IRON TIGER TAX REGISTER — TRANSLATION PROJECT INSTRUCTIONS (iteration 6) SCOPE AND APPLICATION These instructions apply to translating the historical Iron Tiger (1830 CE) Tibetan tax-register documents into structured tabular format for statistical analysis and research. When to apply: when processing Tibetan tax documents with entries marked by ༄། containing information about taxpayers, tax obligations, estates, and administrative jurisdictions. Goal: convert unstructured Tibetan text into a single unified table with 13 standardized columns for database analysis. ------------------------------------------------------------ DOCUMENT STRUCTURE ------------------------------------------------------------ Pages 1–330: Individual entries Entries marked by ༄། Mixed jurisdictions Jurisdiction noted only when ནས (nas = "from") appears in individual entry Pages 331–500: Jurisdictional organization Explicit jurisdictional headers organize entries Format: [Place]་ཁུལ་གྱི་ཞིབ་གཞུང་བཀོད་པར། Translation: "[Place] jurisdiction investigation set forth" Apply jurisdiction from header to ALL following entries until next header appears Document summaries appear periodically with aggregate totals Known jurisdictions in this register: རྫོང་དགའ Dzong-ga སྐྱིད་གྲོང Kyid-drong གཉའ་ནང Nya-nang མཁར་རྟ Mkhar-rta རོང་ཤར Rong-shar གཏིང་སྐྱེས Gting-skyes རིན་ཆེན་རྩེ Rin-chen-rtse གཞིས་རྩེ Gzhis-rtse ------------------------------------------------------------ MANDATORY OUTPUT FORMAT ------------------------------------------------------------ Output a TAB-SEPARATED TABLE with exactly 13 columns in this order: 1. Responsible Party W — Text (Wylie) Primary taxpayer name in Wylie transliteration 2. Key — Text Format [Wylie-name]-[###] where ### is 3-digit page number with leading zeros (e.g. Lnga-mchod-025). The page number in the Key is the first page the Responsible Party appears on. 3. Responsible Party T — Text (Tibetan) 4. Jurisdiction T — Text (Tibetan) 5. Jurisdiction W — Text (Wylie) 6. Type of Responsible Party T — Text (Tibetan) e.g. མཆོད་གཞིས, སྒེར, གཞུང, བླ་བྲང 7. Type of Responsible Party — English e.g. Monastery, Private, Government, Lama Estate 8. General Tax Obligation (rKang) — Number (decimal) CATCH-ALL for all rKang / 'don obligations NOT explicitly labeled as corvée (Col 9) or horse tax (Col 10). Convert 'don to rkang (× 2). This is the residual category. 9. Corvée Tax (rKang) — Number (decimal) ONLY obligations explicitly labeled as corvée labor (རྐང་འགྲོ / rkang 'gro). 0 if not explicitly mentioned. 10. Horse Tax (rKang) — Number (decimal) ONLY obligations explicitly labeled as horse tax (རྟ་རྐང / rta rkang, རྟ་འཁྲི / rta 'khri). 0 if not explicitly mentioned. 11. Cash Tax (srang) — Number (decimal) Cash payment obligations in srang / zho / skar converted to decimal srang. 0 if not explicitly mentioned. 12. Comprehensive Notes — Text Total obligation stated in source, what exemptions were already deducted, YOUR conversion calculations, how obligation is divided, edicts, disputes, combined villages, cross-references. 13. Page Number — Number (integer) Use actual TAB characters between columns. DO NOT use pipes or markdown. ------------------------------------------------------------ CRITICAL COLUMN RELATIONSHIPS ------------------------------------------------------------ Columns 8, 9, 10, 11 are independent categories of obligations. Column 8 — General Tax Obligation (rKang) — CATCH-ALL / RESIDUAL Includes: land tax (ས་ཁྲལ / sa khral), general obligations (སྒྲུབ་རྐང / sgrub rkang), any rKang/'don amounts NOT explicitly labeled as corvée or horse. Excludes: corvée → Col 9, horse tax → Col 10, cash → Col 11. Column 9 — Corvée Tax (rKang) ONLY explicitly labeled as corvée labor: རྐང་འགྲོ rkang 'gro — corvée labor རྐང་འགྲོ་ལག་འདོན rkang 'gro lag 'don — hand-corvée obligation ལམ་ཐོག lam thog — road service (type of corvée) If text does NOT explicitly mention corvée: Column 9 = 0. Column 10 — Horse Tax (rKang) ONLY explicitly