The Clear Mirror: A Traditional Account of Tibet's Golden Age : Sakyapa Sonam Gyaltsen's Clear Mirror on Royal Genealogy

Rating:
Summary: Poetical history
Review: The Clear Mirror, a traditional account of Tibet's Golden Age, is a great story. The histories of kings and kingdoms are probably always accounts of human beings at their worst, with self seeking, skull duggery and outright criminality. But the Tibetan view of history looks past this mean spiritedness and sees the soaring of the human spirit, in a broad sweep of poetic understanding which provides us with another dimension which gives great dignity to human beings. This mythic account of the creation of the universe according to the Tibetans, takes us through the introduction of Buddhist to Tibet, and the rise of the kings of Tibet. This is a political book of great significance, indicated by the opening verse from a 9th century Sino-Tibetan Treaty wishing Tibetans happiness in their own country, and the same to Chinese in their own country. It is a good historical sourcebook for the stories of the Chinese and Nepali princesses, and a strong affirmation of the vaidilty Tibet's rule over Tibet.