A CRYSTAL AND GILT-BRONZE RELIQUARY JAPAN, KAMAKURA PERIOD, 12TH – 14TH CENTURY |

in the form of a crystal column enclosing four loose beads and embellished with gilt-bronze mounts, standing on a stepped octagonal base surrounded by pendent lappets and a collaring band of reticulated scrolling lotus, all rising to a 'flaming pearl' '(Hòju) on top of the reliquary 

Collection of the Onsen-ji Temple, Arima.

Dai 3 kai Tokubetsu-ten Kobe no Bunkazai - Furusato no Shiho wo motomete [The 3rd Special Exhibition Cultural Property of Kobe - Seeking great works from our hometown], Kobe City Museum, Hyogo, 1983, no. 89.

After his death, the remains of Shakyamuni Buddha were divided into nine groups which, according to tradition, the Indian King Ashoka further subdivided in the 3rd century B.C. into 84,000 relics to be preserved within stupas and spread throughout India to promote the Buddhist Faith. In order to pursue this tradition and allow Buddhism to further spread throughout Asia, the original relics were soon replaced by bits of bones from high ranking priest, polished stones or beads of glass, which served as substitutes for the actual original relics of the Buddha. Beside stupas, the wish-granting jewel (in Japanese hōju) soon became also one of the favoured repositories for these relics. The present Buddhist reliquary takes the shape of a crystal column enclosing such relics and is set in finely chased gilt-bronze mounts surmounted by a wish-granting jewel. Compare a pagoda-shaped reliquary similarly surmounted by a wish-granting cintamani jewel but with the body formed of a vajra, also dated to the Kamakura period and designated as an Important Cultural Property, preserved in the collection of the Tokyo National Museum, Property E15502.

Such relics would eventually play a political role in Japan during the Heian and later Kamakura Period. For further analysis on the relationship between the keeping of the Buddhas relics and power struggles in Medieval Japan, see Brian D. Ruppert, Jewel in the Ashes: Buddha Relics and Power in Early Medieval Japan, Harvard University Asia Center, 2000.