unlike most of the participants of the three expeditions, Yoshikawa was not a Buddhist priest but a layman whose family was in the service of the Nishi Honganji Temple. At the end of May 1911, he left Kyōto to travel by steamer from Kōbe to Shanghai, and then on horseback to Hankou, Luoyang, Xi’an, Lanzhou, Liangzhou, Suzhou, and Anxi (Fig. 1). Ōtani’s Chinese chef Li Yuqing went along in the double capacity of cook and interpreter.1