Mucalinda Sheltering Buddha

The Mucalinda Sheltering Buddha statue tells the story of the Gautama Buddha, who, while meditating under the Bodhi Tree, had Mucalinda, the mighty King of Serpents, came from beneath the earth to protect him with his hood during an unusually massive storm. 

When the great storm had cleared, the serpent king assumed his human form, bowed before the Buddha, and returned in joy to his palace.

This Mucalinda, carved in the 1240s at the historic Srivijayan center of Chaiya, echoes the earlier Srivijayan style from the early Mahayana Buddhist kingdom, which, covered much of the present-day peninsular consisting of Thailand, Java, Sumatra, and Malaya.

Statues of the Buddha were not made until after the 1st century CE. For the first four hundred years after his death, Buddha was represented by symbols alone, such as his footprint or an empty throne or Bodhi tree.

Early statues examples of Buddha in human form were made four centuries after the Buddha’s time.

Mucalinda Sheltering Buddha

• Title:                   Mucalinda Sheltering Buddha
• Date:                  1240
• Style:                  Chaiya style (Wat Wiang)
• Museum:            National Museum, Bangkok

Explore the Bangkok National Museum

• Mucalinda Sheltering Buddha
• Ram Khamhaeng Inscription
• Buddha Protected by Mucalinda
• Neolithic Pottery from Ban Chiang

Explore Buddhist Art

• Walking Buddha
• Meditating Buddha Shakyamuni
• Buddha Protected by Mucalinda
• Mucalinda Sheltering Buddha
• Buddha performing Twin Miracles at Sravasti
• Buddha
• Seated Buddha from Gandhara
• Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara – Guanyin
• Seated Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara – Guanyin
• Luohan – Yixian Glazed Ceramic Sculpture (British Museum)
• Luohan – Yixian Glazed Ceramic Sculpture (Royal Ontario Museum)
• Luohan – Yixian Glazed Ceramic Sculpture (MET)
• Garuda (British Museum)
• Avalokiteshvara – Guanyin (British Museum)

Explore Asian Museums

• China

  • Beijing Museums
    • The National Museum of China
  • Shanghai Museums
    • Shanghai Museum
    • Shanghai Science and Technology Museum
  • Nanjing Museums
    • Nanjing Museum

• Japan

  • Tokyo
    • Tokyo National Museum
    • National Museum of Western Art
    • National Museum of Nature and Science
  • Nagoya
    • Yamazaki Mazak Museum of Art
    • Toyota Commemorative Museum of Industry and Technology

• Singapore

  • Asian Civilisations Museum
  • National Museum of Singapore
  • National Gallery Singapore
  • Changi Museum
  • Old Ford Motor Factory
  • Peranakan Museum
  • ArtScience Museum
  • Buddha Tooth Relic Temple and Museum
  • Singapore Philatelic Museum
  • Chinatown Heritage Centre
  • The Battle Box

• India

  • National Museum, New Delhi

• South Korea

  • Seoul 
    • National Museum of Korea

~~~

“Peace comes from within. Do not seek it without.”
– Buddha

~~~

---

Photo Credit: 1) By Michael Gunther (Own work) [CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)], via Wikimedia Commons