Tuesday, May 20th 

6:00pm - 8:00pm EST 

Hybrid | $30

Join us for a fascinating lecture on the history and development of Buddhism in Mongolia. While much has been written about Buddhism along the Silk Road, the contributions of the Buddhist nomads have often been understudied. Using the Oirad translation of the “Runic” rock inscriptions, this lecture will delve into the rich interplay between Buddhism and the nomadic peoples of the Eurasian steppe postal road, exploring their monumental sculptures, scripts, and schools of thought. 

For centuries, the origins of Mongolic literary and Buddhist traditions were thought to date back to the thirteenth century, during the empire of Genghis Khan. However, in a groundbreaking discovery in 2014, an international team of scholars deciphered the Brahmi script of the Bugut (circa CE 585–587) and Khuis Tolgoi (CE 604–620) rock inscriptions found in Mongolia, revealing that the language behind these inscriptions was Mongolic.

This discovery has two significant implications, pushing the origins of Mongolic literary tradition back by six centuries, and sheds new light on the spread of Buddhist practices among the Mongolic-speaking populations during the sixth century. These early interactions unfolded in the context of the Rouran (CE 380–555) and post-Rouran khanate periods, reshaping our understanding of Buddhism's role in the nomadic world.

Saglar (Saga) Bougdaeva was born and raised in Kalmykia. Central to Bougdaeva’s work as a scholar of Eurasian studies is a commitment to identifying and preserving the nomadic oral and written heritage of the Great Eurasian Steppe. Before receiving a PhD in Sociology from Yale University, Bougdaeva studied Mongolian-Tibetan-Mandarin linguistics at Saint Petersburg State University. In 2023, Bougdaeva's translation of the Oyirad-Kalmyk epic "Jangar" was published by the University of California Press.