And He Describes
The People As Speaking A Language Mixed With Tibetan For Some Distance
Before Reaching Ta-T'sien-Lu.
Baron Richthofen also who, as we shall see,
has thrown an entirely new light upon this part of Marco's itinerary, was
exactly five days in travelling through a rich and populous country, from
Ch'eng-tu to Yachau.
[Captain Gill left Ch'eng-tu on the 10th July, 1877,
and reached Ya-chau on the 14th, a distance of 75 miles. - H. C] (Ritter,
IV. 190 seqq.; Cooper, pp. 164-173; Richthofen in Verhandl. Ges. f.
Erdk. zu Berlin, 1874, p. 35.)
Tibet was always reckoned as a part of the Empire of the Mongol Kaans in
the period of their greatness, but it is not very clear how it came under
subjection to them. No conquest of Tibet by their armies appears to be
related by either the Mahomedan or the Chinese historians. Yet it is
alluded to by Plano Carpini, who ascribes the achievement to an unnamed son
of Chinghiz, and narrated by Sanang Setzen, who says that the King of Tibet
submitted without fighting when Chinghiz invaded his country in the year of
the Panther (1206). During the reign of Mangku Kaan, indeed, Uriangkadai,
an eminent Mongol general [son of Subudai] who had accompanied Prince
Kublai in 1253 against Yunnan, did in the following year direct his arms
against the Tibetans. But this campaign, that no doubt to which the text
alludes as "the wars of Mangu Kaan," appears to have occupied only a part
of one season, and was certainly confined to the parts of Tibet on the
frontiers of Yunnan and Sze-ch'wan. ["In the Yuen-shi, Tibet is mentioned
under different names. Sometimes the Chinese history of the Mongols uses
the ancient name T'u-fan. In the Annals, s.a. 1251, we read: 'Mangu
Khan entrusted Ho-li-dan with the command of the troops against
T'u-fan." Sub anno 1254 it is stated that Kublai (who at that time was
still the heir-apparent), after subduing the tribes of Yun-nan, entered
T'u-fan, when So-ho-to, the ruler of the country, surrendered. Again,
s.a. 1275: 'The prince Al-lu-chi (seventh son of Kublai) led an
expedition to T'u-fan.' In chap, ccii., biography of Ba-sz'-ba, the
Lama priest who invented Kublai's official alphabet, it is stated that this
Lama was a native of Sa-sz'-kia in T'u-fan. (Bretschneider, Med Res.
II. p. 23.) - H.C.] Koeppen seems to consider it certain that there was no
actual conquest of Tibet, and that Kublai extended his authority over it
only by diplomacy and the politic handling of the spiritual potentates who
had for several generations in Tibet been the real rulers of the country.
It is certain that Chinese history attributes the organisation of civil
administration in Tibet to Kublai. Mati Dhwaja, a young and able member of
the family which held the hereditary primacy of the Satya [Sakya] convent,
and occupied the most influential position in Tibet, was formerly
recognised by the Emperor as the head of the Lamaite Church and as the
tributary Ruler of Tibet.
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