Stele

CHINA; Northern Wei dynasty

Prince Siddhartha is at the top of the rectangular stele secretly leaving home while flying immortals lift his horse’s hooves from the ground to prevent discovery. The palace with watch-towers along the walls is around him as a schematic representation. The palace gatehouse is perched on, and merges with, the roof of the pavilion below.
The niche in the middle register frames the finally enlightened Buddha with the right hand in abhaya (fearlessness) mudra, and the left hand in varada (wish-granting) mudra as he receives the homage of two Bodhisattvas. The material of his robe spills over the throne, while the pavilion’s ceiling is also canopied with material that billows down the walls.
Below the niche there are two more pavilions. Within each pavilion there are a kneeling donor and smaller attendant. Individual donors are interspersed with the vertical lines of an inscription in the frames about them on the lower level of the stele.