This research project concerns the formation of Buddhist initiation ritual practices in medieval China, focusing primarily on images on murals and in manuscripts that have been discovered in the region of Dunhuang, northwestern China, over the last century, in combination with contemporaneous textual sources, such as liturgical manuals, stela inscriptions, and monastic biographies. Up to now, scholarship on initiation practices in medieval China has primarily relied on textual sources to outline three discrete Buddhist initiation systems—i.e. monastic ordination, mass precept conferral, and Esoteric consecration. Breaking with this firmly established, text-oriented narrative of distinct initiation traditions, visual data attests to the formation of a highly syncretic ritual praxis in medieval China that was adaptable to various doctrinal, social, and geographical contexts. Based on a combination of visual and textual sources that span the formative period between the sixth and the tenth centuries, this project will explore: 1) the patterns of formation and coalescence of Buddhist initiation practices; 2) the transformation of Buddhist initiation from a private monastic ceremony into a mass public ritual; 3) the emergence of lay-oriented iconography as practical aids for the performance of initiation rituals; and 4) the changing dynamics of interactions between secular and monastic communities in the context of the wholesale secularization of Buddhism in medieval China.