Item: Shakyamuni Buddha - Avadana (teaching stories)

Shakyamuni Buddha (Tibetan: sha kya tu pa, English: the Sage of the Shakya Clan) surrounded by narrative vignettes depicting ten previous life stories based on the text Jatakamala. (See Jataka Outline Page). The earliest known paintings depicting this subject can be found in the circumambulatory of Shalu Monastery, Tsang, Tibet.

This individual work is from a larger eleven painting set containing the thirty-four original stories of the Jatakamala along with a further sixty-seven stories supplemented by the 3rd Karmapa, Rangjung Dorje, 1284-1339 (biographical details). The enlarged text is known as the One Hundred Previous Life Stories (T: kye rab gya tsa). (See a blockprint set depicting 104 individual images). (For another painting from this set, fourth left, see Art of the Himalayas, the Zimmerman Family Collection, plate 101, stories 70-79 [Block prints, HAR #80265-80274]).

There are ten stories represented in this painting L1, numbers 13 to 24, and approximately ten in each of the other paintings in the eleven painting set. There are one hundred and one stories in all. The first story in the composition of this painting is located at the top left, Sutasoma, and each subsequent story in the composition follows below moving counter clockwise around the painting.

Jatakamala: Garland of Stories, 13 to 24: 13. She Who Drives Men Mad, A Tale of Self-Control
14. Suparaga, Depending on the Virtuous as Friends
15. The Fish, The Rewards of Virtue
16. The Baby Quail, The Power of Honesty
17. The Jar of Liquor, The Virtuous Turning Others from Evil
18. The Wealthy Prince, The Virtue of Detachment from Worldly Concerns
19. The Lotus Roots, A Tale of Understanding
20. The Treasurer, A Tale of a Pious Man
21. The Story of Kuddhabodhi, A Tale of Subduing Anger
22. The Noble Geese, A Tale of Friendship
23. The Wise One, A Tale of Teaching
24. The Great Monkey, The Consequences of Turning Against a Friend

The stories in both this painting (L2, HAR #58961) and the Zimmerman painting (L4) are arranged counter-clockwise. This indicates that there is likely a central painting for the set, not containing any of the Jataka stories, and all of the one hundred stories are evenly distributed in ten paintings. The paintings displaying the narratives would hang alternately to either side of the central painting. With ten stories per composition the first narrative painting (R1, stories 1-10) would hang on the right side of the central image. The second right (R2) painting would contain stories 21 to 30 followed by a painting (R3) with stories 41 to 50 and so on. All of the narrative compositions hanging on the right side of the central painting would depict the stories in a clockwise manner.

The first painting on the viewers right, left side (L1) of the central image, would have stories 11 to 20, the second painting (L2) stories 31-40 (Nalin Collection), third painting (L3) stories 51 to 60, and the fourth painting (L4, Zimmerman Collection) stories 71 to 80, etc. Calculating the positions of the paintings and how they were possibly displayed can account for why the two paintings (Nalin, Zimmerman) have sequential narratives arranged in a counter clockwise order. At this time this is a theory based on the standard presentation of painting sets. Another Jataka painting from this set needs to be found with the stories circling in a clock-wise direction.

Jeff Watt 9-2022