Skip Navigation

Collection Menu
<em>Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa</em>, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_side1_PS6.jpg)
Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_side1_PS6.jpg)
<em>Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa</em>, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_side1_PS6.jpg)

Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_side1_PS6.jpg)

<em>Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa</em>, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_side4_PS6.jpg)

Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_side4_PS6.jpg)

<em>Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa</em>, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_side3_PS6.jpg)

Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_side3_PS6.jpg)

<em>Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa</em>, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_top_detail4_PS6.jpg)

Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_top_detail4_PS6.jpg)

<em>Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa</em>, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_top_detail6_PS6.jpg)

Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_top_detail6_PS6.jpg)

<em>Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa</em>, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_top_detail5_PS6.jpg)

Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_top_detail5_PS6.jpg)

<em>Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa</em>, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_top_detail2_PS6.jpg)

Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_top_detail2_PS6.jpg)

<em>Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa</em>, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_side2_PS6.jpg)

Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_side2_PS6.jpg)

<em>Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa</em>, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_top_detail3_PS6.jpg)

Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_top_detail3_PS6.jpg)

<em>Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa</em>, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_top_detail1_PS6.jpg)

Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_top_detail1_PS6.jpg)

<em>Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa</em>, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_detail1_PS6.jpg)

Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_detail1_PS6.jpg)

DOWNLOAD

Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa

Asian Art

On View: Asian Galleries, Southwest, 2nd floor
This silver container is in the shape of a burial structure known as a stupa. Stupas take very different forms in Buddhism’s many regions, but they always have a spire of multiple parasols rising from the center. Because of their funerary function, stupas (and stupa-shape containers) became emblems of the enlightened Buddhist’s passage out of the earthly realm. The pictures on the sides of this piece depict the previous lives of the historical Buddha, and an inscription in Chinese indicates that a monk and his mother commissioned the deluxe object to contain a relic from a Buddhist leader.
MEDIUM Silver
  • Place Made: China
    • DATES 986 C.E.
    DYNASTY Song Dynasty
    PERIOD Song Dynasty
    DIMENSIONS height: 14 in. (35.6 cm)  (show scale)
    INSCRIPTIONS The inscription may be translated as: The monk Congcheng, who expounds the Vimalakirti Sutra at the Weiguo Monastery on Zuo Avenue, and his mother Madame Zhao [commissioned] to be manufactured one silver reliquary stupa [in the form] of the Stupa of the Abundant Treasures Buddha (Prabhutaratna), with the wish that: Those nearby may take Maitreya as their kin Those afar may attend Him at the Dragon Flower Tree That all sentient beings in the experiential realms May together attain the fruit of becoming a Buddha Recorded on the twenty-fourth day of the eighth lunar-month in the third year of the Yongxi reign period of the Great Song dynasty (30 September 986), by Li Lingxun, maker of the stupa.
    COLLECTIONS Asian Art
    ACCESSION NUMBER 2012.5a-d
    CREDIT LINE Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange
    EXHIBITIONS
    MUSEUM LOCATION This item is on view in Asian Galleries, Southwest, 2nd floor
    CAPTION Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_side1_PS6.jpg)
    IMAGE side, 2012.5_side1_PS6.jpg. Brooklyn Museum photograph, 2013
    "CUR" at the beginning of an image file name means that the image was created by a curatorial staff member. These study images may be digital point-and-shoot photographs, when we don\'t yet have high-quality studio photography, or they may be scans of older negatives, slides, or photographic prints, providing historical documentation of the object.
    RIGHTS STATEMENT Creative Commons-BY
    You may download and use Brooklyn Museum images of this three-dimensional work in accordance with a Creative Commons license. Fair use, as understood under the United States Copyright Act, may also apply. Please include caption information from this page and credit the Brooklyn Museum. If you need a high resolution file, please fill out our online application form (charges apply). For further information about copyright, we recommend resources at the United States Library of Congress, Cornell University, Copyright and Cultural Institutions: Guidelines for U.S. Libraries, Archives, and Museums, and Copyright Watch. For more information about the Museum's rights project, including how rights types are assigned, please see our blog posts on copyright. If you have any information regarding this work and rights to it, please contact copyright@brooklynmuseum.org.
    RECORD COMPLETENESS
    Not every record you will find here is complete. More information is available for some works than for others, and some entries have been updated more recently. Records are frequently reviewed and revised, and we welcome any additional information you might have.
    <em>Reliquary in the Shape of a Stupa</em>, 986 C.E. Silver, height: 14 in. (35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Walter N. Rothschild and anonymous gift, by exchange , 2012.5a-d. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2012.5_side1_PS6.jpg)

    RELATED OBJECTS

    Jug Kiddush Wine Cup Saddle Ornaments CD Player, "Model MG9218/17" Southern Landscape (Southern Flood) The Evolution of the Negro Political Costume Brush Jar with an Imperial Inscription Ceremonial Wine Vessel on Wheels Shrine with an Image of a Bodhisattva Miniature Table Screen Tomb Figurine Tomb Pillar Brush Rest in the Form of a Mountain Sugar Bowl Sugar Bowl Creamer Sugar Bowl Tankard Tankard Tea Caddy Tea Caddy Tea Caddy Medium Sized Standing Figure of a Bodhisattva Ascetic Shakyamuni Samaya Gokorei (Five-Pronged Vajra Bell) Gautama Buddha Crowned Buddha Seated in a Niche Rudy Two Shoes (Portrait of Rudy Giuliani as the Virgin Mary) Votive Tablet Depicting Shakyamuni Buddha Figure of Seated Buddha Seated Couple Armchair Maximum Sensation Head of a Buddha Clock Incense Burner in the Shape of a Lotus Captain Tracy Thompson, American Eagle Spouted Vessel in the Form of a Bull Stele of a Standing Buddha