Lustration of the Infant Jina Mahavira: Folio from a Kalpasutra Manuscript

Lustration of the Infant Jina Mahavira: Folio from a Kalpasutra Manuscript

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This painting typifies the finest achievement of the late fourteenth-century western Indian style. It is a masterful rendering of a popular subject, the bathing of Mahavira at birth. The jina's identity is indicated by the pair of kneeling buffalo, his cognitive symbol. The infant is seated on the lap of the presiding god Shakra (Indra), and two attendant gods (further manifestations of Shakra) hold lustration vessels aloft in anticipation of his first bath (a legend shared with early Buddhism). An innovation of this period is the introduction of fantastic rocks to indicate the celestial Mount Meru—the setting for this divine abhisheka—a mannerism absorbed from Iranian paintings of the period.

Asian Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Lustration of the Infant Jina Mahavira: Folio from a Kalpasutra ManuscriptLustration of the Infant Jina Mahavira: Folio from a Kalpasutra ManuscriptLustration of the Infant Jina Mahavira: Folio from a Kalpasutra ManuscriptLustration of the Infant Jina Mahavira: Folio from a Kalpasutra ManuscriptLustration of the Infant Jina Mahavira: Folio from a Kalpasutra Manuscript

The Met's collection of Asian art—more than 35,000 objects, ranging in date from the third millennium B.C. to the twenty-first century—is one of the largest and most comprehensive in the world. Each of the many civilizations of Asia is represented by outstanding works, providing an unrivaled experience of the artistic traditions of nearly half the world.