1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 20 1 Modern China and its neighbours. 2 1 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 30 1 2 3 4 5 6 37R xix 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 37R 6 5 4 3 2 1 30 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 20 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 10 KAZAKHSTAN MONGOLIA ARABS Urumqi UIGHURS Turfan Beijing Kashgar Taklamakan Desert Miran Dunhuang Suzhou Khotan o H g n a u H I Xining Srinagar nd LADAKH TIBET us AZHA Xian (Chang’an) KASHMIR H u an g H o TANG CHINA xx CHANGTANG Y a ZHANGZHUNG lo n Chengdu e g ts g n a Delhi YERU Sa Y URU lwe Jumla RULAK KONGPO en Chongqing Tsangp Lhasa N o E YORU P YARLUNG DAKPO Kathmandu A Thimphu L tra apu Brahm Ga NANZHAO Tibetan Empire nges ASSAM Kunming Modern borders g for reference n o k INDIA e Cities, including M modern cities for reference Mandalay 2 The Tibetan empire in the eighth to the ninth centuries 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Tibet. 9 3 20 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 30 1 2 3 4 5 6 37R xxi 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 37R 6 5 4 3 2 1 30 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 20 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 10 Monastery Namtso Lake Mt Nyenchen Radreng Tanglha chu Kyi- Drigung TIBETTaglung Lhasa Ganden Tsangpo Nyemo xxii Samye Densatil Puntsogling Shigatse Zhalu Rinpung Nartang Yamdrog Neudong Lake Tsangpo Gyantse YARLUNG Sakya TSANG Ralung DAGPO Mt Yarlha Shampo S ARUNACHAL A Lhodrag Y PRADESH L A M A H I Mt Kula Kangri INDIA Mt Chomo SIKKIM Lhari BHUTAN NEPAL 4 Central Tibet and Tsang. to Sera 1 to Drepung 2 3 4 to Ganden 5 LINGK HOR 6 Ramoche Potala 7 LHASA 8 Norbu Lingka Dekyi Barkhor 9 Lingka Chakpori 10 Jokhang 1 2 3 4 Ky i - c h u R i v e r 5 6 7 8 9 5 Lhasa. 20 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 30 1 2 3 4 5 6 37R xxiii 1 2 3 4 5 6 1 7 8 9 Tibet Appears, 600–700 10 1 2 3 4 EMPEROR ON THE RUN 5 6 One day in the winter of 763, the unthinkable happened to China’s great Tang 7 empire. A victorious enemy army rode through the streets of the imperial 8 capital, Chang’an. These were the Tibetans, a people of whom, barely a century 9 earlier, most Chinese hadn’t even heard. The city of Chang’an was not only home 20 to the emperor and his court – it was a capital of culture famous throughout 1 Asia, its streets thronging with merchants, musicians, monks and officials going 2 about their daily business. It was the prerogative of the Chinese emperor to look 3 down upon everything outside his realm as barbaric, and here in Chang’an one 4 could perhaps forgive him for doing so. 5 Yet the Tibetan conquest was no simple barbarian onslaught. The Tibetans 6 had first lured the Chinese general Tzuyi and his army out of Chang’an to fight 7 them in the western provinces. Then suddenly, and too late, the Chinese had 8 realised that allies of the Tibetans were marching on Chang’an from the east as 9 well. The emperor fled, leaving the city stripped of both its army and its 30 imperial court. The Tibetans now had a window of opportunity to seize the 1 city before the return of the Chinese army. That window was opened by a 2 rebellious faction at the Chinese court who had gone over to the Tibetan side. 3 A Chinese rebel opened up the city gates and the Tibetans walked into the 4 capital unopposed. 5 The Tibetan general leading the army had no ambition to set up a Tibetan 6 government in Chang’an. Instead, he rewarded the Chinese rebels by placing 37R 1 TIBET 1 their leader, the prince of Kuangwu, on the imperial throne. In a matter of days 2 the new emperor had appointed a new government and declared a new 3 dynasty. Meanwhile, totally demoralised by the cowardice of the previous 4 emperor, the Chinese army simply fell apart. The situation looked dire for the 5 dethroned emperor who, as the Chinese historians put it, was left ‘toiling in the 6 dust’, while the imperial army had broken up into armed bands that were 7 roaming and pillaging the countryside. 