Medieval Buddhist of the Day

[Twitter, 2/18/20] Medieval Buddhists of the Day: 800 members of the Ning clan of Shanxi, who dedicated a stele in 551. It’s been in the Art Institute of Chicago since around 1927, and unlike many of the donors I have posted, it has been written about before, by Sonya Lee and Dorothy Wong among others. It’s large, complex, and bears close study from a number of angles, but because you’re here, you know it’s going to be donors.

So sometimes donor inscriptions will emphasize the lavishness of the gift and how much the patrons had to scrimp and save to afford it. This is one area where it was entirely acceptable to toot your own horn. The Ning family have the longest such passage I’ve run into so far: 人各割己所珍，陟以名山，倸求神石，率共敬刊碑像一區，舉高丈六，眾相嚴儀，振動十方。”Each of us parted with the things he treasured, and we scaled famous mountains in search of wondrous stone, and directed workers to respectfully cut an image-stele, sixteen feet in height, whose many figures of majestic visage have moved [people in] the ten directions.” [NB I think 共 is meant for 工 here, hence “workers”].

Few other inscriptions mention material so explicitly, nor make this particular point, that the stone is especially fine. I can think of one stele in the V&A where the donors claim to have 遠【聘】石匠將昆山美石雕妙聖之真容 “hired stoneworkers from afar to carve fine Kunshan stone into the true visage of the miraculous sage,” but “scaling famous mountains in search of wondrous stone” is rather like the typical claim that a donor “made” (造) an image. I’m pretty sure some delegation went on, if not actual hired help, or possibly the work was pawned off on the younger and more athletic Nings. The donor figures on this stele are also kind of amazing, but I am going to wait and post them later because this thread is already long enough. However, A+ to the Nings for effectively talking up their own monument.