In my preliminary comments on Plate XII I have already had occasion to
discuss briefly the general characteristics of that interesting series
of silk banners which illustrate the legendary life of Gautama Buddha
and scenes closely connected with it.[78] This makes it possible to
restrict my remarks on the paintings reproduced in our Plate mainly to
the interpretation of the incidents and objects they are intended to
represent.
The two banners (Ch. lv. 009–10) shown on the sides of the Plate on the
scale of three-eighths form a pair exhibiting common characteristics
in all externals and undoubtedly painted by the same hand.[79] But
for the loss of all accessories and some damage to the top and bottom
scenes they are both excellently preserved. The drawing is notable for
its fine yet vigorous brush-strokes, the colours strong and clear. The
painter’s skill displays itself particularly in the landscapes of the
background, which convey a sense of great width and distance. Like
the figures, architecture, spacing, &c., of these banners they are
thoroughly Chinese in their treatment.
In the banner on the left (Ch. lv. 009) the topmost scene shows the
meeting of Gautama Buddha in a former birth with Dīpaṅkara Buddha. In
open country with mountains in the background the Buddha advances to
the right followed by two attendants in dress of the Bodhisattva type.
With his left hand he touches the head of the boy, the future Gautama,
who bows down before him with hands joined in adoration. The boy wears
a short deer-skin tunic and is bare-headed. The Buddha’s right hand is
lifted in the gesture of ‘Protection’.
The scene next below, chronologically out of order, represents the
first three of Prince Gautama’s famous ‘Four Encounters’ condensed,
as it were, into one. It shows with much realism the sick man on
his bedstead supported by an attendant, the old man being led by a
boy, and the putrified corpse. The first two of these ‘Encounters’
we have already met with in Plate XII. From the corpse there rises a
cloud carrying a small kneeling figure in Chinese secular dress with
belted coat and tailed cap. The figure is turned towards a palace-like
structure raised on clouds and representing an abode of the blessed.
That the figure of Gautama is absent from the scene may seem strange.
But the omission of the ascetic’s figure is less surprising. In
the fourth ‘Encounter’ of the legend he symbolizes the way of
salvation, and for Chinese eyes this may seem appropriately replaced
by the vision of a heavenly abode. The large paintings show us how
completely the hope of Sukhāvatī, the Buddhist Paradise, has effaced
the desire of Nirvāṇa in the minds of pious Chinese.
The succeeding scene represents the Bodhisattva’s miraculous Descent or
Conception as revealed to his mother in her dream. In a court of the
palace of Kapilavastu Queen Māyā is shown lying asleep upon a couch
placed within a projecting apartment. Its green rush-blinds are partly
rolled up. The infant Bodhisattva is seen kneeling with hands clasped
on the back of the traditional white elephant, which gallops towards
Māyā; two attendants kneel beside him. The whole group, enclosed within
a circular space, is carried on a cloud and thus clearly marked as a
vision.[80]
The bottom scene, which, unlike the rest, is not to be found among the
very numerous representations of Gautama’s Nativity in Graeco-Buddhist
sculpture, seems to show Māyā’s return to her father’s palace after
the dream.[81] Māyā, distinguished by a golden ornament on her head,
is seen walking with a woman attendant from the palace of Kapilavastu.
Both wear wide-sleeved over-jackets in which they muffle their hands.
In the companion banner (Ch. lv. 0010) on the right we see scenes which
continue the story of the Nativity in chronological sequence. The
top scene shows Māyā asleep in the same pavilion and pose as in the
‘Descent’ scene, but with three figures kneeling outside to the left
on a cloud and in adoring attitude. The interpretation is uncertain.
The succeeding scene, though also absent in the Gandhāra relievos, is
quite clear in its character. It presents to us Māyā on her way to the
Lumbinī garden. She is seated in a gaily coloured palanquin carried by
four bearers, whose rapid movement is excellently expressed. Two more
men carry trestles on which to set the palanquin down.
Immediately below we see the miraculous birth of Gautama Bodhisattva, a
familiar subject in Buddhist art of all times and regions. The child’s
issue from the mother’s right flank and her pose grasping a bough are
in close conformity with Indian tradition. But the ingenious use made
of Māyā’s wide-hanging sleeve discreetly to screen the act of birth
seems characteristically Chinese. The infant is springing downwards
where a woman attendant kneels to receive him on a cloth. A white lotus
appears where he is about to fall.
The ‘Nativity’ series is completed in the lowest panel by the famous
incident of the Seven Steps, with lotuses springing up beneath where
the Infant Bodhisattva has set his feet. To the right stands Māyā, with
her hands muffled in her long sleeves and her head turned back towards
the young child. To the left of him stands two women attendants with
bowed heads and hands raised in wonder or adoration. Enough of the
landscape remains to show that the scene was laid in the same grounds
as the preceding two. The Chinese inscription in the cartouche confirms
the interpretation.
The scene of the Seven Steps appears also at the bottom of the silk
banner (Ch. 00114), which is shown in the middle of the Plate reduced
to one-third of its size. It is painted in a more ornate style than
the other two, but lacks their sense of life and space. Here the child
steps forward with an air of difficulty but determination, the left arm
stretched upwards. Four ladies bend over him in surprise and adoration.
Behind to the left appear a fifth lady and a man wearing a belted
yellow robe and tailed cap. Their identity is doubtful.
The scene is preceded by the Bath of the Infant. The newly born
Bodhisattva stands in a golden laver, raised on a stand between two
palm-trees. Their tops are lost in a curling mass of black cloud, and
in this there appear, ranged archwise, the heads of the ‘nine Dragons
of the air’, gazing down on the infant with open mouths. A well-known
Buddhist tradition makes Nāgas or divinities of the thunder-clouds,
i.e. ‘Dragons’ in Chinese eyes, perform the laving of the New-born.
The descent of the water, which their mouths are supposed to pour
forth, is not actually represented here. Five women stand round, one
holding a towel.
The upper portion of the banner shows the Seven Jewels (_sapta
ratnāni_) associated in tradition with Gautama. According to ancient
Indian notions, the Seven Jewels, i.e. the best specimens of each
kind that appear during the reign, appertain to every _Cakravartin_,
or Universal Monarch, from his birth, and there is good reason to
believe that the Predestined One was credited with this character and
its attributes from an early date. We see them represented here in
two groups: in the upper one the wheel, emblem of sovereign rule; the
strong-box, symbolizing the jewel or treasure; the general and the
wife; in the lower one the minister, the elephant, and the horse. They
all stand on the curling white clouds, stylized in a peculiar fashion
and edged in red, blue, and green. Flaming jewels adorn the wheel, the
horse, and the elephant.
The general, clad in a coat of scale-armour and resembling a Lokapāla,
holds with his right hand a narrow oblong shield and in his left a
pennoned lance. The wife, Yaśodharā, is attired in a trailing skirt
and wide jacket with sleeves reaching to the ground. Her hair, as
usual with royal ladies represented in the Life scenes, is bound with
a gold fillet and done in two high loops rising up from the crown. The
minister’s dress is like hers, with a long terra-cotta band tied in a
bow hanging down the back. In the white horse, with red mane and tail,
we recognize, of course, Kaṇṭhaka, the Bodhisattva’s cherished steed, a
favourite figure in the Life scenes of our banners.