 As the seat of the Sakya (or Sakyapa) school of Tibetan Buddhism, it was founded in 1073, by Konchok Gyelpo (; 1034–1102), originally a Nyingmapa monk of the powerful noble family of the Tsang and became the first Sakya Trizin.Its powerful abbots governed Tibet during the 13th and the 14th centuries under the overlordship of the Mongol Yuan dynasty after the downfall of the Tibetan Empire until they were eclipsed by the rise of the new Kagyu and Gelug schools of Tibetan Buddhism.Its Mongolian architecture is quite different from that of temples in Lhasa and Yarlung.