BuddhasInTheWest

Hyōgo Daibutsu at Kobe F.S. Postcard

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The original Hyōgo Daibutsu at Nōfuku-ji was the third largest Buddhist statue in Japan. It was dismantled by the Ordinance on the Collection of Metals issued in 1941 as part of Japanese war efforts during WWII.

Located in the port city of Kobe, the Daibutsu was approximately 12 meters in height. It became a popular tourist destination at the end of the 19th century, thus many photographs and postcards remain of the now lost icon.

This “undivided back” design informs us the postcard was printed before 1907. The “F.S.” in the stamp box refers to the publisher’s name (which I haven’t identified).

Many Japanese postcards of this period were hand-colored collotype prints. You can see the red ink splotches the colorist used to suggest design elements.

An albumen print photograph by Kusakabe Kinbei is held by the Nagasaki University Library, viewable here: http://oldphoto.lb.nagasaki-u.ac.jp/zoom/jp/record.php?id=1044

The Buddhas in the West Material Archive is a digital scholarship project that catalogues artifacts depicting Buddhist material culture for Western audiences. It’s comprised of prints, photos, and an assortment of ephemera and other objects. For a brief introduction to this archive, visit the main Buddhas in the West project page.

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Fritz Müller’s Tin How Temple Postcard

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Chinatown’s Iconic Joss House: We lack a rich photographic history of the religious life of San Francisco’s Chinatown before the 1906 earthquake. Of the photos we have, this Chinese temple on Waverly Place is arguably the most iconic – the Tin How Temple.

The goddess Tin How, otherwise known as Mazu, is known for her devoted protection of sailors and close association with early southern Chinese immigrants who came to the US. A close inspection of the second floor reveals her name, Tin How 天后, on plaques beside the doorway.

For a time, different temple shrines occupied the second and third floors of the adjacent building. One shrine was dedicated to the Emperor of the North, Beidi 北帝, who was an old stellar deity popular in the Pearl Delta Region.

Due to the design on the back we know this post card was issued before 1907. The front informs the San Francisco publisher Fritz Müller had the cards printed in Germany, a common occurrence at the time.

For an insightful commentary on how to conceptualize traditional Chinese religion through Mazu worship, see Natasha’s Heller’s “Using Mazu to Teach Key Elements of Chinese Religions” available here: https://tinyurl.com/48smwjx2.

The Buddhas in the West Material Archive is a digital scholarship project that catalogues artifacts depicting Buddhist material culture for Western audiences. It’s comprised of prints, photos, and an assortment of ephemera and other objects. For a brief introduction to this archive, visit the main Buddhas in the West project page.

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Liebig’s Chinese Buddha Advertising Card

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Gods of Antiquity: In the early age of black and white mass market publications, chromolithography ushered in a new era of visual media. From massive broadside to Victorian trade cards, vibrant color was the future and the British Liebig company capitalized on this market.

Liebig started producing trade cards in 1872 and by the turn of the century their cards were printed in several languages. Several different sets were made each year and these sets soon became collector’s items, predating hobbies such as baseball card collecting.

In 1895 Liebig released the Gods of Antiquity set, with the card here showing the worship of the Buddha by “Chinese nobles.” The scene is mostly a hodge-podge of turn of the century Chinese stereotypes.

A gold Buddha, sitting awkwardly with legs crossed, takes center stage in this imaginary temple scene.

Chinese Buddhist rituals use instruments, but not of the kind depicted here.

For a short introduction to the Liebig Company’s trade cards by Princeton University’s Firestone Library, follow this link: https://tinyurl.com/3nzvs6mh.

The Buddhas in the West Material Archive is a digital scholarship project that catalogues artifacts depicting Buddhist material culture for Western audiences. It’s comprised of prints, photos, and an assortment of ephemera and other objects. For a brief introduction to this archive, visit the main Buddhas in the West project page.

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Pierre Dieulefils’ Angkor Wat Buddhapada Postcard

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Pierre Dieulefils arrived in Vietnam as part of the French military forces in 1885 and opened a photography studio in Hanoi three years later. In anticipation of the great Exposition coloniale de Marseille, Dieulefils toured Cambodia in 1905 to take photographs of Angkor Wat.

These images of Angkor Wat formed part of his thriving postcard business, driven in part by French officers sending cards home to France. The 1905 print run of cards is known as the red series for the red ink used on the obverse.

