The Potala Palace, located in Lhasa, the capital of the Tibet Autonomous Region of China, is a museum and other buildings. It was once the winter home of the Dalai Lamas, built in the dzong style on Marpo Ri, also called Red Mountain. From 1649 to 1959, it was the residence of the Dalai Lamas. After Tibet was taken over by the People's Republic of China, it became mainly a museum.

The palace is named after Mount Potalaka, which in Buddhist tradition is considered the legendary home of the bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara. Construction of the current structure began in 1645, ordered by the 5th Dalai Lama, with advice from Konchog Chophel, the Thirty-fifth Ganden Tripa of the Gelug school. It was built on the site of an earlier palace believed to have been built by Songtsen Gampo in 637.

Located on Marpo Ri in the center of the Lhasa Valley at an altitude of about 3,700 meters (12,100 feet), the palace is 400 meters (1,300 feet) wide from east to west and 350 meters (1,150 feet) long from north to south. Its sloping stone walls are about 3 meters (9.8 feet) thick on average, with some parts reaching 5 meters (16 feet) at the base. Copper was added to the foundations to help protect against earthquakes. The complex has 13 floors and includes more than 1,000 rooms, 10,000 shrines, and about 200,000 statues. It rises 119 meters (390 feet) above the mountain and over 300 meters (980 feet) above the valley floor.

History

The Dalai Lama lived in an estate called Ganden Podrang at Drepung Monastery. In 1621, Tsang made Lhasa the area under Ganden Podrang’s control. In March 1642, Gushri Khan, known as the Dhamma King and Holder of the Faith, used military forces to take control of areas in Tibet, which was called the Land of Wooden Doors, from the Sde-srid Tsang-pa regime of the Garma Gagyu Sect (Tsang). He then gave all thirteen parts of Tibet to the Dalai Lama. On the fifth day of the fourth month in the Water-Horse year of the 11th cycle, the Dalai Lama was made the ruler of Tibet, sitting on the golden fearless snow lion throne. Around 1644, the Dalai Lama, who was then the regent of Ganden Podrang, and Gushri Khan decided to build a palace.

The Potala Palace was built on the site of an older palace called Songtsen Gampo’s palace on Red Hill. Two chapels on the northwest corner of the Potala preserve parts of the older palace. One is called Phakpa Lhakhang, and the other is Chogyel Drupuk, a recessed cavern believed to be Songtsen Gampo’s meditation cave. Ngawang Lozang Gyatso, the Great Fifth Dalai Lama, began building the modern Potala Palace in 1645 after his spiritual adviser, Konchog Chophel, suggested the site was ideal for a government seat because it is located between Drepung and Sera monasteries and the old city of Lhasa.

The outside of the palace was built in three years, while the inside, including its furnishings, took 45 years to complete.

The palace’s name comes from a hill at Cape Comorin, the southern tip of India, which is a sacred place for the bodhisattva of compassion, known as Avalokitesvara or Chenrezi.

The Dalai Lama and his government moved into the Potrang Karpo, or White Palace, in 1649. From that time, the Potala was used as the Dalai Lama’s winter palace. Construction continued until 1694, about twelve years after the Dalai Lama’s death. The Potrang Marpo, or Red Palace, was added between 1690 and 1694. The Kalachakra Mandala was built during the 1690s.

The Yamantaka Mandala was created in 1751.

The lower white front of the palace on the south side was used to display two large thangkas showing Tara and Sakyamuni during the Sertreng Festival on the 30th day of the second Tibetan month.

At least one group of Tibetans around 1950 called the Potala “Peak Potala” (Tse Potala) or simply “the Peak.”

• Potala Palace in the 1920s
• The Sertreng ceremony on 28 April 1949 with thangkas on the palace’s front

The palace was damaged during the Tibetan uprising against the Chinese in 1959, when Chinese shells hit the palace’s windows. It was not damaged during the Cultural Revolution in 1966 because of the intervention of Zhou Enlai, then the Premier of the People’s Republic of China. Tibetan historian Tsering Woeser noted that the palace, which held over 100,000 volumes of scriptures and historical documents, as well as many rooms storing precious objects, paintings, statues, and ancient armor, was nearly emptied of its contents.

The Potala Palace was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1994.

UNESCO has expressed concerns about modernization, particularly the construction of new buildings near the palace, which could harm its unique atmosphere. The Chinese government responded by banning the construction of any buildings taller than 21 meters in the area. UNESCO also raised concerns about the materials used during the palace’s restoration, which began in 2002 at a cost of RMB180 million (US$22.5 million). However, the palace’s director, Qiangba Gesang, stated that only traditional materials and craftsmanship were used. Restoration work was also done between 1989 and 1994, costing RMB55 million (US$6.875 million).

The number of visitors to the palace was limited to 1,600 per day, with daily opening hours reduced to six hours to prevent overcrowding, starting in May 2003. Before the quota was introduced, the palace received about 1,500 visitors daily, sometimes reaching over 5,000 in one day. Visits to the palace’s roof were banned after restoration work ended in 2006 to prevent further damage. Visitor limits were later raised to 2,300 daily to accommodate a 30% increase in visitors after the Qingzang railway to Lhasa opened on 1 July 2006. However, the daily limit is often reached by mid-morning. Opening hours were extended during the peak months of July to September, when over 6,000 visitors visited the site daily.

Architecture

The Potala Palace has walls that slope inward, with straight rows of many windows at the top of the walls and flat roofs at different levels. At the bottom of the rock on the southern side, there is a large area surrounded by walls and gates, with large porticos on the inside. A series of staircases with spaces between them leads to the top of the rock. The entire width of this area is covered by the palace.

The central part of the building group is square-shaped and ends in golden canopies similar to those found at the Jokhang Temple Monastery. The red-colored central section of the Potala is called the "red palace" and includes the main halls, chapels, and shrines of past Dalai Lamas.

The colors red, white, and yellow come from the use of limestone.

• Details of the decoration include a copy of a Buddha statue from the 13th to 14th century.
• The former living quarters of the Dalai Lama are present. A figure sitting on a throne represents Tenzin Gyatso, the current Dalai Lama. The throne has the Chinese character 夀, which means "long life."
• A view from behind the Potala, seen from Ching Drol Chi Ling.
• A park, pond, and temple located behind the Potala.