釋迦方志 2.95

2.95

The sixteenth: In the Great Tang, the śramaṇa Xuanzang of Dazhuangyan Monastery in the capital, pitying his own shadow, went west in the third year of Zhenguan to seek the teaching traces. From the capital in the beginning, he reached Shazhou in the west, and climbed solitary dangerous barriers to Yiwu and Gaochang, experiencing every peril. At that time, the King of Gaochang, of the Qu clan, provided gifts and sent him along to the Yabghu of the Turks' camp. He was further escorted to all the barbarian kingdoms north of the Snow Mountains, thoroughly observing Buddhist culture. Further southeast he crossed the Great Snow Mountains, reached the various Indias, and spent ten years there. Later he returned from south of the Pamirs and north of the Snow Mountains, passing through various mountain kingdoms to return east via Khotan, Lou-lan, and others, through one hundred and fifty kingdoms in all. In the nineteenth year of Zhenguan, he arrived safely in the capital, and by imperial decree translated scriptures, authoring the *Records of the Western Regions* in twelve fascicles. I have searched through the monastic biographies and widely heard reports; the Buddhist kingdoms traversed are fully presented above. Yet the records and biographies seen from time to time appear and disappear; taking those that are illustrious, I have now narrated them. As for those like Fawei and Fabiao whose names are marked without records, their accounts are difficult to weave together. Furthermore, those who went and returned in the Sui dynasty and those who came and went under the Tang all compiled their itineraries, fully detailing them on paper and silk. How could cases such as these be fully related?