Provenance:
San Francisco Private Collection, acquired in India between 1924-1928
While the earliest written record of the Swayambunath Stupa's existence is a 5th-century C.E. stone inscription, some scholars believe there was most likely a shrine there as early as the 1st century. One of the oldest and most sacred pilgrimage sites in Nepal, particularly among the Newars, legend has it that Swayambunath was born out of a lotus flower that bloomed in the middle of a lake that once spread across the Kathmandu Valley. Swayambunath is also known as the Monkey Temple as there are holy monkeys living in the north-west parts of the temple.
Swayambunath in an engraving from 1877
The stupa has Buddha's eyes and eyebrows painted on four sides, and between them the number one (in devanagari script) is painted in the fashion of a nose. The dome at the base represents the entire world, and the thirteen pinnacles on the top symbolize the thirteen stages of spiritual realizations to reach enlightenment. Each morning before dawn, hundreds of Buddhist and Hindu pilgrims ascend the 365 steps from the eastern side that lead up the hill, passing the gilded vajra and two lions guarding the entrance, and begin a series of clockwise circumambulations of the stupa.
Along the top of this exquisitely-detailed painting are the Five Symbolic Buddhas (from the left side): Ratnasambhava, Akshobhya, Vairocana, Amitabha, and Amoghasiddhi. A white Lokeshvara stands at the lower left side, and a blue Mahakala surrounded by flames stands at the lower right side. Numerous monkeys are depicted frolicking in the surrounding forest and outbuildings, and egrets are shown flying in the sky above. At the bottom of the scene is a river, indicated in white, with women cavorting in the rushing water.
The four figures kneeling beside the central stupa are each inscribed with a name, and a lengthy donor inscription runs in two lines along the bottom of the composition.
