Tibetans, Mongols, and Manchus: factionalism and shifting power dynamics in early eighteenth-century Tibet (1697–1705)
<p>After the enthronement of the Sixth Dalai Lama in 1697, an internal power struggle ensued within the dGa’ ldan pho brang government. On one side, the First ’Jam dbyangs bzhad pa, a leading figure among the dGe lugs purists in central Tibet, allied with lHa bzang Khan to challenge the legit...
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| Format: | Thesis |
| Language: | Chinese English Tibetan |
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2023
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| Summary: | <p>After the enthronement of the Sixth Dalai Lama in 1697, an internal power struggle ensued within the dGa’ ldan pho brang government. On one side, the First ’Jam dbyangs bzhad pa, a leading figure among the dGe lugs purists in central Tibet, allied with lHa bzang Khan to challenge the legitimacy of sDe srid Sangs rgyas rgya mtsho’s leadership. On the other side, the sDe srid, who was the head of the dGa’ ldan pho brang at that time, invoked the legacy of the Fifth Dalai Lama and the religious status of the Sixth Dalai Lama to reassert his authority and undermine the opposing voices of the dGe lugs purists. In this battle of rhetoric, as documented in primary sources, both factions levied accusations and propagated rumours to challenge the leadership and damage the public reputation of the other side. The conflict ultimately escalated into a physical confrontation, with each party aiming to eliminate the other. This eventually led to the assassination of the sDe srid in 1705 and the political takeover of lHa bzang Khan, which would have long-term consequences for Tibetan history. It is therefore crucial to understand the events of this period based on original sources.</p>
<p>I have analysed a broad range of Tibetan sources, supplemented with official documents from the Manchu court, to provide an in-depth investigation of the period in question. The primary sources across multiple languages give the impression that the power shift in the dGa’ ldan pho brang between 1697 and 1705 was primarily driven by the internal rivalry between two factions in central Tibet. Although they issued diplomatic threats, the Mongols and the Qing court appear to have had no actual control over the internal power struggle within the dGa’ ldan pho brang. It appears that modern scholarship to date has mostly overlooked the internal power dynamics of the dGa’ ldan pho brang from this bi-factional perspective. Consequently, an analysis of the role of the dGe lugs purists is largely missing from current historical accounts of the power struggle within the dGa’ ldan pho brang. To address this lacuna in the existing scholarship, this thesis, drawing on primary sources, closely analyses the internal power competition between two factions within the dGa’ ldan pho brang with the aim to get a better understanding of the internal and international dynamics during this tumuleous period of Tibetan history.</p> |
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