Five-pronged Vajra Bell (Gokorei) (early 1300s): Art, History and Details

Five-pronged Vajra Bell (Gokorei) (early 1300s) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

The five prongs of this bell symbolize the Buddhist “Five Perfections”—generosity, morality, patience, perseverance, and concentration. The mouth of the bell symbolizes the “Sixth Perfection” of wisdom. The bell was used in Japanese Esoteric Buddhist rituals along with vajra pestles, or kongōsho.

Object facts

• Title: Five-pronged Vajra Bell (Gokorei)
• Date: early 1300s
• Culture: Japan, Kamakura period (1185–1333)
• Type: Metalwork
• Technique: gilt bronze
• Dimensions: height: 16.7 cm (6 9/16 in.); Diameter: 7.5 cm (2 15/16 in.)
• Collection: Japanese Art
• Department: Japanese Art
• Accession number: 2016.38

A detail from the museum

Vajras are symbolic weapons, representing the properties of a diamond (indestructibility) and a thunderbolt (irresistible force), still used in Buddhist ceremonies today.

Collection credit

Lillian M. Kern Memorial Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Vilbar, Sinéad. “Acquisition Highlights 2016: Japanese Art.” Cleveland Art: Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine 57, no. 2 (March/April 2017): 18–19.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.