Introduction
Since childhood, my imagination has been captivated by the peoples and landscape of Tibet and the Himalaya. I finally arrived in this region of the world at age twenty-five and promptly commenced my research and explorations, to which I have now devoted more than two decades. In the first few years, I traveled extensively on foot in the Great Western Himalaya and Tibet, spending long periods of time away from modern frames of reference. During fieldtrips, I would ask many questions about local history and culture and take copious notes. I wintered in Dharamsala, applying myself to full time academic reading at the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives, trying to make better sense of all the things I had heard and seen. In my first decade in the high Himalaya, I acquired the requisite foreign language skills and proficiency in the methods of western scholarship to produce credible work. This enabled me to begin a noteworthy course of research, which I pursue to the present day.

The cultural history of pre-Buddhist Upper Tibet has emerged as my area of expertise. The pre-Buddhist period in Tibet is for all intents and purposes, synonymous with the Iron Age (certain elements of this anachronistic cultural and technological system persisted in Tibet through the first half of the First Millennium A.D.). Upper Tibet is the vast upland of northwestern Tibet, a region of interminable plains crisscrossed by lofty mountain ranges. I chose to specialize in an assessment of the paleoculture and archaeology of Upper Tibet because very little was known about these fields. Large swathes of the region had remained unexplored and Chinese archaeological inquiry in general was extremely minimal, furnishing considerable scope for making worthwhile scholarly contributions. From 1993 until 2000, I worked ten months a year on this research project and from 2000, I have devoted myself to it fulltime. In 2002, in lieu of my academic work, I was conferred a visiting scholar position at the University of Virginia. I also began my academic association with Oxford University in 2002. 

My work and accomplishments

To date, I have conducted formal interviews with many hundreds of residents in Upper Tibet. These have focused on various aspects of indigenous culture including but not limited to clan mythology and history, sacred geographic traditions, spirit-mediumship, and lore concerning the flora and fauna of the region. I am particularly interested in still practiced customs and beliefs that have correspondences to the Bon religion, as recorded in Tibetan literature. In order to contextualize my findings within a cultural historical framework, I have carried out an extremely rigorous survey of Tibetan texts, a bastion of my methodological and theoretical approach of placing ethnographic materials in a wider literary and historical framework. At the same time, I have comprehensively surveyed pre-Buddhist archaeological sites in virtually all areas of Upper Tibet. This aspect of my project entailed traveling more than 30,000 miles by motor vehicle, horseback and on foot. My surveying work has brought to light nearly 700 ancient sites, ushering in a new field of study in archaeology. Over the years, I have unremittingly charted the nature and extent of the Iron Age monuments and rock art in Upper Tibet, leading to the discovery of heretofore unknown types of mountain strongholds, semi-subterranean temples, burial grounds, and necropoli featuring large arrays of standing stones. The ethnohistorical implications of my findings for the development of Eurasian civilization in the Iron Age loom large, and promise to spur a new generation of intensive interdisciplinary scrutiny.      
    
The fruits of my research are recorded in four scholarly books, the first of which is entitled Divine Dyads: Ancient Civilization in Tibet (1997). This work looks at the mythic and religious make-up of two great mountain and lake pairs in Upper Tibet, furnishing a template upon which the interplay of indigenous and Buddhist traditions can be viewed. This work has been used in graduate level studies at academic institutions such as the University of Chicago and the University of Virginia. My second and third books (Antiquities of Northern Tibet and Antiquities of Upper Tibet) initiate the long process of registering the physical and geographic traits of the archaeological sites, analyzing their ceremonial and utilitarian functions, and determining cross-cultural affinities. My aim has been not only to bring new data to the fore but to present it in academic formats. In recognition of the intrinsic value of my discoveries and the level of scholarship I have achieved my fourth book, Calling Down the Gods, was recently published as part of Brill’s prestigious Tibet Studies Library. This work explicates the history, ritual practices and pantheon of deities of the lha-pa (spirit-mediums) of Upper Tibet, an almost extinct class of religious functionaries involved in community well being and prognostication.  

In addition to four books, I have written numerous technical and popular articles. My papers have appeared in a number of peer-reviewed journals including East and West (Rome), The Tibet Journal (Dharamsala), Rock Art Research (Melbourne), and Kailash (Kathmandu). My first archeological paper, A Preliminary Archaeological Survey of gNam mtsho and Dang ra g.yu mtsho (1996), was recently selected for inclusion in a three volume academic collection entitled The History of Tibet (Routledge Curzon). Another archaeological article of mine, Bringing to Light the Forgotten, has been translated into Chinese and published by the International Conference on Tibetan Archaeology and Art, Beijing, 2003.                       

