Amdo (Tibetan : ཨ་མདོ་, Wylie : a mdo [ʔam˥˥.to˥˥]; Chinese :安多; pinyin :Ānduō) is one of the three traditional Tibetan regions, the others being Ü-Tsang (Central Tibet) in the west and Dotoe also known as Kham in the east. The formal name of Amdo is Domey (Tibetan : མདོ་སྨད་) in literatures. [1] Historically, Amdo and Kham together were also called Do Kham on maps and manuscripts. [2] Amdo encompasses a large area from the Machu (Yellow River) to the Drichu (Yangtze). [note 1] Amdo is mostly coterminous with China's present-day Qinghai province, but also includes small portions of Sichuan and Gansu provinces.
Amdo was a part of the Tibetan Empire until the 9th century and was ruled by a local Tibetan theocracy called Tsongkha from the 10th century to the 12th century. In the 13th century Mongol forces started participating in the ruling of the Amdo area. A patron and priest relationship began in 1253 when a Tibetan priest, Phagspa, visited Kublai Khan. Phagspa was made Kublai's spiritual guide and later appointed by him to the rank of priest king of Tibet and constituted ruler of (1) Tibet Proper, comprising the thirteen states of Ü-Tsang; (2) Kham; and (3) Amdo. [3] The Khan first gave Phagspa the title of Tishri and thirteen surrounding regions of Tibet as his offering for the empowerment. At age 33, Phagspa appointed thirteen positions to manage different responsibilities and was offered the rest areas of Tibet, including Amdo, as an offering for empowerments. [4] Sakya leaders continued to serve as administrators of the entire Tibet for nearly 75 years after Phagpa’s death in 1280. From the 14th century to the 16th century, the Great Ming controlled some areas within today's Xining, Xunhua and Hualong. The Emperor Shizong of Qing seized control of Amdo in the 1720s after wars with Khoshut leader Lobdzan Dandzin (Tibetan : བློ་བཟང་བསྟན་འཛིན; Mongolian: Лувсанданзан).
Historically, culturally, and ethnically a part of Tibet, Amdo was from the mid-18th century and after administered by a series of local Tibetan rulers who were associated with the government located in Ü-Tsang through monastery systems, and Dalai Lama's Ganden Podrang had not directly governed the area since that time. [5] Local Tibetan rulers were also often in some kind of alliance with or under the titular authority of a larger, more powerful non-Tibetan regime by such as Mongols and Qing. [6]
From 1917 to 1928, parts of Amdo were occupied intermittently by the Hui Muslim warlords of the Ma Family. In 1928, the autonomous Ma Family joined the Kuomintang, the Chinese Nationalist Party. By 1952, Chinese Communist Party forces had defeated both the Kuomintang and the Tibetan forces and annexed the region, solidifying their hold on the area roughly by 1958.
Amdo is the home of many important Tibetan Buddhism spiritual leaders, lamas, monks, nuns, and scholars, including the 14th Dalai Lama, the 10th Panchen Lama Choekyi Gyaltsen, and the great Gelug school reformer Je Tsongkhapa.
