Encyclopedia of India–China Cultural Contacts v1.c8.s2.t1.7

v1.c8.s2.t1.7

From the time of the Wei and Jin dynasties to the early Song Dynasty, all those Chinese monks who went to India to seek *dharma* had to learn *Shabdavidya* works. Master Xuanzang learnt the same twice at Nalanda Monastery. The *Shabdavidya* science of India had its influence on the study and analysis of ancient Chinese language through the translation of the Buddhist *sutras* into Chinese. In order to translate and read *sutras*, eminent foreign and local monks used works such as the *Miscellaneous names in Sanskrit*, *thousand Sanskrit Words*, *Collections of Sanskrit Words in Tang*, *Collection of Terms in Translation*, *Sound and Meaning of All Sutras* and *Supplement to Sound and Meaning of All Sutras*, etc., edited by many eminent Chinese scholars. The nature and content of these works showed that they were very much influenced by Indian *Shabdavidya* science. It is worthwhile to make an in-depth study on how much influence the Indian linguistic works had on the history of Chinese linguistic works. For instance, the *Standardisation of Transliteration of the Western Regions* compiled by the Imperial Order during the Reign of Qian Long of the Qing Dynasty had many chapters such as Indian Alphabet Genealogy, Supplement to Indian Alphabet Genealogy, Indian Transliterated Word Genealogy, Supplement to Indian Transliterated Word Genealogy and Chinese and Sanskrit Genealogy, etc, is proof of Chinese interest in Sanskrit. Some more works such the Sanskrit Dictionary translated by Su Manshu and *Preface to Fundamental Sanskrit Dictionary* by Zhang Taiyan in late Qing Dynasty reflected that Indian Sanskrit knowledge had been quite popular in some section of Chinese intelligentsia for a long time.