Günjiin Süm
Temple Dedicated to the Manchu Wife of Dondovdorj, Father of the Second Bogd Gegen.
Location: N048°11.009' – E107°33.379', 35.6 miles northeast of Ulaan Baatar as the crow flies and 64 miles by road via the tourist center of Terelj, at the upper end of Khökh Chuluutiin Gol, a small tributary of the Dund Bayangiin Gol, which flows into the Tuul River near Terelj. Accessible only by four-wheel drive vehicle, as several small streams north of Terelj must be crossed. In summer it might be necessary to walk the last mile or so because of the swampy road, but in winter, when the ground it frozen, it is possible to drive the whole way, assuming there is not too much snow.
The 1657 danshig naadam held for Zanabazar at Erdene Zuu after his return from his second trip to Tibet marked the ascension of his influence among his Mongolian followers. As Podzneev points out, “The Gegen’s might in Eastern Khalkha reached its extreme limits at this time; they believed in him and came to him with the most extraordinary requests.” For instance, his nephew Galdandorj, son of the Tüsheet Khan, met with Zanabazar and implored him to cure his wife’s infertility and grant him a son. After numerous such entreaties Zanabazar finally said:
After Zanabazar recognized Manchu suzerainty in 1691 the Qing emperor awarded Galdandorj the title of Darkhan-Ch’ing-Wang. His son, Dondovdorj, was brought up in Beijing, in the Qing court of Kangxi, and in 1697 the emperor gave him a princess to marry. Some Sources imply that the princess, named Khicheengoui Amarlangoui, was one of Kangxi’s own daughters, while others maintain she was the daughter of one the First Degree Qing princes. In either case, his marriage led to Dondovdorj’s further advancement in the Qing court, and in 1700, after his father’s death, he too was awarded the title of Darkhan-Ch’ing-Wang, in addition to becoming the new Tüsheet Khan. Dondovdorj was, however, a notorious boozer, devil-may-care lady’s man, all-around roisterer, and a poet to boot, and after gregarious affronts to public decorum he was finally forced to relinquish both his position as Tüsheet Khan and his Qing title of Darkhan-Ch’ing-Wang.
Reduced in rank to a second-degree prince, Dondovdorj returned to Mongolia, presumably with his Manchu wife. He eventually distinguished himself on the battlefield and apparently fought against the resurgent Zungarian Mongols who under the leadership of Galdan Bolshigt’s nephew Tzevan-Ravdan had invaded Tibet in 1716.
The Qing emperor Kangxi died in 1722. Zanabazar was in Mongolia at the time of Kangxi’s death. He immediately decided to return to Beijing and pay his respects to Kangxi’s remains, even though he was in his late eighties at the time. Accompanying him was Dondovdorj. The new Qing emperor, Kangxi’s son Yongzheng, forgave Dondovdorj’s previous transgressions and he was again elevated to the title of Darkhan-Ch’ing-Wang. As an additional perk he was given yet another Manchu princess in marriage.
Not long after his arrival in Beijing Zanabazar fell ill. Sensing that his end may have been nearing, his attendants asked him where and under what circumstances he would be reborn. According to tradition, Zanabazar replied, “The second wang [Dondovdorj] should bring into his home a maiden belonging according to birth to the year of the monkey or the chicken.” This was interpreted to mean that Dondovdorj was to find a Mongolian girl born in either the year of the monkey or the chicken and that the second Bogd Gegen would be born to her. Apprized of this prophesy, the emperor Yongzheng gave Dondovdorj permission to immediately return home and seek a new wife. Back in Mongolia Dondovdorj straight away found a nineteen-year old woman named Tsagaan-Dara-Bayartu who had been born in the year of the monkey and just a month after his marriage to the Chinese princess he took her as his third wife.
Zanabazar in himself died in 1723 in Beijing. In 1724, “at daybreak on the first day of the middle of the spring moon in the Wood Dragon year” a son was born to Tsagaan-Dara-Bayartu. In 1728 the boy took his first monastic vows and was given the name Lusandanbidonme. In 1729 he was declared the Second Bogd Gegeen, the seventeenth incarnation of Javzandamba.
