The "Queen's"Chorten

The "Queen's" Chorten is located in Karsha, Zanskar, immediately in front of the Chuchikjyal temple. While the latter structure predates its ca. 14th century paintings by a century or two, the "Queen's" Chorten is reliably dated by inscriptions on its own paintings (translated by the Karsha Lonpo and Lama Angchuk) to the second half of the 16th century. A few of the images from the Chorten are found below.

This is an image of the Vairocana Buddha wall inside the dome of the Queen's chorten. The color of the image is not representative. The image below is better.

This is a detail from the Vairocana wall (above). It shows Vajrabhairava, whose outstretched arms are just visible on the overall image of the Vairocana wall on the far right.

This is a detail of a bodhisattva from the wall to the left of the Vairocana wall. Among the inscriptions are dedicatory poems including some which praise the Queen of Zangla as one of the donors of the chorten. She is, however, not the only patron mentioned,

This is a very large file of a bodhisattva. It also provides an extraordinarily detailed view of the painting process, the line work, ornaments and patterns. It also shows clearly the condition of the murals, with cracks in the walls and flung plaster used to annually consecrate and restore the Chorten.

These three lamas, according to Karsha Lonpo, were the artists of the Queen's Chorten murals. They are actually very tiny, and appear at the bottom left of the Vairocana mural, near the images of the Zangla Gyalpo and his queen, and immediately above the local dancers (see the next image) depicted celebrating the donor's work.

Zanskari dancers and ministers dancing and celebrating the consecration of the Queen's Chorten.