by Jambian Gyamco & Zhou Aimin

    The intention of our compilation of this illustrated album of the epic lies in the follwing considerations：It is a long-stand-ing culture and tradition shared by different countries around the world to adapt classic works in light，popular forms. Not only foreign masterpieces，such as the Bible and Buddhist Scriptures，but also China’s four famous classical novels，including Three Kingdoms，Outlaws of the Marsh，Journey to the West，and A Dream of Red Mansions，have all been popularized in light ways. Even The Communist Manifesto，a great work dubbed by Lenin as the “Bible of the working class，”has also been introduced to the mass working class and laborers through an illustrated format. Therefore，we believed that the epic，Gesar，should also be popularized in a direct manner.Furthermore，except for Tibetan prints，there was no complete Mandarin version of the epic，not to mention foreign-language versions，so the the introduction of the dpic in different models became necessary and urgent.Based on these facts，we decided to compile this illustrated album of Gesar.

Contents

Preface
Illustrated manual of gesar
gods and figures described in the epic gesar
illustrated manual of the epic gesar
The birth of the hero
Ascending the throne by winning the horse racc
The war between mor and ling
The war between hor and ling the invasion by hor
The war between hor and ling the conquest of hor
The war between jiang and ling
The war between moin and ling
The conquest of dashi and the obtaining of its treasures
The conquest of axha and the obtaining of its agates
The conquest of qeri and the obtaining of its corals
The conquest of kachi and the obtaining of its jade
The conquest of zhari and the obtaining of its medicines
The war between thogru and ling
Triumph over hell
The Art of thangka
Dethang-buddhist thangka
Manthang-thangka on medicine
Zithang-calendar thangka
Zongthang-thangka of the epic gesar
The production of zongthang
New developments of zongthang
Paintings of gesar by ballad singers
IIIustrations project for the selected edition of gesar in tibetan
The gesar thangka project of the tibet academy of social sciences
Reference
Postscript