This ninth or tenth-century fragment shows three heads in a golden bowl and recalls the Buddhist story of faithful Amara. In the Buddhist treatment the heads depict those with bad intentions, while in the Manichaean illustration the heads in the dish are probably a reference to food offerings and the presence of light — good — in them. Religions of the Silk Road borrowed deities, symbols, and themes from each other. Because of this it is sometimes difficult to know to which religious tradition a fragmentary painting belongs.
Pigments on silk
Museum für Indische Kunst, SMPK, Berlin,
III 6251