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Text, Folio 46 (verso), from a Kalpa-sutra

c. 1500

Medium: Gum tempera, ink, and gold on paper
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: Overall: 12.5 x 25.7 cm (4 15/16 x 10 1/8 in.)
Culture: Western India, Gujarat, late 15th-early 16th century
Museum: Cleveland Museum of Art, Indian and Southeast Asian Art
Credit line: Edward L. Whittemore Fund
Rights: Public domain (CC0), as the museum states it.
Who can see it: Teens profiles and older: its museum says too little about what it shows to place it for younger viewers. How works are placed

About this work

Parshva stands in a yogic posture of meditation, bearing the hardship of the elements, unmoved. When stormwaters threatened his life, serpents shielded him so that he could complete his meditations and reach liberation. One cobra stretched his seven-hooded canopy over his head like an umbrella, while a serpent king and his wife praise him. The abstract gold lines on the blue background represent the waters that rose to the level of his shoulders. In this painting, the image of Parshva wears a white lower garment, which indicates that this manuscript was made for the prominent branch of Jainism that allows monks and nuns to wear white robes.