Amdo consists of all of northeastern Tibet, including the upper reaches of the Machu or Yellow River and Lake Qinghai. Its southern border is the Bayan Har Mountains. [7] The area is wind-swept and tree-less, with much grass. Animals of the region consist of the wild yak and the kiang. Domesticated animals of the region consist of the domestic yak and dzo, goats, sheep, and the Mongolian horse. [8]
In historical times, the people of the region were typically non-Tibetan, such as Mongols or Tibetan speakers of non-Tibetan origin such as the Hor people. [9]
The inhabitants of Amdo are referred to as Amdowa (Tibetan : ཨ་མདོ་པ།, Wylie : a mdo pa) as a distinction from the Tibetans of Kham (Khampa, Tibetan : ཁམས་པ།, Wylie : khams pa) and Ü-Tsang, however, they are all considered ethnically Tibetan.[ citation needed ]
Today, ethnic Tibetans predominate in the western and southern parts of Amdo, which are now administered as various Tibetan, Tibetan-Qiang, or Mongol-Tibetan autonomous prefectures. The Han Chinese are majority in the northern part (Haixi Mongol and Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture) and eastern part (Xining city and Haidong city) of Qinghai province. While Xining city and Haidong city are geographically small compared to the rest of Qinghai province, this area has the largest population density, with the result that the Han Chinese outnumber other ethnicities in Qinghai province generally.[ citation needed ]
The majority of Amdo Tibetans live in the larger part of Qinghai province, including the Mtshobyang (མཚོ་བྱང་།; Haibei in Chinese) Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture (TAP), Mtsholho (མཚོ་ལྷོ་།; Hainan) TAP, Rmalho (རྨ་ལྷོ་།; Huangnan) TAP, and Mgolog (མགོ་ལོག།; Guoluo) TAP, [10] as well as in the Kanlho (ཀན་ལྷོ།; Gannan) TAP of the southwest Gansu province, and sections of the Rngaba (རྔ་བ།; Aba) Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous prefecture of north-west Sichuan province. Additionally, a great many Amdo Tibetans live within the Haidong (མཚོ་ཤར།; Wylie: mtsho shar) Prefecture of Qinghai which is located to the east of the Qinghai Lake (མཚོ་སྔོན།, Wylie: mtsho sngon) and around Xining (ཟི་ལིང།; zi ling) city, but they constitute only a minority (ca. 8.5%) of the total population there and so the region did not attain TAP status. The vast Haixi (མཚོ་ནུབ།; mtsho nub) Mongolian and Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, to the west of the Qinghai Lake, also has a minority Tibetan population (ca. 10%), and only those Tibetans in the eastern parts of this Prefecture are Amdo inhabitants. [11]
Mongols too have been long-term settlers in Amdo, arriving first during the time of Genghis Khan, but particularly in a series of settlement waves during the Ming period. Over the centuries, most of the Amdo Mongols have become highly Tibetanised and, superficially at least, it is now difficult to discern their original non-Tibetan ethnicity. [11] Amdo has been famous in epic story and in history as a land where splendid horses are raised and run wild. [12]
There are many dialects of the Tibetan language spoken in Amdo due to the geographical isolation of many groups. Written Tibetan is the same throughout Tibetan-speaking regions and is based on Classical Tibetan.
The Ch'iang people were early users of iron and stories abound of them in their iron breast-plates with iron swords. [13]
From the seventh through the ninth century, the Tibetan Empire extended as far north as the Turfan, south into India and Nepal, east to Chang'an, and west to Samarkhand. [14] During this period, control of Amdo moved from Songtsen Gampo and his successors to the royal family's ministers, the Gar (Wylie : 'gar).[ citation needed ] These ministers had their positions inherited from their parents, similar to the emperor. King Tüsong [ who? ] tried to wrest control of this area from the ministers, unsuccessfully. [15]
In 821, a treaty established the borders between the Tibetan Empire and the Tang dynasty, while three stele were built – one at the border, one in Lhasa, and one in Chang'an. The Tibetan army settled within the eastern frontier.[ citation needed ]
After 838 when Tibet's King Lang darma killed his brother, the Tibetan Empire broke into independent principalities, while Do Kham (Amdo and Kham) maintained culturally and religiously Tibetan. Within Amdo, the historical independent polities of hereditary rulers and kingdoms remained, while Mongol and Chinese populations fluctuated among the indigenous peoples and Tibetans. [16] During this time period, Buddhist monks from Central Tibet exiled to the Amdo region. [17]
There is a historical account of an official from the 9th century sent to collect taxes to Amdo. Instead, he acquires a fief. He then tells of the 10 virtues of the land. Two of the virtues are in the grass, one for meadows near home, one for distant pastures. Two virtues in soil, one to build houses and one for good fields. Two virtues are in the water, one for drinking and one for irrigation. There are two in the stone, one for building and one for milling. The timber has two virtues, one for building and one for firewood. [8] The original inhabitants of the Amdo region were the forest-dwellers (nags-pa), the mountain-dwellers (ri-pa), the plains-dwellers (thang-pa), the grass-men (rtsa-mi), and the woodsmen (shing-mi). The grass men were famous for their horses. [18]
