A high grass basin at the southern end of the Kham plateau, on the Yunnan-Tibet branch of the tea road (Wikipedia, Tea Horse Road names Dali, Lijiang and Shangri-La on it).
The Dali kingdom lies south at Lijiang and Weixi; no Dali post is shown here. The Ganden Sumtseling monastery of the 17th century is not yet. Nothing about this place is dated in the sources we could reach for 1200; the picture is the general pattern of a Khampa valley, marked as such.
Who holds it
- Title
- The Tibetan chiefs of Gyalthang and Dechen (see Gyalthang, Dechen).
- Since
- not known
- Born
- not known
- Family
- not known
- Confidence
- low
Wikipedia's Tea Horse Road page; geography.
Lord in 1200
The Tibetan chiefs of Gyalthang and Dechen (see Gyalthang, Dechen).
How things stand that morning
Self-governing; no dated event.
Military
No numbers survive for 1200.
Militia
No numbers survive for 1200.
Places of note
- Gyalthang: The place.
Where the sources disagree
- The gazetteer's 'Shangri-La' is the Deqen prefecture's county centre (27.83 N, 99.71 E); the ownership tool gives it to this sheet.
Evidence: Wikipedia's Tea Horse Road page; geography.
On the map: Marker only; a place, not a district.
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
- Wikipedia, Tea Horse Road (read this session)
- Wikipedia, Dali Kingdom (read this session)
- Author's recall of the secondary literature (Petech, Tucci, Stein, Davidson, Smith, Kapstein, Dunnell): not re-read this session, so marked 'recalled' in the text
Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.