国立情報学研究所 - ディジタル・シルクロード・プロジェクト
『東洋文庫所蔵』貴重書デジタルアーカイブ

been lassoed by the person on the left wearing a Chinese hat, who is pulling at the

cord drawn taut by the resisting strain of the Bird. A yelling, spotted demon with

uplifted threatening bludgeon has seized Garuda's right wrist, while a third per-

son, behind the demon, is rolling up his sleeves in delighted anticipation of deliver-

ing his blow. Meanwhile a long, thin hound has pushed in between the several legs

of the attackers and has buried his teeth in Garuda's right thigh. Behind and above

the archer stands a demon with baldpate and long hair streaming from his temples

behind his ears; carrying a hawk on his right forearm. Behind the victim of all

this violence can be seen a hand with admonishing forefinger raised. This may be a

hand of the warrior figure in voluminous robes to the right, of whom not much has

survived. His left hand rests on the end of a bow and in front is a quiver. A small

part of his face remains between the upward billowing drapery at his shoulders.

Behind Garuda are long draperies of another standing deity, and there are traces

of hands above the little adoring figure who stands or kneels beside the next Loka-

pála. The face of this Lokapála has the usual glaring eyes and full lips. He stands,

with booted feet, on the verdant, twin peaks of a highly stylized rock, where the

breezes lift high his shoulder drapery.

Better preserved is the small, bearded Nága deity, standing, barefoot, on a lotus.

His identity is established by the snake head-dress. His warrior trappings are less

elaborate than those of the Lokapálas, and on his legs are the short fur gaiters, or

leglets, frequently worn by figures in the Bezeklik paintings. The same kind of

leglet is worn by the bony, long-haired, howling demon above and behind him.

This creature bears a long rod over his left shoulder. An interesting person, still

higher up, is a highly respectable artist, with paint- or ink-pot on his left hand and

a brush held daintily in his right. He is clad in a painter's blouse and wears a black

skull cap. At the top of the picture is an elderly sádhú with fierce but rather anxious

expression, wearing a tiger skin over his left shoulder and a leopard skin round his

hips.

The large, majestic Lokapála on the right, in warrior dress, with plump face,

large round eyes, and an elaborate mukuta bearing a gilded dragon or mongoose crest

issuing from a lotus, stands with each foot on a separate green top of a grey rocky

peak. On his shoulders are lion-mask epaulettes and a similar mask adorns his

belt. Upheld, in the finely drawn right hand, is a sankh or a jewel. The left hand is at

the left hip, perhaps resting on the head of a mace or sword. Flames rise from the

sankh and from the wind-blown drapery of the left shoulder. If the little Nága deity

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