The large hanging in silk embroidery (Ch. 00260), to which the small
scale, one-tenth, and certain photographic difficulties do not allow
full justice to be done in this reproduction, is by its size—the
perfectly preserved central figure is close upon life-size—by its
remarkably skilful execution, and by its fine colours one of the most
impressive of the pictorial remains recovered. That it represents
Śākyamuni on Gṛdhrakūṭa, the ‘Vulture Peak’, famous in Buddhist legend
and situated near Rājagṛha, the present Rājgir, is conclusively proved
by the rocks behind the Buddha’s figure in the centre.
This fine, if hieratically stiff, figure, as I have already had
occasion to point out,[70] when discussing the statues shown by the
pictures in Plates XIII and XIV, in every detail of its pose and dress
reproduces a specific type, fixed originally by some Indian sculptural
representation.[71] But if its iconographic characteristics are
determined by long hieratic tradition, it is different with the setting
it has found here. In the whole composition of our picture is
revealed the individual touch of a master, and the skill and taste of
the craftsmen who reproduced his work make it easy for us to recognize
the merits of the lost original.
The design in our hanging has been worked solid throughout in
satin-stitch. The embroidery has been executed with admirable care
and the silks used have remained clean and glossy.[72] The ground is
a coarse natural-coloured linen faced with light buff silk. This has
mostly worn off in the interspaces of figures. Two of the figures,
too, representing monkish disciples, having fallen along the line
of folding, while the hanging was stored away and crushed for long
centuries, have perished except for remains of the heads. Otherwise
the picture is practically complete, and neither the effect of the
whole nor that of characteristic features of treatment is impaired.
Śākyamuni stands facing the spectator with his feet on a lotus.
His right arm hangs stiffly by his side with the fingers stretched
downwards and the palm turned to the side. The arm wrapped in the
folds of the glowing red mantle holds an ‘ear’ of it gathered at the
breast. The mantle closely draped about the body falls in a point to
below the knees and allows a light green under-robe to be seen thence
to the ankles. The yellow lining of the mantle shows in a rippling
edge along the outline of the left arm and down the body, a device
which is familiar already to Gandhāra sculpture. The right shoulder and
arm are left bare and are painted a deep golden yellow. The Buddha’s
face is shown in light buff and, curiously enough, the right forearm
as well. This distinction is emphasized in the case of the latter by
the work being executed in thin rows of chain-stitch and is obviously
intentional. But its iconographic significance is for the present
uncertain.[73] Behind the head, with its narrow, slightly slanting
eyes and hair of very dark indigo, appears a nimbus in plain rings of
variegated colours. A narrow halo shaped like a lotus petal, similarly
coloured, surrounds the whole figure, and behind this again appears a
border of rocks emblematic of the Vulture Peak.
By the side of the Buddha stand pairs of disciples and Bodhisattvas,
both on lotuses. The latter, who may represent Avalokiteśvara and
Mahāsthāma, turn three-fourths towards him; the one on the left with
hands in adoration, the other with both arms slightly advanced from the
elbows and the right hand held as if in the _vara-mudrā_. The dress and
adornments of these figures conform to those of Bodhisattvas of the
‘Indian’ type as already noticed, but are drawn more trimly. A certain
stiffness and simplicity in their design suggest close affinity to
Indian models. But in the Bodhisattvas’ faces we notice the influence
of Chinese style, as also in the ornamental borders of their dress.
Of the disciples’ figures in the background enough remains to show that
their heads were shaven and haloed and their dress that of monks, with
mantles barred with cross-stripes. The face of the one on the Buddha’s
left was lined and frowning, which suggests identity with Kāśyapa; the
other with face plump and benign may represent Śāriputra. By the side
of the small and somewhat stiff canopy above Śākyamuni’s head are seen
two graceful Apsaras floating down with outspread arms, borne up by
fine cloud scrolls and their billowing stoles. Their resemblance to the
Apsaras of Plates X and XI is striking.
Below the Buddha’s feet there kneels on either side a small lion of
conventional type with one forepaw lifted. Below them again is a panel
for a dedication, which, however, has never been worked in. Of the
narrow cartouches placed by each line of donors, only the two foremost
on the men’s side bear Chinese characters, now mostly illegible.
The groups of donors on either side of the panel, disposed in strict
symmetry, present special interest by their life-like treatment and by
their costumes. This is easily seen from Plate XXXV, which reproduces
the group of the ladies on the more adequate scale of two-fifths.
Arrayed in three lines and kneeling on mats, they all wear a very plain
type of dress. It comprises high-waisted skirts of brown, green, or
blue, bodices with long close-fitting sleeves, and small shawl-like
stoles. They have no jewels, and their hair is done in a small topknot
without any ornaments. By the side of the hindmost two ladies kneels
a child, and at the back stands a young female attendant in a long
plain gown. On the men’s side there kneels foremost a shaven monk in a
brown cloak, behind him three men dressed in long belted coats of light
greenish-blue and wearing peaked and tailed caps of dark brown or blue.
A young attendant with bare head holding a staff stands at the back.
A glance at the lay donors is enough to prove that the dress in each
case is in closest agreement with that worn by the donors in the two
paintings of Amitābha’s Paradise in Plates X and XI.[74] For these a
series of concordant indications postulates a date distinctly older
than that of our earliest dated picture of A.D. 864.[75] A variety of
considerations lead me to believe that the date of those two paintings
and of our hanging as well cannot be later than the eighth century, but
may possibly be even somewhat earlier.[76]
In accessory details, too, a very close contact reveals itself between
the embroidery picture and the paintings shown in Plates X and XI,
proving that they belong to the same period and were probably produced
under the influence of the same pictorial school. In all three we see
the identical pair of graceful Apsaras figures, in an attitude not
found elsewhere among our paintings. In the dress of the Bodhisattvas
we may note as a common peculiarity the same brocade-like decoration
of the edges of the lower robes. Peculiar, too, to the three pictures
are the plain sage-green lotus seed-beds underfoot or as seats of the
divine figures. Whatever the exact date of production may be, there
seems little reason to doubt that the hanging must rank with the oldest
of our Ch‘ien-fo-tung paintings. The needlework is of the finest, as
Plate XXXV shows with particular clearness, and to this the picture
owes the striking freshness of its colour effects and the excellent
preservation of all parts that remain.