Gewasel is a monk that helped resurrect Tibetan Buddhism. He was taught as a child and showed amazing enthusiasm for the religion. When he was ordained he went in search of teachings. After obtaining the Vinaya, he was set to travel to Central Tibet, but for a drought. Instead he chose to travel in solitude to Amdo. Locals had heard of him and his solitude was not to be as he was sought after. In time he established a line of refugee monks in Amdo and with the wealth that he acquired he built temples and stupas also. [19]
The historical Qiang came into contact with the Sumpa, then with the Tuyuhun. [20] Then around 1032, the Tangut people, possibly of Qiang descent, formed the Western Xia, which lasted into the 13th century.[ citation needed ]
The Mongols had conquered eastern Amdo by 1240 and would manage it under the Bureau of Buddhist and Tibetan Affairs, separately from the other territories administered by the Yuan dynasty. [21] [22] [23] A patron and priest relationship began in 1253 when a Tibetan priest, Phagspa, visited Kublai Khan he became so popular that he was made Kublai's spiritual guide and later appointed by him to the rank of priest king of Tibet and constituted ruler of (1) Tibet Proper, comprising the thirteen states of Ü-Tsang; (2) Kham, and (3) Amdo. [3] He spent his later years at Sakya Monastery in Ü-Tsang, which required that he travel through Amdo regularly. On one of these trips, he encountered armed resistance in Amdo and required escorts from Mongol Princes to travel through Amdo. [24] While the concept of Tibet's Three Regions can be dated back to Tibetan Empire, Dunhuang manuscripts referring to the eastern parts of its territory as mdo-gams (Tibetan : མདོ་གམས) and mdo-smad (Tibetan : མདོ་སྨད), [25] [26] Yuan confirmed the division, and Do Kham as two well defined commanderies, along with Ü-Tsang, were collectively referred to as the three commanderies of Tibet since then. Tibet regained its independence from the Mongols before native Chinese overthrew the Yuan dynasty in 1368, although it avoided directly resisting the Yuan court until the latter's fall. [27] By 1343, Mongol authority in Amdo had weakened considerably: Köden’s fiefdom had been leaderless for some time, and the Tibetans were harassing the Mongols near Liangzhou (byang ngos). In 1347, a general rebellion erupted in some two hundred places in eastern Tibet, and though troops were sent to suppress them, by 1355 eastern Tibet was no longer mentioned in the dynastic history of the Mongols. [6]
Although the following Ming Dynasty nominally maintained the Mongol divisions of Tibet with some sub-division, its power is weaker and influenced Amdo mostly at their borders. [6] The Mongols again seized political control in Amdo areas from the middle of the 16th century. [28] However, the Ming Dynasty continued to retain control in Hezhou and Xining wei.[ citation needed ]
Upper (Kokonor) Mongols from northern Xinjiang and Khalkha came there in 16th and 17th centuries. [29] Power struggles among various Mongol factions in Tibet and Amdo led to a period alternating between the supremacy of the Dalai Lama (nominally) and Mongol overlords. In 1642, Tibet was reunified under the 5th Dalai Lama, by gaining spiritual and temporal authority through the efforts of the Mongol king, Güshi Khan. This allowed the Gelug school and its incarnated spiritual leaders, the Dalai Lamas, to gain enough support to last through the present day. [30] Gushi Khan also returned portions of Eastern Tiber (Kham) to Tibet, but his base in the Kokonor region of Amdo remained under Mongol control. [30]
In 1705, with the approval of the Kangxi Emperor of the Qing dynasty, Lha-bzang Khan of the Khoshud deposed the regent and killed the 6th Dalai Lama. The Dzungar Mongols invaded Tibet during the chaos, and held the entire region until their final defeat by an expedition of the Qing imperial army in 1720. [31] [32]
When the Manchu Qing dynasty rose to power in the early 18th century it established Xining, a town to the north of Amdo, as the administrative base for the area. Amdo was placed within the Qinghai Region. [33] During this period they were ruled by the Amban, who allowed near total autonomy by the monasteries and the other local leaders. [34]
The 18th century saw the Qing Empire continue to expand further and further into Tibet as it engulfed Eastern Tibet including Amdo and even assumed control over Central Tibet. [35]
The Yongzheng Emperor seized full control of Qinghai (Amdo) in the 1720s. The boundaries of Xining Prefecture, which contains most of Amdo, with Sichuan and Tibet-proper was established following this. The boundary of Xining Prefecture and Xizang, or Central Tibet, was the Dangla Mountains. This roughly corresponds with the modern boundary of Qinghai with the Tibet Autonomous Region. The boundary of Xining Prefecture with Sichuan was also set at this time, dividing the Ngaba area of the former Amdo into Sichuan. This boundary also roughly corresponds with the modern boundary of Qinghai with Sichuan. A new boundary, following the Ning-ching mountain range, was established between Sichuan and Tibet. East of these mountains, local chieftains ruled under the nominal authority of the Sichuan provincial government; Lhasa administered the area to the west. The 1720s thus saw Tibet's first major reduction in area in centuries. [36] The Gansu region bordering Tibet was administered by an imperial viceroy. Portions of the country were placed under Chinese law while the Tibetans enjoyed almost complete independence, ruled by Tibetan chiefs that held grants or commissions from the Imperial Government. [37]
