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Annual Report of the Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institution

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Annual Report of the Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institution NOTES ON THE ETHNOLOGY OF TIBET. BASED ON THE COLLECTIONS IN THE UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. WILI.IAM A\ OODTILLE ROCKHILI., Gold Medalist of the Eoyal Geographical Society, Corresponding Member of the Gesellschaft fiir ErdJcnnde, etc., etc., etc. 665 SYNOPSIS OF CONTENTS. 1. Tibet— Origin of the name—Limits—History of its civilization derived from Tibetan and Chinese sources 669 II. Character of the country and people 673 III. Organization—Consauguiueal—Political—Industrial 678 IV. Dress and personal adornment 684 Y. Habitations—Household utensils—Food—Tobacco 701 YI. Agriculture—Weapons—Hunting—Music—Danciug 711 YII. Transportation 716 VIII. Monetary system—Mediums of exchange—Writing—Printing—Time reckoning—Medical knowledge 718 IX. Birth—Marriage—Death 724 X. Religion—Lamas—Religious architecture—Objects connected with relig- ious worship—Miscellaneous objects from the Chinese border lands.. 730 <)67 ' t NOTES ON THE ETHNOLOGY OF TIBET [Based on Collections ln the U. S. National Museum.] By William Woodnille Rockhill. aiBET—ORIGIN OF THE NAME—LIMITS—HISTORY OF ITS CIVILIZA- TION DERIVED FROM TIBETAN AND CHINESE SOURCES. The word "Tibet," also freiiueiitly though erroneously written Thibet, represents two Tibetan words,* meaning " Upper Bod," by which name the central and western portions of Tibet are occasionally called by the natives, to distinguish them from the eastern portiou, which is some- times referred to as Miin-Bod {Sman Bod), meaning " Lower Bod." As to the meaning of the word Bod, different explanations have been offered by European scholars—that which has been most gener- ally accepted, though on insufticient grounds, I think, derives it from the verb /tfcofZ-pa (pronounced hodpa)'-^ to call, to speak," and attention has been called to the fact that the name Slav has a similar meaning. Schiagintweit says the name is derived from a word meaning "force," aid Vigue (Travels in Kashmir, ii, p. 248) thinks it comes from the turKic and means nothing less than "the mountains of the people pro- fessing the Buddhist religion."! However this may be, Tibetans from whatever part of the country they come speak of themselves as Bod-pa, pronounced in some dis- tricts Beuba, in otliors,Bopa, and even Gopa. In colloquial Tibetan the country is called Beu lumba, Ben sa-ch'a or Beu yul, all meaning "the Beu (ba) country. The earliest mention I Lave found of the word "Tibet" is in the Arab Istakhri's works (circa 590 A. D.), where it is used undertheform Tohbat. Other Arab authors of a later date transcribe the word Tobbat, Tiibbat, Tibbat, Tibat,iind Thabbat. The earliest use of the * Stod and Bod (pronf)iinced Teu-beu). tSee Amedee Thierry, Histoire d'Attila et de ses successiMirs, i, p. 284. |Tbi.s paper also embodies the personal observations made by the author duriu^ two iouiuoys to Tibet in 1888-'«9 and 1891-'92. 669 670 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1893. word by an European author is found in Piano Carpini's Historia Mon- galorum (A. D. 1247), wliere it occurs under the form Thabet-, Kubruk in his Itinerariuin uses the form Tehet, as does also Marco Polo. (See H. Yule, Glossary of Anglo-Indian words, pp. 332, 698.)* Mongols speak of Tibet as Tan</ut, and Tibetans they call Tan- gutu, and this is the origin of another appellation for this people and country sometimes used by European authors, Tangast (Tlieopliy- lactus) and Taugut (Prjevalsky), which should, however, be discarded as useless and misleading, as the people inhabiting this section of country are pure Tibetans. Tibet is geographically, roughly speaking, that section of central Asia which extends between the 76° and 102° of east longitude and from the 28° to 36° of north latitude, and, with the exception of its extreme western, southwestern, and southern portions, it forms an integral por- tion of the Chinese Empire. Elisee Reclns (Geographic Universelle, vii, p. 20 et seq.) says that Tibet forms a vast half circle with a radius of 800 kilometers, and that it is one of the best defined natural regions in the world. He roughly estimates its area, rightly including in it the Kokonor Tibetan region on the northeast, and the other Tibetan-speaking countries on the west and south, at about 2,000,000 square kilometers. It would be premature at the present stage of our researches into the question to give any opinion on the varied affinities of the Tibetans. Philologically they belong to the same linguistic family as the Bur- mese. Their national records have been so badly kept that they are of little