Seven Years in Tibet – the story of the escape of the two Austrian war prisoners to the Forbidden Town of Lhasa is known all over the world. But hardly anyone knows the man, who was the companion of Heinrich Harrer – namely Peter Aufschnaiter. He stayed in Tibet when Harrer had already escaped. He kept silent when Harrer talked. Seventy years after the flight from British imprisonment to Tibet, one has started for the first time to evaluate meticulously the diary, letters and newly found material of Aufschnaiter. It turns out clearly that Aufschnaiter was the mastermind of the adventure, without his knowledge of land and language Harrer would not have been able to gain ground in Tibet.