On the Indian Origins of the Tibetan Practice of Depositing Relics and Dhâraṇîs in Stûpas and Images

Taking its point of departure in the Fifth Dalai Lama's arguments in favor of the Indian origins of Tibetan practices of relic deposition, this study supplies an overview of relevant historical developments in the concept of 'relic' in Indian Buddhism, identifies the scriptural sources to which the Fifth Dalai Lama alludes, and discusses certain East Asian parallels. It is argued that relic deposition practices provide one specific example of a more general diachronic process of synthesizing various strands of Indian Buddhism on both the practical and theoretical levels, a process that did not stop at the Tibetan border.