Votive initiation card (tsakali) with preaching Buddha Shakyamuni
Unknown Artist
1000s
Medium
Gum tempera, ink, and gold on paper
Dimensions
11.6 × 10.7 cm
Classification
Painting
Department
Indian and Southeast Asian Art
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
John L. Severance Fund
Accession Number
2000.67
About this artwork
Buddhism was introduced to Tibet in the 7th century, but the persecution that followed in the 9th and 10th centuries destroyed all artifacts of the period. Consequently the earliest existing Buddhist art from Tibet dates to the 11th and 12th centuries, the so-called period of the Second Diffusion of Buddhism, yet few 11th- or 12th-century paintings survive. This miniature painting is one of these rare paintings. Not a manuscript illustration, it was conceived as a separate votive painting, a so-...