Handout of a lecture held online at Göttingen University, in a cycle of lectures (Ringvorlesung) at the University of Göttingen (Germany), Seminar für Turkologie und Zentralasienkunde. Online-Ringvorlesung. Universität Göttingen, Seminar für Turkologie und Zentralasienkunde. Titel: Die buddhistischen Uiguren als Mäzene und Schüler der Tocharer. 18.11.2022 “The Uyghur Buddhists as sponsors and disciples of the Tocharians” The period of the first stage of Uyghur Buddhism, 9th-11th centuries CE, was a time of intense contacts of the Uyghurs, who had established their kingdom in Khocho, with the speakers of Tocharian languages, belonging to a distinct branch of the Indo-European language family. Tocharian Buddhism was not however the exclusive source of knowledge of Buddhism among the Uyghurs, since the latter had been previously reached by missionaries using Iranian or Indo-Aryan languages. Nonetheless, the influence of Tocharian culture is unmistakable during that epoch. The Tocharian Buddhism had been thriving for centuries in the oases of the northern route in the Tarim Basin, in present-day Xinjiang, China, and this brilliant (since around 3rd-4th century CE) Buddhist culture included the Turfan oasis. In this whole area, Tocharian B was the vernacular language, while Tocharian A was spoken and written in fewer spots around Yanqi/Agni (alias Kara-shahr) and Turfan. The Tocharo-Uyghur contacts are proved by the fact that the loans of Buddhist Sanskrit terms found in Old Uyghur texts presuppose intermediaries in Tocharian B and/or Tocharian A. Furthermore, very large Buddhist texts in Old Uyghur have been translated from texts which are preserved in Tocharian: Maitrisimit nom bitig, from a model in Tocharian A, the Maitreyasamiti-nāṭaka, a dramatized narrative on the career of the Buddha Maitreya, which is known by several manuscripts; the Daśakarmapathāvadānamālā (DKPAM), a collection of Buddhist legends, from a model in Tocharian A, itself based on a former similar collection in Tocharian B, from which several fragments have been identified. These huge texts, covering hundreds of pustaka leaves, were designed as pedagogical and encyclopedic means of disseminating Buddhism, first among the Tocharians, and then among the Uyghurs. The colophons found in these texts testify to the sponsoring of the copy by Uyghur donors, whose names appear in several Tocharian manuscripts. The cult of Maitreya was shared by Buddhist communities of Tocharian and Uyghur speakers. The two texts mentioned above offer a rich material for studying of contrastive linguistics and of techniques of translation from Tocharian into Old Uyghur.