The result of 10 years of research, this is an authoritative description of the rise and eventual fall of the Khmer empire. Colour illustrations, not only of the better known monuments but of many of the more obscure sites, complement the text. The Khmers were first noticed by the Chinese when they began to occupy neighbouring maritime territories, Champa and Funan; their own recorded history commences with inscriptions from the 5th century onward. They soon extended their power northwards and westwards, eventually occupying almost the whole area of present-day Thailand. At

These are the memoirs of a Dob-dob', or fighting monk, trained to keep the peace in a monastic community of several thousand monks, during and after the Chinese invasion of Tibet, in 1959. The true story of a young man born in a traditional Tibetan village, ordained a monk in one of the country's great monasteries, and eventually assigned the post of dob-dob, a 'fighting monk' charged with maintaining monastic order. Fleeing Tibet with the Dalai Lama after the Chinese invasion of 1959, never to see his native land again, and suffering the loss of a leg during the'