The Study on Textiles Storing in the Sakya Buddha Statue of statue of Sakyamuni at Yeongsan shrine of Songkwang temple

Abstract

Songkwang temple, located in Suncheon city, Jeonnam, is one of the old temples. In the process of plating a Buddha statue with gold, at Yeongsan shrine of Songkwang temple, November, 17, 2015, it opened the storing Buddihist articles in the Buddha statue, and it discovered a letter of vow, records, and fabrics, etc. In a letter of vow, it is written as storing in the Sakya Buddha Statue in January, 1662, and it entailed the list of benefactor. However, it is presumed that they were stored in the Sakya Buddha Statue in the same time, because it is identical the date of a letter of vow and list of benefactor of relic in storing in the Sakya Buddha Statue, Avalokiteśvara of Gwaneumjeon Hall, appointed as cultural treasure No. 1660 in August 25, 2010. For Avalokiteśvara statue of Yeongsan shrine, including a letter of vow, it is stored in the Sakya Buddha Statue the yellow wrapper(Hwangchopokja) and complex gauze with supplementary gold thread. A letter of vow is the woven fabric with plain weave, and yellow wrapper is the patterned fabric of lotus pattern. The complex gauze with supplementary gold thread is the rare designed textile with flat strips of gold thread on the ground weave of dark brown 4-end complex gauze. Particularly, it is the pattern, not investigated up to now, mixed pattern with lotus, fish, and yin-yang. As a result of analysis of flat strips of gold thread used in complex gauze with supplementary gold thread, gold(Au) is the main component, and it was identified Ag, Cu, Fe, and C, etc. as sub-detected element. Because it is clear the period of the Textiles Storing in the Sakya Buddha Statue at Yeongsan shrine and maintains the state of storing time in the Sakya Buddha Statue, including color, it has very important historical worth in the study of fabric history.