A Concise History of the Sakyapa School summarizes the history of that venerable tradition, briefly describing also its scholastic curriculum and even enumerating many of its most prominent branch monasteries. A precious contribution when its author wrote it in the late 1960s, when the Tibetans in Indian exile desperately needed such a historical synopsis, it remains helpful and relevant today. This new illustrated version reintroduces a hitherto forgotten work in a fresh way, and it also contributes significantly by providing the translator with a new and exhaustive list of all known Sakyapa monasteries (510 in all, grouped by country and county).

The late Chogye Trichen Rinpoche (1919–2007) was one of the most eminent Tibetan masters of his generation, not only for his own Sakya tradition but also for Tibetan Buddhism as a whole. His experience in practicing and teaching the main traditions of the Sakyapa School in Tibet and Mustang led him to become remarkably well informed about its history and its sources, as he demonstrates in the present concise history.