In 1906, the 13th Dalai Lama while touring the country, was enticed by a procession of a thousand lamas, to stay at the temple at Kumbum. He spent a year resting and learning among other things Sanskrit and poetry. [38]
In 1912, Qing Dynasty collapsed and relative independence followed with the Dalai Lama ruling Central Tibet. Eastern Tibet, including Amdo and Kham, were ruled by local and regional warlords and chiefs. [39] The Hui Muslims administered the agricultural areas in the north and east of the region. [34] Amdo saw numerous powerful leaders including both secular and non. The monasteries, such as Labrang, Rebkong, and Taktsang Lhamo supervised the choosing of the local leaders or headmen in the areas under their control. These tribes consisted of several thousand nomads. [34] Meanwhile, Sokwo, Ngawa, and Liulin, had secular leaders appointed, with some becoming kings and even creating familial dynasties. This secular form of government went as far as Machu. [40]
The Muslim warlord Ma Qi waged war in the name of the Republic of China against the Labrang monastery and Goloks. After ethnic rioting between Muslims and Tibetans emerged in 1918, Ma Qi defeated the Tibetans, then commenced to tax the town heavily for 8 years. In 1925, a Tibetan rebellion broke out, with thousands of Tibetans driving out the Muslims. Ma Qi responded with 3,000 Chinese Muslim troops, who retook Labrang and machine gunned thousands of Tibetan monks as they tried to flee. [41] [42] Ma Qi besieged Labrang numerous times, the Tibetans and Mongols fought against his Muslim forces for control of Labrang, until Ma Qi gave it up in 1927. [43] His forces were praised by foreigners who traveled through Qinghai for their fighting abilities. [44] However, that was not the last Labrang saw of General Ma. The Muslim forces looted and ravaged the monastery again. [43]
In 1928, the Ma Clique formed an alliance with the Kuomintang. In the 1930s, the Muslim warlord Ma Bufang, the son of Ma Qi, seized the northeast corner of Amdo in the name of Chiang Kai-shek's weak central government, effectively incorporating it into the Chinese province of Qinghai. [45] From that point until 1949, much of the rest of Amdo was gradually assimilated into the Kuomintang Chinese provincial system, with the major portion of it becoming nominally part of Qinghai province and a smaller portion becoming part of Gansu province. [46] Due to the lack of a Chinese administrative presence in the region, however, most of the communities of the rural areas of Amdo and Kham remained under their own local, Tibetan lay and monastic leaders into the 1950s. Tibetan region of Lho-Jang and Gyarong in Kham, and Ngapa (Chinese Aba) and Golok in Amdo, were still independent of Chinese hegemony, despite the creation on paper of Qinghai Province in 1927. [47]
The 14th Dalai Lama was born in the Amdo region, in 1935, and when he was announced as a possible candidate, Ma Bufang tried to prevent the boy from travelling to Tibet. He demanded a ransom of 300,000 dollars, which was paid and then he escorted the young boy to Tibet. [48]
In May 1949, Ma Bufang was appointed Military Governor of Northwest China, making him the highest-ranked administrator of the Amdo region. However, by August 1949, the advancing People's Liberation Army had annihilated Ma's army, though residual forces took several years to defeat. By 1949, advance units of the Chinese People's Liberation Army (the PLA) had taken much of Amdo from the Nationalists. [49] By 1952, the major towns in the region were fully under the control of People's Republic of China, though many of the rural areas continued to enjoy de facto autonomy for several more years. [50] Tibetan guerrilla forces in Amdo emerged in 1956 and continued until the 1970s fighting the People's Liberation Army. [51]
In 1958, Chinese communists assumed official control of Tibetan regions in Kham and Amdo. Many of the nomads of Amdo revolted. Some areas were reported virtually empty of men: They either had been killed or imprisoned or had fled. The largest monastery in Amdo was forced to close. Of its three thousand monks, two thousand were arrested. [52]
In July 1958 as the revolutionary fervor of the Great Leap Forward swept across the People's Republic of China, Zeku County in the Amdo region of cultural Tibet erupted in violence against efforts by the Chinese Communist Party to impose rapid collectivization on the pastoral communities of the grasslands. Rebellion also stirred the region at the beginning of the 1950s as “Liberation” first settled on the northeastern Tibetan plateau. The immediate ramifications of each disturbance both for the Amdo Tibetan elites and commoners, and for the Han cadres in their midst, elucidates early PRC nation-building and state-building struggles in minority nationality areas and the influence of this crucial transitional period on relations between Han and Tibetan in Amdo decades later. [53]
As a prelude to the Beijing Olympics, protests broke out in 2008 in Amdo, among other places. Some were violent; however the majority were peaceful. [54]
Amdo was traditionally a place of great learning and scholarship and contains many great monasteries including Kumbum Monastery near Xining, Rongwo Monastery in Rebgong, Labrang Monastery south of Lanzhou, and the Kirti Gompas of Ngawa Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture and Taktsang Lhamo in Dzoge County.