service to us in solving the problem of their early home, and the Chinese annals do not enable us to go back earlier than the eighth century, A. D., at which time the Chinese came in contact with tribes of this race, then scattered throughout the northeast corner of Tibet between the upper Yang-tzu kiang, the Kokonor, and the western section of Kan-su and Ssu-ch'uan as far east as the river Min, in the latter province. The purest type of Tibetan is still to be found among the pastoral tribes of that race, and when proper allowance has been made for foreign influences, everything points to a time when the whole Tibetan race lead a purely pastoral life, and it would seem that the early home of the Tibetan nuist be sought, not as they claim, in the valleys to the south of the city of Lh'asa, but to the northeast section of the country, somewhere near the Kokonor, to which region they probably caiue, as Chinese annals lead us to believe, from the east. Reference has been made to Tibetan historical works as a guide in the intricate question of their national origin, but it is believed that these works are of little, if any, assistance. As a means of studying ^Thronshont this paper Tibetan words are written phonetically, consonants are pronounced as in English and vowels have the sound of the corresponding Italian cues. NOTES ON THE ETHNOLOGY OF TIBET. 671 the growth of the country and its advance in civiUzatiou they are fortunately of a little more use. I will here briefly give the principal data bearing on the subject which interests us, contained in a "Book of Kings," or Gyal-rabs sal-vai m6-long (Dr.Emil Schlagiutweifs edition, 18G6), which it must, however, be admitted is of comparatively modern origin and was unquestionably compiled under Chinese influence. From this work we learn that in the first century B. C. there appeared in Tibet, in the valley of the Tsaugpo ch'u and to the south of the city of Lh'asa, a marvelously endowed child whom the wild natives thought heaven had sent to rule them, and whom they took as their chief. This would point to intercourse with India during the earliest days .of their national existence, but as the work goes on to show that this prince was a direct descendant of the Buddha Gautama, a descent than which none could be higher in the eyes of the devout Tibetans, we may doubt the accuracy of the record on this point. In the reign of this first prince's seventh successor, consequently sometime in the second century A. D., it is stated that charcoal was made for the first time, and iron, copper, and silver were extracted from the ore, plows were introduced, and the irrigation of fields made known. In the fifth century A. D., in the reign of Tri-nyan zung-tiin, fields were for the first time fenced in, skin garments were made, walnut trees were planted, and reservoirs dug to supply water for irrigating the fields. In the reign of his successor the yak was crossed with the domestic cow and the valuable cross-breed called djo obtained. Mules were imported into the country and the people were taught how to make bundles of hay. From the fact that grass is still at the present day twisted into heavy cables and allowed to dry in this shape and is so kept, both in Kashmir (see W. Moorcroft, Travels, II, 153) and in Tibet, it is probable that this method of bundling hay was learned from the former country. In the seventh century Srong-tsan gam bo ascended the throne of Tibet and in his long reign the country made rapid strides in civiliza- tion. Under his rule Tibet became an aggressive power and its armies attacked all the neighboring countries, China not excepted. The King sent T'onmi Samb'ota to India to there find a system of writing applicable to the Tibetan language, and also to open negotia- tions for his marriage with a ]S"epalese princess. TV)nmi brought back an alphabet based on the nagari in use at the time in Kashmir, and composed of 30 consonants, 34 of wliich repro- duced more oi; less closely their prototypes, and G were invented for sounds which did not exist in Sanskrit. It is recorded m the Bodhimur (I. J. Schmidt, Geschichte der Ost Mongolen, p. 329) that the King wrote a treatise on horse breeding, besides several other lighter works. 672 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1893. With the Nepalese (;oiisort he had takeu to himself, Buddhism, which had probably beeu kuowu to, though not adopted to auy extent by, the Tibetans prior to this date, became the state religion, and the form of that religion obtaining in Nepaul was adopted by the Tibetans, though a number of ceremonies and customs peculiar to tlieir national Boubo religion were retained by them and incorporated in the new foith. With the Chinese princess who was married to Srong-tsan-gambo, somewhere about 635 A.
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