King of Hell,

14th century

14th century

Asia, Japan

This painting depicts the King of the Capital (Toshi-ō 都市王), the ninth of the Ten Kings of Hell, meting out punishment to a recently deceased sinner. Such mortuary cult images were derived from the apocryphal Ten Kings of Hell Sutra, and developed in China and Korea before appearing in Japan. The sutra explains the journey of deceased persons to the courts of Hell, where the merits of their lives are judged by the Ten Kings. The hearings take place every seventh day for the first forty-seven days following death, and then on the hundredth day, as well as the first year and third year anniversaries. Relatives can plea bargain for their loved ones by performing rituals before the kings on these days, and negotiate for a fortunate rebirth, or even release from the six realms of transmigration.

Paintings of the Ten Kings appeared in Japan in the Kamakura period, and combined local and Chinese artistic and religious influences. Their models were professionally produced Ten Kings paintings imported to Japan from the port of Ningbo in what is now the Chinese province of Zhejiang. Retained from China are the rankings of the kings and many pictorial conventions, like the magisterial pose of the Ninth King holding a brush in his right hand. Unique to Japanese renditions is the addition of a Buddhist deity, in most cases a buddha or a bodhisattva, above each king to indicate the source of his religious authority. Here the bodhisattva Seishi rides on a cloud above the king’s head. Native yamato-e painting style is evident in the bright flames and heavy pigments. Much of the original pigment and gold leaf are now lost. The scroll can be dated by stylistic and iconographic similarities to fourteenth century Ten Kings paintings of the Tosa school.