Amdo
Encyclopedia
Amdo is one of the three traditional regions of Tibet
, the other two being Ü-Tsang
and Kham
; it is also the birth place of the 14th Dalai Lama
. Amdo encompasses a large area from the Machu River (Yellow River
) to the Drichu river (Yangtze River
). While culturally and ethnically a Tibetan area, Amdo has been administered by a series of local rulers in recent centuries. The Dalai Lamas have not ruled over Amdo since the mid-18th century In 1928, the region of Amdo became part of the Qinghai
province of the Republic of China.
The identically-named, sparsely-populated Amdo County
in the Tibet Autonomous Region
(TAR) is not part of the Amdo cultural province. It was directly administered by the Dalai Lama
from Lhasa
and is today a part of the Changthang
region administered by Nagqu in the northern part of the TAR.
Amdo was and is the home of many important Tibetan Buddhist
monks (or lama
s), scholars who had a major influence on both politics and religious development of Tibet
like the 14th Dalai Lama
, the 10th Panchen Lama, and the great reformer Je Tsongkhapa
.
Today, ethnic Tibetans predominate in the western and southern parts of Amdo, which are now administered as various Tibetan, Tibetan-Qiang, or Mongol-Tibetan autonomous prefectures. The Han Chinese
are a majority in the eastern part of Qinghai and the provincial capital Xining
. While geographically small compared to the rest of Qinghai, this area has the largest population density, with the result that the Han Chinese outnumber other ethnicities in Qinghai generally. The northern part of Qinghai has a Mongol majority. For details on the demographics of various Tibetan entities in Amdo and Tibet generally, see Tibet - Major ethnic groups in Greater Tibet by region, 2000 census.
The majority of Amdo Tibetans live in the larger part of Qinghai Province, including the Mtsho byang TAP, Mtsho lho TAP, Rma lho TAP, and Mgo log TAP, as well as in the Kan lho TAP of the southwest Gansu province, and sections of the Rnga ba Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous prefecture of north-west Sichuan Province. Additionally, a great many Amdo Tibetans live within the Haidong Prefecture of Qinghai which is located to the east of the Blue Lake and around Xining city, but they constitute only a minority (ca. 8.5%) of the total population there and so the region did not attain TAP status. The vast Haixi (Mstho nub) Mongolian and Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, to the west of the Blue Lake, also has a minority Tibetan population (ca. 10%), and only those Tibetans in the eastern parts of this Prefecture are Amdo inhabitants.
Mongols too have been long-term settlers in Amdo, arriving first during the time of Genghis Khan, but particularly in a series of settlement waves during the Ming period. Over the centuries, most of the Amdo Mongols have become highly Tibetanised and, superficially at least, it is now difficult to discern their original non-Tibetan ethnicity.
authority but actually controlled by leaders who held allegiance to neither.
and China
subject nations of their empire
. A patron-priest relationship began in 1253 when a Tibetan priest, Phagspa, visited Kublai Khan he became so popular that he was made Kublai’s spiritual guide and later appointed by him to the rank of priest king of Tibet and constituted ruler of (1) Tibet Proper, comprising the thirteen states of U-Tsang Province; (2) Kham, and (3) Amdo. Tibet regained its independence from the Mongols before native Chinese overthrew the Yuan Dynasty
in 1368, but the unique priest/patron relationship with the Mongols endured.
Under the Mongol Yuan Empire of Kublai Khan
, Amdo and Kham
were split into two commandaries, which, along with Ü-Tsang, were collectively referred to as the three commandaries of Tibet.
nominally largely maintained the Mongol divisions of Tibet with some sub-division. However, from the middle of the Ming era, the Chinese government lost control in Amdo, and the Mongols again seized political control. Power struggles among various Mongol factions in Tibet and Amdo led to a period alternating between the supremacy of the Dalai Lama (nominally) and Mongol overlords.In 1642 the independent Mongol king, Gushi Khan
, conferred temporal, as well as spiritual, authority on the fifth Dalai Lama, establishing a dominance for the Gelugpa Buddhist sect and the Dalai Lama that persists to this day. The Mongols also conferred parts of Eastern Tibet (Kham) on the Tibetans, while the Mongols continued to rule the Tibetan Amdo provide – raising present day questions as to which areas in Eastern Tibet the Tibetan government consistently ruled.
