Buddha’s hair. Cult, hagiographic narrative, pilgrim’s tradition (4th – 9th centuries)

Abstract

The cult of Buddha relics found its diverse reflection in the literature of thе period of wide spread of Buddhism in India. It was one of the manifestations of the entire complex of Buddhist culture. The connections of that cult with other forms of religious activity are of great interest. Multiple descriptions of sacred places contained in the texts of Chinese pilgrims who traveled all over the Indian subcontinent provide the researcher with a wealth of material and gives an idea of the many cult centers and revered relics, their types and their distribution in space. Preserved in stupas and monasteries “Buddha’s hair” belonged to the most important category of relics, called “bodily” (śariradhātu). The analysis of the information collectedby pilgrims compared with Indian hagiographic texts makes it possible to identify various semantic associations related to “hair relics”. In the paper an issue is also touched upon the problem of the relationship between the cult of the Buddha’s hair with pictorial canons and formulaic texts of the Buddhist tradition.