In the mid-90s of the XX century, the electronic "Great Encyclopedia of Cyril and Methodius"was created. It was based on the Great Soviet Encyclopedia, which almost completely lacked articles on Buddhism (as well as on other religions) and its ancient monuments (texts, archaeological finds, architectural styles, etc.). The Editorial Committee convened a group of scientists to write new necessary articles and revise the few old materials. B. A. Litvinsky, as the best expert in this field of Buddhology, was invited to cover archaeological Buddhist sites. By that time, I had been working under him as head of the Department of History and Culture of the Ancient East for about 10 years, and we were working together on the collective monograph "Asia: Dialogues of Civilizations" (St. Petersburg, 1996). So I was familiar not only with the work of Boris Anatolyevich (which I had studied since I was a graduate student), with his invaluable contribution to the study of the material heritage of Central Asia, but also with Boris Anatolyevich as an expert on various aspects of ancient Buddhism. It is no coincidence that our coryphaeus served on the editorial boards of several Western journals and encyclopedias, preparing materials for them. Moreover, I specifically represented his responsibility and insistence on his own work. His encyclopedic education, excellent knowledge of special scientific literature on the subject (coupled with a remarkable memory), certainly did honor to any publication in which he participated. Boris Anatolyevich eagerly took up a new "type of writing" for him and the format of storage (distribution) - electronic. Independently compiled a short list of articles (30), which included monuments of Central Asia, "rare guests of encyclopedias". Most of them were personally found, excavated and examined by B. A. Litvinsky and his colleagues-Soviet archaeologists. All articles, of course, were approved and accepted. Boris Anatolyevich worked in the old-fashione ... Read more