The Tibetan history reader

✍ Scribed by Schaeffer, Kurtis R.; Tuttle, Gray

• Publisher: Columbia University Press
• Year: 2013
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 749
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

Covering the social, cultural, and political development of Tibet from the seventh century to the modern period, this resource reproduces essential, hard-to-find essays from the past fifty years of Tibetan studies, along with several new contributions. Beginning with Tibet's emergence as a regional power and concluding with its profound contemporary transformations, the collection is both a general and specific history, connecting the actions of individuals, communities, and institutions to broader historical trends shaping Asia and the world. With contributions from American, French, German, Italian, Chinese, Japanese, and Tibetan scholars, the anthology reflects the international character of Tibetan studies and its multiple, interdisciplinary perspectives. By far the most concise scholarly anthology on Tibetan civilization in any Western language, this reader draws a clear portrait of Tibet's history, its relation to its neighbors, and its role in world affairs.

✦ Table of Contents

Content: Preface and acknowledgments --
Dates in Tibetan history and key events in neighboring lands --
Part I. From prehistory to history. 1. The prehistory of the Tibetan Plateau to the seventh century A.D.
2. Some reflections on the periodization of Tibetan history
3. History as myth --
Part II. Imperial Tibet (seventh to tenth centuries). 4. Remarks on the Mani Kabum and the cult of Avlokitesvara in Tibet
5. On the Tibetan historiography and doxography of the "Great debate of Samye"
Imperial politics
6. The linguistic and historical setting of the Old Tibetan inscriptions
7. The Tibetans in the Ordos and North China --
Part III. Tibetan revivals (tenth to twelfth centuries)
8. The Tibetan tribes of Hexi and Buddhism during the Northern Song period
9. The rulers of Western TIbet
10. The Bon religion of Tibet
11. The evolution of monastic power --
Part IV. Lamas and patrons (thirteenth to fourteenth centuries)
12. The perceptor-donor relation in thirteenth-century Tibetan society and polity
13. The Mongol census in Tibet
14. Sakya Pandita's letter to the TIbetans --
Part V. Centers of power and religious learning (fourteenth to eighteenth centuries).15. The rise of the Pakmodru Dynasty
16. Monastic patronage in fifteenth-century Tibet
17. Central Tibetan conflict in the sixteenth century
18. The He Clan of Hezhou: a Tibetan family in service to the Yuan and Ming dynasties
19. Bon in Central and East Tibet --
Part VI. Modern Tibet (seventeenth to twentieth centuries). 20. The Dalai Lamas and the origins of reincarnate lamas
21. The fifth Dalai Lama
22. Experience, empiricism, and the fortunes of authority: Tibetan medicine and Buddhism on the eve of modernity
Tibet and the Manchus
23. The administration of Tibet during the first half-century of Chinese protectorate
24. Lobjang Danjin's rebellion of 1723
25. Aristocracy and government in Tibet 1728-1959
Economy and trade
26. Gold, wool, and musk: trade in Lhasa in the seventeenth century
27. The circulation of estates in Tibet: reincarnation, land, and politics
28. The geo-history of long-distance trade in Tibet 1850-1950
Institutional growth beyond Central Tibet
29. The kingdom of Derge
30. Labrang: a Tibetan Buddhist monastery at the crossroads of four civilizations
Tibet in a global context
31. Uniting religion and politics in a bid for autonomy: lamas in exile in China and America
32. Progressives and exiles
33. The genesis of the Sino-Tibetan agreement of 1951 --
Full references to original articles --
Bibliography --
Index.

✦ Subjects

Tibet Autonomous Region (China) -- History. Tibet Autonomous Region (China) -- Civilization. Tibet Region -- Civilization. Tibet Region -- History. Tibet, Plateau of -- Civilization. Tibet, Plateau of -- History. HISTORY -- Asia -- China. Civilization. China -- Tibet Autonomous Region.