One of the objects Dieulefils photographed was this large sculptural footprint of the Buddha. Images of the Buddha’s footprints, called buddhapada, hint at his past presence and are considered venerated relics.

The buddhapada is often depicted with special characteristics, including 108 emblems of auspiciousness. The wheel of the Dharma is most commonly placed at the center of the sole.

This carving, weighing three tons, remained at Angkor Wat from the 14th century until 1985. In 2022 it was put on display at the Preah Norodom Sihanouk-Angkor Museum in Siam-reap, Cambodia.

The Buddhas in the West Material Archive is a digital scholarship project that catalogues artifacts depicting Buddhist material culture for Western audiences. It’s comprised of prints, photos, and an assortment of ephemera and other objects. For a brief introduction to this archive, visit the main Buddhas in the West project page.

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Herbert Ponting’s Japanese Pilgrims near Lake Kawaguchi Stereoview

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After 1900, publishers of stereoviews started emphasizing their educational rather than entertainment value, oftentimes selling thematic boxed sets. The card here is part of Underwood & Underwood’s 100-view Japan set from 1904.

We know from the negative number (#3852) this stereophoto was taken by expedition photographer Herbert Ponting during his trip to Japan in 1903. The location at Lake Kawaguchi was a well-known gathering spot for pilgrims looking to ascend Mt. Fuji.

By 1904 it was increasingly common to print educational information on the reverse of the card. Here we also find additional books recommended, including Lafcadio Hearn’s Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan, from which much of the information is cobbled together.

The distinctive clothing and ritual apparatus mark the traveler as a religious pilgrim.

The Ponting-Underwood set, published on the outset of the Russo-Japanese War, became one of the more popular sets on Japan. A scan of the full collection by the Smithsonian Institute is viewable here: https://tinyurl.com/2ukzu87c

The Buddhas in the West Material Archive is a digital scholarship project that catalogues artifacts depicting Buddhist material culture for Western audiences. It’s comprised of prints, photos, and an assortment of ephemera and other objects. For a brief introduction to this archive, visit the main Buddhas in the West project page.

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Marguerite Courtot c. 1920 Studio Portrait

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Silent film star Marguerite Courtot joined Pathé after WWI and became a centerpiece in the studio’s action-adventure serials. She starred in Pirate Gold (1920), Velvet Fingers(1920) and The Yellow Arm (1921), with the latter being a stereotypical “Yellow Menace” adventure.

This photo does not appear to be a production still (a movie set photo), but a studio portrait taken in New York City. The portrait dates to around 1920 when the silent film industry was still centered in Fort Lee, New Jersey.

Courtout grasps on to the Buddha statue using a dramatic stage gesture, a relic of the theater age that was adopted in early film. While The Yellow Arm serial is considered lost, it is possible this was a cast portrait used in promoting the film.

Short written synopses survive for several of the Yellow Arm episodes as copyright claims. The synopsis for episode one is held by the Library of Congress, viewable here: https://www.loc.gov/item/s1229l16612/.

The Buddhas in the West Material Archive is a digital scholarship project that catalogues artifacts depicting Buddhist material culture for Western audiences. It’s comprised of prints, photos, and an assortment of ephemera and other objects. For a brief introduction to this archive, visit the main Buddhas in the West project page.

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Tooth of the Buddha Reliquary Postcard

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When the British re-enshrined the Buddha’s tooth relic at Kandy’s Temple of the Tooth in 1815, few among the British public were aware of the events. In 1875, however, when the Prince of Wales visits the relic, great interest in the sacred tooth spreads across England.

The undivided back design on the reverse indicates this card was printed before 1902, following British postal code. Unlike today, the message had to be written on the other side of the card, thus the blank space on the bottom edge of the obverse.

The “life story” of the tooth relic is preserved in the Dāṭhavaṃsa, compiled in the early 13th century. According to this work, in the ancient past a non-Buddhist Indian king tried to burn and smash the tooth, but it remained unscathed.

Consequently, as the story goes, the king converted to Buddhism and the tooth eventually made its way to Sri Lanka. Here we see the tooth encased in a stupa-shaped reliquary.

For a small collection of South Asian postcards, including a mailed version of the one shown here, see the offerings by the University of San Diego here: https://tinyurl.com/3nphs2k2.

The Buddhas in the West Material Archive is a digital scholarship project that catalogues artifacts depicting Buddhist material culture for Western audiences. It’s comprised of prints, photos, and an assortment of ephemera and other objects. For a brief introduction to this archive, visit the main Buddhas in the West project page.

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Anna Eva Faye’s Śiva Mascot Token

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A rather unique mixture of religion, science, and stage magic was playing out on the Vaudeville circuit at the end of the 19th century. Anna Eva Faye, billed as the “Indescribable Phenomenon,” played to full houses with her other-worldly displays of mentalism.

As a souvenir of her show and a token of good luck (the generic sense of “mascot”), Faye sold coins bearing the image of the multi-armed Indian icon Śiva. The AEF below the figure refers to Anna Eva Faye.

The reverse bears a wreath (common to US coins of the era) enclosing the magic letters: AYX-7OD-77O. The coin reflects how the religious import of Śiva is funneled into larger American beliefs in occult power during this period.

This souvenir coin shows a decent amount of rub wear. This suggests the coin was a trusty good luck companion for someone in the past. The coin is about the size of a US quarter.

For a curated list of old newspaper articles about Anna Eva Faye, see the offering presented by the Library of Congress here: https://tinyurl.com/3jhkjsze.

The Buddhas in the West Material Archive is a digital scholarship project that catalogues artifacts depicting Buddhist material culture for Western audiences. It’s comprised of prints, photos, and an assortment of ephemera and other objects. For a brief introduction to this archive, visit the main Buddhas in the West project page.

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Albumen Photograph of Sanjūsangen-dō Kannon

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For visitors to Japan in the 1860s, Kyoto was seen as brimming with dangerous anti-foreign samurai. This changed in the 1870s when it was transformed by tourism, driven in part by foreign photography studios who were allowed to shoot the city for the 1872 Kyoto Exposition.

While Europeans knew of Kyoto’s Sanjūsangen-dō through late 17th century book engravings, the first photographs of the temple likely did not circulate until the early 1870s. This albumen print is by an unknown commercial photographer and likely dates to the 1880s.

The central icon is a Thousand-armed Kannon from the 13th century and is recognized as a National Treasure of Japan.

There appears to be a double exposure in this photograph, with a priest kneeling in front of the icon. The colorist gave the priest’s robes a wash of blue, but the paint did not cover over the woodwork designs of the altar.

Baron von Stillfried was among the foreign studio owners who photographed Kyoto in 1872. One of his albums, with views of Kyoto, can be seen through the Metropolitan Museum of Art here: https://tinyurl.com/yuuf52u9.

The Buddhas in the West Material Archive is a digital scholarship project that catalogues artifacts depicting Buddhist material culture for Western audiences. It’s comprised of prints, photos, and an assortment of ephemera and other objects. For a brief introduction to this archive, visit the main Buddhas in the West project page.

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D.A. Ahuja’s Idol Maker Postcard

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As new imagery of British colonial Burma circulated in the early 20th century, one trade received heightened interest: idol carving. The marble quarries north of Mandalay provided sufficient raw materials for the local carving industry centered around the village of Sagyin.

An active stone-workers’ quarter in Mandalay meant foreign travelers could encounter Burmese carvers working on Buddhist statuary. This postcard by D.A. Ahuja captures the crafting of a Mandalay-style marble Buddha, with thick garment folds and a band around the head.

The card reveals a lithographic-halftone hybrid process, whereby a black halftone screen was applied on top of a multi-color lithographic substrate. The reverse design suggests this card was printed around 1910.

Burmese white marble has been fashioned into Buddhist statuary since the Konbaung Dynasty (1752–1885). The trade continues in and around Sagyin and Mandalay today.

For further info on the history of Burmese marble carving and the early spread of Burmese Buddhas into China, see Deng, Beiyin. “Reimagining a Buddhist Cosmopolis: Conveying Marble Buddhas from Burma to China, 1890s-1930s.” Journal of Global Buddhism 24, no. 1 (2023): 25–46.

The Buddhas in the West Material Archive is a digital scholarship project that catalogues artifacts depicting Buddhist material culture for Western audiences. It’s comprised of prints, photos, and an assortment of ephemera and other objects. For a brief introduction to this archive, visit the main Buddhas in the West project page.

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