of the Manchu
Qing Dynasty
, Lobzang Khan
of the Khoshud deposed the regent and sent the 6th Dalai Lama to Beijing
; the 6th Dalai Lama died soon after, probably near Qinghai Lake
(Koko nur) in Amdo. The Dzungar Mongols invaded Tibet during the chaos, and held the entire region until their final defeat by the Qing imperial army in 1720.
When the Manchu Qing dynasty rose to power in the early eighteenth century it established Xining, a town to the north of Amdo, as the administrative base for the area. The rule of their administrator, the Amban, was light, however, and allowed relative autonomy to be retained by the monasteries and other local rulers.
As the Qing Empire expanded in the eighteenth century it would intrude more and more on Tibetan autonomy, frequently invading Eastern Tibet and occasionally Central Tibet.
The Yongzheng Emperor
seized full control of Tibet from 1726-1728. The boundaries of Xining
Prefecture, which contains most of Amdo, with Sichuan
and Tibet-proper was established following this. The boundary of Xining Prefecture and Xizang, or central Tibet, was the Dangla Mountains
. This roughly corresponds with the modern boundary of Qinghai
with the Tibet Autonomous Region
. The boundary of Xining Prefecture with Sichuan
was also set at this time, dividing the Ngaba area
of the former Amdo into Sichuan. This boundary also roughly corresponds with the modern boundary of Qinghai
with Sichuan
. A new boundary, following the Ning-ching mountain range, was established between Sichuan and Tibet. East of these mountains, local chieftains ruled under the nominal authority of the Sichuan provincial government; Lhasa administered the area to the west. The 1720s thus saw Tibet's first major reduction in area in centuries. Other parts of old Amdo was administered by the Administrator of Qinghai. Kokonor Mongols from northern Xinjiang moved into Qinghai in this period.
In all these predominantly culturally Tibetan areas, the Qing Empire used a system of administration relying on local, Tibetan, rulers. A 1977 University of Chicago PhD. thesis, described the political history of the Tibetan region in Gansu (which was historically one part of Amdo) during the Qing dynasty as follows:
The Muslim Warlord Ma Qi
waged war in the name of the Republic of China against the Labrang monastery and Ngoloks. After ethnic rioting between Muslims and Tibetans emerged in 1918, Ma Qi defeated the Tibetans. He heavily taxed the town for 8 years. In 1925, a Tibetan rebellion broke out, with thousands of Tibetans driving out the Muslims. Ma Qi responded with 3,000 Chinese Muslim troops, who retook Labrang and machine gunned thousands of Tibetan monks as they tried to flee. Ma Qi besieged Labrang numerous times, the Tibetans and Mongols fought against his Muslim forces for control of Labrang, until Ma Qi gave it up in 1927. Ma Qi defeated the Tibetan forces with his Muslim troops. His forces were praised by foreigners who traveled through Qinghai for their fighting abilities. However, that was not the last Labrang saw of General Ma. Ma Qi launched a genocidal war against the Tibetan Ngoloks, in 1928, inflicting a defeat upon them and seizing the Labrang Buddhist monastery. The Muslim forces looted and ravaged the monastery again.
In the 1930s, the Muslim warlord
Ma Bufang
seized the northeast corner of Amdo which had been ruled by the Hui Muslims, in the name of Chiang Kai-shek
's weak central government and incorporated it into the Chinese province of Qinghai. Amdo was officially incorporated into the Chinese provincial system, with the major portion of it becoming part of Qinghai province in 1928. Most of the communities of the borderland regions of Kham and Amdo remained under their own local lay and monastic leaders into the 1950s. Tibetan region of Lho-Jang and Gyarong in Kham, and Ngapa (Chinese Aba) and Golok people
in Amdo, were still independent of Chinese hegemony, despite the creation on paper of Qinghai Province in 1927.
