Beads

Item number Ee27 from the MOA: University of British Columbia.

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Description

A string of one-hundred-and-ten beads on white cotton cord, one-hundred-and-four of which are spherical orange-brown seeds with a fine mottled surface that have faint striations. String forms a circle, at one side of which, there are three deep-carved beads of brown wood. At the opposite side, there are two identical beads to which are attached a smaller red-brown seed-bead with a spherical orange-brown seed, knotted on with the ends of the cord on which the beads are strung. Tied around the string of beads is braided white cotton cord, on which an amber ? bead is knotted. Cord is 4.4cm. long.

History Of Use

These beads may be of Hindu origin. They are particularly used by the Mahayana School of Buddhism, and are widely used in Tibet, China, and Japan. In Tibet they are used by lamas in repeating the mantra of a particular deity, while lay men use them in repetition of the Mani Formula, six syllables which are believed to assure the person rebirth in the western paradise of the Buddha of boundless light. The six syllables of the Mani are rich in symbolic meaning and subject to many interpretations.