中国简单型佛足迹图文溯源

On the Pictorial and Textual Tracing of the Simple-style Buddha Footprints in China

佛足迹是早期暗示佛陀的重要符号,后期逐渐被解释为佛陀三十二相中的一种。中国目前发现了四处不同图案唐代佛足迹图像,每例图案都在两至三种,图案各不相同,不能用三十二相来解释。以往它们也曾被认为是玄奘从中印度带回中国的一种粉本样式。本文将重新阐释这些佛足迹作为图像类型的产生、传播历史。一类是图像传播,源自西北印度贵霜时期佛足迹的经典结构;另一类是图像文字间的相互转化传播,均是根据《大唐西域记》中的文字记载进行复原的案例,由于各地工匠理解的差异,最终导致了中国四例简单佛足迹图像之间的差异。

The Buddha footprints were important symbols of the Buddha,which later transformed into one of the thirty-two images of Buddha.So far,Buddha footprints of the Tang Dynasty have come to place at four places.Each of them consisted two to three different patterns,which should not be explained by the thirty-two images.The author re-interprets the emergence and transmission of the Buddha foot prints.Their origin could be traced to the classic representations of Buddha footprints of the Kushan empire.As for the correlation between visual images and texts,the author argues that the differences among the four locations should have been due to the discrepancy of craftsmen of different regions.