Over the last twelve years, I have completed a comprehensive survey of pre-Buddhist archaeological sites in Upper Tibet, a project that entailed several years of grueling fieldwork. I have now turned by attention to writing up my findings, which will constitutea three volume treatise of more than 1200 pages. In addition to containing vital data on 400 archaeological sites, this set of tomes entitled Antiquities of High Tibet, will furnish extensive annotated translations of Tibetan texts that enshrine indigenous cultural materials. The Austrian Academy of Sciences has expressed strong interest in the publication of this work. I have already completed my translation and investigation of the archaic Tibetan funerary tradition from both Tun-huang and Bon literary sources. This comprises the first thorough study of the old eschatological traditions, certainly one of the most difficult areas in Tibetan philology.

My departure point was the fine work of Tibetologists such as Stein, Thomas and Lalou, who were among the first to carefully look at the funerary rituals preserved in the Tun-huang manuscripts (Tibet’s largest corpus of Imperial period literature). Thanks to the input of native scholars like Lopön Tenzin Namdak, I was able to make full translations of classical Bon funerary works, which served as an interpretive tool and grammatical index for the subsequent translation of Old Tibetan sources. In essence, I worked backwards in linguistic time, starting with textual resources that are written in a more familiar form of Tibetan before tackling those composed in the ancient language. The great French Tibetanist R. A. Stein suggested such an approach in his papers of the 1980’s, but this is the first time it has been realized on a significant scale. The many linguistic difficulties and the broad cultural background required to make sense of the death ritual texts, had previously dissuaded scholars from attempting such a study.

My inclusive study of the archaic funerary tradition throws up much textual material that is pertinent to the Imperial period (629-846 A.D.) culture and way of life in Tibet. Its significance therefore extends well beyond an elucidation of mortuary beliefs and practices to encompass prominent aspects of the religious and social structure of Tibetan dynastic times. As for my analytical method, I have taken the various funerary rituals and related them to my surface archaeological finds in Upper Tibet, a painstaking comparative exercise. I have also submitted the texts to an analysis based on a study of Inner Asian mortuary archaeology and the funerary traditions of contemporary peoples in contiguous regions. This cross-cultural perspective rooted in both the past and present, facilitates the placement of the Tibetan texts within the multiplex Inner Asian cultural world. In addition to funerary culture, Antiquities of High Tibet explores quasi-historical sources pertaining to the Upper Tibetan Iron Age kingdom of Zhang-zhung, relating them to the fabric of archaeological monuments and rock art I have discovered in the region. The work will inspect the costumes, tools and activities of the ancient Bonpo adepts and kings in order to assess the salient features of Zhang-zhung material culture. The data thus assembled should prove valuable as groundwork for the interpretation of archaeological finds once systematic excavation commences in Upper Tibet.

Curriculum Vitae

Name:                     John Vincent Bellezza
Place of Birth:        New York City, USA
Date of Birth:         October 2, 1957
Home Address:       52 Gramercy Place
                               Southampton, NJ
                               08088  USA
                               tel: 01-609-859-4420
Work Address:       c/o Professor David Germano
                               PO Box 400126
                               University of Virginia
                               Charlottesville
                               Virginia
                               22903  USA 
Email:                     jbellezza@hotmail.com

Formal Education:  Rutgers College, New Jersey

Educational and Research Experiences:

Over twenty years of research and exploration in Cultural Tibet and the Great Western Himalaya (1983-2006).
Major Expeditions: Four Fountains of Tibet, 1987, 1992; Hindu Kush Ethnographic Survey, 1983-1990; Himachal Pradesh Ethnographic Survey, 1989-1996; Great Western Himalayan Traverse, 1983-1994; Cultural Geography of Upper gTsang-po, 1991, 1993; Divine Dyads, 1994, 1995; Cultural Survey of Kinnaur, 1992, 1994, 1996; Byang-thang Cultural History Phase II, 1997, 1998; Changthang Circuit Expedition, 1999; Upper Tibet Circumnavigation Expedition, 2000; Upper Tibet Antiquities Expedition, 2001 (Partner: Ngari Prefecture Government); High Tibet Circle Expedition, 2002 (Partner: Tibet Academy of Social Sciences and Ngari Prefecture Government); High Tibet Antiquities Expedition, 2003 (Partner: Tibet Academy of Social Sciences and Ngari Prefecture Government); High Tibet Welfare Expedition, 2004  (Partner: Tibet Academy of Social Sciences and Ngari Prefecture Government); Tibet Upland Expedition, 2005 (Partner: Ngari Xiangxiong Cultural Exchange Association); Tibet Ice Lakes Expedition, 2006 (Partner: Ngari Xiangxiong Cultural Exchange Association); Tibet Highland Expedition, 2006.

