Wrathful Buddhist Deity in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, September 2010

Esoteric Buddhist Personage

Date: 15th century

Culture: Nepal (Kathmandu Valley)

Medium: Copper with traces of gilding

Dimensions: H. 6 3/8 in. (16.2 cm); W. 4 3/8 in. (11.1 cm)

Classification: Sculpture

Credit Line: Purchase, Friends of Asian Art Gifts, in honor of Douglas Dillon, 2001

Accession Number: 2001.209

Description:

This wrathful Tantric Buddhist personage, with a shaved head, a vertical third eye, and upward-pointing fangs, is unidentified. His jewelry derives from eastern Indian prototypes of the Pala period (9th–12th century). He points a single-pronged thunderbolt scepter (vajra) toward a heart-shaped cavity at the center of his chest, itself occupied by a multipronged vajra. In his raised hand he holds a sword pommel with a guard in the shape of a lion's head.

Text from: www.metmuseum.org/Collections/search-the-collections/6003...