Markus Viehbeck

Markus Viehbeck

Contact:

E-Mail: markus.viehbeck@univie.ac.at
Web: https://univie.academia.edu/MarkusViehbeck

Markus Viehbeck is a Postdoctoral Researcher and PI in the FWF-funded project Himalayan Sūtra Collections: Textual, Material, and Social Perspectives (P35697-G). In the past, he has held positions as researcher and lecturer at the ISTB, as Assistant Professor at the Chair of Buddhist Studies, Cluster "Asia & Europe," University of Heidelberg (2010-2018), and as Interim Professor for Tibetan and Buddhist Studies at LMU-Munich (2022). At the ISTB, he also acts as the chair of the Association for Tibetan and Buddhist Studies issuing the monograph series Vienna Series for Tibetan and Buddhist Studies.

His research interests address diverse topics within Tibetan and Himalayan religion, history, and culture, with a focus on the Tibetan Buddhist canon and Himalayan manuscript studies, Tibetan and Buddhist intellectual history, and processes of transcultural exchange.

His publications include Polemics in Indo-Tibetan Scholasticism (Vienna, 2014), the edited volume Transcultural Encounters in the Himalayan Borderlands (Heidelberg, 2017), as well as the two co-authored monographs Two Illuminated Text Collections of Namgyal Monastery (Kathmandu, 2021) and The Manuscript Kanjur from Shey Palace, Ladakh (Vienna, 2022). For the Tibetan Manuscript Project Vienna (TMPV), he documents and studies manuscripts of Tibetan Buddhist canonical literature and contributes to building up a comprehensive database at Resources for Kanjur & Tanjur Studies (rKTs).

Online resources

Tibetan Manuscript Project Vienna (TMPV): https://tmpv.univie.ac.at

Resources for Kanjur & Tanjur Studies (rKTs): http://www.rkts.org

Himalayan Times (periodical): https://digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/diglit/himalayan_times?ui_lang=eng

All activities

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Mag. Dr. Markus Viehbeck

T: +43-1-4277-43566

markus.viehbeck@univie.ac.at

Winter term 2025

141029 OV Studying at the ISTB - Orientation Event

142018 UE The Life and Teachings of a Wandering Yogi: rDza dPal sprul and the Ris med Era

142206 PS Introduction to Digital Philological Methods and Tools for Tibetology and South Asian Studies

Summer term 2025

142077 PS Nepal's Stolen Deities on Facebook - Recent Controversies in the Restitution of Cultural Heritage from the Himalayas

142138 BA Book and Manuscript Culture in Tibet: Cultural Studies Perspectives

142141 BA Book and Manuscript Culture in Tibet: Philological Perspectives

Viehbeck, M., & Werner, E. (2025). Automated Character Recognition in Early Tibetan Canonical Manuscripts. Revue d'Etudes Tibétaines, (79), 55-65.

Viehbeck, M. (2024). Resounding the Buddha’s Sūtras. Film, . https://doi.org/10.25365/phaidra.609

Viehbeck, M., & Werner, E. (2024). Namgyal Manuscript Collection Datasets. Software or database https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.14247730

Kellner, B., Mathes, K.-D., Viehbeck, M., Matsuoka, H., Moriyama, S., & Neill, T. (Eds.) (2023). To the Heart of Truth: Felicitation Volume for Eli Franco on the Occasion of His Seventieth Birthday. (1 ed.) Arbeitskreis für Tibetische und Buddhistische Studie. Wiener Studien zur Tibetologie und Buddhismuskunde Vol. 104

Viehbeck, M., Lainé, B., Kellner, B. (Ed.), Mathes, K.-D. (Ed.), & Viehbeck, M. (Ed.) (2022). The Manuscript Kanjur from Shey Palace, Ladakh: Introduction and Catalogue. Arbeitskreis für tibetische und buddhistische Studien der Universität Wien. Wiener Studien zur Tibetologie und Buddhismuskunde Vol. 102 https://wstb.univie.ac.at/wp-content/uploads/WSTB_102.pdf

Viehbeck, M. (2021). The Toyo Bunko Manuscript Kanjur and Its Importance for the Study of the Tibetan Buddhist Canon: An Introduction. Web publication, . https://app.toyobunko-lab.jp/assets/2_Introduction_Toyo%20Bunko%20Manusript%20%20Kanjur.pdf

Viehbeck, M. (2021). Human Engagement on Manuscript Margins: Glimpses into the Social Life of a Collection of Buddhist Sūtras from Mustang. Revue d'Etudes Tibétaines, 58, 103-138.

