Two Jain yantra and Jambudvīpa

Estimated Value:

1.200 € - 1.800 €

Schätzpreis:

1.500 €

Description:

Gujarat or Rajasthan, 18th c. and later
65 x 68/ 47 x 47/63 x 64 cm
I: The colourfully decorated yantra with a frame decoration of blue and red blossoms shows a circular diagram in the shape of a lotus with painted mantras and the sacred syllable hṛīṃ in the centre. Arranged on it are the twenty-four jinas, each with a different body colour. The yantra is shaped as a stylised vase with a reduced foot, decorated with decorative loops on the sides and two tendril-like leaves. Below the yantra is a Jainist monk wearing a white robe, opposite him is a shrine with footprints of a saint. The white robe of the monk refers to the main Jain direction of the Śvetāmbara (Sanskrit: "white-robed [monks and nuns]"). Around the yantra, ten deities with their pack animals are depicted in divided picture areas. The inscription at the bottom of the picture gives the date Samvat 1791, which corresponds to the year 1734 AD in the Vikram calendar. II: The yantra consists of an eight-petalled lotus flower enclosed in a triple square frame symbolising the walls of the Samavasaraṇa, thus combining the motif of the first sermon of the Jina in the structure built by the gods with the magical diagram (yantra). The ground plan of the samavasaraṇa is square here, the three crenellated ring walls with four portals are clearly visible. Inside the blossom, which forms the interior of the structure, a hexagram (Sanskrit: ṣaṭkoṇa) is depicted, in the centre of which sits a jina, bordered by the sacred syllables hṛīṃ and auṃ. Four goddesses are placed around the lotus flower, and in front of the walls of the Samavasaraṇa are two small ponds on each side, each flanked by two "hostile" animals (meaning predators) listening peacefully to the sermon. III: The painting shows the central continent of Jambudvīpa of the middle world according to the traditional cosmology of Jainism. The circular land mass is divided into different zones by several horizontally running and colourfully marked mountain ranges and is framed by the ring-shaped salt ocean. The sea is marked with various symbols, including four three-coloured jars from which, according to Jainist tradition, the tides emanate. The inscriptions are in Gujarati script and thus refer to the place of manufacture in the West Indian union state of Gujarat.
From an important private collection in northern Germany, collected mainly in India from the early 1950s to the 1980s

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