LOT Auction Asia  /  No-Reserve AUCTION-ASIA Benefit Sale  / 

238

Lamaist FINGER BONE ROSARY

Currency:USD Category:Antiques / Asian Antiques Start Price:1,400.00 USD Estimated At:2,000.00 - 3,000.00 USD
Lamaist FINGER BONE ROSARY
Online Auction only, with advance bids accepted at iCollector and at the Gallery. No live bidding
in the Gallery, and tie bids go to the earliest bidder. All proceeds will go 100% to the World Peace Foundation Building Fund of Hadley, MA.
Tibet, mixed age - 500+ years for the darkest bones, down to about 100-150 years for the lightest colored. When a High Lama is about to die he instructs his under-Lama devotees to bury him on the side of a mountain (Sky-burial) and go back after exactly one year and collect and use some of his bones - as an honorary and remembering gesture. His by then dried skull may be made into a cup or cut up for beads, the hip bones for a trumpet or other artifacts, and the revered finger bones are added to others previously collected and made into a Mala or Prayer Rosary....for which many generations are required if a long Rosary is to be developed. I received these about 1995 as part of a broken larger Rosary that an old Lama who had moved to China (his Monastery was disbanded) needed to sell. Before I made this string I took photographs of the original parts, and the "tail" here is exactly as the original pieces came to me and were used for its last time (Photographs provided the buyer). 18 beads are an important number for Mala, along with 27, 36, 54, and 108. With the ten desirable finger bones here, there are 6 other bone beads and 2 seed beads from a special Tree (Bodhi?) and one different special seed bead at the anchor position of the tail. Finally, eight very old Indian Carnelian beads that were traded into Tibet hundreds of years ago finish the Mala construction to a wearable modern length. Of high spiritual force, I will make another Mala with others from this fingerbone group for the May auction (unless this one does not sell). I would estimate there are no more than one or two original Lama Fingerbone Mala in America, as they would be about the last thing that anyone who is - or was - a Lama would sell. Until the last couple of decades, passing one down would be the only option. It is legal to own and use, as are other human bone artifacts, since humans are not an endangered species.
Sign In to Bookmark Lot Sign In for Lot Closing Notifications