From 1958 to 1962, the political climate in Amdo was considered unbearable. In 1958, the arrest and murder of the Tseten Monastery's Khenpo Jigme Rigpai Nyingpo while incarcerated in Xining's Nantan prison marked the beginning of the period. [55]
Amdo Tibetans' traditional lifestyle and economy are centered on agriculture. Depending on the region and environment Amdo Tibetans live in, they are either nomads (Drog pa) or farmers (Sheng pa). The economy of Amdo of has been constant throughout history and has changed little in the modern time. A typical family has two homes or bases: one for when they move up into the mountains with their animals in the summer for better grazing, and another down in the valleys where they weather harsh winters and grow fodder for their livestock in small agricultural fields. The families of some villages may make a shorter seasonal trek as their pasture may be nearby, and they may even migrate between homes each day. [56]
As in Amdo and Kham, independent local polities were the traditional governing systems. In Amdo, communities of nomads, farmers, horse traders and monasteries were organized into these polities, which continued from the era of the Tibetan Empire. Varying in size from small to large, some were inherited while others were not, and both women and men were individual leaders of these polities. [57]
Tsowas, consisting of groups of families, are the basic socio-cum-political organization. The Golok peoples, Gomé and Lutsang peoples arranged themselves in tsowas. A larger organisation is the sgar, translated as 'encampment', while larger still is the nangso, translated as 'commissioner'. There were also kingdoms, such as Kingdom of Co ne (Choné). [57] In 1624, for example, the Drotsang Nangso sponsored a monastery which was called the Drotsang Sargön; the monastery at Detsa Nangso was called the Detsa Gompa. Earlier in 1376, a Horse and Tea Trading Station was in Co né. [57]
After the People's Republic of China's (PRC) was founded, communist administrators overlaid a series of larger Tibetan Autonomous Prefectures (TAP) on top of the existing county system, but only where Tibetans formed the majority of the population. This policy towards Tibetans, considered a "minority nationality" within their own country, was set down in the constitution of the PRC. [58]
Dalai Lama is a title given by Altan Khan, the first Shunyi King of Ming China. He offered it in appreciation to the leader of the Gelug school of Tibetan Buddhism, Sonam Gyatso, who received it in 1578 at Yanghua Monastery. At that time, Sonam Gyatso had just given teachings to the Khan, and so the title of Dalai Lama was also given to the entire tulku lineage. Sonam Gyatso became the 3rd Dalai Lama, while the first two tulkus in the lineage, the 1st Dalai Lama and the 2nd Dalai Lama, were posthumously awarded the title.
