A Polychrome Wood Manuscript Cover, Nepal, 11th Century

Auction Closed

September 20, 05:33 PM GMT

Estimate

12,000 - 18,000 USD

Lot Details

Description

Another Property

A Polychrome Wood Manuscript Cover

Nepal, 11th Century

2 by 22½ in. (5 by 57.2 cm)

depicting seven teaching Buddhas, with hands in dharmachakramudra, wearing diaphanous red uttarasangha, and maroon antaravasaka showing at the ankles, seated in vajraparyankasana, the heads with alternate red and blue halos, each with rainbow-edged prabhamandala, all set on a monochrome red background, with seated deities at either end wearing bodhisattva jewelry and fluttering scarves, seated in vajraparyankasana with similar prabhamandala and partially obscured by natural accretion from handling during ritual use

Himalayan Art Resources item no. 13630.

Collection of the late Mr. Stafford Elias, London, circa 1960, and thence by descent.

Compare the style of a dharmachakra Buddha in a Nepalese palm leaf Prajnaparamita manuscript dated 1071 in the collection of the Asiatic Society, Kolkata, with similarly edged robe, neckline and fall of cloth from the lower arms, see Pratapaditya Pal and Julia Meech-Pekarik, Buddhist Book Illuminations, New York, Paris, Hong Kong, New Delhi, 1988, p. 101, fig. 34: and compare the format of early Nepalese book covers recorded by Pt. Rahula Sanskityayana in 1928-9 and 1934 in the collections of Tibetan monasteries including Ngor and Shalu, where the figures are surrounded by similar large circular halos set against an unembellished monochrome background, see S. K. Pathak, ed, The Album of the Tibetan Art Collections, Patna, 1986, pls. 16, 18.