shinzou　神像

KEY WORD :　art history / iconography

An image, either in sculpture or painting, of a deity *kami 神 in its Shinto or Buddhist/Shinto syncretic *suijaku 垂迹 form. The term is more usually applied to sculpture, while suijaku bijutsu 垂迹美術 tends to be applied more commonly to syncretic art in general, and Shinto art *Shintou bijutsu 神道美術 covers all art connected with Shinto apart from architecture. It is believed that in early times there were no images used in Shinto and that the creation and use of images in worship developed after the advent of Buddhism. The early extant Shinto sculptures date from the 9c, while the first instance of the making of a shinzou is believed to be that recorded in TADO JINGUUJI GARAN ENGI SHIZAICHOU 多度神宮寺伽藍縁起資財帳 (Record of Properties of the Associated Temple of Tado Shrine), complied in 801, which relates the story of the priest Mangan's 満願 conversion of the kami of Tado Shrine in 763 and his subsequent portrayal of the kami in a sculpture. In sculpture kami are often portrayed as seated figures of Japanese noblemen or noblewomen in court dress, but they can also be shown as monks (see *sougyou hachiman 僧形八幡). They may also be dressed in Chinese style robes and resemble Hindu deities adopted by Buddhism such as *Kichijouten 吉祥天 . Female images are called joshinzou or megamizou 女神像 and male images are called danshinzou or ogamizou 男神像. There are also works of sculpture, which may be called shinzou, that show syncretic deities, such as *Zaou Gongen 蔵王権現. Shinzou could serve as the body of the kami *shintai 神体 within a shrine . As shintai, they were usually kept secret and were influential only when directly copied as authoritative images of the kami. Shinzou are usually less than life size . They are made of wood or of lacquer over wood *mokushin kanshitsu 本心乾漆 and may be painted in polychrome. They were usually carved from single blocks of wood *ichiboku-zukuri 一木造 even after Buddhist sculptures began to be made by piecing together smaller pieces of wood *yoseki-zukuri 寄木造 around the mid-11c. This, along with a tendency to emphasize the sculpture's cylindrical mass, is felt to show the importance of the tree itself as a basis for the sculpture. 9c shinzou, such as the Hachiman triads of Touji 東寺 (Kyouougokokuji 教王護国寺), Kyoto, somewhat resemble Buddhist sculptures of the Kounin 弘仁 through Jougan 貞観 eras (810-76) in style. However, shinzou are unconstrained by Buddhist iconography and represent specific, single deities, rather than universal types. The tendency to emphasize the weight and mass of the figure that is notable in the 9c continued to mark the style of shinzou to some degree during the next two centuries. In the Kamakura period the resemblance between Buddhist sculptures, portrait sculptures and shinzou is sometimes close; and particularly portrait sculptures and shinzou cannot easily be distinguished. The circumstances of the making of most extant shinzou are unknown. The first sculpture concerning which there are ample contemporary records is the Hachiman in Toudaiji 東大寺. This sculpture was carved by Kaikei 快慶 (fl. 1185-1220), who is well known as a sculptor of Buddhist images, modeled on painting of Hachiman copied from an original believed to be by *Kuukai 空海.

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