Mar 14, 2014

Two Nuns Teaching Lay Women: Colophon page of Folio 167 (recto), from a Kalpa-sutra and Story of Kalakacharya

Two Nuns Teaching Lay Women: Colophon page of Folio 167 (recto), from a Kalpa-sutra and Story of Kalakacharya

1278

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Gum tempera and ink on palm leaf

Overall: 5.4 x 32.1 cm (2 1/8 x 12 5/8 in.)

Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund 1971.126.a

Location

Did you know?

Small captions give the names of the figures; the larger nun is identified as the female leader (mahattarā).

Description

Wearing white billowing monastic robes, the two nuns contrast with the beautifully adorned laywomen, who wear elaborately patterned textiles and jewelry. Jains commissioned illuminated manuscripts as a way to accrue religious merit, and they would have images of themselves at prayer inserted into the image cycles like this as signs of their patronage.

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