The current exhibition “Beyond Time: The History, Culture and Art of Sakya Monastery” at the Palace Museum in Beijing features a metal sculpture of Cakrasaṃvara among its sacred works of art (Figs.1–3). While most of these objects have never been exhibited or published before, and are also not on display at Sakya itself, an image of the Cakrasaṃvara sculpture was already published by Li Jicheng in The Realm of Tibetan Buddhism in 1985, with the following caption: “The Kālacakra Vajra. Bronze, 30cm tall. In the Sagya Monastery.”1
Cakrasaṃvara is depicted standing in the middle of a ring of fire with his consort Vajrayoginī, trampling on what appear to be Kālarātri and Bhairava. He has four faces (possibly with silver inlays for the eyes), twelve arms, and two legs. His right leg is straight and his left leg is bent. His first pair of arms are crossed at his chest in an embrace with Vajrayoginī, holding a bell and a vajra. Vajrayoginī has one face, two arms, and two legs. She embraces Cakrasaṃvara with her left arm around his neck and holds a skullcup in her left hand. Her right arm is raised, holding a curved knife in her right hand. She extends her left leg in the same posture as Cakrasaṃvara and entwines her right leg around his waist. Therefore, it is likely that Cakrasaṃvara is depicted in the tradition of Kṛṣṇācārya.
The sculpture has a dedicatory inscription specifying it as a funerary commission and identifies the sculptor who made it as the “Master Artist Namkha Drakpa” (lHa bzo mkhas pa Nam mkha’ grags pa). Inscriptions on two other metal sculptures from the first half of the 16th century reveal that an artist by the name of Namkha Drak was active in Ngari (mNga’ ris), Western Tibet. This sculpture of Cakrasaṃvara is therefore likely to be the artist’s third known work.
The sculpture actually features two inscriptions (Fig. 4). The first is a single line around the lower rim at the front of the lotus base, while the second consists of three lines at the front of the pedestal, below the lotus base. The first inscription is a verse in homage to Cakrasaṃvara, the second consists of two verses and is a dedicatory inscription. All of these verses are composed of metrical lines of nine syllables.
Inscription Around the Lower Rim2
࿓࿓།།དམིགས་མེད་ཐུགས་རྗེའི་དབང་གིས་འགྲོ་ཀུན་ལ།། ལྷན་སྐྱེས་ཞིང་དང་སྦྲུལ་པ་སྣ་ཚོག་གྱིས།། འཁོར་བ་ཇི་སྲིད་མྱ་ངན་མི་འདའ་བའི།། ཧེ་རུ་ཀ་དཔལ་མགོན་ལ་བདག་ཕྱག་འཚལ།།
Transliteration of the Inscription Around the Lower Rim
@@||dmigs med thugs rje’i dbang gis ’gro kun la|| lhan skyes zhing dang sprul pa sna tshog gyis|| ’khor ba ji srid mya ngan mi ’da’ ba’i|| he ru ka dpal mgon la bdag phyag ’tshal||
Translation of the Inscription Around the Lower Rim
I bow to Heruka, the glorious protector,
Who for the sake of all beings, by the power of his non-referential compassion,
Through innate pure lands and manifold emanations,
Does not pass into nirvāṇa as long as saṃsāra endures.
Inscription at the Front of the Pedestal
࿓།ཨོ་སྭསྟི། དཔལ་ལྡན་བླ་མའི་ཐུགས་དགོངས་རྫོགས་ཕྱིར་དང་།། ཕ་མས་གཙོ་བྱས་སེམས་ཅན་ཐམས་ཅད་ཀྱི།། སྒྲིབ་པ་བྱང་ཞིང་ཀུན་མཁྱེན་ཐོབ་བྱའི་ཕྱིར།། ལྷ་བཟོ་མཁས་?པ་ནམཁའ་གྲགས་པས་བཞེང་།། དེ་?ལས་བྱུང་བའི་རྣམ་དཀར་དགེ་?བ་ཡིས།། ཚོགས་གཉིས་ཐར?་ཕྱིན་ནམ་གྲགས་འཁོར་བཅས་རྣམས།། དཔལ་ལྡན་འཁོར་ལོ་སྡོམ་པའི་ཕོ་ཕྲང་དུ།། ཚེ་?འདི་ཉིད་ལ་མྱུར་དུ་འཇུག་པར་ཤོག། མཾག་ལཾ་པཱཝནཏུ།། དག?།།
Transliteration of the Inscription at the Front of the Pedestal
@|om swasti| dpal ldan bla ma’i thugs dgongs rdzogs phyir dang|| pha mas gtso byas sems can thams cad kyi|| sgrib pa byang zhing kun mkhyen thob bya’i phyir|| lha bzo mkhas? pas namkha’ grags pas bzheng|| de? las byung ba’i rnam dkar dge? ba yis|| tshogs gnyis thar? phyin nam grags ’khor bcas rnams|| dpal ldan ’khor lo sdom pa’i pho phrang du|| tshe? ’di nyid la myur du ’jug par shog| maṃga laṃ pāwantu|| dag?||
Translation of the Inscription at the Front of the Pedestal
Oṃ svasti. To fulfil the intentions of the glorious lama,
And so that all sentient beings, mainly father and mother,
Shall be purified of obscuration and attain omniscience,
This sculpture was made by the Master Artist Namkha Drakpa.
