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Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books

GAUBIL AND THE SOURCES OF THE GANGES.

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pot{tala, demeure du Grand Lama, des sources du Gange & des _pays circonvoisins, le tout tiré des Cartes Chinoises & Tartares, ftar le P. Gaubil, de la Compagnie de jésus, avec des Remarques du même Pere.»'

Father Gaubil is by no means sure of the correctness of the Lamas' map, as he says:

Je ne saurois bien répondre du détour & de la figure du Gange d'abord après sa source.

être P. Régis croit aussi que cela doit être corrigé. Je suis bien sûr que les positions des deux Cartes Chinoise & Tartare que j'ai vues, ne sont pas exactes dans cette carte de la source du Gange. L'entredeux de toutes les rivières marquées dans cette Carte, les environs & tout le pays est montagneux.

Gaubil gives a list of the positions of all the places entered on the map. For Lake Lapama he has 29° 50' N. lat., J5° 50' W. long. of Peking, for Lake Lanka 29° 50' and 36° 30' resp., and for Mont Cantès (Kailas) 30° 30' and 35° 50 resp., and he adds:

Ces positions sont fort approchantes des Cartes Chinoises & Tartares que j'ai vues. Elles me paroissent fautives. Elles n'ont été prises que sur le rapport des gens du pays. La mesure actuelle, faite par des Lamas, a donné la position du Mont Cantès & des lac Lanka & Lapama. Les Lamas y allèrent de Poutala en mesurant.

On d'Anville's map, the sheet of western Tibet (Pl. LI), the lakes and Kailas are on the same latitude as on Gaubil's. Gaubil's material is drawn from Chinese and Tartar maps. The whole situation and the hydrographical arrangement is the same as on d'Anville's Lama map. The names on both maps are also very much the same, although spelt in different ways. Otherwise the habitus of the maps is somewhat different. Gaubil's map was published in 1729 in Souciet's Observations, and d'Anville's in 1733. I am not aware whether Gaubil has got his material from the first Lama map which was rejected in 1711 or whether he has drawn his sketch from the same material as d'Anville, that is to say the later and more reliable Lama map. 2 But it may be that Gaubil has used earlier native material.3 It is also interesting to learn from Gaubil that the Lamas went from Lhasa to the Kailas and the two lakes, surveying on their way up. That is why the map is better in the west than in the east, where danger arose, and better along the Tsangpo than north of this river. Perhaps they did not go at all to Bongba and other places north of the Tsangpo and only had to trust the verbal information they obtained about these regions. At least one gets that impression when comparing the country round Kailas and the lakes with other parts of Tibet on their map.

I Gaubil has a little map of the sources of the Ganges, which I reproduce here as Pl. LIII.

2 In his explanation to the maps Anquetil du Perron says: »Enfin la Figure Vie (Pl. LIII) présente la fausse Source du Gange, telle qu'elle se trouve dans la carte des Lamas Chinois, dans celles de MM. d'Anville, Rennell &c.

3 Bonin is right in supposing it to be Chinese, on account of the characteristic way in which the mountains and lakes have been drawn, the almost square outlines of the river-courses, and the

Chinese or Mongolian orthography of the names.