NOTES D'ICONOGRAPHIE BOUDDHIQUE –des Vidyārāja et Vajradhara de Touen-houang

Paintings from Tun-huang represent Kuanyin, especially the Kuan-yin with thousand arms and thousand eyes, surrounded by a multitude of lesser gods. The lower corners are often occupied by two terrifying deities of the vidyārāja 明王 type. Several such paintings kept at the Musée Guimet and the British Museum bear inscriptions giving these two deities rather obscure names of vajra-bearers. Some of these names, probably of a later date, come from a list of "Eight Great Vajra", a group of deities well known in the tenth century because they are depicted in the Diamond Sūtra. However, the iconographical details do not tally with these scriptural identifications.