Tibetan People: The Tibetans’ racial origins are little known and remain a matter of scientific speculations. The written history of Tibet started 1400 years ago.
Archaeological findings of prehistorical remnants are rare on this plateau because of its political sensitivity and harsh environment. However, some evidence from geoscience expeditions shows that humans were living here in Paleolithic times. Stone tools have been found in central north and western Tibet without dating information.
Only on a Paleolithic site on the northern plateau has been dated to 4000 years. A Neolithic remnant was discovered in 1977 on the wet and warm eastern slope of the plateau.
The remnant has an elevation of 3,100 m and dated as 4690 ± 150 years. BP believed that the Tibetans migrated to the plateau in the late Neolithic age.
Ethnologists, whose opinions vary and disagree, have distinguished two main racial types, one tall with long limbs and heads and round heads. The former type found mainly among the northern and eastern nomads of Kham and Amdo. They mainly look like the modern Turkic and Mongolian peoples, which is considered to be descended from a tall dolichocephalous race of great antiquity.
The latter, inhabiting mostly the central and Bhutan, is regarded as a descendant of the Paroean group’s Proto-Chinese. The process of intermingling with the neighbouring peoples and minority nationalities.
Buddhist Version of Origin of Tibetan People
According to Tibetan Buddhists, the world goes through an endless cycle of creation and decay, and a new Buddha appears in each world age to teach Buddhist principles.
Legend says that one of these Buddhas, Amitabha, ordered a bodhisattva named Avalokitesvara to bring Buddhism to Tibet. At the time, only animals and ogres lived here.
Avalokitesvara thus produced a monkey and sent it to meditate in Tibet. A female ogre approached the monkey in the form of a beautiful woman who offered to be his wife.
The couple had children, but they were covered with hair and had tails. Avalokitesvara sent the children to a forest to mate with other monkeys. He returned a year later and discovered many offspring.
When Avalokitesvara gave these creatures food, they turned into human beings sprang the Tibetan people, and he was then able to convert them to Buddhism.
Tibetan farmer and Nomads
In general speaking, Tibet main livelihood patterns can be divided into farming areas and pastoral areas. Therefore, for centuries, subsistence agriculture and animal husbandry have been the main livelihood in Tibet. They provide food, clothing, raw materials for handicraft, and goods for trade.
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