Tibet, or Greater Tibet, is a region in the western part of East Asia, covering much of the Tibetan Plateau and spanning about 2,500,000 km2 (970,000 sq mi). It is the homeland of the Tibetan people. Also resident on the plateau are other ethnic groups such as Mongols, Monpa, Tamang, Qiang, Sherpa, Lhoba, and since the 20th century Han Chinese and Hui. After the annexation of Tibet by the People's Republic of China in 1951, the entire plateau has been under the administration of the People's Republic of China. Tibet is divided administratively into the Tibet Autonomous Region and parts of the Qinghai, Gansu, Yunnan and Sichuan provinces. Tibet is also constitutionally claimed by the Republic of China as the Tibet Area since 1912. Tibet is the highest region on Earth, with an average elevation of 4,380 m (14,000 ft). Located in the Himalayas, the highest elevation in Tibet is Mount Everest, Earth's highest mountain, rising 8,848 m (29,000 ft) above sea level.
While the Tibetan plateau has been inhabited since pre-historic times, most of Tibet's history went unrecorded until the creation of Tibetan script in the 7th century. Tibetan texts refer to the kingdom of Zhangzhung as the precursor of later Tibetan kingdoms and the originators of the Bon religion. While mythical accounts of early rulers of the Yarlung dynasty exist, historical accounts begin with the introduction of Tibetan script from the unified Tibetan Empire in the 7th century. Following the dissolution of the empire and a period of fragmentation in the 9th-10th centuries, a Buddhist revival in the 10th–12th centuries saw the development of three of the four major schools of Tibetan Buddhism.
The Tibetan independence movement is the political movement advocating for the reversal of the 1950 annexation of Tibet by the People's Republic of China, and the separation and independence of Greater Tibet from China.
Kham is one of the three traditional Tibetan regions, the others being Domey also known as Amdo in the northeast, and Ü-Tsang in central Tibet. The official name of this Tibetan region/province is Dotoe. The original residents of Kham are called Khampas, and were governed locally by chieftains and monasteries. Kham covers a land area distributed in multiple province-level administrative divisions in present-day China, most of it in Tibet Autonomous Region and Sichuan, with smaller portions located within Qinghai and Yunnan.
Güshi Khan was a Khoshut prince and founder of the Khoshut Khanate, who supplanted the Tumed descendants of Altan Khan as the main benefactor of the Dalai Lama and the Gelug school of Tibetan Buddhism. In 1637, Güshi Khan defeated a rival Mongol prince Choghtu Khong Tayiji, a Kagyu follower, near Qinghai Lake and established his khanate in Tibet over the next years. His military assistance to the Gelug school enabled the 5th Dalai Lama to establish political control over Tibet.
Ü-Tsang is one of the three Tibetan regions, the others being Amdo in the north-east, and Kham in the east. The region of Ngari in the north-west was incorporated into Ü-Tsang after the Tibet–Ladakh–Mughal War. Geographically Ü-Tsang covered the south-central part of the Tibetan cultural area, including the Brahmaputra River watershed. The western districts surrounding and extending past Mount Kailash are included in Ngari, and much of the vast Changtang plateau to the north. The Himalayas defined Ü-Tsang's southern border. The present Tibet Autonomous Region corresponds approximately to Ü-Tsang and the western part of Kham.
Ma Bufang (1903 – 31 July 1975) (traditional Chinese: 馬步芳; simplified Chinese: 马步芳; pinyin: Mǎ Bùfāng; Wade–Giles: Ma3 Pu4-fang1, Xiao'erjing: مَا بُفَانْ) was a prominent Muslim Ma clique warlord in China during the Republic of China era, ruling the province of Qinghai. His rank was lieutenant-general.
Zhao Erfeng (1845–1911), courtesy name Jihe, was a late Qing Dynasty official and Han Chinese bannerman who belonged to the Plain Blue Banner. He was an assistant amban in Tibet at Chamdo in Kham. He was appointed in March 1908 under Lien Yu, the main amban in Lhasa. Formerly Director-General of the Sichuan-Hubei Railway and acting viceroy of Sichuan province, Zhao was a much-maligned Chinese general of the late imperial era who led military campaigns throughout Kham, earning himself the nickname "the Butcher of Kham" and "Zhao the Butcher".
This is a list of topics related to Tibet.
Kumbum Monastery, also called Ta'er Temple, is a Tibetan gompa in Lusar, Huangzhong County, Xining, Qinghai, China. It was founded in 1583 at the site of Je Tsongkhapa's birth in a narrow valley close to the village of Lusar in the historical Tibetan region of Amdo. Its superior monastery is Drepung Monastery, immediately to the west of Lhasa. It is ranked in importance as second only to Lhasa.
