FORGOTTEN KINGDOM
by
Peter Goullart
with 16 pages of plates
London 1957
READERS UNION • JOHN MURRAY
Peter Goullart was brought up in the Orient and spent most of his life there. This book describes his years in the ancient forgotten Chinese kingdom of Nakhi in Yunnan, by the Tibetan border, where, as a representative of the Chinese Industrial Co-operatives, he really mixed with the people. 'This is a book about paradise by a man who lived there for nine years. It is not easy to write a good book about paradise, but people are Mr Goullart's forte, and when he mixes us up with the Nakhis he delivers us up to his idyll. Likiang itself, fits sunlight and its flowers and its rushing waters, its wine shops and caravans, its glints of danger, its swagger and its happy laughter, is really here' (The Times Literary Supplement).
Wrapper design by Walter B. Cook
For sale to READERS UNION members only
This book is dedicated to
DR JOSEPH F. ROCK
This RU edition was produced in 1957 for sale to its members only by Readers Union Ltd at 38 William IV Street, Charing Cross, London W.C.2, and at Letchworth Garden City, Hertfordshire, Full details of membership may be obtained from our London address. This edition has been reset in 11 point Fournier type, leaded, printed and bound at the Aldine Press, Letchworth Garden City, Hertfordshire. The book was first published by John Murray (Publishers) Ltd.
CONTENTS
I
THE CARAVAN JOURNEY TO LIKIANG
II
LIKIANG
III
THE MARKET AND WINE-SHOPS OF LIKIANG
IV
FURTHER AFIELD
V
THE START OF THE CO-OPERATIVES
VI
MEDICAL WORK
VII
THE NAKHIS
VIII
THE TIBETANS
IX
THE BOA, THE LOLOS AND THE MINKIA
X
THE LAMASERIES
XI
POLTERGEISTS
XII
SUICIDES AND DTOMBA CEREMONIES
XIII
MARRIAGES
XIV
SOME LIKIANG FESTIVALS
XV
MUSIC, ART AND LEISURE AMONG THE NAKHI
XVI
PROGRESS
XVII
HOKING BRIGAND
XVIII
THE LAST OF LIKIANG
My grateful acknowledgment is due to Dr Heinz Breitkreuz for his kind permission in allowing me to reproduce the photographs contained in this book.
ILLUSTRATIONS
The author leaving on a tour of inspection
Hokuoto: a typical mountain Nakhi peasant
Akounya. A Minkia girl
Likiang. Author's house
View of Mount Satseto
Mme Lee at her shop
Caravan from Hsiakwan to Likiang
A Tibetan buying pottery
Likiang street scene
A Tibetan at Likiang Market
A Hsiangchen Tibetan woman shopping
Ahouha—one of the pangchinmei (girls) of Likiang
Likiang market square
Likiang Park
The Yangtze River at the Copper Mining Cooperative
The Yangtze River entering Atsanko gorge
Yuenfoungsze Lamasery. Lama dance
The Yuenfoungsze. Lamasery sacred orchestra
Yuenfoungsze Lamasery
Yuenfoungsze Lamasery. The venerable lama
Shangri Moupo Lamasery. Senior lamas with the lama Manager
Wuhan with his first-born son, old mother, and wife —all formally dressed
Mme Lee's husband and grandson
Old Nakhi villagers, formally attired
The main street of Likiang with some Khamba Tibetans
Leather-tanning and Shoe-making Co-operative
Wool-spinning Co-operative
Path inside Atsanko gorge where the Yangtze River flows
A view of Likiang plain and Shwowo village
INTRODUCTION
I was born in Russia more than fifty years ago. The upheavals, which have swept the world since the beginning of this century, caught me at an early age, and so sudden and violent were the changes that I can never think of my life as one connected and orderly process but only as a series of lives with little to connect them. Yet the years have not dimmed the recollections of my boyhood. My father died when I was two years old, and as the only child I became the centre of my mother's devotion. She was a wonderfully intelligent and sensitive woman, deeply interested in literature, music and the beauty of nature. I always felt that she was somewhat isolated from her many relatives, because none of them could equal her in intelligence, understanding or the breadth of her views. She wrote poetry and painted: she was psychic, and all this drew her and, eventually, myself away from the other members of the family. Among her circle of friends were many of the outstanding scientists and philosophers of her time, and this may have had something to do with the method of my education which others considered peculiar and which was undertaken by a series of private tutors, including a philosopher and a theosophist. I remember clearly the vibrant life of Moscow and the sophisticated quieter refinements of Paris, although I was still quite young at the time.
I developed early an interest in the Orient, particularly in China, Mongolia, Turkistan and Tibet. It must have been in my blood and it undoubtedly came from my mother's side. Her father and grandfather were great and famous merchants during the past century, and their caravans went to Kobdo and Kiahta, and even as far as Hankow, to pick up China teas and silks. They ranged through Mongolia, trading in cattle, and dealt with Tibet in herbs, musk and saffron. All that was over when I appeared in the world and the only relic of the glorious past was my grandmother Pelagie, my mother's mother, who lived to the ripe age of ninety-seven. During the long winter evenings she used to tell me long stories of how her husband and his father made their journeys into Cathay and Mongolia and other fabulous lands where once Prester John and Ghenghiz Khan ruled. I listened starry-eyed; and all round her were old tea-chests painted with beautiful Chinese ladies proffering delicate teacups to bearded mandarins with fans and elaborate headdresses. There was lettering on the chests, like 'Hung Men Aromatic Tea', and there was still a faint fragrance of these brands floating in the heated air of her room. There were strange robes from Mongolia and Tibet in the long coffers against the walls, and Mongolian samovars, used by caravans, stood in the corner. I can still see the Shamanist drums and flutes hanging on the walls. This was all that remained of unrecorded travels: the men themselves were dead long ago.
I am glad that grandmother Pelagic died just before the Revolution — she was already half blind and was unable to walk, but her mind was still brilliant when she talked of her beloved past. Then the Revolution came. The subject is still painful to me, and there is no need to relate it here as it has been described so often. My mother and I were determined to get out of Russia. We rushed by train to Turkistan, only to find terror and bloodshed in Samarkand and Bokhara. The roads from there to Central Asia were blocked. We returned to Moscow to find the situation still worse. We fled to Vladivostok where we stayed for a year. On the way we were caught in the famous Czech uprising and it took us months to get through. The dangers and horrors we passed through best remain unrelated. At last we reached Shanghai.
In 1924 my mother died and I thought I could not survive her passing. In my grief I went to the famed West Lake near Hangchow and there, quite by chance, I met a Taoist monk. Our friendship was spontaneous, for I was already familiar with the Chinese language, and he took me to his monastery situated on a peak a few miles from town. There my friend ministered to me as if I were his dearest brother, and the Grand Abbot received me with wonderful understanding. "With their guidance I found peace, as though by magic, and my heart seemed to heal.