On the Sacredness of Mount Kailasa in the Indian and Tibetan Sources 1

Beyond the ‘Site of Eternal Snow’ (himalaya) and beyond the Chang Tang (byang thang) plain, emerges a luminous crystal dome, the holy mountain Kailasa. All the mountains around it seem to bow to its gleaming peak, although at a height of “only” 6,714 metres it is not the highest of them. Four of the greatest Asian rivers have their source within a range of hundred kilometers: the Indus in the north, the Brahmaputra in the east, the Karnali in the south and the Sutlej in the west.