Temple Guardian 14th century Japan Japanese Museum ( placed at the entrance to a temple to ward of evil ) Located at Rijksmuseum Amsterdam.

---

wood (plant material), h × w × d 62cm More details Temple guardians are placed at the entrance to a temple to ward off evil. Each of these figures holds a vajra for crushing ignorance. Their open and closed mouths represent a and un, the first and final syllables of Siddham (a script used to write Sanskrit): these syllables symbolize all spoken sounds and scripts, thus all knowledge. Worshippers who enter the temple precinct through the guardians’ gate symbolically acquire this knowledge.

---

Size: 4000px × 6000px
Location: Rijksmuseum
Photo credit: © Peter Horree / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No

Keywords: 14th, acquire, art, artist, asia, asian, beautiful, century, civilization, closed, crushing, culture, enter, entrance, evil, figures, final, gallery, gate, guardian, guardians, historic, history, holds, ignorance, interesting, japan, japanese, knowledge, knowledge., marble, masterpiece, mouths, museum, museums, open, picture, portrait, precinct, relief, represent, scripts, sculptor, sculpture, siddham, sounds, spoken, statue, stone, style, syllables, symbolically, symbolize, temple, vajra, ward, worshippers