page_title: Aurel Stein
section_title: Expeditions
hierarchical_section_title: Aurel Stein / Expeditions
caption_attribution_description: English: A picture of the grave of Sir Aurel Stein, in the British Cemetery, Kabul. The Hungarian plaque, attached August 2003, reads: "Raised by Hungary, educated by England, received by Afghanistan, the great Hungarian Orientalist on the 60th anniversary of his death. Saluting, L. Bodolai, L. Dávid"
context_page_description: Sir Marc Aurel Stein, KCIE, FRAS, FBA
  was a Hungarian-born British archaeologist, primarily known for his explorations and archaeological discoveries in Central Asia. He was also a professor at Indian universities.
  Stein was also an ethnographer, geographer, linguist and surveyor. His collection of books and manuscripts taken from Dunhuang caves is important for the study of the history of Central Asia and the art and literature of Buddhism. He wrote several volumes on his expeditions and discoveries which include Ancient Khotan, Serindia and Innermost Asia.
  A memorial stone on his name was erected in Mohandmarg, Kashmir on 14 September 2017 at the same place where Aurel Stein used to pitch his tent.
context_section_description: Stein made four major expeditions to Central Asia—in 1900–1901, 1906–1908, 1913–1916 and 1930. He brought to light the hidden treasure of a great civilization which by then was practically lost to the world. One of his significant finds during his first journey during 1900–1901 was the Taklamakan Desert oasis of Dandan Oilik where he was able to uncover a number of relics. During his third expedition in 1913–1916, he excavated at Khara-Khoto.
  The British Library's Stein collection of Chinese, Tibetan and Tangut manuscripts, Prakrit wooden tablets, and documents in Khotanese, Uyghur, Sogdian and Eastern Turkic is the result of his travels through central Asia during the 1920s and 1930s. Stein discovered manuscripts in the previously lost Tocharian languages of the Tarim Basin at Miran and other oasis towns, and recorded numerous archaeological sites especially in Iran and Balochistan.
  When Stein visited Khotan he was able to render in Persian a portion of the Shahnama after he came across a local reading the Shahnama in Turki.
  During 1901 Stein was responsible for exposing forgeries of Islam Akhun, as well as establishing the details and the authencity of manuscripts that had been discovered before 1896 in northwest China.
  Stein's greatest discovery was made at the Mogao Caves also known as "Caves of the Thousand Buddhas", near Dunhuang in 1907. It was there that he discovered a printed copy of the Diamond Sutra, the world's oldest printed text, dating to AD 868, along with 40,000 other scrolls (all removed by gradually winning the confidence and bribing the Taoist caretaker). He took 24 cases of manuscripts and 4 cases of paintings and relics. He was knighted for his efforts, but Chinese nationalists dubbed him a burglar and staged protests against him. His discovery inspired other French, Russian, Japanese, and Chinese treasure hunters and explorers who also took their toll on the collection.
  During his expedition of 1906–1908 while surveying south of the Johnson Line in the Kunlun Mountains, Stein suffered frostbite and lost several toes on his right foot.
  
  When he was resting from his extended journeys into Central Asia, he spent most of his time living in a tent in the spectacularly beautiful alpine meadow called Mohanmarg which lies at the mouth atop the Sind Valley where from he translated Rajatarangini  from Sanskrit to English. Stein was a lifelong bachelor, but was always accompanied by a dog named "Dash" (of which there were seven). 
  The fourth expedition to Central Asia, however, ended in failure. Stein did not publish any account, but others have written of the frustrations and rivalries between British and American interests in China, between Harvard's Fogg Museum and the British Museum, and finally, between Paul J. Sachs and Langdon Warner, the two Harvard sponsors of the expedition.
  Stein died in Kabul on 26 October 1943 and is buried in the Sherpur Cantonment, Kabul.
caption: Photograph of Aurel Stein's grave marker in the Sherpur Cantonment, Kabul
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