PANEL: Ethnoarchaeology in the Himalayas (Monday July 4 2.00 5.00) Convenors: Lindsay Zamponi (Ph.

D Candidate, SOAS, London) and Dr. Tadeuz Skorupski (SOAS, London) The Tibetan Amulet Box, or Ga'u Dr. John Clarke (Curator, Department of South and Southeast Asia,Victoria and Albert Museum, London) This paper will discuss evidence for the history, gender divisions and regional styles of the ga'u or amulet box. The possible origins of the ga'u in China and India are examined and further art historical and literary references from Tibetan history drawn into the discussion. Surviving possibly early ga'us are discussed. A division of ga'u types is proposed based on gender and class. The regional styles of men's round and shrine shaped box ga'us are outlined and the question of style explored. The most prominent types of women's ga'us and issues of regionality are similarly focussed on. Differences in finish and degrees of decoration are related to class and wealth and the ga'us indicating actual governemnt status looked at. Finally the question of stone supply and carving are discussed. Issues and Conclusions Arising from an Examination and Analysis of Ritual Implements of the dGe-lugs-pa Order of Tibetan Buddhism Lindsay Zamponi (PhD candidate, Department of Art and Archaeology, School of Oriental and African Studies) This paper will present issues and recent findings arising from my doctoral research project, entitled An Examination and Analysis of Ritual Implements of the dGelugs-pa Order of Tibetan Buddhism . The main object of the project is to determine if there are sect-specific characteristics of the forms, structures (including materials, symbolic motifs and iconographic elements) and types of decoration (such as the style of metalwork and the use of precious and semi-precious gems) of the various ritual implements employed in the Tantric practices of Tibetan Vajrayana Buddhism. The ritual objects under consideration in this study are those that are used as tools in ritual performance and also depicted iconographically in painting and sculpture as attributes of deities, Arahats, yogins and yoginis, mahasiddhas and lineage-holders. Among them are: the vajra, or rdo-rje; the hand-bell; the double-sided hand-drum and doublesided skull-hand-drum; the skull-bowl; the hook-knife; the phur-pa; the khatvbqga; the trident; the vajra goad hook; the vajra hammer; homa fire-offering implements; and various staffs, sceptres, wands, whisks, ritual mirrors, ladles, swords, wateroffering vases, seed dispensers, arrows and lassos. The paper will describe the methodology employed in the project, issues that have arisen thus far, and key considerations regarding sectarian preference in the manufacture and usage of ritual implements. Among the topics discussed will be the practical difficulties of conducting a survey of ritual implements held in international museums, private collections and monasteries; the ethnographic mode of collecting Tibetan material artefacts, and resultant issues pertaining to archival information held by museums; and the construction of a database of ritual implements, to be employed

in the creation of a typological classification system for each type of object, and as a tool in identifying and classifying objects owned and/or used by members of the dGelugs-pa order. The paper will conclude with a brief assessment of the potential practical applications of this research in the fields of art history and archaeology. Western Himalayas wooden sculptures: stylistic definition and connection with the art of Kashmir Dr. A.K. Singh (Reader, Department of History of Art, Faculty of Arts, BHU, Varanasi) Upper basin of the river Sutlej in Himachal Pradesh, forming the border district Kinnaur, has been explored by scholars like Alexander Gerard, A. H. Francke, G Tucci and Rahul Sankrityayan but village to village survey was never attempted to investigate the archaeological potential. The present author has been working in the region since 1977 to prepare an inventory of archaeological material through conducting village to village and door to door survey in Kinnaur. The fieldwork has yielded a huge amount of cult images in bronze with other artefacts of great historical importance. Especially sites like Rangrik, Ropa, Kothi, and Ribba preserve a good deal of rare wooden images of high aesthetic merit which deserve attention. The paper attempts to study the stylistic definition and provenance of some select Buddhist wooden sculptures discovered by the author. The area had been a buffer state between the Indian states of Western Himalayas and Tibet. It is known that during the time of the second diffusion of Buddhism in Tibetan provinces, in particular western Tibet (gNari-Khorsum), Kashmir played a key role in the process by extending full support and supplying scholars, monks and artists. Still in many old Buddhist temples of Western Tibet art works of Kashmiri artists are preserved. Aesthetically superb, the sculptures under investigation present a very interesting case of diffusion of an art style that is Kashmiri, about which still not much is known. In the medieval period, from the 8th to the 10th century, when Kashmir consolidated its power in Northern India, Western Himalayas, and Central Asia and established her hegemony in the region, the state of artistic tradition too achieved a high watermark. The artistic expression of Kashmir became eclectic rather more international due to intense cross cultural contacts in the North-western peninsula which from very beginning was open to various influences from the west. During the heyday of political hegemony Kashmiri art too permeated far afield. In the making of Kashmiri art expression elements of Gandharan, Gupta Indian, Persian, Central Asian, Chinese, Tibetan, Byzantine, Greeco-Roman and folk of native valleys of Western Himalayas can be discerned The wooden sculptures under discussion display a maturity of the style and its further transition. This paper will present a study about the regional development of Kashmiri style, its extension, and various stylistic sources. Indeed, the contribution of Chamba School needs to be examined carefully for scientific evaluation of Kashmiri expression, the paramount style in the western Himalayan region. Chronologically, the material can be ascribed to a definite frame of time that is from ninth to twelfth century AD.

Two popular dharani-s and Tibetan instructions on their use Dr. Michael Willis (Curator, Department of Asia, British Museum, London) This paper has emerged from a study of Tibetan wood-blocks and wood-block prints in the collection of the Department of Asia at the British Museum. The prints and blocks studied are those which were used to make prayer-flags. The texts on the prayer-flags are not generally read by Tibetans and have not been subject to detailed academic study. For the present study, the relevant texts were located in canonical sources and translated. Two dharani-s were found to be particularly popular for use on flags. Translated from Sanskrit in about the ninth century, they contain various instructions on how the texts should be used, and so show a number of continuities and discontinuities in current practice. Recent Research in the Tawang District of Arunachal Pradesh. Dr. Richard Blurton (Curator, Department of Asia, British Museum, London) Studies of the tribal societies of northeast India have invariably concentrated on the unchanging 'traditional' quality of these societies. A recently constituted research project, 'Tribal Transitions. Cultural Change in Arunachal Pradesh', which is based in SOAS, headed by Dr Stuart Blackburn, and funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, challenges these assumptions. These different arguments do not deny that the Northeast is passing through a period of intense cultural change today, but remind us that change has always taken place in the fabric of material culture and sometimes dramatically and speedily as well. Finally, the rapid nature of today s change makes it imperative for this change to be documented. This paper will examine aspects of religious change amongst the Monpa, a group settled in the northwest of the state, close to Bhutan and Tibet. Change here has come about through economic, political and religious factors some of which will be highlighted in this paper. Further, some intimation will be made of the use of such fieldwork in the better understanding of museum collections which, all too often, come down to us lacking in vital contextual information