Banner
China
700-900
Patterned and plain woven silk, wood and paint
Width 33.8 cm x height 129.2 cm
Museum nos. Ch.i. 0022, Ch. 00342 Stein Loan

These silk textiles are Buddhist ritual banners. Banners like these were used by pious donors as offerings to honour the Buddha. They were carried aloft hooked on a staff and they also fluttered from the tops of stupa (domed memorial shrines). A painted wooden board across the bottom of the banner prevented the streamers becoming tangled and helped to keep it in place.

These banners were recovered from Cave 17 of the Mogao Grottoes. This shrine site is one of China's great Buddhist pilgrimage complexes and is situated near the oasis town of Dunhuang. It is part of an area of Central Asia we now call the Silk Road. This series of overland trade routes crossed Asia from China to Europe. The Silk Road was also important for the exchange of ideas. While silk textiles travelled west from China, Buddhism travelled east, entering China from India.

The explorer and archaeologist Sir Marc Aurel Stein (1862-1943) brought this banner back from Central Asia. The V&A has around 700 ancient and medieval textiles recovered by Stein at the beginning of the 20th century.