Gudrun Melzer

This project brings together an international collaborative team with expertise in Buddhist manuscripts, palaeography, and the Mulasarvastivada vinaya (MSV) in order to sort, transcribe, study and catalog a set of unique eighth century birch bark manuscript fragments presently held in the Schøyen Collection in Oslo. The manuscript contains various portions of the MSV Bhaisajyavastu (‘Chapter on Medicine’) and Uttaragrantha (‘The concluding/superior scripture’), part of the former and the entire body of the latter having until recently been considered lost in Sanskrit.This collaborative project will for the first time make the preserved Sanskrit text of these sections available for editing, translation, comparison, and in-depth study.