Nestorian (Jingjiao 景教) Inscriptions from China and Chinese Central Asia -- An Investigative Study

This project, based on an earlier Foundation grant (RG006-P-01: Nestorian and Manichaean Remains in Ch’üan-chou in South China -- An Epigraphical Religious-Historical and Art-Historical Survey), was part of a major international scholarly endeavor jointly funded by the Foundation and the Australian Research Council, which was sponsored by UNESCO under its Integrated Study of the Silk Road Program. The section of the project funded by the Foundation focused on Nestorian communities in China and Central Asia, with research team making considerable progress in the decipherment of stele inscriptions, especially those from Quanzhou 泉州. This has led to the unexpected discovery new data on Song-dynasty Nestorian communities in the Quanzhou area, which had hitherto not been known to modern researchers.