Gyêgu Subdistrict, formerly a part of the Gyêgu or Jiegu town is a township-level division in Yushu, Yushu TAP, Qinghai, China. The name Gyêgu is still a common name for the Yushu city proper, which include Gyêgu subdistrict and three other subdistricts evolved from the former Gyêgu town. The four subdistricts altogether forms a modern town which developed from the old Tibetan trade mart called Jyekundo or Gyêgumdo in Tibetan and most Western sources. The town is also referred to as Yushu, synonymous with the prefecture of Yushu and the city of Yushu.
The sinicization of Tibet includes the programs and laws of the Chinese government and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to force cultural assimilation in Tibetan areas of China, including the Tibet Autonomous Region and the surrounding Tibetan-designated autonomous areas. The efforts are undertaken by China in order to remake Tibetan culture into mainstream Chinese culture.
Tibet is a term for the major elevated plateau in Central Asia, north of the Himalayas. It is today mostly under the sovereignty of the People's Republic of China, primarily administered as the Tibet Autonomous Region besides adjacent parts of Qinghai, Gansu, Yunnan, and Sichuan.
The Phagmodrupa dynasty or Pagmodru was a dynastic regime that held sway over Tibet or parts thereof from 1354 to the early 17th century. It was established by Tai Situ Changchub Gyaltsen of the Lang family at the end of the Yuan dynasty. The dynasty had a lasting importance on the history of Tibet; it created an autonomous kingdom after Yuan rule, revitalized the national culture, and brought about a new legislation that survived until the 1950s. Nevertheless, the Phagmodrupa had a turbulent history due to internal family feuding and the strong localism among noble lineages and fiefs. Its power receded after 1435 and was reduced to Ü in the 16th century due to the rise of the ministerial family of the Rinpungpa. It was defeated by the rival Tsangpa dynasty in 1613 and 1620, and was formally superseded by the Ganden Phodrang regime founded by the 5th Dalai Lama in 1642. In that year, Güshi Khan of the Khoshut formally transferred the old possessions of Sakya, Rinpung and Phagmodrupa to the "Great Fifth".
Tibet was a de facto independent state in East Asia that lasted from the collapse of the Qing dynasty in 1912 until its annexation by the People's Republic of China in 1951.
There were several Mongol invasions of Tibet. The earliest is the alleged plot to invade Tibet by Genghis Khan in 1206, which is considered anachronistic; there is no evidence of Mongol-Tibetan encounters prior to the military campaign in 1240. The first confirmed campaign is the invasion of Tibet by the Mongol general Doorda Darkhan in 1240, a campaign of 30,000 troops that resulted in 500 casualties. The campaign was smaller than the full-scale invasions used by the Mongols against large empires. The purpose of this attack is unclear, and is still in debate among Tibetologists. Then in the late 1240s Mongol prince Godan invited Sakya lama Sakya Pandita, who urged other leading Tibetan figures to submit to Mongol authority. This is generally considered to have marked the beginning of Mongol rule over Tibet, as well as the establishment of patron and priest relationship between Mongols and Tibetans. These relations were continued by Kublai Khan, who founded the Mongol Yuan dynasty and granted authority over whole Tibet to Drogon Chogyal Phagpa, nephew of Sakya Pandita. The Sakya-Mongol administrative system and Yuan administrative rule over the region lasted until the mid-14th century, when the Yuan dynasty began to crumble.
Ü is a geographic division and a historical region in Tibet. Together with Tsang, it forms Central Tibet Ü-Tsang, which is one of the three Tibetan regions or cholka. The other two cholka are Kham (Dotod) and Amdo (Domed). According to a Tibetan saying, "the best religion comes from Ü-Tsang, the best men from Kham, and the best horses from Amdo".
The Golok or Ngolok peoples live in Golog Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Qinghai, China around the upper reaches of the Yellow River and the sacred mountain Amne Machin. The Golok were renowned in both Tibet and China as ferocious fighters free from Tibetan and Chinese control.
Karma Tenkyong, in full Karma Tenkyong Wangpo, was a king of Tibet who ruled from 1620 to 1642. He belonged to the Tsangpa Dynasty which had been prominent in Tsang since 1565. His reign was marked by the increasingly bitter struggle against the Gelugpa sect and its leader the Dalai Lama. The outcome was the crushing of the Tsangpa regime and the establishment of the Dharma-based Tibetan state that endured until 1950.
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