The earliest attempts to operate a postal service in Tibet occured when the Indian Post Office opened a number of temporary post offices in Tibet to support the Frontier Commision in 1903, and to support the Younghusband Expedition to Lhasa in 1904. The 1904 Convention between Britain and Tibet allowed the Indian Imperial Government to establish a permanent postal service in Tibet, and Indian post offices were duely opened in Gyantse [Gyangzê], Phari [Pagri] and Yatung [Yadong] in 1905, and in Gartok the following year. These post ofices used Indian stamps.
Tibet had been a vassal state to the Qing dynasty since 1720, but during the nineteenth-century Chinese influence had waned. However, a convention on Tibet signed between Britain and China in 1906 was interpreted by the Qing government as recognition of Chinese sovereignity over Tibet, and so in 1908 the Chinese government dispatched an army to re-establish Chinese authority in Tibet. The Chinese army defeated the Tibetan army at Chamdo in 1909, and occupied Lhasa in February 1910.
The Chinese set up post offices in Lhasa, Gyantse, Shigatse [Xigazê], Chamdo [Qamdo], Phari and Yatung. To begin with the post offices used the "coiled dragon" set of ordinary Chinese stamps (issued between 1902 and 1910). However, in March 1911 the "coiled dragon" set of Chinese stamps was issued for use in Tibet, with their values in Tibetan currency overprinted in three languages, Chinese, English and Tibetan.
The Chinese revolution, which overthrew the Qing dynasty and established the Republic of China, took place on the 10th October 1911, and by the end of December 1911 the Chinese post offices at Lhasa, Gyantse and Shigatse had been closed, and those in Phari and Yatung closed early the next year. Only the post office at Chamdo remained open, as Eastern Tibet remained under Chinese control until 1918.
Tibetan : 32 skar སྐར་ (pronounced gar) = 1 sgormo སྒོར་མོ་ (pronounced gômo)
Chinese : 32 fen 分 = 1 yuan 圓
English : 12 pies = 1 anna ; 16 annas = 1 rupee
1 skar = 1 fen = ½ anna
1 sgormo = 1 yuan = 1 rupee
Issued : March 1911
Values : 3 pies, ½ Anna, 1 Anna, 2 Annas, 2½ Annas, 3 Annas, 4 Annas, 6 Annas, 12 Annas, 1 rupee, 2 rupees
| No. | Chinese Stamp | Overprinted Value | Variants | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chinese | English | Tibetan | |||
| 1 | 1 cent | 半分 [½ fen] |
Three Pies | སྐར་ཕྱེད། [½ skar] |
a. Overprinted upsidedown |
| 2 | 2 cents | 壹分 [1 fen] |
Half Anna | སྐར་གང་། [1 skar] |
|
| 3 | 4 cents | 貳分 [2 fen] |
One Anna | སྐར་གཉིས་། [2 skar] |
|
| 4 | 7 cents | 肆分 [4 fen] |
Two Annas | སྐར་བཞི། [4 skar] |
|
| 5 | 10 cents | 伍分 [5 fen] |
Two & Half Annas | སྐར་ཡྔ་། [5 skar] |
|
| 6 | 16 cents | 陸分 [6 fen] |
Three Annas | སྐར་དྲུག་། [6 skar] |
a. Capital inverted "S" in "Annas" |
| 7 | 20 cents | 捌分 [8 fen] |
Four Annas | སྐར་བརྒྱད་། [8 skar] |
|
| 8 | 30 cents | 拾貳分 [12 fen] |
Six Annas | སྐར་བཅུ་གཉིས། [12 skar] |
|
| 9 | 50 cents | 貳拾肆分 [24 fen] |
Twelve Annas | སྐར་ཉི་ཤུ་རྩ་བཞི། [24 skar] |
|
| 10 | 1 dollar | 壹圓 [1 yuan] |
One rupee | སྒོར་མོ་གཅིག་། [1 sgormo] |
|
| 11 | 2 dollars | 貳圓 [2 yuan] |
Two rupees | སྒོར་མོ་གཉིས་། [2 sgormo] |
|
| Lhasa, 1911 | Phari, 1911 |
|
|
Stamps of Independant Tibet | Stamps of the People's Republic of China