Page 64 - 2021 March 17th, Indian and Himalayan and Southeast Asian Art, Christie's New York City

A Rare Figure of Hariti

Imbued with an aura of motherly guardianship, the present figure represents the yakshi-
turned-Buddhist deity, Hariti. Perhaps the single most prevalent female deity in the ancient
region of Gandhara, Hariti is revered as a grantor of wealth and fertility. She was likely
integrated into the Buddhist pantheon as a direct adaption of the Kushan protector goddess
Ardhokhsho, although she is also seen as an indirect analogue to the Greek goddess Tyche,
Roman Fortuna, Hindu Shri and Persian Anahita, all exhibiting similar iconographical
qualities. Despite her prevalence, this more than four-foot tall figure abounding with children
and jewels, is among the few large-scale sculptures of Hariti remaining in private hands.

Hariti derives her identity from a story of conversion. Born a ravenous yakshi, Hariti is said
to have birthed over 500 children. To sustain her large family, day by day, she devoured a
child in Rajagriha, Buddha’s place of residence. Upon hearing of her activities, the Buddha
concealed Hariti's own dearest child, Priyankara, underneath his offering bowl. Searching for
her child, Hariti grew so distressed by the perceived loss of one of her own that she finally
understood the pain she had caused the mothers of Rajagriha. Buddha convinced her to
amend her destructive behavior, and in return, ensured that monasteries leave food out for
her every day.

Consequently, images of Hariti with a child in her arms were commonly installed in food
halls of Buddhist monasteries to ensure fertility and sustenance. In the seventh century
travelogue, A Record of Buddhist Practices Sent Home from the Southern Sea, the Chinese
Buddhist pilgrim Yijing described images of Hariti placed upon porches in dining areas
across South Asian monasteries, and witnessed abundant food offerings made with wishes
for fertility and wealth— which Yijing insisted were always fulfilled (see Junjiro Takakusu
(trans.) A Record of Buddhist Practises, Oxford, 1896, p. 37). Reading this account, one would
expect to see ample images of Hariti surviving to the present day; the reality, however, is
quite contradictory, with the number of surviving figures of Hariti paling in comparison to
monumental images of Buddha and the bodhisattvas Avalokiteshvara and Maitreya.
The importance of Hariti cannot be understated. While pregnancy, labor, and infancy are
all highly precarious stages in human life, the archeologist and historian A.D.H. Bivar
believes the development of Hariti as a primary image in the Buddhist pantheon resulted
from a devastating pandemic known as the Antonine Plague in the second century of the
Common Era (see A.D.H. Bivar, “Hariti and the Chronology of the Kushans” in Bulletin of
the School of Oriental and African Studies, 1970, vol. 33, no. 1, pp. 19-20). Suspected to have
been smallpox, Bivar posits the epidemic developed in South and Central Asia during the
reign of the Kushan emperor Kanishka (c. 127-150 CE) and spread to pandemic-reaching
proportions throughout the Roman Empire and China via the caravan routes of the silk
road trade. Causing drastic social and political effects throughout the region, it is possible
Hariti’s popularity reflected a growing desperation to preserve a fragile population fraught
by biological disaster.