Languages:
English, Tibetan, Hindi, Urdu, Western Pahari, Nepali, Spanish

Work Experiences:
2003-present:  Director, Pre-Buddhist Archaeological Sites, Tibet Himalayan Digital Library
2002-present:  Research affiliate scholar, East Asia Center, University of Virginia
2002-present:  Member, Oxford University Bon Translation Project
1997-present:  Tibetanist research scholar, Istituto Shangshung, Merigar, Italy (Supervisor: Professor Namkhai Norbu)
1990-present:  Translator and Author
1988-present:  Lecturer
1985-2000:  Professional mountain, pilgrimage and cultural guide with various companies such as Mountain Travel and Sherpa Expeditions

Community Voluntary Work:
Environmental Consultation with Himachal Pradesh State Government, India: 1984-1993; Northern Areas Council, Pakistan: 1984-1990

 Clubs and Affiliations:
The Explorers Club, New York City

 Grants and Fellowships:
1) Shang Shung Institute (Merigar, Italy)
2) Tibetan Medical Foundation (Weslaco, Texas)
3) The Spalding Trust (Stowmarket, United Kingdom)
4) Philadelphia Theravadin Meditation Center (Philadelphia)
5) Asian Cultural Council (New York City)
6) Rubin Foundation (New York City)
7) Bon Translation Project (Oxford University)
8) National Endowment for the Humanities (Rubin Museum shared grant)
9) Trust For Mutual Understanding (New York City)
10) Kalpa Group (Oxford, United Kingdom)
11) Expeditions Council, National Geographic Society (Washington, DC)
12) Unicorn Foundation (Paris)
13) Lumbini International Buddhist Institute (Lumbini)

Media Participation:
WNYC (93.9 FM), The Leonard Lopate Show: January 23, 2003
Washington Post, “Clues to Legendary Tibetan Culture Emerge”, by Guy Gugliotta: February 17, 2003
KSFR (90.7 FM), The Journey Home, January, 2003 
KSFR (90.7 FM), Santa Fe Radio Cafe: January 22, 2004
National Public Radio, Radio Expeditions, “Exploring Tibet’s Lost Civilization”: February 9, 2005
Canadian Broadcasting Company, TV Documentary on Tibetan Shamans, by David Aubury, 2006
Discovery, TV Documentary, Mysteries of Guge: Tibet’s Lost Kingdom, 2006

 Publications:

I. Books
(Taught in major universities, including University of Chicago, University of Virginia and Oxford  University)
 Forthcoming (2007). Antiquities of High Tibet: A Comprehensive Ethnoarchaeological and  Textual Analysis of Pre-BuddhistMonuments and Rock Art in the Tibetan Upland (The Austrian    Academy of Sciences has expressed keen interest in its publication).  
2005.  Calling Down the Gods: Spirit-Mediums, Sacred Mountains and Related Bon Textual  Traditions in Upper Tibet, Tibetan Studies Library, vol. 8.Leiden: Brill.
2002.  Antiquities of Upper Tibet: An Inventory of Pre-Buddhist Archaeological Sites on the High Plateau, Delhi: Adroit.   2001. Antiquities of Northern Tibet: Archaeological Discoveries on the High Plateau, Delhi:    Adroit.
1997.  Divine Dyads: Ancient Civilization in Tibet, Dharamsala: Library of Tibetan Works and Archives.

