Walk around the Underground Palaces
Exhibition Venue: Museum of Buddhist Underground Palaces
Exhibition Dates: 2011-12-25 ~ 2021-12-25
In India, after a relic was placed in a reliquary, it was usually enshrined within a chamber at the center of a stupa. The storage of relics and the shape of the stupas were adapted and changed after the introduction of Buddhism into China. During the Northern Wei Dynasty, reliquaries were placed inside stone caskets and then buried in rammed earth under the base of a pagoda. At that time, the Chinese tomb-style underground palaces had not yet been integrated into Buddhist practice. After the Sui dynasty, rectangular or square stone slabs were laid on the top and around the four sides of the buried stone caskets, and then surrounded by brick walls. This represents one of the earlier models of underground palaces in the transitional phase from the Northern Wei Dynasty, when stone caskets were buried in rammed earth under the base of a pagoda, to the Tang Dynasty when underground palaces were constructed.
See full exhibition online at https://g.co/arts/8euHfwk5zRfXRAAfA