8 It turned out that the Tibetans had no desire to try to put this chaos in 9 order: no desire, in other words, to rule China itself. Having put their puppet 10 emperor on the throne, they left the city. Some say that they heard rumours of 1 a vast Chinese army advancing from the south. The general Tzuyi was indeed 2 approaching, but at the head of a ragtag army numbering only a thousand or 3 so. When he came to Chang’an he found only a remnant of the Tibetan army 4 still there, and a rather frightened puppet emperor on the throne. Since Tzuyi’s 5 army was so unimpressive he decided to enter the city beating a drum to let 6 the citizens of Chang’an know that the old order had been restored. Soon after- 7 wards the Tang emperor returned, his empire much reduced. Though they 8 may have had no taste to rule from the imperial throne, the Tibetans set their 9 border only a few hundred miles to the west of the capital and forced the 20 Chinese emperor into a series of peace treaties that cut China off from the 1 West. 2 How did the Tibetans come to pose such a threat to China? To find out, we 3 must go back a century to the time when a king calling himself ‘Son of the 4 Gods’ had managed to harness the power of Tibet’s warring clans and turn it 5 outwards. This explosion of energy overwhelmed everything in its way: and so 6 Tibet appeared. At its centre was the Divine Son, a man with the glamour of a 7 deity, Songtsen Gampo.1 8 9 THE DIVINE DESTINY OF PRINCE SONGTSEN 30 1 Prince Songtsen was born into destiny. Surrounded by ritual from the moment 2 of his birth, he was raised to fulfil a special role, never in any doubt that he was 3 different from other boys. His father was a great king, and no ordinary king but 4 a tsenpo, the embodiment of the divine in this world. When Songtsen inherited 5 that title from his father, he would also inherit the glamour of the divine that 6 his father embodied, a glamour that was already sweeping all of Tibet before it. 37R If few people had heard of the tsenpo before, Songtsen’s father was changing 2 TIBET APPEARS, 600–700 that as he forged alliances with other clans. He was always willing to use his 1 semi-divine status to meddle in clan struggles while at the same time seeming 2 to rise above them. It was the nature of the tsenpo to be of this world and 3 beyond it at the same time. 4 Throughout his childhood, Songtsen was told his family history. The first of 5 the tsenpos, it was said, came down from heaven via the local sacred moun- 6 tain. Like rain falling from the sky, he enriched the earth. Local chiefs bowed 7 down before him, for his fate was to rule over them. The first tsenpos were 8 essentially gods among men. During their tenure on earth, the connection to 9 heaven was always there, a ‘sky cord’ made of light leading from the top of their 10 heads up into the beyond. The indignity of death was not for them. Instead, at 1 the appointed time, they ascended back to heaven on the sky cord. Still, 2 Songtsen knew that his family had fallen somewhat since the age of these noble 3 ancestors. They sky cord was gone, squandered by a more recent tsenpo called 4 Drigum. 5 It seems that Drigum had been a troublemaker who got involved in point- 6 less feuds with his subjects and constantly challenged them to duels – hardly 7 fair considering that he fought with a divine sword forged in heaven. The 8 tsenpo finally met his match when he challenged one of his courtiers to a 9 duel. The courtier agreed, on condition that the tsenpo put aside his magical 20 weapons. At the same time the courtier prepared a trick. He took a hundred 1 oxen and loaded sacks of ashes onto their backs. Then he fixed gold spearheads 2 to their horns. When the duel began, the cattle were loosed, and in the 3 chaos of swirling ash, the courtier killed the tsenpo. Thus the sky cord connec- 4 tion was lost. Drigum’s body was put into a copper coffin and cast into 5 the river.2 6 Nowadays, as Songtsen knew, the tsenpos died like other men; and there 7 were many opportunities for death. Songtsen’s father was not shy of riding into 8 battle at the head of his troops.