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Sakya Paṇḍita

Sakya Paṇḍita

1182 CE–1251 CE · Liangzhou (Wuwei)

1182–1251 CE

Sakya Paṇḍita Kunga Gyaltsen (1182–1251 CE) was one of the most learned figures of Tibetan Buddhism, a master of the Sakya school renowned for his command of Indian logic and epistemology and his treatise on valid cognition. Late in life he traveled to Liangzhou (Wuwei, in the Gansu corridor) at the summons of the Mongol prince Köden (Godan); their meeting (c. 1247) began the patron–priest relationship between Tibetan Buddhist hierarchs and Mongol rulers that would shape Tibetan history. He died at Liangzhou in 1251. He is well documented.

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Did you know?

  • Born into Genghis Khan's world

    Sakya Paṇḍita (1182–1251), one of Tibet's foremost Buddhist scholars, was born while Genghis Khan (c. 1162–1227) was still a young man gathering his following. In 1247 Sakya Paṇḍita met Genghis's grandson, Prince Godan, at Liangzhou and negotiated the terms under which Tibet came under Mongol authority.

    How we know

    Sakya Paṇḍita 1182–1251; Genghis Khan c. 1162–1227 (birth year debated, hence "c."); Prince Godan/Köden = son of Ögedei, grandson of Genghis; Liangzhou (Wuwei) meeting 1247.

Life journeyclick any stop, or use ←/→Trace on the map →

Stop 1 of 11244–1251Died

Liangzhou (Wuwei)

What they did here

DOCUMENTED: summoned by the Mongol prince Köden, he reached Liangzhou c. 1246–47; the meeting initiated the Tibet–Mongol patron–priest relationship. He died there in 1251.

About Liangzhou (Wuwei)

Liangzhou, the area of modern Wuwei in Gansu province, China, was a strategic oasis garrison town on the Hexi Corridor of the Silk Road and an early conduit for Buddhism entering China. The translator Kumārajīva was held there for some seventeen years after his capture from Kucha before being taken on to Chang'an in 401; pilgrims such as Xuanzang also passed through the city on the route west.

See other sages who lived in Liangzhou (Wuwei)→

The world in their lifetime

Thinkers, teachers, and rulers whose lives overlapped with Sakya Paṇḍita’s — a glimpse of the wider world they lived in. Drawn purely from recorded birth and death years.

Works

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