Open full image Pin

Folio 141, from a Kalpa-sutra and Story of Kalakacharya: Text (recto); Monk Holding a Flower Venerated by a Lay disciple (verso)

Unknown

1287

unspecified

From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art

Mughal Painting Medieval Religious

Dominant colour

Folio 141, from a Kalpa-sutra and Story of Kalakacharya: Text (recto); Monk Holding a Flower Venerated by a Lay disciple (verso) is a 1287 unspecified by Unknown, a Mughal Painting work, held at Cleveland Museum of Art.

Who painted this?: Unknown
When & what style?: 1287 · Mughal Painting
Where can I see it?: Cleveland Museum of Art

About this work

You see a monk in white robes holding a flower while a layperson kneels before him. This tiny painting is on the back of a palm-leaf page from a Jain holy book written in 1287. The white robes tell us the monk belongs to the Shvetambara branch of Jainism. Palm leaves were the usual writing material for sacred texts in India before paper took over. To see more works like this, look up western india, gujarat.

The story of this work

Overview

Palm leaf was the preferred material for sacred texts before the 1400s in India. The text here was often appended to the Kalpa-sutra, the most sacred book of Jainism. This story concerns the life of a Jain teacher named Kalaka, a prince who developed the ability to work magic after he become a monk, inspired by the teachings of a holy man. The painting on this page shows a monk clad in white, indicating his affiliation with the Shvetambara (“white clad”) branch of Jainism. It is the second to the last page of the manuscript and includes the beginning of the colophon, which contains…

Read the full account in the museum source.