The Mani stones bearing Naxi Dongba inscriptions were discovered in a pile of Mani stones most of which were inscribed with the Tibetan Mantra “Om Mani Padme Hhum” at the entrance to Jiaqu village in Muli County , Sichuan . These Dongba inscriptions can be regarded as hav-ing the most number of pictographs and the most complete content of all Dongba inscriptions carved on stone found up to now .Not only are these in-scriptions important local historical material , they are also important material for multi -disciplinary research, including philology , folklore study, reli-gious study, etc.They are particularly significant for studying the relationship between the Naxi and Tibetans, and especially for researching the rela-tionship among Bon , Buddhism , and Dongba reli-gions.This pile of Mani stones in Muli County consists of stones engraved with both Naxi Dongba pictographs and Tibetan .Most of the Tibetan in-scriptions are the six -word mantra “Om Mani Padme Hum”.There are three stones in the pile of stones engraved with Naxi Dongba pictographs .A complete translation for the the Dongba pictographs carved on these stones is as follow( in granting us) luck, wealth and nurture;( We) Beg ( you ) to have a kind and beautiful heart, throw away bad thoughts into hell; to pay back your kindness of dropping yak butter on our fore-heads, your kindness in creation of the world;( We ) Wish the stars in the sky will never drop down;to pay back your kindness for cultivating the lands;Seventy tillers, wish them not to be born in wrong places; Ninety shepherds, wish them not to fall into the enemy's hands. ( The spirit of the dead) will not stay in the hell, but get blessings from the god.” The Mani stone pile is representative of Tibet-an Buddhist culture , and the appearance of both Naxi Dongba pictographs and Tibetan inscriptions in a Mani stone pile at the same time is very rare . The author of this article suggests that this discov-ery is valuable for three reasons . 1 .It is valuable as Data The study of the relationship between Naxi and Tibetan is one of the hot research topics in Southwestern ethnic studies in recent years .Schol-ars have conducted a lot of research from the per-spective of archaeology , Chinese and Tibetan liter-ature, and fieldwork , and have realized major a-chievements.However, fewer studies have been done from the angle of Dongba writings .One rea-son is the difficulty in reading Dongba inscriptions has resulted in fewer publications on those Dongba materials that could reflect the relationship between the two ethnic groups .The inscriptions discussed in this article results from the cultural interaction and linguistic contact between the two ethnic groups.Hence, it can be used as important data for the study of their ethnic relations . The Mani stone pile is one of the most typical features of Tibetan Buddhism .Its origin is closely related to the relationship between early Tibetan beliefs and the Bon religion .The Dongba religion also has a very deep relationship with the Bon reli-gion.In this sense , the Mani stone pile , which contains the stones engraved with the Tibetan man-tra “Om Mani Pad Me Hum” as well as the Naxi Dongba inscriptions , can be regarded as testimony to multi-religious-cultural integration in this re-gion.Judging from the content of the inscriptions , it concretely reflects local conceptions of life and death as well as funeral customs .Therefore , it can be used as a data for studying local folklore .On the other hand , the location of the Dongba Mani pile-Jiaqu village -is one of the stops along the Naxi's migration route recorded in the Dongba man-uscripts.The residents there are a branch of the Naxi-the Ruoka people . They speak the Naxi language and believe in Dongba religion .Howev-er, they have been classified as Mongolian in the National Classification project ( carried out by the Chinese government during the 1950's) .This data provides a reference for the study of the ethnicity of the residents in this village from the perspective of philology . 2.It is Valuable as a Document Naxi Dongba ancient manuscripts are mainly paper -based documents , and inscriptions carved on stone are very rare .At the present , the only engraved inscriptions that have been discovered and recorded are the land contracts carved on a brick unearthed in Baoshan of Lijiang , and the inscriptions by Maizong etc ..In January 1934, the renowned scholar Fang Guoyu discovered some carvings on a cliff which were written in Chinese , Tibetan and Geba characters ( a phonetic writing system of Dongba ) and which dated to the 47 th year of the Wanli period in the Ming dynasty (1619) at Qiaotou village, Jingzhuang Township , Lijiang.Fang made a copy of the Chinese and Ge-ba characters, and provided a preliminary annota-tion to the Geba characters .Unfortunately , these inscriptions were destroyed while building a road in 1951. There are also some Dongba characters carved on the wall of the sacred Aming cave in Baidi, Diqing Prefecture, Yunnan.Mr.Yu Suish-eng has written an article discussing these inscrip-tions.Some sources have also mentioned that the Liangshan Prefecture Museum ( in Sichuan ) col-lected a jade stone engraved with Dongba picto-graphs.However, our own textual research has re-vealed that the inscriptions are actually the “Eight Auspicious Symbols” of Tibetan Buddhism , which has been widey used by many ethnic groups in the western part of Sichuan .Although these inscrip-tions are very similar to Dongba pictographs , they cannot be regarded as Dongba pictographs .In The Collected Writings of Wen You, the author pub-lished two rubbings .However , we cannot see these objects now.The book entitled the Rubbings of Stone Carvings throughout the Dynasties of China Collected by Bejing Library included a rubbing of the “Foundation Stone of National Lijiang Normal School ” on which there were three lines of Dongba pictographs .Recently , Yang Yihua has given an introduction to the pile of Mani stones at Jiabo Vil-lage of Yiji Township .Compared with the data dis-covered in the past , the document mentioned in this article contains more characters , its structure is more complete and its content is richer .There-fore, it adds a new genre of material for Naxi Dongba documents . 3 .Its Value for Philological Studies There are altogether 128 Dongba pictographs found on the three Mani stones in this pile .They are written from left to right , and altogether there are 9 lines.In some places of each of the lines , two or three pictographs are on top of each other written going from top to bottom .The phenomenon of writing two pictographs on top of each other within a line appears in 16 places; and, that of writing three pictographs on top of each other hap-pens in one place .Except for these places , the rest of the lines are written with as single picto-graphs in a single line .In general , the pictographs on these stones are arranged in a linear fashion . This differs from other Dongba religious manu-scripts where most of the pictographs are not writ-ten linearly . Generally speaking , except for the relation-ship between the words and expressions and the ar-rangement of the pictographs , the Dongba picto-graphs on these Mani stones reflect the characteris-tics of early Dongba pictographs-either from the perspective of the characteristics of the font , or from the usage rules of the characters .In addition, the regional characteristics of these pictographs are also very obvious .This document can be regarded as a reference for conducting comparative studies on the use of the vertical and horizontal writing structure of Dongba documents from other periods and regions .By doing so , we can explore the de-velopment and change of Dongba characters .