5 From Chongzhen lishu 崇楨曆書 to Tengri-yin udq-a and Rgya rtsis chen mo

Abstract

Beginning with the visits to the Tibetan area by the Portugese Jesuit priests A. de Andrade (1580–1634) and M. Marques (d. 1640s) in the 1620s, regions dominated by Tibetan religion and culture were visited by a number of Catholic priests belonging to several different orders, men of the cloth who were ostensibly in search of souls that, in their view, needed to be saved. One undoubted high point among these contacts is the well-documented stay in Central Tibet of the Italian Jesuit priest I. Desideri (1684–1733) during the years 1715–1721. In his recent splendid book, T. Pomplun