The offspring of Tubo Dynasty, King Zangma went there and he had two princes. One was Trimi Lewangqum and the other was Tongliejin.

Tongliejin had a prince called Gongkar Gyalpo. Gongkar Gyalpo earnestly studied laws of Tubo Dynasty and documents related to Zanpu.

He was determined to build a strong country and he put it into action. He was a king of aspiration. He had four wives, namely a queen and three princesses, while the four wives could not get along well with each other. The queen was quite dominant.

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Beizhenji. She was the queen and gave birth to prince of the first born. She was quite eloquent and good at playing politics. Thus, the queen leaded the king around by the nose.

Princesses were badly tormented. They lived a worse life than servant girls and suffered too much. They were beaten for no reasons. They were recorded in the Tibetan opera Drowa Sangmo.

Each princess was pregnant. Since the queen already had a prince. Therefore, no one reported their pregnancy to the queen. An official asked the princesses to keep the pregnancy to themselves.

They could not speak it out, especially keeping it from the queen. If the queen knew it, they could not healthily deliver children. Thereby, they kept their pregnancy as a secret. Finally, each princess gave birth to a prince.

Yede Samdezan was named after his birthplace. Another was called Yede Samdezan.

Tongde Dredezan was also named after his birthplace. Bumar Khabu Dezan was called so because of growing up under planks.

There was such a story.

During the rule of the king, he followed customs of India and adopted the way putting family names in front of names. This method did not keep long. It was replaced by Tibetan own method.

Many kings had five princes. Each of the three princesses had a prince, and the queen had two. The king had 5 princes and they all grew up. The state became quite powerful with a strong troop and vast territory. It was quite mighty.

After the country became powerful, King Gongkar Gyalpo was arrogant and irrational.

He bullied the masses, oppressed the innocent and exploited the people. He levied a great many of taxes on people from every walk of life.

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The common people were suffering from his oppression. Gradually, people were angry with him and they staged an uprising. The king and princes were expelled from the royal palace. They had to go to the capital, Misenpa, in Kholung Doimai.

Misenpa was where the palace of Gongkar Gyalpo sit. The eldest son, Nam Guide lived in the king’s palace. The second son was Gongkar Gyalpo. They had to go to the eldest brother’s palace for shelter, because they were expelled. They were expelled by the insurgents. Therefore, they had no choice. But long stay in the palace could lead to discord and contradiction.

It was not happy to live in the palace for long. Gongkar Gyalpo started to introspect. Everyone was thinking and discussing a way out. Theft was rampant. Robberies and bullies were everywhere. Without a venerable leader, the state was torn apart and wars were unceasing. No one could redress the scales.

When people knew he was the offspring of Zanpu, they greeted him and asked him to be the king. Therefore, the princes acted as kings in many regions. They and their descendants built these states into prosperous ones with mighty power. They punched a hole on the big rock to tie down the tiger to guard the house. They hung iron chains on the bluff to connect the bluff to chasm.

There was such a story.

There was a king called Yede Suna. During his reign, the poverty gap among the masses was huge. Some people were quite rich while some were quite impoverished.

Some people owned a lot of land and woods while some owned little. Thereon, the king made some measures to equalize the wealth. Thereby, people called him the savior.

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In another place, theft was rampant. Thieves and brigands endangered people’s property and safety. Yede Yungpen, the king of that state, wiped out all thieves and brigands.

He protected safety of the masses so he was called the guardian, guardian Yungpeng.There were many famous kings there.

They surrendered Reza, king of India. Reza was in Indian language. He defeated Indian king and took reign of India.

There were many stories of this kind. Scholars Mere Lama and Lodro Gyatso have done research on these stories and adapted them into Tibetan opera scripts, for example, Drowa Sangmo.

The stories and Tibetan operas all derived from history of Gongkar Gyalpo in Monyul.

>> Watch the video of Tibetan Operas of Monyul on Kangba Lecture, please click here!