National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books

64

It gives the name of the Lhasa commissioner who for a time was regent of Ladakh and who, as the chronicles prove, intended to make himself the independent ruler of the country. His name is given here as rGyal-bai rgyal-thsab rJe-btsun Mi-pham-mgon. But unfortunately, there was no time for copying these inscriptions in full, nor for making impressions of them.

Behind the present village of rGya, on the left bank of the brook, there is a plateau studded with a number of ancient, mostly ruined mohod-rten. They are still

held in veneration by the present inhabitants of rGya (Plate XXXI, a). This is remarkable, because many of these mohod-rten which are called Lha-bab-mchodrten, undoubtedly go back to Mon times. And had not the people of the neighbouring village told us plainly that they were indifferent to everything connected with the Mons ? The difference may be this, that whilst the Mons of Rum-rtse did not succumb to Tibetan influences, the Mons of rGya did. We found several types of cremation tablets with Indian inscriptions, containing the Yé dharmc formula. The characters employed are of c. 700-900 A.D. according to Dr. Vogel's estimate. But there were also several tablets which showed the same formula in Tibetan characters. The difference between the Tibetan and Indian characters rests mainly in this, that in the Tibetan version the aspirated mediae are indicated by an ordinary media furnished with a subjoined /1, whilst in the Indian version gh, clh, and bh are expressed in simple characters. Besides, the Tibetan version has the tripartite y, whilst the Indian version has a later form of the y. In two cases, there were two tablets showing almost exactly the same design, but the characters used for the inscription were Tibetan on one of them, and Indian on the other. Among the Lhabab-mohod-rten, there were also the ruins of an ancient monastery of unknown origin, built of sun-dried bricks. I am almost convinced that the town of rGya is mentioned in the time of King Sadna legs, c. 850, in the chronicles of Ladakh. There it is stated that King Sadna legs built the temple of sKar-Chung-rdo-dbyings in the province of rGya (r Gyct-sde) . This could, of course, also be translated by Indian Province " or " Chinese Province." But it is very unlikely that a Tibetan king should have built a monastery in a district, the hold on which was always uncertain. It is a pity that

the name of the ruined temple in the middle of the Lha-bab-mcliod-rten has become

entirely lost.

On the 20th August, we left rGya for Mar-rtse-lang (map Marsahing), the Marsilla of Moorcroft. Below rGya, we passed by a high lhatho, an altar of the pre-Buddhist religion, with a few houses and fields in the vicinity. It is the Latu of Moorcroft, and soon we reached the houses and fields of a small settlement, called

Rong.1

We made a short halt at this place, because I wished to examine the site of some ancient graves, called Mon-gyi-rom-khang, " graves of the Mons." The first who told me of the existence of these graves, was our evangelist dGá-Phun-thsogs of Kyelang,. who is a native of rGya. He had told me that he had been inside them when a shepherd

I Ou the map this vii?ale is indicated by the name of Lath o.