Tibetan monasteries · The Tibetan lands: houses, monasteries and clan chiefs, with no king · as at first light, 1 January 1200

Jokhang

The Jokhang is the holiest temple in Tibet, begun in the seventh century in the reign of Songtsen Gampo (tradition) and the place where the Indian teacher Atisha taught in the 1040s and found the 'Royal Testament of the Pillar' in 1049 (en Wikipedia).

The second and third floors of the Buddha Hall and the annexes were added in the eleventh century; the vast complex of later centuries (it was 'greatly expanded in the late seventeenth century') does not exist. Lhasa itself is not a capital. Since the fall of the kings in the ninth century 'the centre of political power was not situated in Lhasa' (en Wikipedia, Lhasa); its weight is religious.

On 1 January 1200 it is a temple, a pilgrim settlement round it and a ring of Kagyu and Kadam houses within a day's walk, and nobody the pages name holds it. WHO HOLDS LHASA, the question the brief puts: we cannot name a lord. The nearest organised power is the Tsalpa Kagyu house of Tsel Gungthang (about 10 km east; founder Zhang Tsalpa died 1193), the Drikung, Taklung and Tsurphu lie a day or two away, and the temple is kept by its own custodians.

That the Tsel family held the east Lhasa valley is the Mongol-age arrangement (recalled), not a 1200 fact.

Who holds it

Title
Keepers of the Jokhang
Since
not pinned
Confidence
low

En Wikipedia (Jokhang, Lhasa) says nothing about who looked after the temple or held Lhasa between the ninth century and the seventeenth. No source we could open names a keeper, steward or patron for 1200.

Overlord

none: no one rules Tibet in 1200; the house answers to its own patrons and to the custom of the valleys

What it holds

  • The Jokhang and its images (the Jowo Shakyamuni statue is the tradition of Princess Wencheng, not a source of 1200)
  • Pilgrim offerings from Ü, Tsang, Nepal and Kham
  • The settlement round the temple (market and lodging; no source describes it)

How it was acquired

Seventh-century royal foundation; custody since the ninth century is not described.

Allies and rivals

Atisha's Kadam disciples tended it in the eleventh century (Reting and Nyethang are their houses). In 1200 the near neighbours are Tsel Gungthang, Yerpa and Ramoche. No quarrel over the Jokhang is recorded.

How things stand that morning

Pilgrimage temple of every school, in the care of keepers whom no source names. Not the seat of any lord.

Wealth

No source we could open gives figures; the usual base is estates and serfs, herds, pass tolls, trade in salt, wool, tea and barley, and the gifts of patrons.

Military

No standing army; the house or lord calls on retainers, tenants and kin. No troop numbers are given by any source we could open.

Threats

  • None known. In 1240 Dorda's Mongol column burns Reting and Gyal Lhakhang but is said to have spared Lhasa (recalled, unchecked).

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

  1. 1240A Mongol raid under Dorda Darkhan reaches the Lhasa valley and burns Reting.Depends on: A Mongol army reaching Tibet decades after 1200 (Chinese and French Wikipedia on Reting). Stopped by: No Mongol rise.

Places of note

  • Jokhang: The temple
  • Lhasa pilgrim settlement: The settlement round the temple (gazetteer point for the city)

Where the sources disagree

  • En Wikipedia (Jokhang) gives the coordinates as 29 39 11 N, 91 2 51 E, which is about 9 km west of the temple and does not agree with the Lhasa page (91 07 03 E); we use 29.653 N, 91.131 E.
  • The page dates Atisha's find of the Pillar Testament to 1049 and says it was 'believed' to be Songtsen Gampo's own: tradition, not contemporary evidence.

Evidence: The pages say nothing of the keepers or the town for 1200. The answer to 'who holds Lhasa' is therefore 'not known'. Treasury of Lives, the Blue Annals, the Red Annals, Petech, Sorensen and Hazod and Davidson could not be opened in this session (treasuryoflives.org and rigpawiki.org refused the fetch; the archive.org full texts were refused or cut off), so facts marked 'recalled' are from memory of those works and unchecked. Dates: 1200 is an Iron-Monkey year in the Tibetan cycle (the first sixty-year cycle began in 1027, a Fire-Hare year); 1 January 1200 falls in the closing weeks of the Earth-Sheep year (1199), before the Tibetan new year. Western years below are the ones the cited pages give; the Tibetan histories give animal-years and the conversions differ by a year or two.

On the map: A 2 km disc; the real extent of the 1200 settlement is not known.

Primary sources for Tibet (centre)

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

Sources and studies

  1. Wikipedia, Jokhang
  2. Wikipedia, Lhasa
  3. Wikipedia, Reting Monastery
  4. Chinese Wikipedia, 热振寺
  5. French Wikipedia, Histoire du Tibet
  6. Wikipedia, History of Tibet

Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.