Paintings of Buddhist Saints Revealed in Japan

News August 11, 2020

(Courtesy Noriaki Ajima)
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Japan Temple Painting
(Courtesy Noriaki Ajima)

KORA, JAPAN—The Asahi Shimbun reports that researchers including Noriaki Ajima of Hiroshima University and Yukari Takama of Osaka Kyoiku University used infrared technology to photograph two columns in the main hall at Saimyoji temple. The main hall structure was built in the early thirteenth century. The photographs revealed four images of Buddhist saints on each of the columns, which stand on either side of a “shumidan” platform bearing an altar and many statues in the center of the building. Scholars disagree on when the artworks could have been created. To read about an early Buddhist shrine in Nepal, go to “Buddhism, in the Beginning,” one of ARCHAEOLOGY’s Top 10 Discoveries of 2014.

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