ABSTRACT
Sacred natural sites are areas of land or water having special spiritual significance to peoples and communities (Jeanrenaud and Oviedo, 2007), which can encompass ‘complete territories, extensive landscapes and can also be as small as a single rock or tree’ (Verschuuren et al., 2010: pp. 1-2). For hundreds of millions of followers of Hinduism, Jainism, Sikhism, Tibetan Buddhism and Bon, Mt Kailash (6,714 msl.) and its adjacent Lake Manasarovar, both located in the Pulan County of the Tibetan Autonomous Region (TAR), China, are among the holiest of pilgrimage sites in the Himalayas (see Figure 12.1 and 12.2). Various Buddhist, Hindu and Jain traditions of cosmological interpretation have identified Mt Kailash as the axis mundi, around which the world is organized (Snelling, 1990). The mountain also serves as the earthly abode of supreme gods such as Shiva and Demchog, the site of meditation of revered sages such as Milarepa and Mahavira, and as the link between heaven, earth and hell for the Hindus, Jains, Tibetan Buddhists and Bonpos. Lake Manasarovar (4,590 msl.), a freshwater body adjacent to Mt Kailash, is considered extremely sacred by the Buddhists due to its association with the birth legend of Lord Buddha, and by the Hindus as a direct creation of Brahma’s mind as a place of meditation (Pravananda, 1949; Snelling, 1990).
