Study on chief factors to compose ‘Hoshi-mandara' and on peculiarity of ‘Chu-son'-from artistic point of view which links religion to science-

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

To analyze distinctive features in composing ‘Hoshi-mandara'(‘Star mandara' or ‘Mandara of the Great Dipper') from religious and scientific point of view and find chief factor to decide its compose. I examined various existing ‘Hoshi-mandaras'. As understanding the peculiarity of ‘Chu-son'(the image which stays at the center of mandara) and roles of other elements is premise to make the point clear, taking photos of individual images was essential. Permission to examine or take photos of several mandaras and other important works being not given under some religious restrictions, the amount of information to look through the province of ‘Hoshi-mandara' was limited. Nevertheless, considerable achievement of this study, one of which is inserted in the report of study, is that the original photo-database was made up, which of some ‘Hoshi-mandaras' before Kamakura period, including individual photos of ‘Chu-son' ‘the Great Dipper' ‘the Nine Luminaries' ‘the Twelve Constellations of the Zodiac' ‘the Twenty-eight Stellar Mansions' or the basic elements. Thus the database gives a lot of information about each element which appears on ‘Hoshi-mandara' According to the analysis so far to find iconographic features of each image, there must be some kinds of interchange between Singon sect and Tendai sect. To continue further analysis of each photo datum is to shed light on understanding principal factors to compose ‘Hoshi-mandara'