Drepung Monastery

Located at the foot of Mount Gephel, 5 kilometers to the northwest of Lhasa, Drepung Monastery is the Gelug Sect of Tibetan Buddhism monasteries. Coupled with Ganden and Sera, Drepung Monastery is known as the "great three" Gelukpa university monasteries of Tibet. It was listed as the Tibet Autonomous Region key cultural relics protection units in 1962 and was further claimed as national key cultural relic’s protection units in 1982.

It was founded in 1416 by Jamyang Chojey, a direct disciple of Je Tsongkhapa, the founder of the Gelukpa School. Drepung, known for the high standards of its academic study, was called the Nalanda of Tibet, a reference to the great Buddhist monastic university of India.

History:
Old records show that there were two centres of power in Drepung: the so-called lower chamber (Zimkhang 'og ma) associated with the Dalai Lamas-to-be, and the upper chamber (Zimkhang gong ma) associated with the descendants of Sonam Drakpa, an illustrious teacher who died in 1554. it had been constructed in 1518 by Gendun Gyatso Palzangpo (1476–1541), retrospectively named and counted as 2nd Dalai Lama.

Features:
With large-scale, the temple covers an area of about 25 million square meters. There were original seven Zhacang (College for religious study) in the temple and later they were consolidated into four Zhacang, namely Luoyang color forest, fruit Mang, Dejan and Hubei. A lot of famous monks in Tibet have been studying religion there, and it had accommodated thousands of monks in the peak. This temple is known as the largest temple of Lamaism.

It is now divided into what are known as the seven great colleges: Gomang (sGo-mang), Loseling (Blo-gsal gling), Deyang (bDe-dbyangs), Shagkor (Shag-skor), Gyelwa (rGyal-ba) or Tosamling (Thos-bsam gling), Dulwa (‘Dul-ba), and Ngagpa (sNgags-pa).

Recently, the main buildings of the temple include Coqen Hall, Luo color Linza warehouses, Gedan quite chapters, a central Lacan and so on, and those were mostly built in the Ming and Qing dynasties (1368-1644) in succession.

The hall for religious study, also known as the main building in the temple, is grand and magnificent. It has 183 columns, and there are beautiful column sculpture, as well as exquisite tapestries Jing Zhuang, hanging blocks, Thangka (scroll paintings), statues, murals, etc. It can accommodate 8000 people chanting at one time. Moreover, the temple has preserved a large number of ancient Tibetan literature and classics, which will offer you fantastic opportunities to know the culture of Tibet.

Tips:
1.Monks in Drepung Monastery are very friendly, and you will certainly get a lot of harvest if you have invited them to accompany with touring the temple.
2.t is worth mentioning that there is a kitchen in the Coqen Hall, known as one of Tibet's largest kitchen.
3.In the Half way up the hill lies a small temple called NECHUNG MONASTERY, 500 meters to the southeast of Drepung Monastery. With heavy and grand color, the walls paintings in the NECHUNG MONASTERY are special and deserve have a look.