Sarira reliquary in the shape of a pavillion

Korea

8th century

Gilt bronze

Minneapolis Institute of Art

A gilt bronze reliquary in the shape of a pavilion with intricate decorative elements and hanging chains. A gilt bronze reliquary in the shape of a pavilion with intricate decorative elements and hanging chains. Since the early years of Buddhism in South Asia, Buddhists have enshrined funerary relics in stupas, or burial mounds. As Buddhism spread to Northeast Asia in subsequent centuries, thousands of stupas—often tower-like and dubbed “pagodas’” in the West—were constructed, each embedded with bone fragments or other relics (sarira) housed within a multi-layered reliquary. The present work is the innermost container of such a reliquary. Made of gilt bronze, it takes of the shape of a palatial building, decorated at the base with downt