Keywords
Art History
Painting
A narrative painting or a relief of a story, called Avadana in Sanskrit which relates stories of Buddha's disciples and their followers in their present and former lives. The term Avadana was translated piyu (Jp: hiyu 譬喩), meaning metaphor. However, in Chinese sutras Avadana stories are not always metaphorical. Several examples were found in India, Java, and Central Asia, but not in mainland China or in Japan. The best example is the handscroll painting Rōdosha hensō 牢度叉変相 (late 8th century), Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris.