Southern Tibet : vol.2 / 79 ページ（カラー画像）

0079	Southern Tibet : vol.2
南チベット : vol.2

Gerard correctly supposes that Moorcroft exaggerates the dimensions of
Rawun Rudd or Langa-cho in making it four times as big as Tso-mavang. The
most accounts he got made the lake 6 days in circumference and only one made
it 7 days. He only met 6 or 8 persons who had gone round it. On account of
its irregular shores he does not think it is much larger than the sacred lake. He
criticises Moorcroft who doubted the existence of islands. At least 15 persons told
him there was a small island, only 200 or 250 yards across. As a matter of fact Moor-
croft says that the lake is »surrounding some large portions of rock a little detached
from the Himachub, though at another place he denies the existence of islands.
For Gartok he gives several names: Garoo, Gartop, Gur, Yoogar, Zhoogar
and Gurtokh. Tsaparang or Chaprang he calls Chubrang and says it is a collection
of tents, inhabited during the winter. Roodak is a town of 200 houses on the
right bank of the Indus, half way between Leh and Gartok. It is famed for the salt
and borax lakes in the vicinity. Chakchaka is one of them. Ladak is bounded on
the north by Yarkund and its dependencies, on the east and S.E. by Chinese Tartary.
By Tibet he obviously means only the country farther east, Tibet Proper. »Intra-
Himalayan regions» is an expression he is probably the first to use.
On Gerard's map,¹ Pl. IV., there is no communication whatever between the
two lakes. The outlines of the lakes are somewhat changed from Moorcroft's
representation, and in the centre of Langa Lake there is an island. The Satlej issues
from the Langa Lake. The N.E. branch of the Indus is much greater than the
Gartok branch.

Dr J. G. GERARD has written an article: Observations on the Spiti Valley
and circumjacent country within the Himálaya, which proves that its author was
far ahead of his time. ² It was published the same year as Ritter's second volume
of his geography of Asia and gives a good general idea of the then current views
of some parts north of the Himalayas. He says nothing is known or even conjectured
about a northern and N.E. boundary of the great central platform of Asia. He
regards Lake Mánsarovara as the highest point of the Indian Peninsula, forming a
plain which throws off the great rivers from S.E. to N.W., and the base of clusters
of peaks insulated between their sources and the northern slope of the plateau, of
which all knowledge was still confined to conclusions from the upper course of the
Satlej and Indus, where the basins of those rivers, and consequently the lowest
depression of the soil, had been ascertained to rest upon the zone of 15,000 feet,
and the table land, through which they flow, to rise beyond 17,000. »There are
but approximations to the altitude of the broken plains of Tartary, which only serve

国立情報学研究所 - ディジタル・シルクロード・プロジェクト
『東洋文庫所蔵』貴重書デジタルアーカイブ

引用情報

OCR読み取り結果

国立情報学研究所 - ディジタル・シルクロード・プロジェクト 『東洋文庫所蔵』貴重書デジタルアーカイブ

引用情報

OCR読み取り結果

国立情報学研究所 - ディジタル・シルクロード・プロジェクト
『東洋文庫所蔵』貴重書デジタルアーカイブ