ILLUSTRATIONS DEPICTING THE ENVIRONMENT AROUND THE MYTHICAL CITY… OF TIBETAN MEDICINE

Abstract

The first chapter of the most famous treatise in Tibetan medicine called Four Treatises (Rgyud bzhi) characterises the environmental preconditions in order to practice medicine in a perfect way. One of these aspects is the description of the mythical city called Lta na sdug where a precious palace of the Buddha of medicine is situated. The origin of the text passage and, hence, the geographical location of this mythical city is discussed controversially in the current literature. This paper, however, argues that it is possible that the suggested principles are applicable at any suitable place of Tibetan medical practice if they were adapted to the local environment as long as most of the described parameters are adhered to symbolically. Different types of visual expressions depicting features of the city as described in this introductory chapter will be compared. First, plate number one of the famous seventeenth century thangka collection to the Blue Beryl commentary stored in Ulan-Ude presents a rather orthodox interpretation of these circumstances. Second, not a painting but a three-dimensional example of monastic cityplanning: the medical murals in the inner courtyard of the Medical Faculty and the architectural arrangement of the Faculty within the whole cloister indicate that the local authorities may have regarded Labrang territory as a material form of Lta na sdug. Third, yet another pair of murals in a small monastery painted by the same artist as the murals at Labrang monastery present an alternative, vivid way of depiction.