Tree Spirit Deity in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, September 2018

Tree Spirit Deity (Yakshi)


Date: 1st–2nd century

Culture: India (Uttar Pradesh, Mathura region)

Medium: Red sandstone

Dimensions: H. 13 3/4 in. (34.9 cm); W. 12 1/2 in. (31.8 cm); D. 5 in. (12.7 cm)

Classification: Sculpture

Credit Line: Rogers Fund, 1927

Accession Number: 27.186

This double-sided bracket (vrksadevata) for a gateway (torana) is decorated on either side with a tree-spirit deity known as a yakshi, who holds a flowering tree as a symbol of her fecundity. Her pose is that of salabhanjika ("breaking a branch of the sala tree"): grasping a branch, she thus engages with the fertility of the earth, bringing the tree into flower. Such figures provided an auspicious presence at the entrance to a sacred site.

Text from: www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/38379