Kham Regional Systems Dataset: 1,562 Tibetan Religious Sites Prior to Mid-20th Century

Prior to the mid-twentieth century, this dataset contains a geospatial database of 1,562 Buddhist monasteries, temples, hermitages, shrines, and Bonpo religious establishments. It includes point locations, reconstructed regional systems, transportation corridors, and GIS data, compiled by Karl Ryavec for the Tibetan Monastic Ritual Economy Model Database.

Use Cases

• Map historical religious networks based on monastery point locations.
• Analyze regional systems and transportation corridors in eastern Tibet.
• Study the spatial organization of religious establishments prior to the mid-20th century.

Strengths

• Contains 1,562 distinct religious site locations.
• Includes reconstructed regional systems and transportation corridors as GIS data.
• Accompanied by a historical atlas documenting spatial organization.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Description metadata is limited; actual data quality requires manual inspection after download.

Provenance

Source

Tibetan Monastic Ritual Economy Model Database

Time Range

Prior to the mid-twentieth century

Freshness

Last updated 2026-06-01 16:42:52; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Kham and adjacent Tibetan regions