This study investigates the earliest surviving Tibetan paper, from the Dunhuang cave library, using paper fibre analysis combined with codicological, palaeographical and textual information. The hypotheses tested by this method concern the regional origins and production centres of early Tibetan paper and methods for dating this material. Using overlapping typologies, we classify a sample of manuscripts into coherent groups, relating them to particular 'book cultures'. By linking three main manuscript groups to different geographical regions, we offer new insights into an important manuscript collection, and show that the method of overlapping typologies has the potential to yield further insights.shrubs belonging to the Daphne and Edgeworthia species (shog shing or dung lo ma in Tibetan)-which still provide the basic materials for paper made in the Himalayan regions-but from the roots of both the Stellera chamaejasme species (re lcag pa in Tibetan) and, more seldom, Euphorbia fisheriana (re lcag gi rtsa ba in Tibetan) (Trier 1972, 56; Dawa 1999, 156-9, 320-1). Stellera is a small genus of fewer than ten species, found growing in comparatively dry conditions in areas such as Central Asia, Iran and parts of Tibet. It is widely distributed along the Himalayan range, where it is found at altitudes of 2700-4500 m. 1 In principle, it should not be difficult to determine the relative importance of each of these different fibres in the early history of Tibetan papermaking. Stellera chamaejasme fibres can be clearly differentiated from Daphne and Edgeworthia despite the fact that all of these plants belong to the Thymelaeaceae family.It should also be possible to distinguish paper made from these Thymelaeaceae family plants from Chinese paper. According to traditional Chinese accounts, the first true paper was invented by Cai Lun in ad 105 in south-eastern China, and is said to have been made from mulberry bark, remnants of hemp, rags of cloth and fishing nets (Hunter 1932(Hunter , 1978Tsien 2004). We know that in Central China, fine paper was made for important documents primarily from hemp and mulberry (Tsien 1973;Whitfield 2007). Rattan was used from about the seventh century, until it was supposedly replaced by bamboo in southern China in approximately the 10th-11th centuries (Tsien 1973(Tsien , 1985Bloom 2001). In this way, by the end of the eighth century, the Chinese were probably using a variety of raw fibres that included the rags of hemp, flax (ropes) and ramie (known as 'Chinese grass'), bark of mulberry, bamboo and rattan, rice and wheat straw, and many other types of grass depending on the region of production. Some plants, such as ramie, were widely distributed and available in all China, while others were limited to particular geographical zones.The above accounts are, however, based on secondary sources rather than on systematic analysis. The purpose of this study is to determine the nature of the earliest available Tibetan paper, through paper analysis combined with textual, palaeographical and codicolog...
