Could we have found traces of part of history thanks to books found in Tibet? This is confirmed by a publication sent by one of our readers, through our WhatsApp chat. “This news seems dubious and is spreading,” he warns us. Indeed, the tweet has been widely shared since its publication on August 4th. The description reads: “The library found in Tibet contains 84,000 secret manuscripts (books) spanning 50,000 years of human history.”
The discovery would be at the monastery of Sakya. “It may be the largest library in the world in the distant history of the planet,” the publication adds. However, there is no indication of when this discovery dates back. Only one detail is revealed: the books would have been discovered behind a huge wall. Only, here, nothing proves the contents of these books.
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In southern Tibet, Sakya Monastery is considered one of the main schools of Tibetan Buddhism. It is particularly famous for its library, which is said to be the largest in the autonomous region. According to Lonely Planet, the heritage has “about 24,000 texts comprising 8,848 reams of writing”. But if the library of Sakya Monastery does exist, the discovery of the manuscripts actually seems like a chestnut tree when it comes to historical myths.
Writing not yet discovered
Posted a year ago a video from youtuber “Planet Raw” already referred to this intriguing library. But a first element is modified between the tweet and the video. The youtubeur speaks of a library kept for nearly 10,000 years, unlike the Twitter account which relies on “50,000 years of human history”. Moreover, the figure systematically differs between publications. On the Reddit forum, Internet users even reduce the duration to “1,000 years of history”. Anyway, it shows the lack of precision of this information.
Indeed, how could the manuscripts discovered at the monastery of Sakya date back 50,000 years when writing did not yet exist? Remember, we had to wait until the end of prehistory to see the appearance of the first writings. The discovery takes place in the middle of Mesopotamia. If at the beginning it is mainly about pictograms rather than a real writing, we are at this period much more advanced in the calendar of humanity. Here is the second error of the publication: the manuscripts cannot go back so far in history, while writing was invented only in 3,400-3,300 BC.
A 20 year old story
In the video of “Planet Raw”, we also learn that the discovery of the manuscripts is not recent and would actually date back to 2003. Chinese news agency Xinhua also mentioned this news on November 15 of that same year. She then explained that the discovery took place during the restoration of the monastery. The dispatch does explain that the manuscripts were stored in a wall, but adds: “No one knows any further details about them since they have remained untouched for the past hundreds of years.”
But what do these mysterious manuscripts contain? “Scholars of Buddhism believe that the majority of the huge collection may consist primarily of Buddhist scripture and probably also covers a wide variety of fields including literature, history, philosophy, astronomy, mathematics and art”, lists the Xinhua press agency in 2003. However, nothing proves that these manuscripts hide “a secret” which would change the course of History.