Mustang: A Lost Tibetan Kingdom

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I Shall always remember with gratitude the kind assistance of His Majesty Angun Tenzing Trandul, the late king of Lo and Raja of Mustang. To his son Jigme Dorje Trandul, the Present King, I express my respectful thanks for his welcome and kindness to me during my visit to his land.

To his Royal Highness Prince Basundhara of Nepal, I am most grateful for assistance in obtaining permission to travel to Mustang.

I am also grateful to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Nepal for granting me authorisation to reside in Mustang. In particular I should like to thank for this privilege the Commander-in-Chief of the Nepalese Army, General Surendra Shah, His Excellency Mr. Prakash Chandra Thakur, and his Excellency Major General Padma Bahadur Khatri.

With Tashi thank Karmay, my friend and companion, I share any merit this book may have. To him I express my admiration and sincere affection.

May I also thank here Professor Purna Harsha of the Department of Archaeology of Nepal foe his sympathetic understanding and assistance.

To Boris Lissanevitch of Kathmandu I am indebted for equipment generously lent, provisions given, for his lavish hospitality, and for innumerable services that facilitated my departure.

To numerous residents of Kathmandu I owe thanks for advice and counsel; in particular I am indebted to the late Field Marshal Kaiser Shumsher Jung Bahadur Rana, Colonel Charles Wylie, Colonel J. Roberts, Father M. Moran, S. J., and Mr. Peter, Aufschnaiter.

To the Hon. Pemba Gyaltsen, and to his Holiness the Lama of Tsarang, and also to the assistance and friendship of many other Lobas I owe much of the information contained in this book

I should like to thank Professor Christopher von Furer- Haimendorf of the School of Oriental and African Studies of the University of London for his scholarly advice and encouragement.

To Samten Karmay, brother of Tashi Karmay, I am greatly indebted for the exact translation of Tibetan and Loba documents I brought back from Mustang, while to Mrs George Villiers I am most grateful for the considerable work and effort she has put into the manuscript of this book.

From the Jacket

Mustang lies on the roof of the world north of Nepal and surrounded on three sides by Chinese held Tibet; foreigners were forbidden to enter its territory and virtually nothing was known about its people and their civilization until Michel Peissel obtained permission to make a long stay there. To reach the walled capital, Lo Mantang, his small caravan of yaks and porters had to make their way fifteen days across the Himalayas. In Mustang he found a mediaeval world uniquely preserved from modern technology, in which the wheel is not used, the earth is believed to be flat and polyandry is practised.

Warmly received by the King, the author, who speaks Tibetan, visited the great castles, many monasteries (some of them subterranean), the lonely hermitages and the remote villages. He studied the religion, history, laws and customs of the land of Lo, as it is called in Tibetan, and made such close friends amongst the Lamas, Dukes, Counts, scholars, rich traders, royal dancers, peasants and serfs, that he even received, by baptism, a Loba name, Shelkagari- Crystal Clear Mountain.

Of his journey he says: I have been fortunate in having been able to explore one of the last uninvestigated corners of our planet… a land where the soul of the man is still considered to be as real as the soul of the man is still considered to be as real as the feet he walks on; a land said to be " barren as a dead deer" but where beauty and happiness abound in spite of hardship. His good fortune Michel Peissel has generously shared with his readers; his book is a milestone in the history of Himalayan exploration and the understanding of Tibetan culture.