New Evidence on the ‘Renovation Inscription’ at Tabo Monastery

Abstract

The partly obliterated inscription that forms the subject of this paper provides information on both the early history of Tabo monastery (Spiti, Himachal Pradesh) and the socio-religious situation of Western Tibet in the 11th century. The three editions that have been published so far could not make use of a handwritten draft which is to be found among the unpublished works of A.H. Francke (1870–1930). The missionary’s manuscript contains the oldest available documentation of the inscription and provides text for some passages where the three later editions feature a lacuna. The present paper assesses the variant readings in the three published editions and in Francke’s draft, taking into account the additional evidence of a detailed video-documentation of the inscription which the author was able to prepare in 2002.