Derge

Derge (Tibetan: སྡེ་དགེ་, Wylie: sde dge), officially Gengqing Town (Tibetan: དགོན་ཆེན་ཀྲེན།, Wylie: dgon chen kren; Chinese: 更庆镇; pinyin: Gēngqìng Zhèn), is a town in Dêgê County in Garzê Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in Sichuan, China. It was once the center of the Kingdom of Derge in Kham.

History

Historically, Derge, which means "land of mercy", was an important centre of Tibetan culture, along with places such as

The town of Derge is famous for its three-storey printing house, or parkhang, built in 1729, where the Kangyur, a collection of Buddhist scriptures, and the Tengyur, a collection of commentaries, are still printed from wooden blocks.^[3] It was established during the reign of Derge king Tenpa Tsering.^[2] Derge has produced artists such as the Situ Panchen, the 8th Tai Situpa who was a renowned Buddhist master who helped revive Tibetan culture and language, and aided King Tenpa Tsering in setting up the Derge Parkhang or Derge printing house. The printing house, which is administered by the Religious Affairs Bureau, continues to use its ancient techniques, and utilizes no machines in the printing process.

It has been estimated that the 217,000 blocks stored at Derge comprise 70% of the Tibetan literary heritage. The Derge editions are considered especially high quality, with few typographical errors.^[4]

Derge County contains several historic Tibetan monasteries, notably