from the Devanagari of India, and commenced the translation of the canon from Sanscrit into the language of the country.[1] For a long time there was a struggle for supremacy between the old nobility and the new hierarchy, in which, after several vicissitudes, the Buddhist monks gained the ascendancy.
It was during this early period of Buddhist rule in Tibet that the first European visited the country. We are indebted to Colonel Yule[2] for a complete knowledge of the adventurous journey of Friar Odoric of Pordenone, between a.d. 1316 and 1330. It was on his return from Cathay that, after travelling many days through Kansan, the modern Shensi and Szechuen, he came to the chief and royal city of Tibet, obviously Lhasa, all built with walls black and white. He tells us that, in this city, no one dare to shed the blood of any, whether man or beast, and that there dwells the Abassi,[3] which in their tongue is the Pope. More than three centuries elapsed before another European visited Lhasa, and momentous events took place in the interval.
In the middle of the fourteenth century a great reforming Lama arose in Tibet, named Tsong-khapa, who proved to be an incarnation of one of the Dhyani Buddhas, named Amitabha. He was born near Lake Kokonor in 1358, and died in 1419. Tsong-khapa built and took up his abode in the Galdan monastery, near Lhasa, of which he was the first khanpo or abbot, and where his body lies. He forbade clerical marriages, prohibited necromancy, and introduced the custom of frequent conferences among the Lamas. His reforms led to a schism in the Tibetan church. The old sect, which resisted all change, adhered to their dress, and are called Shammars, or Dukpas, and Red Caps. Their chief monastery is at Sakia-jong, and they retain supremacy in Nepal and Bhutan. The reformers adopted a
- ↑ It had previously been translated from Pali, the old language of Magadha, into Sanscrit.
- ↑ 'Cathay, and the Road Thither,' i. p. 146.
- ↑ Colonel Yule, after putting aside the ponderous erudition of Giorgi ('Alphabetum Tibetanum,' p.688), discusses the probable meaning and derivation of this word Abassi, used by Odoric (ubi sup. p. 149, note).