In May 1949, Ma Bufang was appointed Military Governor of Northwest China, making him the highest-ranked administrator of the Amdo region. However, by August 1949, the advancing People's Liberation Army
had annihilated Ma's army, though residual forces took several years to defeat. By 1952, the region was fully under the control of People's Republic of China
. By 1949, advance units of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (the PLA) had taken much of Amdo from the Nationalists.
In 1958, Communists assumed control of Tibetan regions in Kham and Amdo. Many of the nomads of Amdo revolted. Some areas were reported virtually empty of men: they either had been killed or imprisoned or had fled. The largest monastery in Amdo was forced to close. Of its three thousand monks, two thousand were arrested.
, Labrang Tashi Khyil south of Lanzhou
, and the Kirti Monasteries of Ngaba
and Taktsang Lhamo in Dzoge County (Ch: Ruanggui /Zoige Xian).
Tibet
Tibet is a plateau region in Asia, north-east of the Himalayas. It is the traditional homeland of the Tibetan people as well as some other ethnic groups such as Monpas, Qiang, and Lhobas, and is now also inhabited by considerable numbers of Han and Hui people...
, the other two being Ü-Tsang
Ü-Tsang
Ü-Tsang , or Tsang-Ü, is one of the three traditional provinces of Tibet, the other two being Amdo and Kham. Geographically Ü-Tsang covered the central and western portions of the Tibetan cultural area, including the Tsang-po watershed, the western districts surrounding and extending past Mount...
and Kham
Kham
Kham , is a historical region covering a land area largely divided between present-day Tibetan Autonomous Region and Sichuan province, with smaller portions located within Qinghai, Gansu and Yunnan provinces of China. During the Republic of China's rule over mainland China , most of the region was...
; it is also the birth place of the 14th Dalai Lama
14th Dalai Lama
The 14th Dalai Lama is the 14th and current Dalai Lama. Dalai Lamas are the most influential figures in the Gelugpa lineage of Tibetan Buddhism, although the 14th has consolidated control over the other lineages in recent years...
. Amdo encompasses a large area from the Machu River (Yellow River
Yellow River
The Yellow River or Huang He, formerly known as the Hwang Ho, is the second-longest river in China and the sixth-longest in the world at the estimated length of . Originating in the Bayan Har Mountains in Qinghai Province in western China, it flows through nine provinces of China and empties into...
) to the Drichu river (Yangtze River
Yangtze River
The Yangtze, Yangzi or Cháng Jiāng is the longest river in Asia, and the third-longest in the world. It flows for from the glaciers on the Tibetan Plateau in Qinghai eastward across southwest, central and eastern China before emptying into the East China Sea at Shanghai. It is also one of the...
). While culturally and ethnically a Tibetan area, Amdo has been administered by a series of local rulers in recent centuries. The Dalai Lamas have not ruled over Amdo since the mid-18th century In 1928, the region of Amdo became part of the Qinghai
Qinghai
Qinghai ; Oirat Mongolian: ; ; Salar:) is a province of the People's Republic of China, named after Qinghai Lake...
province of the Republic of China.
The identically-named, sparsely-populated Amdo County
Amdo County
Amdo County. is a small county within the Nagchu Prefecture of the Tibet Autonomous Region.Its capital is Pagnag, located at 32°15'50" North, 91°40'50" East. Pagnag has a station on the new railway from Golmud to Lhasa. There is a major rail depot 3 km west of the town....
in the Tibet Autonomous Region
Tibet Autonomous Region
The Tibet Autonomous Region , Tibet or Xizang for short, also called the Xizang Autonomous Region is a province-level autonomous region of the People's Republic of China , created in 1965....
