Qonggyai County  Chongye | |
|---|---|
 Near theValley of the Kings | |
.png) Location of Qonggyai County (red) and Shannan City (yellow) within Tibet Autonomous Region | |
  Qonggyai Location of the seat in Tibet Autonomous Region Show map of Tibet Qonggyai Qonggyai (China) Show map of China | |
| Coordinates:29°15′30″N91°51′30″E / 29.25833°N 91.85833°E /29.25833; 91.85833 | |
| Country | China |
| Autonomous region | Tibet |
| Prefecture-level city | Shannan (Lhoka) |
| County seat | Qonggyai |
| Area | |
• Total | 1,030 km2 (400 sq mi) |
| Population | |
• Total | 15,199 |
| • Density | 15/km2 (38/sq mi) |
| Time zone | UTC+8 (China Standard) |
| Website | www |
| Qonggyai County | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chinese name | |||||||||
| Simplified Chinese | 琼结县 | ||||||||
| Traditional Chinese | 瓊結縣 | ||||||||
| |||||||||
| Tibetan name | |||||||||
| Tibetan | འཕྱོངས་རྒྱས་རྫོང་། | ||||||||
| |||||||||
Qonggyai County orChongye (Tibetan:འཕྱོངས་རྒྱས་རྫོང,Chinese:琼结县) is a county under jurisdiction ofShannan in theTibet Autonomous Region, China.[2]
Qonggyai contains theValley of the Kings, a series of graveyardtumuli, approximately 27 kilometres (17 mi) south ofTsetang,Tibet, near the town of Chongye or Qonggyai on Mure Mountain. The site possesses eight large mounds of earth resembling natural hills that are believed to contain eight to ten buried Tibetan kings.[3]
According to Tibetan tradition all the kings from Dri-gum onwards are buried at ‘Phyong-rgyas, but as the site now presents itself, there are just ten tumuli identifiable as the tombs of all the kings fromSrong-brtsan-sgam-po toKhri-lde-srong-brtsan, including two princes.[4]
Other sources, however, have indicated that there are actually nine mounds rather than eight or ten.[5] The kings believed to be buried at the site includeSongtsen Gampo (the founder of theTibetan Empire),Mangsong Mangtsen,Tridu Songtsen,Gyangtsa Laban,Me Agtsom,Trisong Detsen,Muné Tsenpo andRalpacan.[3][6]
Qonggyai Dzong was established in mid-14th century underPhagmodrupa rule. Under theGanden Podrang, the county was part of Lhoka Governor's (Tibetan:སྤྱི་ཁྱབ་,Wylie:spyi khyab) jurisdiction. Since 1960, Qonggyai county is part ofLhoka (Shannan) prefecture.
Qonggyai County is located in the middle of theBrahmaputra River valley and covers an area of 1030 square km, with 2.8 million mu of arable land, an area of 1.3 million mu of grassland, with a forest area of 0.7 million mu.[citation needed] The county had a total population of 20,000 people in 2003.
