National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books

PLATE XXIV

PAINTING FROM BEZEKLIK

Bez. x. K-0

ROM the south-west corner of the shrine. Although large portions are missing

and the remainder has suffered badly from the depredations of white ants,

there still survive interesting details of this elaborate composition. The

general ravaged condition makes elucidation very difficult even with the original

before one's eyes. Still more difficult does it become in the monochrome repro-

duction; but with the guidance of the following descriptive notes it may be possible

to distinguish much that at first sight seems hopelessly obscure.

The whole appears to present a celestial vision or phantasy in which gods and

demons participate amidst rolling streams of cloud. Drawn to various scales,

according to their importance, Lokapálas, Dharmapálas, devils, imps, and human

beings play their parts, and, as seen in the foreground, the bird Garuda, váhana of

Vishnu.

In the upper part there was a row of deities, the first on the left being Kárttikeya,

riding on his váhana, the simurgh or phoenix in the lalitásana pose, that is, with one leg

hanging down and the other folded in front. His expression is fierce, with knitted

brow and wide-open, glaring eyes. On his shaven head black tufts of hair have been

reserved; that over the forehead, tied tightly by a ligature near the roots, spreads,

brush-like, in a fringe above his eyebrows. His visible ear is pointed at the top.

In each of his six hands is a symbol; the red sun in the upraised upper right hand

and the white moon in the left. The next pair carry, in the right, two arrows, and in

the left, a bow of Persian type. Of the third pair, the right hand is broken away

leaving only two short red stems projecting below. The left rests on the hip and

carries a long wand, perhaps the shaft of a lance or pole-axe. Excepting three

stoles, respectively red, white, and green, the upper part of the body is nude. On

the arms were gilded armlets with bunches of coloured beads. His loin-cloth (dhoti)

is pink, girdled with a white kamarband, and his feet are shod with sandals. The

phoenix, with long snaky neck, strides towards the left but turns his head, and with

open beak seems to be protesting as he looks upward towards his rider. The wavy

line of breast and neck is emphasized by imbricated, scale-like feathers. Claws

and head are well drawn, although the left leg shows a joint or angle where none

should be.

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