The British Library's Wise Drawings

Here is a link to a blog on the British Library website by Diana Lange, who contributed to the 2013 IALS conference in Heidelberg:

http://blogs.bl.uk/asian-and-african/2016/07/the-wise-collection-acquiring-knowledge-on-tibet-in-the-late-1850s.html

As you can read on the blog, Diana has been working on the  'Wise Drawings', a set of 'picture maps' commissioned by a British official in the mid-19th century.  Diana has discovered the name of the official: a Major William Edward Hay, who was Assistant Commissioner in Kulu. However, we do not yet now the name of the monk who actually drew the images.

If you scroll down to the bottom of the Diana's article, you will see that you can now examine the drawings online. The image shown here (complete with British Library 'water mark') shows the Leh palace and bazaar. There is another showing parts of Zangskar, and still others showing the route between Ladakh and Lhasa.

John Bray