Wanla Gompa is a historic Buddhist monastery on the ridge that crowns Wanla village in

Ladakh Ladakh () is a region administered by India as a union territory and constitutes an eastern portion of the larger Kashmir region that has been the subject of a Kashmir#Kashmir dispute, dispute between India and Pakistan since 1947 and India an ...

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

. Its small but impressively preserved three-storeyed Avalokitesvara temple is one of the earliest known Drigung Kagyu prayer chambers to have survived in Ladakh. Wanla is a sub-monastery of Lamayuru, which provides a caretaker monk responsible for daily rituals and for granting access to the temple. The main image features Avalokitesvara in 11-headed ("Chuchigzhel") form. It is 13 km southeast of Lamayuru Monastery. Along with a 1980s side building the monastery sits within the sparse remnants of a medieval castle whose construction is mentioned in Ladakhi chronicles as being by the Ladakhi King Lhachen Ngaglug (lHa-chen Ngag-lug), i.e. probably in the 12th century. The monastery was added in the heart of the castle in the 14th century. This timing adds to academic interest in Wanla since, as some writers have described, this was "an otherwise completely obscure period of Ladakh's history between the foundation of the Alchi group of monuments, the latest of which are to be attributed to the early 13th century, and the establishment of the Ladakhi kingdom in the early 15th century". The temple is currently being restored by the Achi Association.Achi Association website
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References

Neuwirth, Holger & Auer, Carmen (Hrsg.) „The Three Storied Temple of Wanla", Buddhist Architecture in the Western Himalayas, Band 2, Verlag der Technischen Universität Graz, 2015, 205 S.,

External links

* http://www.achiassociation.org/Wanla/WanlaIntro.html {{Authority control Buddhist monasteries in Ladakh Tibetan Buddhist monasteries and temples in India Drikung Kagyu monasteries and temples

See also

References

External links