Dondovdorj’s second Manchu wife faded into the background and nothing seems to be known of her. To this day, however, numerous folktales exist about the first one, Khicheengoui Amarlangoui, who moved to Mongolia to live with her husband and eventually came to love her adapted country and its people. “The Peaceful Princess,” as she was called, came to consider herself a Mongolian and according to legend she said that when she died she did not her body returned to the land of her ancestors but instead wished to be buried in Mongolia. "I am the wife of a Mongolian man, therefore I am a Mongolian. Bury me in Mongolian soil,” she reportedly said.
Here the ”Peaceful Princess” reenters the historical record. The Qing emperor Yongzheng’s successor, Qianlong, heard about the princess’s wish and in 1740 ordered that a temple be built in Mongolia to hold her remains (one Source claims Dondovdorj himself had the temple built). The so-called Gunjiin Süm consisted of five parts: a tower, the Bogd Entrance, a guard house, the central temple, and the grave of the princess. The complex was heavily damaged in the 1930s, however, and now only remnants of the tower and the Bogd Entrance remain. The temple was gutted but the shell remains and has been restored to a certain extant.
The Temple
The eight-foot high wall around the temple, which encompassed a square about 200 feet long on each side, is still in fairly good shape on three sides.
North side of the walled compound
The princess’s grave, behind the temple, was reportedly looted in the mid-thirties, not, according to local informants, by communist iconoclasts, but by common thieves looking for gold, silver, and other valuables believed to have been buried with her.
Researchers examining the site in 1949 found remains of the princess’s sandalwood coffin and also the body of a man preserved sitting upright in the lotus position. Further examination of the site in 1959 revealed a blouse decorated with pearls, two large loose pearls, and several dolls made of gold and silver. If the site was looted in the 1930s the thieves apparently missed these items. They are now reportedly in the Mongolian State Museum of History in Ulaan Baatar. The fate of the princess’s body remains unclear.
Temple Dedicated to the Manchu Wife of Dondovdorj, Father of the Second Bogd Gegen.
Location: N048°11.009' – E107°33.379', 35.6 miles northeast of Ulaan Baatar as the crow flies and 64 miles by road via the tourist center of Terelj, at the upper end of Khökh Chuluutiin Gol, a small tributary of the Dund Bayangiin Gol, which flows into the Tuul River near Terelj. Accessible only by four-wheel drive vehicle, as several small streams north of Terelj must be crossed. In summer it might be necessary to walk the last mile or so because of the swampy road, but in winter, when the ground it frozen, it is possible to drive the whole way, assuming there is not too much snow.
The 1657 danshig naadam held for Zanabazar at Erdene Zuu after his return from his second trip to Tibet marked the ascension of his influence among his Mongolian followers. As Podzneev points out, “The Gegen’s might in Eastern Khalkha reached its extreme limits at this time; they believed in him and came to him with the most extraordinary requests.” For instance, his nephew Galdandorj, son of the Tüsheet Khan, met with Zanabazar and implored him to cure his wife’s infertility and grant him a son. After numerous such entreaties Zanabazar finally said:
I know that thou wouldst need a son; therefore when I set out in a miraculous manner for Tibet, I visited there the mountain of the hermits, and in a certain cave I found a lama named Arthasiddha, a reincarnation of Vajrapani. I told him that there was one prince among us who needed a son, and asked him for that; he replied to me that when he had completed his meditation he would be ready to be reborn as the son that prince. In proof of his fairness, I demanded that he give me an acknowledgement, and I now present it to thee. This lama died today, and his soul ought to be incarnated in the womb of thy wife.Galdandorj’s wife did shortly thereafter become pregnant and eventually gave birth to a son who was given the name Dondovdorj.
