BON. — Also Bonpo: this is the name of the indigenous religion of the Tibetans, prior to the introduction of Buddhism into the country. It is also called *I Ha-chos*, that is, “the religion of the ancient gods.” Bon mythology knows of a “king of heaven” *Srid-pa*, who presides over the celestial spirits to whom the souls of the good ascend after death. There is a Sky-Earth god, a solar god *Ke-sar*, whose conflicts with his wife *A Bru-gu-ma* are recalled in spring songs. There is, as in China, a local earth god, *Sa-dag-po*, and a hearth spirit, *T'ab lha*. Knowledge of it remains very scant because it was absorbed by Buddhism, though not so completely that traces of it do not remain in the practice of present-day Lamaism (v.).
In practice, the Bon religion is a shamanistic animism (v. SCIAMANISMO): the shaman knows the art of entering into communion with the spirits, called Lha, and of receiving their revelation after entering a state of trance through suitable practices of concentration and mystical excitation; and of appeasing those that dominate the mountain passes, so exposed to the dangers of winds in those rugged regions. The cult of ancestors is also associated with that of the spirits, and together they form the fundamental basis of the religiosity proper to the Mongolian family.
A characteristic cultic practice, which has endured, is the piling up of heaps of stones (*rdo bum*) at points most frequented by spirits, and the placing upon them of scraps of cloth or other votive offerings.
The Bon religion was, toward the 7th century A.D., superficially absorbed by the Mahayanist Buddhism introduced into the country by the prince Sron btsan sgam po, at the suggestion of his two wives, one Chinese and the other Nepalese, who were followers of the Mahayana doctrine.
BON. BARTOLOMEO: V. BON, FAMIGLIA.