id: 148829 accession number: 1976.71.a share license status: CC0 url: https://clevelandart.org/art/1976.71.a updated: 2022-01-04 16:50:37.685000 Reliquary Box, AD 200-400. Pakistan, Gandhara, probably Swat, late Kushan Period (AD 1-320). Bronze; diameter: 8.6 cm (3 3/8 in.); overall: 7 cm (2 3/4 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Edward L. Whittemore Fund 1976.71.a title: Reliquary Box title in original language: series: series in original language: creation date: AD 200-400 creation date earliest: 200 creation date latest: 400 current location: 242A Ancient India creditline: Edward L. Whittemore Fund copyright: --- culture: Pakistan, Gandhara, probably Swat, late Kushan Period (AD 1-320) technique: bronze department: Indian and Southeast Asian Art collection: Indian Art - Kushan, Gandhara type: Metalwork find spot: catalogue raisonne: --- CREATORS --- measurements: Diameter: 8.6 cm (3 3/8 in.); Overall: 7 cm (2 3/4 in.) state of the work: edition of the work: support materials: inscriptions: --- CURRENT EXHIBITIONS title: Year in Review, 1976 opening date: 1977-02-01T05:00:00 Year in Review, 1976. The Cleveland Museum of Art (organizer) (February 1-March 6, 1977). --- LEGACY EXHIBITIONS * Kushan Sculpture: Images from Early India. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (November 13, 1985-January 15, 1986), Asia Society Galleries, New York, NY (February 13-April 6, 1986), and Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, WA (May 13-July 13,1986). --- PROVENANCE Ulrich von Schroeder [b, 1943], Zürich, Switzerland, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art date: ?-1976 footnotes: citations: The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH date: 1976- footnotes: citations: --- fun fact: digital description: wall description: This casket in bronze represents the great variety of reliquary caskets. It is round, has a low foot, and is covered with a lid (with raised handle) that fits over the vessel rather than being inset. It is a traditional shape frequently encountered in Gandharan reliquaries, but its slight flattening and elaborate decoration imply a slightly late date. A central band of a floral creeper decorates the main body of the box and its lid, and is framed on both sides by narrower fluted bands.

This type of freehand design is characteristic of the late Kusana-early Gupta period. Similar floral patterns are found in another CMA object (1972.164), the lid of a box showing combat between a man and a lion, which also dates to a later period. There the design fills the vacant areas in the busy composition. This pattern, however, has its antecedents in the Begram ivories . which, according to most sources, pre-date the Sasanian invasion of the mid-third century AD. Therefore, it can be assumed that this type of floral decoration was already in use in the third century and that this reliquary box probably dates to the third-fourth century AD.

The bronze alloy, in its somewhat silverish-metallic appearance, seems to be very close to the material used in the Swat bronzes, which suggests that Swat may also be the provenance for this reliquary. --- RELATED WORKS --- CITATIONS Lee, Sherman E. "The Year in Review for 1976." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 64, no. 2 (1977): 39-78. page number: Mentioned: no. 164, p. 79; Reproduced: no. 164, p. 58 url: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25152676 Czuma, Stanislaw J., and Rekha Morris. Kushan Sculpture: Images from Early India. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art in cooperation with Indiana University Press, 1985. page number: Mentioned and Reproduced: cat. no. 85, p. 171 url: Jongeward, David, Elizabeth Errington, Richard Salomon, and Stefan Baums. Gandharan Buddhist Reliquaries. Seattle: Early Buddhist Manuscripts Project, 2012. page number: Mentioned and Reproduced: p. 105, fig 3.55; pp. 294–295, no. 401 url: --- IMAGES