Kunga Lotro Gyaltsen
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Kunga Lotro Gyaltsen (Wylie: Kun dga' blo gros rgyal mts'an) was a Tibetan Imperial Preceptor (Dishi) at the court of the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty of China. He lived from (1299-1327) and belonged to the abbot family Khon of Sakya which had a precedence position in Tibet in this era. He held the title from 1314 to his demise in 1327.
Kunga Lotro Gyaltsen was one of the 13 sons of the abbot-ruler (dansa chenpo) Zangpo Pal (d. 1323). His mother was Jomo Kunga Bumphulwa, the widow of the Tibetan administrator (dpon-chen or ponchen) Aglen.[1] The position of Imperial Preceptor or Dishi was always kept separate from that of abbot-ruler, and since 1286 it had been held by members of the Sharpa and Khangsarpa families. However, after the demise of the Dishi Sanggye Pal in 1314, a member of the Khon family was once again appointed. Kunga Lotro Gyaltsen was summoned to the imperial court in North China by the great khan Ayurbarwada, and formally installed on 27 March 1315.[2] As Dishi he had a paramount influence in the Bureau of Buddhist and Tibetan Affairs or Xuanzheng Yuan, the department handling Buddhist and Tibetan affairs. His decrees carried the weight of the imperial authority.[3] A letter by his hand, issued in 1316, begins: "By the king's order, the words of Kunga Lotro Gyaltsen Palzangpo, imperial preceptor: To the officials of Pacification Commissioner rank, to generals, soldiers, administrators of the nang so, to judges, holders of golden letters, chiefs of districts, laymen and monks who collect taxes and go and come, to myriarchs, to dignitaries, a command."[4]