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Sec. iv] SCENES FROM THE LEGENDARY LIFE OF GAUTAMA BUDDHA 851

secular life is quasi-archaic and belongs to times preceding the later Tang period in which the earliest of our dated pictures were painted.

This conclusion is considerably strengthened by the fact that, on the other hand, we can trace a distinct similarity between the costumes seen in our banner scenes and those in sculptural or pictorial representations of earlier origin. We have already called attention to the close resemblance which the high conical head-dress worn by Ministers and other personages of consequence in our banners bears to that seen in the Lung-mên relievos representing the court dignitaries of a Wei king and executed about the middle of the seventh century.24 The same applies to their robes. It is equally interesting to note that in the big embroidery picture, Ch. oo26o, Plate CIV, the donors are represented with head-gear which is identical with that seen on the majority of the men in the scenes from Gatttama's Life story. The hair-dresses of the donatrices also agree closely with those worn by many of the ladies in these scenes. That this fine embroidery picture is older than most of the paintings in our collection from the ' Thousand Buddhas ' seems to me clearly indicated by a variety of concordant observations.25 This is plainly the case also in respect of the fine silk paintings, Ch. xlvii. ooi and Ch. liii. oor, where the earlier head-dresses just referred to are to be found again on the figures of donors and their ladies.2'

Finally, brief mention may be made of certain archaeological indications which a comparison of objects represented in the setting of the banner scenes with actually surviving relics furnishes. M. Petrucci has already pointed out that the buildings which figure as the locale of so many of the scenes show in all details the architectural style which in Japan is known as the Nara style and associated with the new capital Nara founded by the Emperor Shomu (A.D. 724-48).27 To M. Petrucci, too, belongs the credit of having pointed out that the musical instruments seen in the scenes of ' Prince Siddhartha's life in the seraglio' and the ' Sleep of the women' are of just the same shape as those found in the great treasure collection which the pious Emperor Shomu bequeathed to the Shôsôin temple of Nara, and which has been preserved to this day as ' a unique domestic museum '.28 In this connexion I may direct attention also to the decorative motifs evidently derived from Gandhâra art which the palace wall and door jambs exhibit in Ch. xlvi. oo7 (Plate Lxxv). The massive ring-handle represented on the same palace door is cried by a monster's head which curiously recalls on the one hand the corresponding door-ornament seen in a Han relievo, and on the other the grotesque appliqué masks going back to a ' Gorgoneion' type which appear so frequently on terracotta vases, etc., of Yôtkan.29

Early headdress in pictures.

Archaeological indications from objects.

2' See above, p. 849, note 18; Chavannes, Mission archeol., Planches, i, Nos. 292-5; i. pp. 329, 561; Petrucci, Gazette des Beaux-Arts, 1911, vi. p. 212. M. Petrucci justly emphasizes the close relationship in costume, attitude, and pose which links the delineation of these Lung-men figures with the earlier art of Ku Kai-chih.

As regards the head-dress of the court ladies in the Lungmên relievos (see Chavannes, toc. cit., No. 296), it is curious to observe that it seems to represent a transition stage nearer to the elaborate coiffure of the donatrix figures in most of our paintings than to the relatively simple and more graceful one exhibited by the ladies in the banner scenes.

26 See below, pp. 895 sq. and Descriptive List, under Ch. 00260.

I may note that the similarity is very close also as regards the costumes ; cf. for that of the men, e.g., the top scene of Ch. xxvii. oor, Pl. LXXVII. The group of donatrices is shown also in Thousand B., PI. Xxxv.

26 For colour reproductions of Ch. liii. ooI and of the fine figure of the donatrix, see Thousand B., Pl. X and vignette. Certain peculiarities of treatment, such as the use of ' high lights ', give to this painting and the closely related picture of Amitzbha's Paradise, Ch. xlvii. oat (see Thousand B., Pl. XI), a position apart. Regarding the date of these paintings cf. also below, p. 885.

27 See Petrucci, Gazette des Beaux-Arts, 4911, vi. p. 208. For illustrations of buildings, see PI. LXXIV—LXXVI ; Thousand B., Pl. XII, XIII.

=8 Cf. Petrucci, ibid. ; Ch. xlix. 005 ; Iv. ooI1 (Desert Cathay, ii. Pl. VI). It is certain that the famous storehouse of the Shôsôin (cf. Fenollosa, Epochs of Chinese and Japanese Art, i. pp. 11 o sqq.), to which we shall have occasion to refer repeatedly below in connexion with our decorated fabrics, contains many other objects also analogous to those represented in our paintings.

29 Cf. Chavannes, Mission arch&ol., Planches, 1, No. Iqo;

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