(TAR) is not part of the Amdo cultural province. It was directly administered by the Dalai Lama
Dalai Lama
The Dalai Lama is a high lama in the Gelug or "Yellow Hat" branch of Tibetan Buddhism. The name is a combination of the Mongolian word далай meaning "Ocean" and the Tibetan word bla-ma meaning "teacher"...
from Lhasa
Lhasa
Lhasa is the administrative capital of the Tibet Autonomous Region in the People's Republic of China and the second most populous city on the Tibetan Plateau, after Xining. At an altitude of , Lhasa is one of the highest cities in the world...
and is today a part of the Changthang
Changthang
The Changtang is a high altitude plateau in western and northern Tibet extending into southeastern Ladakh, with vast highlands and giant lakes. From Eastern Ladakh Changtang stretches approximately 1600 km east into Tibet, as far as the state of Qinghai. All of it is geographically part of...
region administered by Nagqu in the northern part of the TAR.
Amdo was and is the home of many important Tibetan Buddhist
Tibetan Buddhism
Tibetan Buddhism is the body of Buddhist religious doctrine and institutions characteristic of Tibet and certain regions of the Himalayas, including northern Nepal, Bhutan, and India . It is the state religion of Bhutan...
monks (or lama
Lama
Lama is a title for a Tibetan teacher of the Dharma. The name is similar to the Sanskrit term guru .Historically, the term was used for venerated spiritual masters or heads of monasteries...
s), scholars who had a major influence on both politics and religious development of Tibet
Tibet
Tibet is a plateau region in Asia, north-east of the Himalayas. It is the traditional homeland of the Tibetan people as well as some other ethnic groups such as Monpas, Qiang, and Lhobas, and is now also inhabited by considerable numbers of Han and Hui people...
like the 14th Dalai Lama
14th Dalai Lama
The 14th Dalai Lama is the 14th and current Dalai Lama. Dalai Lamas are the most influential figures in the Gelugpa lineage of Tibetan Buddhism, although the 14th has consolidated control over the other lineages in recent years...
, the 10th Panchen Lama, and the great reformer Je Tsongkhapa
Je Tsongkhapa
Tsongkhapa , whose name means “The Man from Onion Valley”, was a famous teacher of Tibetan Buddhism whose activities led to the formation of the Geluk school...
.
Present demographics
The Tibetan inhabitants of Amdo are referred to as Amdowa as a regional distinction from the Tibetans of Kham (Khampa) and U-Tsang (Central Tibet), however, they are all considered ethnically Tibetan.Today, ethnic Tibetans predominate in the western and southern parts of Amdo, which are now administered as various Tibetan, Tibetan-Qiang, or Mongol-Tibetan autonomous prefectures. The Han Chinese
Han Chinese
Han Chinese are an ethnic group native to China and are the largest single ethnic group in the world.Han Chinese constitute about 92% of the population of the People's Republic of China , 98% of the population of the Republic of China , 78% of the population of Singapore, and about 20% of the...
are a majority in the eastern part of Qinghai and the provincial capital Xining
Xining
Xining is the capital of Qinghai province, People's Republic of China, and the largest city on the Tibetan Plateau. It has 2,208,708 inhabitants at the 2010 census whom 1,198,304 live in the built up area made of 4 urban districts.-History:...
. While geographically small compared to the rest of Qinghai, this area has the largest population density, with the result that the Han Chinese outnumber other ethnicities in Qinghai generally. The northern part of Qinghai has a Mongol majority. For details on the demographics of various Tibetan entities in Amdo and Tibet generally, see Tibet - Major ethnic groups in Greater Tibet by region, 2000 census.
The majority of Amdo Tibetans live in the larger part of Qinghai Province, including the Mtsho byang TAP, Mtsho lho TAP, Rma lho TAP, and Mgo log TAP, as well as in the Kan lho TAP of the southwest Gansu province, and sections of the Rnga ba Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous prefecture of north-west Sichuan Province. Additionally, a great many Amdo Tibetans live within the Haidong Prefecture of Qinghai which is located to the east of the Blue Lake and around Xining city, but they constitute only a minority (ca. 8.5%) of the total population there and so the region did not attain TAP status. The vast Haixi (Mstho nub) Mongolian and Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, to the west of the Blue Lake, also has a minority Tibetan population (ca. 10%), and only those Tibetans in the eastern parts of this Prefecture are Amdo inhabitants.