Viehbeck, M., & Luczanits, C. (2021). Two Illuminated Text Collections of Namgyal Monastery: A Study of Early Buddhist Art and Literature in Mustang. (1. ed.) Vajra Books. Vajra Academic Vol. 1

Viehbeck, M. (2020). The Yogi and the Scholar: Rhetorical Polemics as Literary Frames and Conceptual Framework in Tibetan Buddhist Discourse . Entangled Religions, 11(4). https://doi.org/10.46586/er.11.2020.8694

Viehbeck, M. (2020). From Sūtra Collections to Kanjurs: Tracing a Network of Buddhist Canonical Literature across the Western and Central Himalayas. Revue d'Etudes Tibétaines, 54, 241-260.

Viehbeck, M. (2019). Indo-Tibetan Relations in Tibetan Polemical Discourse: Reconsidering Cultural Dynamics between Tradition and Innovation. In B. Kellner (Ed.), Buddhism and the Dynamics of Transculturality: New Approaches (pp. 201-224). De Gruyter.

Viehbeck, M. (2018). Mona Chettri. Ethnicity and Democracy in the Eastern Himalayan Borderland: Constructing Democracy. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2017. European Bulletin of Himalayan Research, 52, 138-141.

Viehbeck, M., & Torri, D. (2018). Religious Revival and Artistic Renaissance across the Himalayas: An Introduction. European Bulletin of Himalayan Research, 52, 3-16.

Viehbeck, M., & Torri, D. (Eds.) (2018). Special Issue: Religious Revival and Artistic Renaissance across the Himalayas. European Bulletin of Himalayan Research, 52, 3-131.

Viehbeck, M. (2017). Introduction: Cultural History as a History of Encounters - A 'Contact Perspective'. In M. Viehbeck (Ed.), Transcultural Encounters in the Himalayan Borderlands: Kalimpong as a “Contact Zone” (pp. 1-22). Heidelberg University Publishing.

Viehbeck, M. (2017). 'The First Tibetan at a Western University?': Entanglements of Scholarship, Buddhism, and Power in Kalimpong and Beyond. In M. Viehbeck (Ed.), Transcultural Encounters in the Himalayan Borderlands: Kalimpong as a “Contact Zone” (pp. 273-300). Heidelberg University Publishing.

Viehbeck, M. (Ed.) (2017). Transcultural Encounters in the Himalayan Borderlands: Kalimpong as a “Contact Zone”. Heidelberg University Publishing. Heidelberg Studies on Transculturality Vol. 3

Viehbeck, M. (2016). An Indian Classic in 19th-Century Tibet and beyond: Rdza Dpal sprul and the Dissemination of the Bodhi(sattva)caryāvatāra. Revue d'Etudes Tibétaines, 36, 5-44.

Viehbeck, M. (2016). Coming to Terms with Tibet: Scholarly Networks and the Production of the First 'Modern' Tibetan Dictionaries. Revue d'Etudes Tibétaines, 37, 469-489.

Harris, T., Holmes-Tagchungdarpa, A., Sharma, J., & Viehbeck, M. (2016). Global Encounters, Local Places. Connected Histories of Darjeeling, Kalimpong, and the Himalayas-An Introduction. Transcultural Studies, 7(1), 43-53. https://doi.org/10.17885/heiup.ts.23542

Unlocking Tibetan Canonical Literature through OCR: Coping with Large-scale and Heterogeneous Textual Sources

Viehbeck, M. (Speaker) & Laine, B. (Speaker)

3 Oct 2025

Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science