Qonggyai County is located in southern Tibet and is surrounded by mountains. It has an average elevation of about 3900 meters, with a maximum altitude of 6450 meters.[citation needed] It is in a temperate semi-arid plateau monsoon climate zone, with an annual frost-free period of about 125~53 days.[citation needed] The annual rainfall is 345 millimeters and natural disasters, mainly droughts, floods, hail and pests are common.[citation needed] Mineral resources include mainly crystal stone,jade,chromium andiron.Antelope,black-necked crane,otter,swan,eagle and river deer are common.[citation needed]
| Climate data for Qonggyai, elevation 3,741 m (12,274 ft), (1991–2020 normals) | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Month | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | Year |
| Mean daily maximum °C (°F) | 8.5 (47.3) | 10.5 (50.9) | 12.6 (54.7) | 15.6 (60.1) | 19.3 (66.7) | 22.9 (73.2) | 22.3 (72.1) | 21.9 (71.4) | 20.9 (69.6) | 17.5 (63.5) | 13.1 (55.6) | 10.4 (50.7) | 16.3 (61.3) |
| Daily mean °C (°F) | −0.3 (31.5) | 2.2 (36.0) | 4.9 (40.8) | 7.7 (45.9) | 11.7 (53.1) | 15.5 (59.9) | 15.3 (59.5) | 14.7 (58.5) | 13.5 (56.3) | 9.4 (48.9) | 3.8 (38.8) | 0.7 (33.3) | 8.3 (46.9) |
| Mean daily minimum °C (°F) | −8.3 (17.1) | −6.0 (21.2) | −2.6 (27.3) | 0.8 (33.4) | 5.0 (41.0) | 9.3 (48.7) | 10.1 (50.2) | 9.1 (48.4) | 7.5 (45.5) | 2.0 (35.6) | −4.6 (23.7) | −7.5 (18.5) | 1.2 (34.2) |
| Averageprecipitation mm (inches) | 0.5 (0.02) | 1.7 (0.07) | 5.5 (0.22) | 13.1 (0.52) | 26.3 (1.04) | 56.3 (2.22) | 114.3 (4.50) | 85.5 (3.37) | 44.6 (1.76) | 8.7 (0.34) | 2.5 (0.10) | 0.7 (0.03) | 359.7 (14.19) |
| Average precipitation days(≥ 0.1 mm) | 0.8 | 1.1 | 2.9 | 7.3 | 9.7 | 14.4 | 21.8 | 19.2 | 12.5 | 3.5 | 0.9 | 0.3 | 94.4 |
| Average snowy days | 1.7 | 2.1 | 6.0 | 7.5 | 1.0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1.3 | 1.9 | 0.6 | 22.1 |
| Averagerelative humidity (%) | 23 | 24 | 30 | 39 | 42 | 47 | 60 | 61 | 54 | 39 | 30 | 26 | 40 |
| Mean monthlysunshine hours | 243.1 | 216.4 | 225.7 | 214.8 | 231.3 | 216.8 | 174.7 | 188.5 | 195.2 | 239.0 | 244.8 | 252.1 | 2,642.4 |
| Percentagepossible sunshine | 74 | 68 | 60 | 55 | 55 | 52 | 41 | 47 | 53 | 68 | 77 | 79 | 61 |
| Source:China Meteorological Administration[7][8] | |||||||||||||
Qonggyai is dominated by agriculture, and is one of the grain based counties in Shannan.[citation needed] Crops grown are mainlyhighland barley, winter wheat, spring wheat, peas, radish, potatoes and so on.[citation needed] Livestock include yak, pianniu, cattle, sheep, goats, mainly. A forested area of 150 acres (0.61 km2) contains some apple, pear and peach orchards. Ethnic handicrafts forms most of the industrial sector and products include buckets, kettles, Tibetan cabinets, bowls, bracelets, necklaces, incense, butter lamps, etc.[citation needed]
The capital,Qonggyai Town (Qonggyai, Chongye) contains an ancient castle, and covers 0.5 km2 (0.19 sq mi), with a population of nearly 500 people.[citation needed] Commercial, financial, telecommunications, hospitals, schools and other public facilities are located in this small political, economic, and cultural center.
Qonggyai County contains 1town and 3townships.
| Name | Chinese | Hanyu Pinyin | Tibetan | Wylie |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Towns | ||||
| Qonggyai Town (Chongye) | 琼结镇 | Qióngjié zhèn | འཕྱོངས་རྒྱས་གྲོང་རྡལ། | 'phyongs rgyas grong rdal |
| Townships | ||||
| Gyemen Township | 加麻乡 | Jiāmá xiāng | རྒྱས་སྨན་ཤང་། | rgyas smad shang |
| Sharsü Township | 下水乡 | Xiàshuǐ xiāng | ཤར་བསུས་ཤང་། | shar bsus shang |
| Lhayül Township | 拉玉乡 | Lāyù xiāng | ལྷ་ཡུལ་ཤང་། | lha yul shang |
