''Sogdian Daēnās'', also known as ''Sogdian Deities'' (; zh, t=粟特神祇白畫) is a line drawing discovered by the French Orientalist

Paul Pelliot Paul Eugène Pelliot (28 May 187826 October 1945) was a French sinologist and Orientalist best known for his explorations of Central Asia and the Silk Road regions, and for his acquisition of many important Tibetan Empire-era manuscripts and ...

at the

Mogao Caves The Mogao Caves, also known as the Thousand Buddha Grottoes or Caves of the Thousand Buddhas, form a system of 500 temples southeast of the center of Dunhuang, an oasis located at a religious and cultural crossroads on the Silk Road, in Gansu p ...

Dunhuang Dunhuang () is a county-level city in northwestern Gansu Province, Western China. According to the 2010 Chinese census, the city has a population of 186,027, though 2019 estimates put the city's population at about 191,800. Sachu (Dunhuang) was ...

, dated to the 10th-century Guiyi period. It is probably associated with the

Zoroastrian Zoroastrianism ( ), also called Mazdayasnā () or Beh-dīn (), is an Iranian religion centred on the Avesta and the teachings of Zarathushtra Spitama, who is more commonly referred to by the Greek translation, Zoroaster ( ). Among the wo ...

cult Cults are social groups which have unusual, and often extreme, religious, spiritual, or philosophical beliefs and rituals. Extreme devotion to a particular person, object, or goal is another characteristic often ascribed to cults. The term ...

of the Sogdian people. The historian , a member of the

Academia Sinica Academia Sinica (AS, ; zh, t=中央研究院) is the national academy of the Taiwan, Republic of China. It is headquartered in Nangang District, Taipei, Nangang, Taipei. Founded in Nanjing, the academy supports research activities in mathemat ...

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocea ...

, recognised this "paper image" as one of the "pieces of paper depicting Mazdean deities for the celebration". This piece is part of the collection of the

Bibliothèque nationale de France The (; BnF) is the national library of France, located in Paris on two main sites, ''Richelieu'' and ''François-Mitterrand''. It is the national repository of all that is published in France. Some of its extensive collections, including bo ...

Description

This sketch, painted on paper in black ink with light colouring, depicts two ladies sitting opposite each another, their heads being encircled by nimbi. Both are represented holding various attributes: the lady on the left, who sits on a rectangular throne supported by a row of lotus petals, holds a foliated cup and a tray with a dog seated on it. The one on the right is seated on a dog or wolf, and has four arms, the upper two supporting the sun and moon discs, the lower two arms holding a scorpion and a snake. They wear a characteristic hairstyle, surmounted by a water-drop-shaped or peach-shaped headdresses that are probably made of metal.

Analysis

The drawing had been published in

Jao Tsung-I Jao Tsung-I or Rao Zongyi (; 9 August 1917 – 6 February 2018) was a Hong Kong sinologist, calligrapher, historian and painter. A versatile and prolific scholar, he contributed to many fields of humanities, including history, archaeology, epi ...

's ''The Line Drawing of Dunhuang'' in 1978, but has only attracted the interest of researchers since it was displayed in the Sérinde exhibition in 1995. The peach-shaped headdress resembles the hairstyle of the

Uyghur Uyghur may refer to: * Uyghurs, a Turkic ethnic group living in Eastern and Central Asia (West China) ** Uyghur language, a Turkic language spoken primarily by the Uyghurs *** Old Uyghur language, a different Turkic language spoken in the Uyghur K ...

princess. The dress of the lady on the left, at least, does not seem to correspond to the Chinese fashion at the time, and both representing the expression of foreign beliefs. According to Lilla Russell-Smith, the painting was most likely "commissioned by a Buddhist Uyghur donor who was still very much influenced by Manichaean thought" or possibly "a Manichaean Uyghur who was already deeply influenced by Buddhist ideas of rebirth." According to Jiang Boqin ()—a professor at

Sun Yat-sen University Sun Yat-sen University (; SYSU) is a public university in Guangzhou, Guangdong, China. It is affiliated with the Ministry of Education, and co-funded by the Ministry of Education, SASTIND, and Guangdong Provincial Government. The university is p ...

—it is a piece of Zoroastrian art, and the four-armed deity is a Sogdian goddess worshipped in their Zoroastrian cult, whose name is Nanâ, or Nanaia, the goddess originated from

Mesopotamia Mesopotamia is a historical region of West Asia situated within the Tigris–Euphrates river system, in the northern part of the Fertile Crescent. Today, Mesopotamia is known as present-day Iraq and forms the eastern geographic boundary of ...

. Frantz Grenet—a French specialist on Sogdiana and Zoroastrianism—and the historian Zhang Guangda argue that the lady on the left representing Daēnā, the good according to Zoroastrian vision; the other one represents Daēva, the bad. Jiang Boqin agrees with Grenet and Zhang that the deity on the left being Daēnā, but he determined the one on the right is the goddess Nanâ.

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External links

Pelliot chinois 4518 (24) : Deux divinités féminines
at {{Central Asian history Ancient Central Asian art Sogdian art Zoroastrian art Deities in art Drawings of people Spiritual and religious images Bibliothèque nationale de France collections Dunhuang

Description

Analysis

See also

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External links