Kalpasutra manuscript page: Monks and Devotees / Artist Unknown, India, Gujarat

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Record Details

Accession Number
1970/2.116
Title
Kalpasutra manuscript page: Monks and Devotees
Artist Nationality
Indian
Object Creation Date
1400-1450
Object Creation Place
Asia (continent)
India (nation)
Creation Place 1
Asia (continent)
Creation Place 2
India (nation)
Style/Group/Movement
Jaina painting
Dimensions
11 cm x 25.9 cm (4 5/16 in. x 10 3/16 in.)
Century
15th century
Primary Object Classification
Books and Folios
Primary Object Type
leaf
Secondary Object Classification
Painting
Physical Description
The horizontal folio from a Kalpasutra manuscript consists of seven lines of text to the left and center broken by a squarish gold symbol framed in a red line and cusped blue lines. Gold diamond shapes framed in red are at the sides, with a vertical red line between the one on the left and the text. Between the text and the right diamond shape there is a painting consisting of three registers of figures against a red ground. The top row depicts three laymen wearing crowns, the middle two monks and a nun and the bottom row three nuns.
Subject Matter
Some of the earliest Indian paintings on paper are found in manuscripts of the Kalpasutra, a popular text that recounts the lives the jinas or “spiritual victors” of the Jaina religion. The paper was cut into horizontal pages, following a long tradition of palm-leaf manuscripts. In paper as in earlier palm leaf books, loose-leaf pages were flipped, bottom to top, as one read them; the verso (back or reverse side) of one folio would be seen with the recto (front side) of the following page.
Here monks and nuns sit in rows offering homage to one of the jinas or a teacher, who probably was depicted on the preceding folio. The convention of depicting the faces in profile with a projecting “further eye” is common in early painting throughout northern India. It is only in the early sixteenth century that this “further eye” disappears. This manuscript page is the earliest painting in the exhibition.
Primary Keywords
jainism
manuscripts
monks
Rights
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Technical Details

Image Size
1408 x 720
File Size
122 KB
Record
1970/2.116
Link to this Item
https://quod.lib.umich.edu/m/musart/x-1970-sl-2.116/1970_2.116.jpg

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https://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/i/image/api/manifest/musart:1970-SL-2.116:1970_2.116.JPG

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"Kalpasutra manuscript page: Monks and Devotees; Artist Unknown, India, Gujarat." In the digital collection University of Michigan Museum of Art. https://quod.lib.umich.edu/m/musart/x-1970-sl-2.116/1970_2.116.jpg. University of Michigan Library Digital Collections. Accessed March 28, 2024.
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