This paper investigates the transcription system of mantra pro-nunciation characterized of Buddhist transcription language, and studies the difference between the Sanskrit Fifty Consonants/Vowels and the actual mantra transcription. centered on the ...
This paper investigates the transcription system of mantra pro-nunciation characterized of Buddhist transcription language, and studies the difference between the Sanskrit Fifty Consonants/Vowels and the actual mantra transcription. centered on the <Mantras> of Manyeonsa issue published in the Chosun Dynasty.It is also con-cerned with discussing the changes in mantra transcription focusing on the literatures of the 18th~19th centuries which had mostly been excluded from studies. All of the <Mantras> issues published by major temples such as Anshimsa, Manyeonsa, and Mangwolsa used the "Siddham?t?k? →Chinese transliteration → Korean transliteration," trying to spell out as close to the Sanskrit pronunciation as possible, with occasional notes on those having discrepancies with the original Sanskrit pronunciation. However, in the 18~19th century literatures dealt in the present study, mostly published for reciting purpose by minor temples, there are many spellings with strong individual dialects.In all of them the Siddham?t?k? transcription is hardly found, with some presence of Chinese transcription, but with mostly Korean transcription.Also, as these mantras were used for ceremonial recit-ing purpose at temples, various phonemic phenomena are naturally observed such as palatalization, nasal sound assimilation, consonant assimilation, and wrong separate liaisonspellings, which are ob-served in pure Korean.