On Yuan Chwang's Travels in India, 629–645 A.D. v2.c18.55

v2.c18.55

A legend about the hare like that here told by the pilgrim seems to have survived among the Mongols down to the present. Thus the Kalmucs, who worship the hare as a god, and call him Sakyamuni, “say that on earth he allowed himself to be eaten by a starving man, for which gracious act he was raised to domineer over the moon where they profess to see him”.⁵