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Sacred Texts: Buddhism

Chapter XVI. The Systems of Reckoning Time

19th Century BuddhologyBuddhist IconographyTibetan Buddhism

Connected to
Chapter VIII. The Sacred Literature Shares 3 topics Chapter XV. Worship of the Deities, and Religious Ceremonies Shares 3 topics Chapter III. The Religious System of Sakyamuni Shares 3 topics Chapter VII. Historical Account of the Introduction of Buddhism into Tibet Shares 3 topics
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This is an excerpt from a mid-nineteenth-century European scholarly account of Tibet — likely from the Schlagintweit brothers' expedition writings, dated around 1863 — covering Tibetan astronomical and calendrical systems in the tradition of orientalist ethnography. It explains that Tibetans derived their calendrical science from both India and China alongside Buddhism, producing two competing systems: the Indian "white mathematics" (Kartsis) and the Chinese "black mathematics" (Naktsis), the latter also encompassing divination. The text catalogs the astrological tables appended to Tibetan almanacs, each serving a distinct purpose — tables for determining fate, marriage timing, post-death rebirth, and planetary influence — giving Tibetan terms and their etymologies throughout. On chronology, it describes three coexisting methods: the 12-year animal cycle for recent events, counting backward from the present year, and a 60-year cycle standardized from the year 1026 AD when the Kala Chakra system was introduced. A distinctive claim concerns a politically imposed calendrical distortion: when China made Tibet a dependency in 1718, Tibetans were forced to shift their cyclic numbering by two years to align with the Chinese cycle, effectively erasing two years from the calendar — a discrepancy the author uses a primary document (a treaty with Chinese authorities at Daba) to illustrate and verify. The work combines firsthand field observation from Sikkim with citations of earlier scholars, making it most useful to readers interested in the intersection of Tibetan religious history, calendrical science, and Sino-Tibetan political relations.

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