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

1906-08. Sok-terek, Camp 68 (D. 4) ... 36° 21′ 49″
Triangulation Station above Achchan, Camp 69 (D. 4) ... 36° 24′ 41″
Ulāgh-mazār, Camp 350 (near sacred tombs; B. 2) ... 37° 14′ 18″

NOTES ON SHEET No. 15 (YURUNG-KĀSH AND KERIYA R. SOURCES)

The survey within the portion of the K'un-lun represented in this sheet was made during August and September, 1907; only the westernmost snowy peaks, including 'Muz-tāgh' (Pk. 1/61 A) and those on the northern main K'un-lun range (A-D. 1), having been sighted in 1900-01. The plane-table work was based on a great number of previously triangulated peaks which are shown in Appendix A (61 A, 61 B). Of these five were fixed by the Kashmir triangulation of the G. T. Survey (Johnson, 1862). Of other trigonometrical points most were determined by Captain Deasy, while some are derived from triangulation work of my first and second journeys.

An account has been given above of the routes by which the survey was first carried to the very difficult ground at the head-waters of the Yurung-kāsh river and subsequently extended past the basin of the Keriya river sources (D. 2) to the high and barren plateaus stretching along the southern range of the K'un-lun (see pp. 21 sqq.). Observations made in different parts of these ranges indicated an approximate snow-line at levels varying from about 17,500 to 18,500 feet.

For a fairly detailed description of the routes followed in this rugged mountain region and on the plateaus to the south, see Desert Cathay, ii. pp. 443 sqq., Figs. 318-332. The only track through it, occasionally used, leads from Polur to Ladāk over the Bāba-Hātim and Lanak-lā passes. Its difficulties are great, and, though, no doubt, known since early times, it cannot be traced in old records.

Among the physical features of this elevated region the most striking, perhaps, is the great contrast between the extremely deep-cut, and in many places quite inaccessible, gorges of the Yurung-kāsh headwaters and the wide, in parts ice-clad, basins in which gather the sources of this and the Keriya river. Quite different, too, from the former is the character of the forbiddingly barren uplands of northernmost Tibet which lie south of the southern main range and extend also between the Keriya river drainage and the northern chain.

As the Yurung-kāsh gorges west and south of the great and conspicuous massif of 'Muz-tāgh' (Pk. 1/61 A), and probably those below the Zailik valley debouchure (B. 1) also, are quite impassable, access to that portion of the upper Yurung-kāsh drainage which the map shows as wholly unexplored will have to be sought by some glacier pass across the northern range from the Genju or Ulāgh-sai headwaters (No. 14. B. 4).

Correction. The contours and cliff symbols along the Yurung-kāsh river course below Zailik (A, B. 1) should throughout be brought close to the left bank.

NOTES ON SHEET No. 16 (KERE-BĀZĀR, BAI)

The small area at the foot of the Tien-shan, shown in this sheet, was surveyed from a single route and by R. B. Lāl Singh alone towards the end of April, 1915. The early season and adverse atmospheric conditions prevented extension of his work further towards the main range. The watershed of this appears to have been nowhere within view, and on various grounds it is probable that the headwaters of both the Kizil and Kuchā rivers reach considerably further north than conjecturally indicated on the plane-table.

The traverse was fitted to the position adopted for Kuchā (see below), and details adjusted to the latitude observed at Kara-kul (B. 4) and to the route lines Kuchā–Muz-art pass and Kuchā–Korla.

The surveyor's observation of conifer forest on the southern slopes of the range at elevations from about 7000 to 9000 feet is fully borne out by Dr. Merzbacher's observations in the Terek valley north-west of Bai, and in other Tien-shan valleys further west; cf. Merzbacher, The Central Tian-shan (London, 1905) pp. 133 sq., 141, etc.

Astronomically observed latitude.
1913-15. Kara-kul, Camp 323 (Bēg's house; B. 4) ... ... 42° 16′ 52′