II. Articles, Scholarly Papers and Book Reviews
2005. “A Cornerstone Report. Comprehensive Archaeological Surveys Conducted in
Upper Tibet between 2001 and 2004. Documentation of archaic monuments and rock art in the Tibet Carried out under the auspices of the Tibetan Academy of Social Sciences and Ngari Xiangxiong Cultural Exchange Association of the Tibet Autonomous Region.” in Tibet Himalayan Digital Library, http://tinyurl.com/b2hnr
2005. (Forthcoming, featuring a study of Upper Tibetan rock art) in Himalayan Art Resources  http://himalayanart.org
2004. “Metal and Stone Vestiges: Religion, Magic and Protection in the Art of Ancient Tibet” in Asian Art Online Journal, http://www.asianart.com/articles/vestiges/index.html
2004. “Pilgrim’s Way, Scientist’s Mind” (Chinese trans. Fu Jun) in Lhasa: Tibet Geographic, vol.  1, pp. 133-138.
2003 (in press). “Territorial Characteristics of the Pre-Buddhist Zhang-zhung Paleocultural
Entity: A Comparative Analysis of Archaeological Evidence and Popular Bon Literary Sources” prepared for the Tenth International Association of Tibetan Studies, Oxford.
2003. “Pre-Buddhist Data” in Environmental and Cultural Geography Collection, Tibet Himalayan Digital Library (work in progress), 
http://iris.lib.virginia.edu/tibet/collections/cultgeo/prebuddhist-gis.html
2003. “Here Today, Gone Tomorrow: The Race to Document Upper Tibet’s Iron Age Heritage Before the Evidence is Carried Away” in San Francisco: Lotus Leaves, vol.6 (1), pp. 1-3.
2003. “Bringing to Light the Forgotten: Major Findings of a Comprehensive Inventory of Pre- Buddhist Sites in Upper Tibet (Tibet Autonomous Region, Peoples Republic of China). Conducted Between 1992-2002” in Westport: Athena Review, vol. 3 (4), pp. 16-26. Chinese language version: Xunzhao Shiluo De Wenhua: “Xibu Xizang Qian Fujiao Shiyi Zhongyao Kaogu Yiji Diao Cha Baogau” (trans. Tang Huisheng and Tan Xiuhua) in Essays on the International Conference on Tibetan Archaeology and Art, pp. 1-29. Chengdu: Sichuan Remin Chuban She, 2004.
2003. “Tibetan Stones of Time: Exploration of the Ancient Bon Kingdom of Zhang Zhung” in Ligmincha.org, http://www.ligmincha.org/html/zhangzhung.html
2002. “Gods, Hunting and Society: Animals in the Ancient Cave Paintings of Celestial Lake in Northern Tibet” in Rome: East and West, vol.52 (1-4), pp. 347-396.
2000. “Pre-Buddhist Archaeological Sites in Northern Tibet: An Introductory Report on the Types of Monuments and Related Literary and Oral Historical Sources” in Kathmandu: Kailash, vol. 19 (1-2), pp. 1-142.
2000. “Bon Rock Paintings at gNam mtsho: Glimpses of the Ancient Religion of Northern Tibet” in Melbourne: Rock Art Research, vol. 17 (1), pp. 35-55.
2000. ‘Schuyler Jones’ “Tibetan Nomads”, book review in Dharamsala: The Tibet Journal, vol. 25 (1), pp. 94-99.
2000. “Images of Lost Civilization: The Ancient Rock Art of Upper Tibet” in Asian Art Online  Journal, http://www.asianart.com/articles/rockart/index.html
2000. “Elders of Tibet: Vital Link with a Vast Unwritten Tradition” in Conway: The Mirror: Newspaper of the International Dzogchen Community, May/June, no. 4.
1999. “Archaeological Mysteries at Tibet’s Sacred Mountain Nyenchen Thanglha” in Kathmandu:  Himal, vol. 12 (12), pp. 42, 43.
1999. “High Country Culture” in El Paso: Discovering Archaeology, vol. 1 (3), pp. 78-83.
1999. “A Preliminary Archaeological Survey of Da rog mtsho” in Dharamsala: The Tibet Journal, vol. 24 (1), pp. 56-90.
1999. “Northern Tibet Exploration: Archaeological Discoveries of the Changthang Circuit Expedition” in Asian Art Online Journal, http://www.asianart.com/articles/tibarchaeo/index.html1999. “The Ancient Amulets of Tibet”, in Asian Art Online Journal, http://www.asianart.com/articles/tibarchaeo/index.html
1998. “Thogchags: Talismans of Tibet” in Hong Kong: Arts of Asia, vol. 28 (3), pp. 44-64.
1997. “Notes on Three Series of Unusual Symbols Discovered on the Byang thang” in Rome: East and West, vol.47 (1-4), pp. 395-405.
1996. “A Preliminary Archaeological Survey of gNam mtsho and Dang ra g.yu mtsho” in Delhi: The Tibet Journal, vol.21 (2), 58-84. Reprint: The History of Tibet, vol. 1, pp. 99-117. Routledge Curzon: London, 2003. Reprint: The Mirror: Newspaper of the International Dzogchen Community, May/June 1997; July/August 1997; April/May 1998; June/July 1998.    
1995. “Doring Revisited” in Kathmandu: Himal, vol. 8 (3), pp. 29-32.
1994. “Thog lcags” in Dharamsala: The Tibet Journal, vol.19 (1), pp. 92-97.
1994. “Victor Chen's Tibet Handbook”, book review in Kathmandu: Himal, vol. 7 (6), p. 31.
1993. “Quest for the Four Fountains of Tibet” in Kathmandu: Himal, vol6 (1), pp. 41-44.

III. Additional Published Works
I have also co-authored Lonely Planet Tibet (Lonely Planet Publications, Melbourne: 1999; 2002; 2005); and contributed information and written pieces for Victor Chan’s Tibet Handbook;  Stephen Batchelor’s Tibet Guide Book; Stan Armington’s Lonely Planet Trekking in Nepal and    Lonely Planet Bhutan; Hugh Swift’s Trekking in the Himalaya and Karakorum; etc.