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

Sanskrit school at Leh; but the school soon came to an end, and the book was then
placed in this mchod-rten. mChod rtens of this kind, which serve chiefly as receptacles
for old and useless manuscripts, remind me strongly of the Jewish Genizas.

The hill behind the town of Leh is called rNam-rgyal-rtsē-mo. On the top there
are the ruins of the royal palace which was built by bKra-shis-rnam-rgyal (c. 1520 A.D.)
As I had often visited this site during my former stay at Leh, I had not intended to
visit it again on this occasion. Owing, however, to the return of the Italian, Dr. Filipo
de Filipi, of the Duke of Abruzzi's mountaineering expedition, with his wife and
brother, it was decided to show them some of the sights of Leh. One forenoon was
accordingly set apart for a trip to the top of rNam-rgyal-rtsē-mo, Mr. Reichel of the
Moravian Mission accompanying us. I had no reason to regret having been of
the party, for on this occasion I noticed a few things which I had overlooked before.

The Maitrēya temple on the rNam-rgyal-rtse-mo is apparently the oldest, and is in
all probability identical with the "Red College" built by King 'aBum-lde, 500 years
ago. It contains an inscription in praise of the reformer bTsong-kha-pa; and, among
many other frescoes, a picture of the bKra-shis-lhun-po Monastery in Tibet. This picture
shows the group of buildings which make up the large monastery, and there is a long
inscription attached to it which is distributed all over the picture. Although this in-
scription, as well as the other one, is in very bad preservation, several sentences can be
made out. As masons or architects are therein mentioned, it probably refers to a
restoration of the temple. The name of a great minister, Phyag-rdor, is given in one of
the inscriptions. He is possibly the same minister Phyag-rdor who is mentioned in
the Daru rock inscription. I am inclined to think, for reasons which I will
state later on, that Phyag-rdor served under Lha-chen Bha-gan, c. 1470—1500 A.D.
In that case the inscriptions in this temple may date from the latter half of the 15th
century. I ordered both of them to be copied. On the right and left hand side of the
huge Maitrēya statue, there are fragmentary traces of two other statues which once
stood there. This is in agreement with a statement in the rGyal-rabs.

There is another temple, of red colour, on the top of the same hill, namely, the temple
of "the four Lords" (mGon-khang). This is the very one which was erected by
king bKra-shis-rnam-rgyal c. 400 years ago, as stated in the chronicles. K. Marx was
assured of its existence by bKra-shis-btsan-phel, his lama friend, but he was unable
to visit it. It contains very artistically executed figures of "the four Lords" which
are about from three to eight feet high. The principal figure represents rNam-thos-sras
(Vaiśravaṇa). All four figures were covered with blankets; but these were removed
with the exception of the one which covered Vaiśravaṇa. With regard to the latter
image we were told that it is exhibited only once a year. The lama showed us, however,
a fresco of Vaiśravaṇa on the wall, where he is represented in sexual union with his
Śakti. As these images belong to the few in Ladakh which can be dated, they are of
the greatest importance for the history of Tibetan art. Among the frescoes on the
walls, I found one on the right hand side of the door which represented gorgeously
dressed men with Yarkandi turbans on their heads. I could not understand the presence