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Secrets oƒf TibetBy Jason Williams

Chaosium Inc. is

Charlie Krank, Dustin Wright, Mike Mason, Meghan McLean,

Nicholas Nacario, Bill Lamb, Ken Kaufer,

and a few curious othersSample

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Author

Jason Williams

Interior Illustrations

Caleb Cleveland

Lee Simpson

Maps

Dean Engelhardt

Cover Painting

Caleb Cleveland

Editing, Copy Reading

Roderick Robertson

Development

Mike Mason

Layout, Art Direction, Production

Nicholas Nacario

This adventure pack is best used with the roleplaying game CALL OF CTHULHU,

available separately. Find more Chaosium Inc. products at

www.chaosium.com

Howard Phillips Lovecraft

1890 - 1937

Secrets of Tibetis copyright © 2013 by Chaosium Inc. All rights reserved.

The names of public personalities may be referred to, but any resemblance of a scenario character to persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

Except in this publication and associated advertising, all illustrations for SECRETS OF TIBET remain the property of the artists, who otherwise reserve all rights.

The 1912 map of Tibet on page 86 is From the American Geographical Society Library, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Libraries

This adventure pack is best used with the roleplaying game CALL OF CTHULHU, available separately. Find more Chaosium Inc. products at www.chaosium.com

Item #23129

ISBN10: 1568823967

ISBN13: 9781568823966

Printed in USA

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CONTENTSIntroduction 4Tibetan History and Culture 6Tibetan Religion 26Tibetan Gods and Monsters 54Notable Persons 65Travelling to Tibet 84Lhasa 93Dreaming of the River of Night 120Company Town 131O' Sleeper! Arise! 139Using this Book with Earlier Editions 147Glossary 152 Bibliography 157Index 159

This book has been written for use with Call of Cthulhu 7th edition and is compatiable with previous editions. Guidance on use with earlier editions of Call of Cthulhu can be found on pages 147 to 151.Sam

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4 Introduction - Secrets of Tibet

Introduction

Tibet is the common term used in the west-ern world to refer to the plateau situated north of the Himalayan mountain range in Asia. The people of that country refer to it as Bod and the people of the land as Bod-pa. Since Tibet is the more commonly used name for that area it will be used in this book instead of the more prop-er Bod. The word Tibet may have been derived from Töbäd, which is Turkish for “the heights.” The Sanskrit word referring to Tibet is Trivista-pa (Heaven) and the Chinese word is Xizàng (From U-Tsang).

The story of Tibet is as much about the land-scape as it is about its people. The southern border of the Himalayas is home to the high-est mountain peaks on earth. Throughout the country there are areas which are nearly im-possible to reach without modern technolo-gy. To many Tibetans, merchant travelers and pilgrims, the land is also populated with ma-levolent gods and monsters lurking beneath every rock.

Religion, government and mythology in Ti-bet are inextricably connected and one factor cannot be examined without looking at the other. The lack of a native written language until the seventh century AD, means that the The Potala Palace of Lhasa

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Secrets of Tibet - Introduction 5

earliest history of the country has been hand-ed down through oral traditions and iconic images. Even until recent times there has been very little done in Tibet to explore the archae-ological record, but the little that has been done reveals early bronze-age settlements in the northern regions.

The Indian-Australian tectonic plate collided with the Eurasian plate an estimated 35 to 55 million years ago. The Himalayas were formed by this collision. The area was originally on the bottom of the ocean approximately two thousand miles away towards the Antarctic. Many of the highest peaks are comprised of limestone containing ancient sea life fossils some of which have been found towards the top of Chomolungma (Mt. Everest). There are secrets that lie sleeping in ancient tombs and vaults amongst the mountains and deep val-leys of Tibet.

Within these pages the keeper will find de-tailed information about everyday life in this mysterious and unique country along with the outré and horrific underlying truths.

Tibetan demons are remnants of the races that came to Earth from the stars millions of years ago. They dwell in hidden places, are served by their loyal minions and protected by ancient dark cults that span the globe. These masters slumber on until the time when the stars will be right and their awakening shall herald the end of the world as we know it. Over the millennia some have awakened briefly, sometimes for years or even centuries, to ob-serve what has been happening in the universe.

English spelling of Tibetan words and names tend to vary widely in the historical documents that I have used for research. I have made an attempt to use the most common English spellings, but the reader should be aware that there may be variant spellings for some of the terms and place names presented within this text. One of the problems that early explorers had travelling through Tibet was a tendency by the natives to have up to three different names for one location. There have also been several different methods in use for the Angli-cization of Tibetan words, the most common method in use called the Wylie transliteration named after an American professor of Asian Languages and Literature from the University of Washington, named Turrell V. Wylie. Wy-lie learned Tibetan by inviting Sakya Dagchen Rinpoche and his family to live in Seattle in 1960 after they had fled from the Chinese oc-cupation of Tibet.

One further caveat is that I am not a Tibet-an speaker (other than a few basic words and phrases) and have used available interpreta-tions for some information which may not be 100% accurate, but that should just add to the uncertainty and mystery of the country.

This is not an examination of the more re-cent history of the country of Tibet and does not take sides on whether or not the country of China should have any political control or involvement in that land. Since the story of the current Dalai Lama and Tibetan Diaspo-ra is very well known and easily obtained, it will not be covered in-depth within this book.

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