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

On the 9th September, I went to the Teu-gser-po or Tiserru (as ordinary people call
this ruined mchod-rten), accompanied by Mr. Schmitt of the Moravian Mission, Lobzang,
a Christian and Meteorological Observer at Leh, Pindi Lal, and the Khalasi. Our object
was to study the inside of the structure. When we had climbed up to half its height, we
found a hole in the surface, the opening of a narrow shaft. Lobzang went down first of
all. He came to a narrow room of triangular shape, which was perfectly empty. We
then tried to dig a new hole in a different place, when suddenly a number of men, who
had been working in the fields, rushed towards us terrified. They implored us not to
open the Tiserru, as such a procedure would bring incalculable misfortune to the
country. From their remonstrances we learned something about the history of the
old monument. The story reminds us of European fairy tales, such as that of the
devil being caught in a bottle. In King 'aBum-lde's times, there used to live a demon
in a cavity of the rock Teu-gser-po. This devil, who had fire proceeding from his
mouth, roamed about the country and destroyed the king's palace and portions of the
town of Leh. To exorcise him, the huge stūpa was built above his abode. If we opened
the stūpa, the people feared that the evil spirit which had been kept under custody for
500 years, might once more attain liberty. We pointed to the old holes in the building,
and observed that he might have escaped long ago. But that was of no avail. At the
same time, we were told that the old stūpa was not only a repository for devils, but for
heavy gales also. When in the days of King 'aBum-lde, the country suffered severely
from storms, several large clay pots were held against the wind with their mouths
open. As soon as the wind subsided, their mouths were closed, and they were stored
up in the stūpa with the storms contained in them. People were afraid we might find
and open this ancient pottery, and that the country would be plagued with heavy gales
again.
From the opposition which we met in this case from the peasants of Leh, it was
plain to me that it is difficult to do archæological work in an inhabited country. The
chronicles of Ladakh have only a very short note on this mchod-rten. They simply
state that it was built, because "some fatality" had occurred at Leh. I am still of
opinion that the idea of a devil living in this place has something to do with the ancient
graves described above. These graves are situated in proximity to, and some of them
possibly below the mchod-rten.
On the same day, I went higher up the Leh valley, following the desert road
to the west of the cultivated area, accompanied by Pindi Lal and the Khalasi. Close to
the village of dGonpa, we passed by the ruined site of an old town with mchod-rten of
ancient type near it. There we found also a stone sculpture of some Bodhisattva, en-
shrined in a masonry wall, with a lhatho (altar of the pre-Buddhist religion), in front of
it (Plate XXXIV, a). As usual, the altar was furnished with many ibex horns. This
ruined town may be the original site of the present village of dGonpa.
Marching upwards in the side-valley to the left of the village of dGonpa, we
came to the ruins of an ancient temple, which is generally known by the name of
Gya-mthsa. I had visited it occasionally, ten or twelve years ago, when I was stationed
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