Halo

What the halo is

The halo is the ornament set behind a Buddhist image to represent its radiance. One kind sits behind the head alone; another rises to enclose the whole body, and the shapes, boat-like or circular, carry names of their own.

The seated Dainichi Nyorai in a shrine cabinet at Kotokuji in Tokyo, a Kamakura-period work recorded as an Important Cultural Property, is described as carved from a single cypress block split and rejoined, hollowed from below, with a separately joined head and a lacquered and gilded surface; the halo is wooden, painted white, with gilt-bronze cords and floral ornaments fixed to its bands; the pedestal is wooden, lacquered and gilded.

That entry shows the halo recorded as a part with its own material and finish, distinct from the image. The figure is gilded; the halo is white with metal ornament.

The same description notes thirty-six small figures of buddhas and bodhisattvas on clouds fixed to the inner walls of the cabinet, which together with a pagoda at the top centre of the halo represent the principal deities of the Diamond World mandala. The halo carries part of the iconography.

Not the front canopy

In Japanese the word for the halo sounds the same as the word for a Kōhai, the canopy at the front of a shrine or temple hall. The two have nothing to do with each other, and writing about either should make clear whether sculpture or architecture is meant.

Halos are easily lost. Many old images carry later replacements, and records say whether the halo is original. The Kotokuji entry judges the whole, except the outer lacquer of the cabinet, to be original, halo included.

On site, look behind the image. A disc behind the head is the head halo; a boat-shaped board enclosing the figure is the full-body kind, and pierced work or painting marks its quality.