Dear Friends,
This calendar strives to bring to light old maps showing Tibet as an independent country or territory. ICT undertook an informal survey of approximately 500 maps of Asia in the Library of Congress and found Tibet in scores of shapes, sizes and configurations. The vast majority of maps between 1630 and 1800 show Tibet as being part of Grand Tartary, or Independent Tartary. Some showed it as part of the Mongolian Empire. Some showed it as an independent country.
Between 1800 and 1920, most maps showed Tibet as an autonomous territory, protectorate or dependency of the Chinese Empire. Between 1920 and 1950, maps are equally divided showing Tibet as independent or as a territory aligned with the Chinese Republic. We also studied scores of old Chinese-made maps dating back to a famous Chinese map made in 1136, most of which do not show Tibet at all, or after 1800 show it as a territory aligned with, but not part of China. We included a representative Chinese map here, from 1868, which was recently republished in a book in Beijing. This informal survey is in no way scientific, even though we were able to look at nearly the entire collection of Asia maps at the Library of Congress, which probably has one of the largest collections of old maps of Asia in the United States.
This calendar is part of a larger map project which will include making these maps available on our website, www.savetibet.org. If you have or know of old maps of Tibet, China or Asia, or have feedback about this project, please contact us at mapproject@savetibet.org. Thank you for your interest in this calendar and in preserving Tibet's rich cultural and geographic history.
Sincerely,
John Ackerly,
President
Mapping the Tibetan World
A map is a graphical representation of a space, usually displaying the political reality of the time as known to cartographers. The maps in this calendar were chosen for artistic appeal (so we did not include black and white maps), to show boundaries of Tibet, to illustrate different time periods, and to represent cartographers of different countries.
The maps are snapshots of Tibetan history roughly covering the reigns of the fifth through the thirteenth Dalai Lamas. Most of these Dalai Lamas died young, except the fifth and the thirteenth. During the absence of mature Dalai Lamas, the political vacuums were filled with internal fighting and influence from foreign powers; this resulted in fluctuation of territorial control of Tibet by the Tibetan central government. Some of these territorial changes are reflected in the maps.
There does not seem to be any indication of the Tibetan government of the past commissioning the drawing of a map of Tibet, however there are written records referring to, and establishing, borders. The first scientific map of Tibet was commissioned by the Qing Dynasty of China in 1707, in part to establish its claim over Tibetan territory. The imperial cartographic project was started with the help of the French Jesuit, Father Jean-Baptiste Regis, to map China and its claimed territories. Initially the mapping of Tibet was carried out primarily with the help of Manchu officials but their maps were rejected by Father Regis because of inaccurate information and the unreliable cartographic techniques they used. Several years later, Tibetan lamas were trained in scientific cartographic techniques to map Tibet. The lamas' mapping project was started around 1715 and finished in 1717. The Qing mapping project established a new milestone in the cartographic work on Tibet. These maps were the first that clearly demarcated a political boundary of the Chinese Empire, including its claimed territories like Tibet. As the same surveying techniques used in Europe were used to make the new Tibetan maps, the maps could be read in any part of the world. This has played a major role in defining the territorial claims of the Chinese Empire and formalizing the political boundaries of the Chinese Empire to the European powers.
Tsering Wangyal Shawa
Geographic Information Systems Librarian Head,
Digital Map and Geospatial Information Center
Princeton University, New Jersey
