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

The irrigation canals of Li are of some interest. In one case the water is con-
ducted through a rock or mountain by a tunnel of considerable length. People here
firmly believe that this tunnel was made by fairies (mkha-'agro) or gods (lha). In the
West people would be proud of their clever ancestors.

In one of the mchod-rten at Li, on the road to Nako, I found a clay tablet represent-
ing Avalokitésvara with eleven heads and eight arms, an interesting stage in this
divinity's development into a figure with a thousand arms.

On Friday the 23rd July, we marched to Nako. We had hardly left the village of
Li, when our caravan had to cross the swollen Spiti river by a rope bridge. (Plate
XII, a). I sincerely sympathised with Pindi Lal when he said "I am tired of these
bridges." But we had a right to be tired of them, for it was, after all, the last one we
had to cross in the course of our journey. After we had spent about three hours in
transporting our luggage and ourselves across the foaming waves, we had to climb up a
very steep and high mountain side with no shade and a scorching sun above us. When
it seemed as if I had reached the ends of the earth with nothing beyond, the large
emerald plateau of the village of Nako suddenly appeared before me. There were
waving fields in which girls were working and singing merrily, and a picturesque town
reflected in the mirror of a clear little lake.

We noticed at once the site of a great 'aBrugpa monastery, called Lo-tsa-bai
Lha-khang (Plate XII, b). Four large temple halls are still standing and form a kind
of court. South-east of them, there are many ruins of other buildings, probably the
cells of monks. There are also plenty of more or less ruined mchod-rten. This great
monastery is believed to have been founded by Lo-tsa-ba Rin-chen-bzang-po, in the days
of king Ye-shes-'od of Guge, c. 1025 A.D., and I am convinced that this assertion is
right. Here we are certainly on ancient ground. Let me now proceed to describe the
different temples.

The western hall is called Lha-khang-ched-po. The principal figure in this hall is
that of rNam-par-snang-mdzad (Vairochana), the chief of the Dhyâni-buddhas of the five
regions (Plate XIII, a). On his right we find Don-yod-grub-pa (Amôgha-siddha) and
Rin-chen-byung-ldan (Ratna-sambhava) ; on his left sNang-ba-mtha-yas (Amitâbha) and
rDo-rje-sems-dpa (Vajra-sattva). Rin-chen-byung-ldan is represented once more on the
same wall with a dragon frame, similar to that of the principal figure.¹ As regards the
frescoes on the walls, they were arranged in circles, just as we find them at the Alchi
monastery. However, their quantity being enormous and their state of preservation
poor, I gave up the attempt either to copy or describe any of them. I must leave
that to future students who can afford to spend at least a month in that interest-
ing place. Elsewhere ² I have given expression to my opinion that stucco images are