Muli Tibetan Autonomous County is in the Liangshan (Cool Mountains) prefecture of Sichuan province in China. It is a remote, mountainous and forested region with few roads. The highest peaks are nearly 6000 metres in height, including the trio of sacred mountains: Shenrezig, Jambeyang and Chanadorje in Yading Natural Park. Liangshan is a county-level city in Shandong province, China. ... Sichuan (Chinese: 四川; pinyin: ; Wade-Giles: Ssu-ch`uan; non-standard transliteration: Szechwan) is a province in central-western China with its capital at Chengdu. ... Statue of Manjusri (Monju) at Senkoji in Onomichi, Japan Mañjuśrī (文殊 Ch. ... Yading - a national level reserve in the southwest of Sichuan Province, China. ...

Muli county has an area of 13,426 square kilometres and a population of more than 125,000. The inhabitants of Muli include many of China's minorities, predominantly Tibetan and Yi as well as Pumi and Naxi people. There are also some ethnic Mongol people who settled here after the pacification expeditions of Kublai Khan in the 16th century. Tibetan can refer to: A place or item from Tibet. ... The Yi people (Chinese: 彝族 Yìzú, own name: Nosu) are a modern ethnic group in China. ... The Pumi people (Chinese: 普米族 Pǔmǐzú, own name: /phʐẽmi/) are an ethnic group. ... Categories: Ethnic groups of China ... Honorary guard of Mongolia. ... Kublai Khan or Khubilai Khan (1215 – 1294), Mongol military leader, was Khan (1260-1294) of the Mongol Empire and founder and first Emperor (1279-1294) of the Chinese Yuan Dynasty. ...

The county is characterised by the canyons formed by three rivers flowing from north to south: the Shuiluo river, the Litang river and the mighty Yalong river that carves out a huge canyon before flowing into the Yangtze. Length 6,380 km Elevation of the source  ? m Average discharge 31,900 m³/s Area watershed 1,800,000 km² Origin Qinghai Province and Tibet Mouth East China Sea Basin countries China The Chang Jiang (Simplified Chinese: 长江; Traditional Chinese: 長江; pinyin: Cháng Jiāng; Wade-Giles: Chang Chiang...

The main resources in Muli are hydro electric power from the rivers and a wide variety of plants used in traditional Chinese medicine, such as Chinese caterpillar fungus. The remote location and low population have allowed many protected species to survive here, including the white-lipped deer and stump-tailed macaque.

Muli is famous for its gold producing rivers, which are still exploited on a small, non-industrial scale. Its broad expanses of forests were also heavily logged until a logging ban was introduced in 1999. Now most of the local economy is based on agriculture and livestock. Forests include hemlock, cypress, yellow cedars, as well as spruce and fir trees.

Muli is also known for its azalea, rhododendron and walnut plants.

The county seat is at Muli town, formerly known as Bowa, which is reached by a single road from Xichang, over a mountain pass. Until 1950 Muli was a semi-independent theocratic kingdom, ruled by a series of hereditary lama kings based at the trio of Yellow (Gelugpa) sect Buddhist monasteries at old Muli, Kulu and Waerdje. These lamaseries were overthrown by the new Communist rulers of China in the 1950s and destroyed during the Cultural Revolution. The monastery at old Muli, 120km north of the county seat, once housed more than 700 monks. It was originally built in early Qing Dynasty, took 12 years to build and was completed in the 17th year of the reign of Qing Emperor Shunzhi, around 1600. It was modelled on important lamaseries in Tibet and is said to have contained an impressive golden statue of Gyiwa Qamba Buddha over 10 metres high. 1950 was a common year starting on Sunday (link will take you to calendar). ... The Geluk (dge lugs) School was founded by Tsongkhapa (1357-1419), Tibets best known religious reformer and arguably its greatest philosopher. ...

The first Living Buddha, Qoigyi Sanggyai, came to Muli in 1580, reportedly from Qamdo, and became the apprentice of the 3rd Dalai Lama.

Since 1987 the Muli monastery has been partly restored and now has about 80 young monks in residence. It is near a modern small town called Wachang, located high up on the western edge of the Litang river valley, at about 3000 metres altitude. The other monasteries at Kulu [now known as Kangwu]and Waerdje are still in ruins.

Muli was visited by the botanist and explorer Joseph Rock in the 1920s and 30s. He befriended the then lama king, Chote Chaba, and used the monastery as a base for exploring and plant collecting in the then unvisited regions of Minya Konka and Yading. Joseph Rock wrote colourful accounts of his encounters with the eccentric lama ruler of Muli in the National Geographic magazine. These are said to have been the inspiration for the writer James Hilton and his novel Lost Horizon, about a remote monastery in the Himalayas. Joseph Francis Charles Rock, (1884 – 1962) was an Austrian-American explorer, geographer, linguist and botanist. ... Lama can refer to: the Tibetan word for religious teacher (like the Sanskrit term guru) see Tibetan Buddhism. ... Yading - a national level reserve in the southwest of Sichuan Province, China. ... James Hilton (1900-1954) was a popular English novelist of the first half of the 20th century. ... The cover of the 1961 paperback edition Lost Horizon is a fantasy adventure novel by James Hilton. ...

• Photos of Muli