A COLOSSAL (54 CM) GRAY SCHIST FRAGMENT OF THE RIGHT HAND OF BUDDHA SHAKYAMUNI, ANCIENT REGION OF GANDHARA, 3RD-4TH CENTURY

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A COLOSSAL (54 CM) GRAY SCHIST FRAGMENT OF THE RIGHT HAND OF BUDDHA SHAKYAMUNI, ANCIENT REGION OF GANDHARA, 3RD-4TH CENTURY Expert’s note Measuring more than 50 cm in length, the present hand is a rare surviving fragment of a Gandharan devotional image of extraordinary scale. Judged against the proportions of surviving monumental sculptures, it probably belonged to a figure standing well over three meters high, placing the original image among the most ambitious sculptural commissions produced in Gandhara. The largest securely published freestanding Gandharan schist Buddhas form a remarkably small group: foremost among them are a figure from Sahri-Bahlol Mound B, now in the Peshawar Museum, measuring 264 cm high (fig. 1), and the 250 cm-high Buddha in the MIHO Museum, whose right forearm is lost (fig. 2). Fragmentary remains nevertheless demonstrate that still larger schist colossi once existed. The monumental torso of a bodhisattva in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, probably from Sahri-Bahlol, measures 163.8 cm by itself and originally formed part of a figure standing more than three meters high (fig. 3). Kushan period. Magnificently carved in the round, the hand extends naturally towards the devotee in the abhaya mudra, the gesture of bestowal and supreme compassion, with the wrist gently arched backwards. The palm, modeled with soft, fleshy volumes, gives way to elongated, gently flexed fingers, rendered with remarkable suppleness and entirely devoid of muscular tension as they open in a graceful, natural movement, with the digits distinctively joined by delicate webbing. Dimensions: Length 54.3 cm Of particular iconographic significance is the thin web of stone joining the fingers. This feature evokes the Buddha's webbed hands, one of the thirty-two Great Marks, or Mahalakshanas, of a Fully Enlightened Being. Rarely encountered in Gandharan sculpture, it belongs to an elevated sculptural convention also found in the finest images produced at Mathura during the Kushan and Gupta periods. Together with the remarkable naturalism and precise anatomical modeling, its presence confirms the technical mastery, iconographic refinement, and monumental ambition of the original image. Literature comparison: Compare a closely related smaller stone fragment of the right hand of the Buddha, Ancient Region of Gandhara, 1st-2nd century, 32.4 cm long, in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, object number 13.96.18.

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