132 lojda, klimburg-salter and strinu
brahmanical context, are thus integrated and can be regarded as Buddhist and
classified as mundane (Skt. laukika).25
A similar arrangement of deities is to be found in an entry hall to the assem-
bly hall in Zhalu (Tib. Zha lu) monastery in Central Tibet founded in 1027.26
The protector hall (Tib. mgon khang), which originally also functioned as an
entry hall (Tib. sgo khang), displays very similar assemblies of pan-Indian gods
in two of its chapels (fig. 4.4).27 The arrangement of these deities in horizontal
rows with decorative motifs at the top of the wall just below the ceiling, as
well as the simple two-dimensional style, can also be found in Tabo Phase I.
Although the iconography does not coincide completely, the categories of dei-
ties are mostly the same.
Both in Zhalu monastery and in the Tabo entry hall, the painted programmes
depicting these benevolent protective deities were not repainted when other
parts of the respective temples were renovated.
2.4 Tabo Monastery, Phase I
The pan-Indian figures in the Tabo entry hall were painted in a simple style
that often seems clumsily executed with brushstrokes overlapping the outline
and poor quality pigments in rather muted colours. Some figures are painted
in a more elaborate mode of representation—more carefully articulated facial
figures and abdomen and the use of shading. All figures, except for the ones
seated in the pose of royal ease (Skt. lalitāsana), are in sattvaparyaṅka, a varia-
tion of the diamond seat (Skt. vajrāsana) with feet crossed and directed down-
wards. Every deity has its left arm bent outwards with the hand lying flat on the
left thigh with bent index finger. This typical position of minor deities can also
be observed in earlier Khotanese depictions of these deities (fig. 4.5). A strict
frontality combined with an unarticulated body structure and a u-shaped head
identifies the Tabo entry hall paintings as belonging to the Tibetan Himalayan
Style. Comparable seated figures in the earliest variant of this style can be
found in the region of Baltistan to the West of Tabo. There, a maṇḍala carved
25 Seyfort Ruegg, The Symbiosis of Buddhism with Brahmanism/Hinduism, ix.
26 Vitali, Roberto, Early Temples of Central Tibet (London: Serindia Publications, 1990), 92–93
gives the date of the founding of the temple and dates the second construction phase in
the year 1045. See also Ricca, Franco, and Lionel Fournier, “Notes concerning the mgon-
khaṅ of Źwa-lu,” Artibus Asiae 56. 3–4 (1996): 359.
27 Ricca, and Fournier, “Notes concerning the mgon-khaṅ of Źwa-lu,” 343–363. These authors
have also remarked on similarities between the Tabo entry hall paintings and those of the
founding phase of Zhalu monastery (Ricca, and Fournier, “Notes concerning the mgon-
khaṅ of Źwa-lu,” 360).