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 jewellery and fluttering scarves, seated in vajraparyankasana with similar prabhamandala and partially obscured by natural accretion from handling during ritual use.
CATALOGUE NOTE
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.
Details
- Title : A POLYCHROME WOOD MANUSCRIPT COVER Nepal
- Year : 11th Century
- Classification : Manuscript
- Dimension : 2 by 22 1/2 in. (5 by 57.2 cm.)
- Accession No : Himalayan Art Resources item no. 13630. Lot no. 923
- Collection : Sotheby’s
- Credit Line : Collection of the late Mr. Stafford Elias, London, circa 1960's and thence by descent.
- Status : 21 MARCH 2019 | 30,000 — 50,000 USD