Under the auspices of H.H. the Dalai Lama and the trusteeship of eminent Tibetan lineage holders and scholars, we are pleased to announce the formation of the Tibetan International Digital Library.

The Tibetan International Digital Library has been formed in order to create much needed integrated access and secure archival conservation for the dispersed, and in some cases endangered, textual and multimedia Tibetan cultural resource collections worldwide.

Based on a ground-breaking, state-of-the-art digital library platform, designed to serve places of learning, the public, and collection holders regionally in India, Nepal, China, throughout Asia, and internationally, TIDL will also provide enhanced financial sustainability in support of the over four hundred collection holders worldwide.

Ever since the 1960s, individuals, nonprofit organizations, museums, libraries, and study centers in North America, Europe, and Asia have worked to document, preserve, and make accessible as much as possible of Tibet’s cultural heritage. These unique and vitally important surviving documentary materials – collections of classical texts; audio and video recordings and/or transcripts of oral commentaries; photographic, video, and film documentation of arts traditions and historical events; and translations of classical texts in modern languages – are now held in collections which are scattered around the world.

In order that these unique and irreplaceable collections can play their much-needed role in furthering the education of current and future generations throughout the culturally Indo-Tibetan regions and communities of Asia, and in regional and worldwide academic research, learning, and social discourse, TIDL is creating a unified library system that provides:

(i) a single access point for the dispersed worldwide collections, and
(ii) a safe archival home for collections that may, either now or in the future, face challenges that threaten their survival.

In Phase One of the project, the Orient Foundation for Arts and Culture (which holds the largest collection of digitised audio commentarial recordings to classical texts together with video documentation of classical arts traditions) will be working with the world's largest collection holders of digitised classical texts to create unified multimedia access to these major textual and oral commentarial collections and, concurrently, will be building the technical infrastructure for creating unified access to the further more than four hundred primary digital resource collections worldwide.

Based on over 40 years of working closely with the senior Tibetan masters of all traditions and with the major monastic and scholastic centres of India and Nepal, TIDL's project managers and team of highly skilled specialists in the development of digital library systems will be working, under the guidance of TIDL's trustees and senior lamas of all traditions, to build a digital library platform which fully reflects the cultural forms and vast breadth of classical Tibetan knowledge, arts, and practices.

The Tibetan International Digital Library will include the widest possible range of digital resources covering the entire spectrum of the classical Indo-Tibetan curriculum, namely:

1 ཐ་སྙད་རིག་གནས་ཁག Linguistics, Grammar & Poetics
2 རྣམ་ཐར་དང་། ཆོས་འབྱུང་། རྒྱལ་རབས། Histories & Biographies
3 སྐྱེས་རབས་དང་། སྤྲིང་ཡིག །བསྟོད་ཚོགས། Jataka Tales, Praises & Epistles
4 སྨོན་ལམ་དང་གསུང་མགུར། Prayers & Songs
5 གྲུབ་མཐའ། Tenet Systems
6 ཚད་མ་རིག་པ། Logic & Epistemology (pramāṇa)
7 ཕར་ཕྱིན་གྱི་ཆོས་སྐོར། Perfection of Wisdom Studies (prajñā-pāramitā)
8 དབུ་མའི་ཆོས་སྐོར། Middle Way Philosophy (mādhyamaka)
9 ཆོས་མངོན་པའི་སྐོར། Psychology & Phenomenology (abhidharma)
10 འདུལ་བ་དང་སྡོམ་གསུམ་སྐོར། Discipline & Ethics of the Three Vows (vinaya)
11 མདོའི་འགྲེལ་པ། Commentaries on Sutra
12 རྒྱ་གཞུང་འགྲེལ་པ། Commentaries on Indian Treatises (shastra)
13 སྔོན་འགྲོ Preliminary Practices
14 ལམ་རིམ་གྱི་དམིགས་སྐོར། Graduated Path Topics & Texts
15 བློ་སྦྱོང་གི་ཆོས་སྐོར། Mind Training Topics & Texts
16 ཆོས་བརྒྱུད་སོ་སོའི་མན་ངག་དང་ཁྲིད། Pith Instructions & Core Practice Teachings by Tradition
17 གསང་སྔགས་ཀྱི་ཆོས་སྐོར། Tantra
18 ཆོ་ག་དང་བསྐངས་གསོ་ཆོས་ཕྱོགས་ཀྱི་མཛད་སྒོ། Rituals & Ceremonies
19 བྲིས་འབུར་གྱི་བཟོ་རིག་སྒྱུ་རྩལ། Visual Arts
20 རོལ་མོ་དང་གླུ་གར། Performing Arts (Music & Dance)
21 གསོ་བ་རིག་པ། Medicine
22 རྩིས་དང་ས་ཚོད་བརྟག་པ། Astronomy, Astrology, Divination & Geomancy
23 སྤྱི་ཚོགས་དང་སྐྱ་བོའི་རིག་གཞུང་། Society & Secular Culture

(If the Tibetan text does not display correctly on your device, select here)

From the beginning of the technical development of the Tibetan International Digital Library, Tibetan technical staff will be trained in the cataloguing and metadata structures and technical protocols of the TIDL platform and archive. Going forward, it is the aim of the trustees, that the TIDL digital library platform and archive will be administered as much as possible by Tibetan staff.

Further updates will be posted here as the project develops. In the meantime please feel free to contact us at: