Pair of Guardian Kings (Niō) (1200s): Art, History and Details

Pair of Guardian Kings (Niō) (1200s) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

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

These wrathful protectors of Buddhism would have once stood within the sides of the main entrance gate to a temple. One has an open mouth that intones the sound ah, and symbolizes the beginning, or life.One has a closed mouth that intones the sound un, and symbolizes the end, or death.

Object facts

• Title: Pair of Guardian Kings (Niō)
• Date: 1200s
• Culture: Japan, Kamakura period (1185–1333)
• Type: Sculpture
• Technique: Chestnut and cypress wood
• Dimensions: Overall: 167.9 cm (66 1/8 in.)
• Collection: Japanese Art
• Department: Japanese Art
• Accession number: 1972.158

A detail from the museum

This is one of a pair of guardian kings, or Nio. Their fierce expressions and postures indicate their protective function.

Collection credit

Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Lee, Sherman E. “The Year in Review for 1972.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art, vol. 60, no. 3, 1973, pp. 63–115.
• Nippon no bijutsu (November 1972), no. 78.
• Shōichi Uehara. "Wooden Statues of Vajrapāni." Kobijutsu 古美術 (December 1972), no. 39, pp. 111–113.

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.