“Nag-chu dzong is located about one hundred and fifty miles north of Lhasa on the Nag River, in a wide valley surrounded by low hills. The whole area is controlled by the Lhasa monastery of Drepung and is governed by a lama’s confidant in the rank of dzedrung, who is always a representative of the monastery. The lama’s confidant is called khan-po and is considered the nominal rector of the monastery of Shabden in Nagguchu. (…) The place itself is a motley bunch of about eighty houses of typically Sino-Tibetan architecture. French lazaristic fathers M. Hook and M. Gabet visited this site in 1845 and described it in detail. Little has changed since that time. In the center, there is the monastery of Shabden, conditionally having at least three thousand inhabitants; but in fact, only one hundred and eighty people live there. (…) The monastery consists of a prayer hall, or du-khang; on the first floor, there are the rooms reserved for private chambers of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and His Holiness the Tashi Lama, from the temple (lha-khang) with a large statue of the Buddha Maitreya, a two-story house of the monastery’s senior lama and several other buildings around the central courtyard with rooms for lamas. Outside there is a temple dedicated to the religious patron of the district.”

(Yu.N. Roerich. Following the Paths of the Middle Asia.)