Veneration of the Buddha as a Fiery Pillar (200s CE): Art, History and Details

Veneration of the Buddha as a Fiery Pillar (200s CE) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

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

At the bottom of this carved panel is the depiction of a pillar incised with cross-hatching and surrounded by a halo of flames. A stylized lotus and a pointed trident symbol marking good fortune and divinity crown the pillar. This image indicates the presence of the Buddha and underscores his superhuman qualities, including radiance and power to work magic. Two male figures hold fly whisks of honor on either side. Above is a golden pillar covered with jewels that the Buddha miraculously generated. Swirling leaves sprout from grooved disks at regular intervals, and celestial beings fly and dance in praise.

Object facts

• Title: Veneration of the Buddha as a Fiery Pillar
• Date: 200s CE
• Culture: Southern India, Andhra Pradesh, Nagarjunakonda
• Type: Sculpture
• Technique: limestone
• Dimensions: Overall: 59 cm (23 1/4 in.)
• Collection: Indian Art - Andhra
• Department: Indian and Southeast Asian Art
• Accession number: 1943.72

A detail from the museum

The acanthus leaves sprouting from the pillar echo Greco-Roman motifs.

Collection credit

Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Ramachandran, T. N. “Nāgārjunikonda.” Memoirs of the Archæological Survey of India, 1928.
• Coomaraswamy, Ananda K. Elements of Buddhist Iconography. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1935.
• Lee, Sherman E. Buddhist Art. Detroit Institute of Arts, Twenty-Fourth Loan Exhibition, October, 1942. Detroit: Detroit Institute of Arts, 1942.

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.