Glossary
Types of attestation for names and terms of the corresponding source language
This term is attested in a manuscript used as a source for this translation.
This term is attested in other manuscripts with a parallel or similar context.
This term is attested in dictionaries matching Tibetan to the corresponding language.
The attestation of this name is approximate. It is based on other names where the relationship between the Tibetan and source language is attested in dictionaries or other manuscripts.
This term is a reconstruction based on the Tibetan phonetic rendering of the term.
This term is a reconstruction based on the semantics of the Tibetan translation.
This term has been supplied from an unspecified source, which most often is a widely trusted dictionary.
g.1
Bande Yeshé Dé
Wylie: ban+de ye shes sde
Tibetan: བནྡེ་ཡེ་ཤེས་སྡེ།
Yeshé Dé (late eighth to early ninth century) was the most prolific translator of sūtras into Tibetan. Altogether he is credited with the translation of more than one hundred sixty sūtra translations and more than one hundred additional translations, mostly on tantric topics. In spite of Yeshé Dé’s great importance for the propagation of Buddhism in Tibet during the imperial era, only a few biographical details about this figure are known. Later sources describe him as a student of the Indian teacher Padmasambhava, and he is also credited with teaching both sūtra and tantra widely to students of his own. He was also known as Nanam Yeshé Dé, from the Nanam (sna nam) clan.
g.2
Mahākāla
Wylie: nag po chen po, mgon po nag po
Tibetan: ནག་པོ་ཆེན་པོ།, མགོན་པོ་ནག་པོ།
Sanskrit: mahākāla
Mahākāla is a wrathful Buddhist protector deity. In Tibetan, the name Mahākāla was mostly translated literally with nag po chen po (“Great Black One”) but on occasion it was rendered mgon po nag po (“Black Lord”). In Toh 440, for which the Sanskrit is extant, we have an attested example of this. Hence we have rendered both Tibetan terms in this text as Mahākāla. Outside the Buddhist tradition, Mahākāla is also a name for a wrathful form of Śiva.
g.3
Prajñāvarman
Wylie: pradz+nyA barma
Tibetan: པྲཛྙཱ་བརྨ།
Sanskrit: prajñāvarman RP
A Bengali paṇḍita resident in Tibet during the late eighth and early ninth centuries. Arriving in Tibet at the invitation of the Tibetan king, he assisted in the translation of numerous canonical scriptures. He is also the author of a few philosophical commentaries contained in the Tengyur (bstan ’gyur).