Origin from 851
Mogao Cave 17, known as the Library Cave, is a small chamber sealed behind a hidden wall in the corridor of a larger cave at the Mogao complex near Dunhuang on the Silk Road. It was discovered by chance in 1900 by the Daoist caretaker Wang Yuanlu and found to hold more than 50,000 manuscripts, paintings, printed documents and textiles dating from the fourth to eleventh centuries, written in over twenty languages and covering Buddhist, Daoist, Manichaean, Nestorian Christian and secular material. The British-Hungarian archaeologist Aurel Stein acquired a large portion of the cache in 1907, and the find remains one of the most significant manuscript discoveries of the twentieth century, comparable to the Cairo Genizah as a sealed repository whose contents survived precisely because they were hidden away rather than kept in ordinary use.
Facts
Origins
Origin PeriodMogao Cave 17 was originally cut as a memorial shrine for the monk Hongbian in the ninth century, before it was later used to store manuscripts. Origin PeriodThe cave was sealed with tens of thousands of manuscripts and artworks inside sometime in the early eleventh century, most likely between 1002 and 1035, and remained closed until its rediscovery in 1900. Origin PeriodManuscripts date 4th to 11th centuries; cave sealed some time after, rediscovered 1900 1 FoundedDiscovered by chance in 1900 by the Daoist caretaker Wang Yuanlu, who found a hidden chamber sealed behind a wall in the corridor of a larger cave at the Mogao complex. 1 Organisation
Category of StructureA sealed manuscript hoard, matching the existing single use of Repository on file. Distinguishing FeatureHeld an estimated forty to fifty thousand manuscripts and printed documents in Chinese, Tibetan, Sanskrit, Sogdian, Khotanese and other languages, alongside paintings and textiles. 1 Status
Status TodayHistorical; not practised continuously 1 Cross-Tradition Connections
Associated With
Cairo, Cities This source names Cairo directly: "twentieth century, comparable to the Cairo Genizah as a sealed repository whose contents survived precisely because they were hidden away rather than kept in ordinary use."
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