1. Tibetan is written in a script derived from the Indian script of the seventh and eighth centuries AD. Since then the spoken language of Tibet has changed with respect to the written, much as happened with English, except more radically. One name, for example, in Tibetan can be spelled «RwaSgreng» but is ponounced «Reting» or «Rating».

2. There has never been an attempt by the Tibetans to establish a roster of official place names in the Latin script corresponding to their spoken form. Hence the names used here are those found most frequently on maps and in major works of Western literature about Tibet.

3. With the arrival of the Chinese in 1951 there was a general revision of all place names, which were then transcribed in ideograms. As with all such transcriptions, signs were used to represent a collection of sounds, without any reference to the meaning of the word.

4. For transcribing Chinese ideograms into Latin script there are several systems: two of the most widely used are the Wade-Giles and Pinyin. The latter is the official system in China, and now in Tibet, but its use in Latinizing a Chinese ideogram of a Tibetan place name can considerably alter the current pronunciation of that name.

Below there is an attempt to give a few examples of the place name problem by presenting a certain number of names in several of their principal forms, as the reader will encounter them in different publications.

Col. 1: Most current usage, reflecting contemporary pronunciation.
Col. 2: Transcription of the Chinese ideogram according to
        the official Chinese Pinyin system.
Col. 3: The official Chinese names in Chinese ideograms. (1)
Col. 4: Several variants, in common use, of the same name.
Col. 5: Transliteration of the written form to the Tibetan script,
        of Sankrit origin.
Col. 6: Transcription of the Chinese ideogram according the Wade-Giles system.