Stein, Aurel. Serindia. Detailed Report of Explorations in Central Asia and Westernmost China. 5 vols. Oxford (Clarendon Press) 1921. [46224]
Serindia, Vol. IV, Plates: Silk painting (Ch. xxviii 006) representing thousand-armed Avalokitesvara (Kuan-Yin) with attendant divinities, from 'Thousand Buddhas', Tun-Huang.
In the early 1900s, Wang Yuanlu, a Taoist priest acting as the self-appointed abbot of the Buddhist cave shrines at Dunhuang, made a startling discovery. A crack in one of the cave’s brilliantly painted frescoes had revealed a previously walled-up, locked door. Behind it lay a rock-cut chapel filled with thousands of ancient manuscripts, paintings and printed texts, undisturbed for more than 900 years. Among them lay the oldest dated example of a printed book known to exist.
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