Railing Pillar Depicting Asita’s Visit

Sage Asita visited King Suddhodhana at his palace when the Buddha was born as prince Siddhartha in the Shakya Clan. Upon seeing the auspicious signs on the baby’s body, Asita prophesied that he would either become a great king or a great monk, of which, the latter came to be true. This episode is shown on the part of this relief panel.

In the early days of Buddhism, the Buddha was worshipped through Aniconism which meant that certain objects were worshipped that didn’t show him in the human form. These emblems were the Footprints, the Bodhi Tree, the Dhamma Chakra, an Empty Throne, a stupa, the pillar of radiance and many more.

However, it is disputed among scholars whether these emblems stood for specific events from the life of the Shakyamuni Buddha or important Buddhist pilgrimage sites. Nevertheless, this phase of Aniconic worship culminated into the iconic or the anthropomorphic worship. In this Casing slab, Buddha/baby Siddhartha has been depicted symbolically by a pair of footprints on the cloth held by Asita.