Mongols too have been long-term settlers in Amdo, arriving first during the time of Genghis Khan, but particularly in a series of settlement waves during the Ming period. Over the centuries, most of the Amdo Mongols have become highly Tibetanised and, superficially at least, it is now difficult to discern their original non-Tibetan ethnicity.
Language
There are many dialects of the Tibetan language spoke in Amdo due to the traditional geographical isolation of many tribal groups, however the written Tibetan language is the same throughout Tibet.9th Century
After the break-up of the central Tibetan kingdom in the ninth century, Amdo and Kham retained close cultural and religious links to central Tibet. Politically, however, they were organized as small kingdoms and tribes nominally under Chinese and Tibetanauthority but actually controlled by leaders who held allegiance to neither.
13th Century
The Mongols conquered eastern Amdo in the early 13th century and made both TibetTibet
Tibet is a plateau region in Asia, north-east of the Himalayas. It is the traditional homeland of the Tibetan people as well as some other ethnic groups such as Monpas, Qiang, and Lhobas, and is now also inhabited by considerable numbers of Han and Hui people...
and China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
subject nations of their empire
Mongol Empire
The Mongol Empire , initially named as Greater Mongol State was a great empire during the 13th and 14th centuries...
. A patron-priest relationship began in 1253 when a Tibetan priest, Phagspa, visited Kublai Khan he became so popular that he was made Kublai’s spiritual guide and later appointed by him to the rank of priest king of Tibet and constituted ruler of (1) Tibet Proper, comprising the thirteen states of U-Tsang Province; (2) Kham, and (3) Amdo. Tibet regained its independence from the Mongols before native Chinese overthrew the Yuan Dynasty
Yuan Dynasty
The Yuan Dynasty , or Great Yuan Empire was a ruling dynasty founded by the Mongol leader Kublai Khan, who ruled most of present-day China, all of modern Mongolia and its surrounding areas, lasting officially from 1271 to 1368. It is considered both as a division of the Mongol Empire and as an...
in 1368, but the unique priest/patron relationship with the Mongols endured.
Under the Mongol Yuan Empire of Kublai Khan
Kublai Khan
Kublai Khan , born Kublai and also known by the temple name Shizu , was the fifth Great Khan of the Mongol Empire from 1260 to 1294 and the founder of the Yuan Dynasty in China...
, Amdo and Kham
Kham
Kham , is a historical region covering a land area largely divided between present-day Tibetan Autonomous Region and Sichuan province, with smaller portions located within Qinghai, Gansu and Yunnan provinces of China. During the Republic of China's rule over mainland China , most of the region was...
were split into two commandaries, which, along with Ü-Tsang, were collectively referred to as the three commandaries of Tibet.
17th Century
The following Ming DynastyMing Dynasty
The Ming Dynasty, also Empire of the Great Ming, was the ruling dynasty of China from 1368 to 1644, following the collapse of the Mongol-led Yuan Dynasty. The Ming, "one of the greatest eras of orderly government and social stability in human history", was the last dynasty in China ruled by ethnic...
nominally largely maintained the Mongol divisions of Tibet with some sub-division. However, from the middle of the Ming era, the Chinese government lost control in Amdo, and the Mongols again seized political control. Power struggles among various Mongol factions in Tibet and Amdo led to a period alternating between the supremacy of the Dalai Lama (nominally) and Mongol overlords.In 1642 the independent Mongol king, Gushi Khan
Güshi Khan
Güshi Khan , a Khoshut prince and leader of the Khoshut Khanate, who had supplanted the Tumed descendants of Altan Khan. His military assistance to the Gelug school enabled the 5th Dalai Lama to establish political control over Tibet...
, conferred temporal, as well as spiritual, authority on the fifth Dalai Lama, establishing a dominance for the Gelugpa Buddhist sect and the Dalai Lama that persists to this day. The Mongols also conferred parts of Eastern Tibet (Kham) on the Tibetans, while the Mongols continued to rule the Tibetan Amdo provide – raising present day questions as to which areas in Eastern Tibet the Tibetan government consistently ruled.
18th century
In 1705, with the approval of the Kangxi EmperorKangxi Emperor
The Kangxi Emperor ; Manchu: elhe taifin hūwangdi ; Mongolian: Энх-Амгалан хаан, 4 May 1654 –20 December 1722) was the fourth emperor of the Qing Dynasty, the first to be born on Chinese soil south of the Pass and the second Qing emperor to rule over China proper, from 1661 to 1722.Kangxi's...
of the Manchu
Manchu
The Manchu people or Man are an ethnic minority of China who originated in Manchuria . During their rise in the 17th century, with the help of the Ming dynasty rebels , they came to power in China and founded the Qing Dynasty, which ruled China until the Xinhai Revolution of 1911, which...
Qing Dynasty
Qing Dynasty
The Qing Dynasty was the last dynasty of China, ruling from 1644 to 1912 with a brief, abortive restoration in 1917. It was preceded by the Ming Dynasty and followed by the Republic of China....
, Lobzang Khan
Lha-bzang Khan
Lha-bzang Khan was chief of the Khoshut tribe of the Oirat Mongols and the son of Dalai Khan and grandson of Güshi Khan and the last Khoshut-Oirat King of Tibet. He became Khan by poisoning his brother Vangjal . Since Güshi's time, the Khoshuts had lost real power in Lhasa to the Regent there...
of the Khoshud deposed the regent and sent the 6th Dalai Lama to Beijing
Beijing
Beijing , also known as Peking , is the capital of the People's Republic of China and one of the most populous cities in the world, with a population of 19,612,368 as of 2010. The city is the country's political, cultural, and educational center, and home to the headquarters for most of China's...
; the 6th Dalai Lama died soon after, probably near Qinghai Lake
Qinghai Lake
Qinghai Lake , is a saline lake situated in the province of Qinghai, and is the largest lake in China. The names Qinghai and Kokonor both mean "Blue/Teal Sea/Lake" in Chinese and Mongolian. It is located about west of the provincial capital of Xining at 3,205 m above sea level in a depression...
(Koko nur) in Amdo. The Dzungar Mongols invaded Tibet during the chaos, and held the entire region until their final defeat by the Qing imperial army in 1720.
When the Manchu Qing dynasty rose to power in the early eighteenth century it established Xining, a town to the north of Amdo, as the administrative base for the area. The rule of their administrator, the Amban, was light, however, and allowed relative autonomy to be retained by the monasteries and other local rulers.
As the Qing Empire expanded in the eighteenth century it would intrude more and more on Tibetan autonomy, frequently invading Eastern Tibet and occasionally Central Tibet.
The Yongzheng Emperor
Yongzheng Emperor
The Yongzheng Emperor , born Yinzhen , was the fifth emperor of the Manchu Qing Dynasty and the third Qing emperor from 1722 to 1735. A hard-working ruler, Yongzheng's main goal was to create an effective government at minimal expense. Like his father, the Kangxi Emperor, Yongzheng used military...
seized full control of Tibet from 1726-1728. The boundaries of Xining
Xining
Xining is the capital of Qinghai province, People's Republic of China, and the largest city on the Tibetan Plateau. It has 2,208,708 inhabitants at the 2010 census whom 1,198,304 live in the built up area made of 4 urban districts.-History:...
Prefecture, which contains most of Amdo, with Sichuan
Sichuan
' , known formerly in the West by its postal map spellings of Szechwan or Szechuan is a province in Southwest China with its capital in Chengdu...
and Tibet-proper was established following this. The boundary of Xining Prefecture and Xizang, or central Tibet, was the Dangla Mountains
Tanggula Mountains
Tanggula Mountains Shanmai) are a mountain range in the central part of the Tibetan Plateau. Administratvely, the western part of the range is in Nagqu Prefecture of the Tibet Autonomous Region; the highest, central part, in the border area of Nagqu Prefecture and Tanggula Town of the Qinghai...