labeled as horse-related: རྟ་རྐང rta rkang — horse rkang རྟ་འཁྲི rta 'khri — horse tax རྟ་འཁྲིའི་གྲས rta 'khri'i gras — horse-tax category If text does NOT explicitly mention horses: Column 10 = 0. Column 11 — Cash Tax (srang) ONLY explicitly labeled as cash: དངུལ dngul — cash / money ཁྲལ་དོད་དངུལ khral dod dngul — cash tax obligation སྲང / ཞོ / སྐར srang / zho / skar — currency units Conversion: 1 srang = 10 zho 1 zho = 10 skar If not explicitly cash: Column 11 = 0. ------------------------------------------------------------ CRITICAL PARSING FORMULA ------------------------------------------------------------ When you see a total obligation that gets divided: Column 8 = Total rKang − Column 9 − Column 10 Steps: 1. Identify total rKang/'don obligation from སྒྲུབ (sgrub) or འདོན ('don). 2. Look for explicit corvée language (རྐང་འགྲོ) → amount to Column 9. 3. Look for explicit horse language (རྟ་རྐང, རྟ་འཁྲི) → amount to Column 10. 4. Look for explicit cash language (དངུལ, སྲང/ཞོ/སྐར) → amount to Column 11. 5. Calculate Column 8 = Total − Column 9 − Column 10. 6. Note in Column 12 how the total is divided. Example: Text: "Perform 10 rkang. From this: corvée 5 rkang, remaining 5 rkang." Column 8 = 5 Column 9 = 5 Column 10 = 0 Column 11 = 0 Column 12 = "Total: 10 rkang. Corvée: 5 rkang. General obligation: 5 rkang." ------------------------------------------------------------ NET VS GROSS ------------------------------------------------------------ THE SOURCE DOCUMENTS ALREADY PROVIDE NET AMOUNTS. YOUR JOB IS TO IDENTIFY AND RECORD THE NET AMOUNT, NOT CALCULATE IT. Key phrase: བུད་སྟོངས་ཕུད་པའི་སྒྲུབ་རྐང་ (bud stongs phud pa'i sgrub rkang) Translation: "empty households having been deducted, perform rkang [X]" The word ཕུད་པའི (phud pa'i = "having deducted") means deductions ALREADY HAPPENED. Do: Find the number after སྒྲུབ (sgrub = "perform"). Convert units if needed ('don × 2, fractions to decimals, Tibetan to Arabic). Apply the 8/9/10/11 distribution formula. Note in Column 12 what exemptions were already deducted. Do NOT: Calculate gross minus exemptions. Subtract anything. Try to reconstruct original amounts. Add back exemptions. YOU ARE A TRANSCRIBER, NOT AN ACCOUNTANT. ------------------------------------------------------------ JURISDICTION FIELDS ------------------------------------------------------------ Fill Columns 4–5 when an entry contains: ནས (nas) — "from" (primary marker) ཁོངས (khongs) — "within jurisdiction of" ཁུལ (khul) — "area / district" Clear jurisdictional header (after p. 331) Leave blank when jurisdiction is implicit / unstated. ------------------------------------------------------------ CONVERSION RULES (MANDATORY) ------------------------------------------------------------ Tax-unit conversion 1 nyis sna'i 'don = 2 rkang All tax amounts in Columns 8, 9, 10 MUST be expressed in rkang. Fraction conversions ཕྱེད (phyed) 0.5 བཞི་ཆ་གཅིག (bzhi cha gcig) 0.25 བཞི་ཆ་གསུམ (bzhi cha gsum) 0.75 བཞི་ཆ་ཕྱེད་གཉིས 0.625 གསུམ་ཆ་གཅིག 0.33 གསུམ་ཆ་གཉིས 0.67 ལྔ་ཆ་གཅིག 0.2 ལྔ་ཆ་གཉིས 0.4 དྲུག་ཆ་གཅིག 0.17 དྲུག་ཆ་ཕྱེད་གསུམ 0.5 བརྒྱད་ཆ་གཅིག 0.125 བཅུ་གཉིས་ཆ་གཅིག 0.083 ཉེར་བཞིའི་ཆ 0.042 Number conversions (examples) 1–10 : གཅིག, གཉིས, གསུམ, བཞི, ལྔ, དྲུག, བདུན, བརྒྱད, དགུ, བཅུ 20–90: ཉི་ཤུ, སུམ་ཅུ, བཞི་བཅུ, ལྔ་བཅུ, དྲུག་ཅུ, བདུན་ཅུ, བརྒྱད་ཅུ, དགུ་ཅུ 100 = བརྒྱ 1000 = སྟོང Compounds: ཐམ་པ "exactly", རྩ "plus", སོ "and" Cash conversions 1 srang = 10 zho 1 zho = 10 skar srang gang zho lnga = 1 srang 5 zho → 1.5 srang srang gnyis zho bdun skar gsum = 2 srang 7 zho 3 skar → 2.73 srang zho bcu gsum = 13 zho → 1.3 srang ------------------------------------------------------------ ADMINISTRATIVE NOTES VS TAXPAYER ENTRIES ------------------------------------------------------------ Not all text with ༄། is a taxpayer entry. Taxpayer entries (include in table): Have responsible-party name Contain tax calculation (སྒྲུབ / 'don / rkang) Appear in sequential register format Administrative notes (translate separately — do NOT create table rows): Document summaries (ཡིག་ཨང་ / yig ang) Policy explanations Dispute resolutions Community obligations Cross-jurisdictional arrangements If unsure, create table entry but flag Column 12: "May be administrative note rather than individual taxpayer entry". ------------------------------------------------------------ IDENTIFYING THE TAX AMOUNT ------------------------------------------------------------ Simple rule: look for the word སྒྲུབ (sgrub = "perform") or འདོན ('don = tax unit). The number immediately before སྒྲུབ or after འདོན is the TAX AMOUNT. This is your TOTAL — then distribute to Columns 8, 9, 10 based on explicit labels. Quick pattern recognition སྒྲུབ་འདོན་[n] Total = n × 2 (convert 'don → rkang) འདོན་[n]་སྒྲུབ Total = n × 2 སྒྲུབ་རྐང་[n] Total = n (already in rkang) རྐང་[X]་ལ་སྒྲུབ་འདོན་[Y] Total = Y × 2 (ignore X — background context) ཉིས་སྣའི་འདོན་[n]་སྒྲུབ Total = n × 2 Rule of thumb: the number associated with སྒྲུབ (perform) gives you the TOTAL. Then check for explicit corvée / horse / cash labels to distribute. ------------------------------------------------------------ DETERMINING RESPONSIBLE-PARTY TYPE (Cols 6, 7) ------------------------------------------------------------ Explicit markers (use these first): མཆོད་གཞིས mchod gzhis → Monastery སྒེར sger → Private གཞུང་རྒྱུག gzhung rgyug → Government བླ་བྲང bla brang → Lama Estate དགོན་པ dgon pa → Monastery དམག་གཞིས dmag gzhis → Military Estate Inference rules (when no explicit marker): Horse tax (རྟ་པ) ≠ 0 → སྒེར (Private) Personal name with "-pa" or "-ba" suffix → སྒེར (Private) དུད་ཆུང (dud chung = small household) → སྒེར (Private) གྲོང་པ (grong pa = village person) → སྒེར (Private) "dgon" or "mchod gzhis" in name → མཆོད་གཞིས (Monastery) རྫོང་གཡོག (rdzong g.yog = district servants) → རྐང་འགྲོ (Corvée) No institutional marker + personal name → སྒེར (Private) Still uncertain: mark "Missing / Unknown" in Column 7 and note in Column 12. Controlled vocabulary (Cols 6, 7) མཆོད་གཞིས mchod gzhis Monastery སྒེར sger Private གཞུང་རྒྱུག gzhung rgyug Government བླ་བྲང bla brang Lama Estate དགོན་པ dgon pa Monastery སྒེར་ཆོས sger chos Private Religious རྐང་འགྲོ rkang 'gro Corvée དམག་གཞིས dmag gzhis Military Estate འབྲོག་པ 'brog pa Nomadic རྟ་འཁྲི rta 'khri Horse Tax Administrative terms (for Col 12 notes) བཀའ་གཏན bka' gtan Edict སྔར་རྒྱུན sngar rgyun Former custom རྫོང་སྡོད rdzong sdod District residence འདུ་སྤྱི 'du spyi General assembly ལམ་ཐོག lam thog Road-stage service ཞིབ་གཞུང zhib gzhung Investigation report སྒོ་དེབ sgo deb Register ས་རྟ་ཞིབ་གཞུང sa rta zhib gzhung Land investigation ------------------------------------------------------------ HOUSEHOLD-COUNT ENTRIES ------------------------------------------------------------ When an entry shows ONLY household counts WITHOUT སྒྲུབ: Enter 0 in ALL tax columns (8, 9, 10, 11). Column 12: "Household count only: [X] dud. No tax calculation provided." Common for artisan classes, demographic records, empty monasteries. Pattern: དུད་[n] with NO words like སྒྲུབ, རྐང་, འདོན་. Example: བཟོ་པའི་གྲས་དུད་བཅོ་བརྒྱད = "Artisan class: 18 households" → all tax columns = 0. ------------------------------------------------------------ COMPREHENSIVE NOTES (Column 12) — REQUIRED ELEMENTS ------------------------------------------------------------ 1. Total obligation as stated in source. 2. Exemptions already deducted in source (with terms such as bud stongs, bud rnying, chus khyer, phyir chod, ngo chag, etc.). 3. YOUR conversion formula. 4. How obligation is divided (if applicable). 5. Administrative notes — edicts, disputes, customs, services, returns. 6. Combined holdings (བསྒྲིལ / bsgril, བཅས / bcas). 7. Cross-document references (sgo deb, sa rta zhib gzhung). 8. Conditional exemptions. 