Shalu lies about 22 km south of Shigatse.
En Wikipedia dates it to 1040 and to the founder Chetsun Sherab Jungne and calls it 'the first major monastery built by Tsangpa noble families during Tibet's Buddhist revival'; the Chinese page gives 1087 (our reading of the two pages disagrees by forty-seven years and we state both). The page praises its learning, its 'psychic training' (the Shalu tradition of mind-body practices) and its murals. In 1200 it is a family monastery of the Chetsun noble house, which is Kadam-trained and close to Sakya in Tsang.
The great Shalu of the fourteenth century (the rebuilding of 1306, Buton Rinchen Drub as abbot, the Shalu myriarchy of the Mongol age) is not yet. Who leads the house in 1200 is not known.
Who holds it
- Title
- Lord-abbot of Shalu (the Chetsun house)
- Since
- not pinned
- Confidence
- low
En Wikipedia (Shalu Monastery) names only the founder, Chetsun Sherab Jungne, and says nothing of the Chetsun family or of any abbot between the eleventh century and the fourteenth.
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
- Shalu monastery
- Chetsun estates round it (not itemised)
- The house's patronage of artists and scholars (the page praises its murals, undated)
How it was acquired
1040 or 1087 by the Chetsun family.
Allies and rivals
Near neighbours: Sakya (about 90 km west), Narthang (about 10 km), the Nyang valley houses. No quarrel is known.
How things stand that morning
A learned family monastery of Tsang; head not known.
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.
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.
- 1306The great hall is rebuilt in the Chinese-influenced style (recalled).Depends on: Peace and Yuan favour in the next century. Stopped by: Not applicable in 1200.
Places of note
- Shalu: The monastery, position within about 5 km
Where the sources disagree
- Founding: 1040 (en Wikipedia) against 1087 (the Chinese page, as read at the start of this work).
- En Wikipedia gives no coordinates; we use the 29.04 N, 88.84 E of our notes, about 20 km south of Shigatse.
Evidence: One short page. 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.
On the map: Small disc; the estates of the Chetsun are 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.
- History of Buddhism in India and Tibet, Buton Rinchen Drub (Bu ston Rin chen grub) (1322). Optional background. Read online
- The Blue Annals, Go Lotsawa Zhonnu Pal ('Gos lo tsa ba gZhon nu dpal) (1476 to 1478). The fullest Tibetan account of who mattered around 1200, written three centuries later from earlier biographies and lineage records, many now lost. Read online
- The collected works of Lama Zhang, and the early Kagyu lives, Lama Zhang (Zhang Yudrakpa Tsondru Drakpa) and his disciples; the biographers of Drigung, Taklung and Phagmodru (the 1160s to the early 13th century). The nearest contemporary witnesses to the lords of central Tibet in 1200. Read online
- The Sakya genealogy, and the works of the Sakya hierarch of 1200, Jetsun Drakpa Gyaltsen (Grags pa rgyal mtshan) and Sakya Pandita; the genealogy by Ngawang Kunga Sonam (the hierarchs' writings about 1170 to 1250; the genealogy 1629). Sakya in 1200 was ruled by Jetsun Drakpa Gyaltsen, the third of the five founders, with his nephew Kunga Gyaltsen (later Sakya Pandita, born 1182) under his teaching. Read online
- History of the Song, the chapters on Xia and on foreign states, Toqto'a (脫脫) and the Yuan history office (1343 to 1345). The Song court's accounts of its neighbours, each arranged as an annal of embassies and wars. Read online
- Indo-Tibetica (the temples and inscriptions of western Tibet), with the Royal Genealogy of Ngari, Giuseppe Tucci (editor and translator); the genealogy by Ngawang Drakpa (Ngag dbang grags pa) (the inscriptions and temple records of the 11th to 15th centuries; Indo-Tibetica published 1932 to 1941; the genealogy about 1497). Guge, Purang and Ladakh in 1200 are among the least documented kingdoms in the atlas. Read online
Sources and studies
Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.