. This roughly corresponds with the modern boundary of Qinghai
Qinghai
Qinghai ; Oirat Mongolian: ; ; Salar:) is a province of the People's Republic of China, named after Qinghai Lake...
with the Tibet Autonomous Region
Tibet Autonomous Region
The Tibet Autonomous Region , Tibet or Xizang for short, also called the Xizang Autonomous Region is a province-level autonomous region of the People's Republic of China , created in 1965....
. The boundary of Xining Prefecture with Sichuan
Sichuan
' , known formerly in the West by its postal map spellings of Szechwan or Szechuan is a province in Southwest China with its capital in Chengdu...
was also set at this time, dividing the Ngaba area
Ngawa Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture
The Ngawa Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture is an autonomous prefecture in Sichuan, whose capital is Barkam town . It has an area of 83,201 km²....
of the former Amdo into Sichuan. This boundary also roughly corresponds with the modern boundary of Qinghai
Qinghai
Qinghai ; Oirat Mongolian: ; ; Salar:) is a province of the People's Republic of China, named after Qinghai Lake...
with Sichuan
Sichuan
' , known formerly in the West by its postal map spellings of Szechwan or Szechuan is a province in Southwest China with its capital in Chengdu...
. A new boundary, following the Ning-ching mountain range, was established between Sichuan and Tibet. East of these mountains, local chieftains ruled under the nominal authority of the Sichuan provincial government; Lhasa administered the area to the west. The 1720s thus saw Tibet's first major reduction in area in centuries. Other parts of old Amdo was administered by the Administrator of Qinghai. Kokonor Mongols from northern Xinjiang moved into Qinghai in this period.
In all these predominantly culturally Tibetan areas, the Qing Empire used a system of administration relying on local, Tibetan, rulers. A 1977 University of Chicago PhD. thesis, described the political history of the Tibetan region in Gansu (which was historically one part of Amdo) during the Qing dynasty as follows:
In the time of the Manchu dynasty, the entire region was administered by a viceroy of the Imperial Government. That portion of the country occupied by Chinese Moslems and some other, smaller, racial units was under traditional Chinese law. The Tibetans enjoyed almost complete independence and varying degrees of prestige. The Chone Prince ruled over the forty-eight "banners" of one group of Tibetans; other Tibetan rulers or chiefs held grants or commissions- some of them hundreds of years old- from the Imperial Government. At that time the ethnic frontier corresponded almost exactly with the administrative frontier.
Twentieth century
Following the collapse of the Qing dynasty in 1912, Tibetan areas enjoyed a period of de-facto independence. Central Tibet was the domain of the Dalai Lama’s government, while areas of Eastern Tibet (Kham) and Northeastern Tibet (Amdo) were governed by regional kings, chiefs, and warlords. The Hui Muslims administered the agricultural areas in the north and east of the region. A number of powerful local rulers emerged in Amdo. Monasteries such as Labrang, Repkong and Taktsang Lhamo appointed headmen, gowa (go ba), to the tribes within their areas, these tribes being groups consisting of several thousand nomads. In other areas, such as Sokwo, Ngawa and Choni, secular leaders achieved the status of kings, similarly presiding over a group of tribes while certain tribes had their own hereditary gowa. The latter included the tribes beyond Labrang's influence in Machu.The Muslim Warlord Ma Qi
Ma Qi
Ma Qi was a Chinese Muslim warlord in early 20th century China.-Early life:His grandfather Sa-la Ma , is a Salar. He was born in 1869 in Daohe, now part of Linxia, Gansu, China. His father was Ma Haiyan...
waged war in the name of the Republic of China against the Labrang monastery and Ngoloks. After ethnic rioting between Muslims and Tibetans emerged in 1918, Ma Qi defeated the Tibetans. He heavily taxed the town for 8 years. In 1925, a Tibetan rebellion broke out, with thousands of Tibetans driving out the Muslims. Ma Qi responded with 3,000 Chinese Muslim troops, who retook Labrang and machine gunned thousands of Tibetan monks as they tried to flee. Ma Qi besieged Labrang numerous times, the Tibetans and Mongols fought against his Muslim forces for control of Labrang, until Ma Qi gave it up in 1927. Ma Qi defeated the Tibetan forces with his Muslim troops. His forces were praised by foreigners who traveled through Qinghai for their fighting abilities. However, that was not the last Labrang saw of General Ma. Ma Qi launched a genocidal war against the Tibetan Ngoloks, in 1928, inflicting a defeat upon them and seizing the Labrang Buddhist monastery. The Muslim forces looted and ravaged the monastery again.