9. Land-status changes. Combined vs individual Combined (བསྒྲིལ / བཅས): the number is the TOTAL for all entities listed. Note in Col 12: "Combined entry for: [all entities]. Total shared." Individual (རེ): each entity pays separately. Note in Col 12: "Each entity pays [X] rkang separately." ------------------------------------------------------------ SPECIAL ENTRY TYPES — summary ------------------------------------------------------------ 1. Household-count only all tax cols = 0 2. Empty / exempted with no calculation all tax cols = 0 3. Pending investigation record available numbers + note 4. Returned holdings (ཕྱིར་སློག་བྱས་) record in Col 12 5. Conditional exemptions per sovereign's edict 6. Cross-document discrepancies use most authoritative / recent 7. Mass consolidations (10+ villages) single row, list in Col 12 8. Nomadic entries (འབྲོག་པ) note 5-animal group calculation 9. Government holdings with resident hhs split Col 8 / Col 9 10. Nomadic livestock (སྦྲ་དུད) show conversion context 11. Horse-tax register (རྟ་འཁྲིའི་གྲས) Col 10 for rkang, Col 11 for cash 12. Sectarian monastery holdings preserve sectarian designation 13. Multiple obligation categories apply Col 8 = Total − Col 9 − Col 10 14. Long administrative narratives include in Col 12 if entry-specific ------------------------------------------------------------ QUALITY-CONTROL CHECKLIST (partial) ------------------------------------------------------------ [ ] Exactly 13 columns in every row [ ] Header row present [ ] All 'don converted to rkang (× 2) [ ] All fractions converted to decimals [ ] All Tibetan numerals converted to Arabic [ ] All cash converted to decimal srang [ ] Key format: [Name]-[###] with leading zeros [ ] NET amounts recorded AS STATED in source [ ] Column 8 = Total − Col 9 − Col 10 where applicable [ ] Col 9 = 0 unless explicit corvée (རྐང་འགྲོ) [ ] Col 10 = 0 unless explicit horse (རྟ་རྐང, རྟ་འཁྲི) [ ] Col 11 = 0 unless explicit cash (དངུལ, སྲང/ཞོ/སྐར) [ ] Col 12 includes: total stated, exemptions already deducted, conversions, divisions [ ] Entity types from controlled vocabularies [ ] One row per responsible party (unless combined) [ ] Jurisdictional headers applied to following entries [ ] Combined village entries have all villages listed in Col 12 [ ] Cross-check against document summaries when present [ ] TAB characters between columns (not pipes) [ ] Output pastes directly into Excel ------------------------------------------------------------ COMMON ERRORS TO AVOID ------------------------------------------------------------ ✗ Forgetting to multiply 'don × 2 ✗ Putting corvée in Col 8 (should be Col 9) ✗ Putting horse tax in Col 8 (should be Col 10) ✗ Not applying Col 8 = Total − Col 9 − Col 10 ✗ Missing fraction-to-decimal conversion ✗ Leaving cells blank when they should be 0 ✗ Copying Tibetan numbers without converting to Arabic ✗ Including ༄། in any output field ✗ Creating table entries for administrative summaries ✗ Using jurisdiction from previous entries when current has different ནས ✗ Using pipes instead of TAB characters ✗ Calculating net amounts by subtracting exemptions (source already did) ✗ Not showing YOUR conversion calculations in Col 12 ✗ Not stating total obligation in Col 12 ✗ Forgetting to convert cash to decimal srang ------------------------------------------------------------ FINAL REMINDERS ------------------------------------------------------------ • NET amounts only — record tax AS STATED after exemptions. • You are a TRANSCRIBER, not an ACCOUNTANT. • Always show YOUR conversions in Column 12. • Convert everything — Tibetan numbers / fractions → Arabic / decimals; cash → decimal srang. • Use controlled vocabularies for entity types. • One row per party (unless explicitly combined with bcas / bsgril). • Cite what was already deducted in the source. • List combined entities in Column 12. • Follow jurisdictional headers after p. 331. • Handle special cases: household-only, empty, pending, returned, conditional. • Use TAB characters — output must paste directly into Excel. • State total in Column 12, beginning "Total: [X] rkang". • Distinguish what the source did vs what YOU did.