Princess Wencheng

Wen Cheng and Wencheng (Tibetan: mun chang kung co, Tibetan: མུན་ཆང་ཀུང་ཅོ ) was a princess of the Chinese Tang Dynasty, in the course of the marriage policy in the year 641 AD to the royal court of Songtsen Gampo to Lhasa (Tibet) was married. Such marriages were then common, there are historical documents in which rulers of the steppe and highland peoples demand princesses as a tribute and legitimacy around China.

The marriage was equal to several objectives: Firstly, Wen Cheng was an ambassador of the Court of Chang'an (now Xi'an ) in Lhasa. At the same time, this alliance should hold the then militarily strong Tibetans of raids on the Chinese lowlands.

To enable Wen Cheng to an appropriate court life " beyond civilization " her an entire court was given by the emperor, musicians, maids of honor, but also books and Buddhist monks. She brought to Tibet with a large statue of Buddha Shakyamuni, which has since been revered in Tibet as Jowo Shakyamuni and first in the Jokhang Temple found its place in the Ramoche Temple in Lhasa and later.

Up to this time, Buddhism had spread south and east of Tibet in large parts. According to traditional ideas he came with Wen Cheng - 1000 years after the historical Buddha - in the remote high landscapes of Tibet. A first contact with Buddhism had been a legendary according to tradition, in the time of king Lha Thothori Nyantsen (5th century), had remained without consequences. In conjunction with indigenous shamanistic rites of the Tibetans, some centuries later formed the beginning of the first phase of translation of Buddhist scriptures from India to Tibet Vajrayana Buddhism, a form of Mahayana Buddhism out.

Even today, Wen Cheng has political relevance. To see some - especially Chinese - historians in their marriage with Songtsen Gampo a proof for the former dependency of Tibet from China. The problem is that most of the sources for this are of Chinese origin and therefore represent only the perspective of the Empire. From the Tibetan point of view Wen Cheng was one of several women of the king and only the expression of good foreign relations.

From the Tibetans it as the White Tara (Tib.: Dölkar, Dolma Karpo ) is venerated as a bodhisattva.