By the pure virtue having arisen from this,
May Namdrak, together with his retinue, who have perfected the two accumulations,
Swiftly enter in this very life
The palace of glorious Cakrasaṃvara. Maṅgalaṃ bhavatu. Revised.
The opening of the dedicatory inscription, “To fulfil the intentions of the glorious lama,” clarifies that the sculpture was part of a funerary commission made for a Tibetan lama. Unfortunately, the lama’s personal name is not specified, which would otherwise allow for a more precise dating if the lama and his year of death could be identified.
The inscription identifies the sculptor as the Master Artist Namkha Drakpa. The final part of the inscription is an aspirational prayer that again mentions a Namkha Drakpa with his retinue. This time, however, his name is given in short form as Namdrak (Nam grags), with the second and fourth syllables (mkha’ and pa) omitted. This raises the question of whether this is the same master artist and his circle of students, or whether it is a different person with the same name who commissioned the work as a patron with his retinue or family members.
A stylistic analysis of the sculpture remains to be done, as well as a stylistic comparison with the other two metal sculptures produced by the artist Namkha Drak to firmly establish whether all three were produced by the same master artist in the first half of the 16th century.
Yury Khokhlov and Yannick Laurent (2020) studied these two other sculptures and attributed them to Namkha Drak based on inscriptions and stylistic comparisons (Figs. 5–6). The first sculpture depicts a triad of three standing bodhisattvas and is a miniature replica of the “Three Jowo Silver Brothers” (Jo bo dngul sku mched gsum) of Khorchak (’Khor chags) monastery in Purang (Pu hrang). Mañjuśrī in the middle, with Avalokiteśvara to his proper right and Vajrapāṇi to his proper left. The triad was likely produced around 1512, when Namkha Drak was commissioned to carry out works at Khorchak, as attested by a history of the monastery and its images. The second sculpture portrays Lowo Khenchen Sönam Lhündrup (Glo bo mKhan chen bSod nams lhun grub, 1456–1532), a princely Sakya scholar-monk from the royal family of Mustang; the latter controlled Purang at various points during the second half of the 15th century and undertook renovations at Khorchak.3
The inscriptions of the two sculptures provide the name of the sculptor as “Emanated Artisan Namkha Drak” (sPrul ba’i lha bzo Nam mkha’ grags) and “Paṇchen of the Arts Namkha Drak” (bZo rig paṇ chen Nam mkha’ grags). The history of Khorchak and its images refers to him and his apprentices as “Chief Artist Namkha Drak, master and students” (dPon mo che Nam mkha’ grags dpon slob pa).4 The inscription of the Cakrasaṃvara sculpture refers to him as “Master Artsist Namkha Drakpa” (lHa bzo mkhas pa Nam mkha’ grags pa), adding the fourth syllable pa to his personal name Namkha Drak. However, this addition might simply be due to the metre of the verse in which the inscription was written.
Endnotes
- Li 1985: 75, p. 43. ↩︎
- Some syllables feature an additional syllable-separating dot called tsheg, while others lack it. These have been corrected without further remark. ↩︎
- See Khokhlov and Laurent 2020. ↩︎
- See Khokhlov and Laurent 2020: 263–264 (1.1), 265 (2.1), 270 (C.1). ↩︎
Bibliography
Khokhlov, Yury and Yannick Laurent. “Nam mkha’ grags and the Three Silver Brothers: A Sixteenth-Century “Divine Artist” from Western Tibet and His Artistic Legacy.” Proceedings of the 7th International Conference on Tibetan Archaeology and Art, Part II. Journal of Tibetology 22: 236–274.
Kramer, Jowita and Christian Luczanits. 2023. “Portrait of Lowo Khenchen Sonam Lhundrub: A Royal Teacher and Artist.” Project Himalayan Art, Rubin Museum of Art. http://rubinmuseum.org/projecthimalayanart/essays/portrait-of-lowo-khenchen-sonam-lhundrub
Li, Jicheng. 1985. The Realm of Tibetan Buddhism. San Francisco, CA: China Books & Periodicals.