Tibetan Documents concerning Chinese Turkestan. I: the Ha-za

Among the Tibetan MSS. recovered by Sir Aurel Stein from the now famous hidden library of Tun-huang (Ch'ien-fo-tung) is a roll of thin paper inscribed on one side with a part of a text of a Buddhist sūtra in Chinese. The reverse contains a Tibetan document, which, as we may infer from many similar instances, was inscribed later. The Tibetan text, which consists of 254 lines of writing (plus the lower half of a preceding line) is a chronicle, covering without interruption a period of seventy-six years. Each entry commences with the name of the year according to the twelve-year cycle, and then appends a brief resume of the leading events, usually ending with the phrase “[so] one year“. The text contains a large number of names, names of peoples, places, and persons, including royalties, generals, and ministers, Chinese envoys and Turkish khagans: and the whole conveys a lively impression of Tibetan activities during the period, especially of incessant campaigns against all co-terminous states, the Chinese, the Hbrog (nomads), and other tribes of Tibet. Of special interest for Indian history are the indications of Tibetan domination in Nepal.