In the 1930s, the Muslim warlord
Ma clique
The Ma clique or Ma family warlords is a collective name for a group of Muslim warlords in Northwestern China who ruled the Chinese provinces of Qinghai, Gansu and Ningxia from the 1910s until 1949. There were 3 families in the Ma clique , each of them respectively controlled 3 areas, Gansu,...
Ma Bufang
Ma Bufang
Ma Bufang was a prominent Muslim Ma clique warlord in China during the Republic of China era, ruling the northwestern province of Qinghai. His rank was Lieutenant-general...
seized the northeast corner of Amdo which had been ruled by the Hui Muslims, in the name of Chiang Kai-shek
Chiang Kai-shek
Chiang Kai-shek was a political and military leader of 20th century China. He is known as Jiǎng Jièshí or Jiǎng Zhōngzhèng in Mandarin....
's weak central government and incorporated it into the Chinese province of Qinghai. Amdo was officially incorporated into the Chinese provincial system, with the major portion of it becoming part of Qinghai province in 1928. Most of the communities of the borderland regions of Kham and Amdo remained under their own local lay and monastic leaders into the 1950s. Tibetan region of Lho-Jang and Gyarong in Kham, and Ngapa (Chinese Aba) and Golok people
Golok people
The Golok or Ngolok peoples are groups from Amdo in eastern Tibet, where their territory is referred in Tibetan as sMar-kog. They are located around the upper reaches of the Yellow River and the sacred mountain Amnye Machen . They are not an homogeneous group but are composed of peoples of very...
in Amdo, were still independent of Chinese hegemony, despite the creation on paper of Qinghai Province in 1927.
In May 1949, Ma Bufang was appointed Military Governor of Northwest China, making him the highest-ranked administrator of the Amdo region. However, by August 1949, the advancing People's Liberation Army
People's Liberation Army
The People's Liberation Army is the unified military organization of all land, sea, strategic missile and air forces of the People's Republic of China. The PLA was established on August 1, 1927 — celebrated annually as "PLA Day" — as the military arm of the Communist Party of China...
had annihilated Ma's army, though residual forces took several years to defeat. By 1952, the region was fully under the control of People's Republic of China
People's Republic of China
China , officially the People's Republic of China , is the most populous country in the world, with over 1.3 billion citizens. Located in East Asia, the country covers approximately 9.6 million square kilometres...
. By 1949, advance units of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (the PLA) had taken much of Amdo from the Nationalists.
In 1958, Communists assumed control of Tibetan regions in Kham and Amdo. Many of the nomads of Amdo revolted. Some areas were reported virtually empty of men: they either had been killed or imprisoned or had fled. The largest monastery in Amdo was forced to close. Of its three thousand monks, two thousand were arrested.
Monasteries
Amdo was traditionally a place of great learning and scholarship and contains many great monasteries including Kumbum Jampa Ling (Chin. Ta'er Si) near XiningXining
Xining is the capital of Qinghai province, People's Republic of China, and the largest city on the Tibetan Plateau. It has 2,208,708 inhabitants at the 2010 census whom 1,198,304 live in the built up area made of 4 urban districts.-History:...
, Labrang Tashi Khyil south of Lanzhou
Lanzhou
Lanzhou is the capital and largest city of Gansu Province in Northwest China. A prefecture-level city, it is a key regional transportation hub, allowing areas further west to maintain railroad connections to the eastern half of the country....
, and the Kirti Monasteries of Ngaba
Ngawa Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture
The Ngawa Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture is an autonomous prefecture in Sichuan, whose capital is Barkam town . It has an area of 83,201 km²....
and Taktsang Lhamo in Dzoge County (Ch: Ruanggui /Zoige Xian).