Detail: Back view

This figure has been assembled based on photographs taken in the 1930s and 1940s in the Tibetan capital of Lhasa during the Great Prayer Festival, which included troops of ceremonial armored cavalry that wore a standardized set of equipment as stipulated by the central government of Tibet probably from the mid-seventeenth or eighteenth century onward. It included a helmet, shirt of mail, set of four mirrors, armored belt, bow case and quiver, matchlock musket, bandoleer with gunpowder and bullets, and short spear for the rider as well as a saddle, saddle rug, and tack for the horse. Armed and equipped in a similar fashion, Tibetan government officials were periodically required to demonstrate proficiency on horseback with musket, bow and arrow, and spear until as late as the mid-twentieth century.

Detail: Side View

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