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

where itp asses beyond the north-eastern corner of Idikut-shahri'. The pieces here

reproduced were collected from the fallen debris in a narrow passage surrounding

the shrine.

1

,

►

f

Kao. III. 021, &c.

This very fragmentary picture, probably part of a sort of predella from a large

painting, depicts some of the punishments encountered in a Buddhist hell.

In the centre, an almost nude white woman, head and left thigh missing, stands,

with hands tied behind her waist, bound to a post by a band round her body and

another at her ankles, her black hair streaming lank about her shoulders. Each of

the elongated nipples of her small, pendent breasts is tied round with a ligature.

To add to her discomfiture a black snake coils round her right leg, crosses over in

front above the knee, behind the thighs, and appears again beside her left hip. On

either side stands a demon executioner, each with one foot raised and pressed

against the woman's elbow to give purchase in the use of a large-toothed frame-

or bow-saw with which they appear to be sawing downwards through her head.

One leg only remains of the right-hand demon, and much of the middle of the

other is also missing; but his face, with fierce glaring eyes, and his shoulders can

be seen in the small detached fragment above. One end of the top of the red saw

frame is in the steadying grasp of the left hand of this demon, and from the posi-

tion of what remains of the right arm, the right hand is holding the side of the

frame to exert the alternate pulling force. This type of saw is in common use

to-day by Chinese carpenters. The flesh of the demons is pink and they wear

green-bordered red dhotis and anklets.

To the left, a small, hairy, and emaciated devil, `a hungry ghost', very roughly

but expressively drawn, is hastening away with hands upraised as though even he

is shocked by the business proceeding in the centre. Or, perhaps, a prospective sub-

ject for further chastisement, who, already having been reduced by preliminary

treatment, makes a desperate effort to escape.

To the right, a three-legged cauldron set amidst floating green and red flames is

filled with human beings, whose agonized faces can be distinguished. Two atten-

dant demons, of the same type as those in the centre, stand right and left. One,

whose lower leg only remains, puts his foot against a leg of the cauldron, and the

other seems to carry a red object on his back. Their knees and shins have guards

on them, perhaps to protect them from the heat.

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