After Zanabazar recognized Manchu suzerainty in 1691 the Qing emperor awarded Galdandorj the title of Darkhan-Ch’ing-Wang. His son, Dondovdorj, was brought up in Beijing, in the Qing court of Kangxi, and in 1697 the emperor gave him a princess to marry. Some Sources imply that the princess, named Khicheengoui Amarlangoui, was one of Kangxi’s own daughters, while others maintain she was the daughter of one the First Degree Qing princes. In either case, his marriage led to Dondovdorj’s further advancement in the Qing court, and in 1700, after his father’s death, he too was awarded the title of Darkhan-Ch’ing-Wang, in addition to becoming the new Tüsheet Khan. Dondovdorj was, however, a notorious boozer, devil-may-care lady’s man, all-around roisterer, and a poet to boot, and after gregarious affronts to public decorum he was finally forced to relinquish both his position as Tüsheet Khan and his Qing title of Darkhan-Ch’ing-Wang.
Reduced in rank to a second-degree prince, Dondovdorj returned to Mongolia, presumably with his Manchu wife. He eventually distinguished himself on the battlefield and apparently fought against the resurgent Zungarian Mongols who under the leadership of Galdan Bolshigt’s nephew Tzevan-Ravdan had invaded Tibet in 1716.
The Qing emperor Kangxi died in 1722. Zanabazar was in Mongolia at the time of Kangxi’s death. He immediately decided to return to Beijing and pay his respects to Kangxi’s remains, even though he was in his late eighties at the time. Accompanying him was Dondovdorj. The new Qing emperor, Kangxi’s son Yongzheng, forgave Dondovdorj’s previous transgressions and he was again elevated to the title of Darkhan-Ch’ing-Wang. As an additional perk he was given yet another Manchu princess in marriage.
Not long after his arrival in Beijing Zanabazar fell ill. Sensing that his end may have been nearing, his attendants asked him where and under what circumstances he would be reborn. According to tradition, Zanabazar replied, “The second wang [Dondovdorj] should bring into his home a maiden belonging according to birth to the year of the monkey or the chicken.” This was interpreted to mean that Dondovdorj was to find a Mongolian girl born in either the year of the monkey or the chicken and that the second Bogd Gegen would be born to her. Apprized of this prophesy, the emperor Yongzheng gave Dondovdorj permission to immediately return home and seek a new wife. Back in Mongolia Dondovdorj straight away found a nineteen-year old woman named Tsagaan-Dara-Bayartu who had been born in the year of the monkey and just a month after his marriage to the Chinese princess he took her as his third wife.
Zanabazar in himself died in 1723 in Beijing. In 1724, “at daybreak on the first day of the middle of the spring moon in the Wood Dragon year” a son was born to Tsagaan-Dara-Bayartu. In 1728 the boy took his first monastic vows and was given the name Lusandanbidonme. In 1729 he was declared the Second Bogd Gegeen, the seventeenth incarnation of Javzandamba.
Dondovdorj’s second Manchu wife faded into the background and nothing seems to be known of her. To this day, however, numerous folktales exist about the first one, Khicheengoui Amarlangoui, who moved to Mongolia to live with her husband and eventually came to love her adapted country and its people. “The Peaceful Princess,” as she was called, came to consider herself a Mongolian and according to legend she said that when she died she did not her body returned to the land of her ancestors but instead wished to be buried in Mongolia. "I am the wife of a Mongolian man, therefore I am a Mongolian. Bury me in Mongolian soil,” she reportedly said.
Here the ”Peaceful Princess” reenters the historical record. The Qing emperor Yongzheng’s successor, Qianlong, heard about the princess’s wish and in 1740 ordered that a temple be built in Mongolia to hold her remains (one Source claims Dondovdorj himself had the temple built). The so-called Gunjiin Süm consisted of five parts: a tower, the Bogd Entrance, a guard house, the central temple, and the grave of the princess. The complex was heavily damaged in the 1930s, however, and now only remnants of the tower and the Bogd Entrance remain. The temple was gutted but the shell remains and has been restored to a certain extant.
The Temple
North side of the walled compoundResearchers examining the site in 1949 found remains of the princess’s sandalwood coffin and also the body of a man preserved sitting upright in the lotus position. Further examination of the site in 1959 revealed a blouse decorated with pearls, two large loose pearls, and several dolls made of gold and silver. If the site was looted in the 1930s the thieves apparently missed these items. They are now reportedly in the Mongolian State Museum of History in Ulaan Baatar. The fate of the princess’s body remains unclear.
