The l Han kar ma is one of three ninth century Tibetan catalogues enumerating the Tibetan translations of Buddhist texts. The list contains about 750 titles and was written in AD 812 on commission of the Tibetan king to provide an overview of the translations that had already been finished. Together with a second extant catalogue, the 'Phang thang ma, the l Han kar ma is an important source for the literary history of Buddhist texts in India and Asia. In the 14th century, the Tibetan scholar Bu ston Rin chen grub used the l Han kar ma as a model and source text for creating and structuring the Tibetan Buddhist canonical collections of b Ka' 'gyur and bs Tan 'gyur. This volume contains the first critical edition of the l Han kar ma, using the five most widely used bs Tan 'gyur editions and abiding by the serial numbers given by Marcelle Lalou. Each text title is completed by an apparatus containing the numbers of all the text versions of the respective title in the Dunhuang collections of Paris and London, in the 'Phang thang ma, in the canon catalogues by Bu ston and in Tibetan and Chinese editions of the Buddhist canon, including the r Nying ma rgyud 'bum, followed, where necessary, by a discussion of the identification of the respective catalogue entry with existing texts. The book begins with an extensive introduction about the historical context of the l Han kar ma, its structure and its text, as well as extensive registers and indexes.
