Orchid Press is pleased to make available for the wide community with interest in Tibetan culture a reprint edition of this seminal conference, featuring papers by some 47 eminent Tibetologists, first presented at the International Seminar on Tibetan Studies in Oxford in 1979. Dedicated to one of the most highly respected of these scholars, Hugh Richardson, the quality and diversity of the papers herein, reflecting as they do the very significant contribution to this field of Richardson himself, are a fitting tribute to the man.
Commencing with an essay in appreciation of Richardson's life and myriad achievements, and followed by a complete bibliography of his writings, the papers then presented span the full range of disciplines that have focused on this rich and endangered culture. Included in this list are important contributions to the history, geography, religion, philosophy, arts, sociology, ethnography, folklore, language and literature, medicine and commerce of Tibet and the Tibetan diaspora.
Many of the papers remain standard references in their respective fields, and copies of the original publication of these Proceedings are now long out of print and very difficult to obtain. It is thus hoped that this reprint edition will serve as a valuable reference for new and current scholars in the field of Tibetan studies, both in terms of the scholarly material presented and as an inspirational example of the quality of work of those who preceded them.

"It is difficult to think of any aspect of Tibetan culture which is not, to some extent at least, touched upon." Review by K.R. Norman, Modern Asian Studies, Vol. 16-1, 1982.