Himalayan Art Resources

Item: Vajrayogini (Buddhist Deity) - Krodha Kali (Wrathful Black Varahi)

རྡོ་རྗེ་རྣལ་འབྱོར་མ། སྣང་བརྙན་ཡོངས། 金刚瑜伽佛母(全图)
(item no. 909)
Origin Location Tibet
Date Range 1800 - 1899
Lineages Kagyu
Size 73.03x52.07cm (28.75x20.50in)
Material Ground Mineral Pigment on Cotton
Collection Rubin Museum of Art
Catalogue # acc.# P1999.29.4
Notes about the Central Figure

Classification: Deity

Appearance: Semi-Peaceful

Gender: Female

Interpretation / Description

Troma Nagmo (Sanskrit: Krishna Krodhini. English: the Fierce Black One), a wrathful form of Vajravarahi.

"...Bhagavani [Krodha Kali] with a great radiance at the time of darkness, fierce and raging. The main face is wrathful, the very pure relative truth, and the upper face of a pig is the pure ultimate truth, gazing upward; [both] having three round red eyes. The right hand holds a curved knife upraised and the left a skullcup of blood [held] to the heart. In the bend of the left elbow, as the nature of method, appears a katvanga staff. Wearing an elephant hide as an upper garment and a tiger skin as a lower garment; adorned with snakes and bones. Dark yellow hair bristles upward, the remainder falling loose. With a crown of five dry human skulls, a necklace of fifty fresh. The left leg is extended in a half dance posture pressing on the heart of a human corpse. Appearing youthful and dwelling in the middle of a blazing mass of fire." (Terdag Lingpa Gyurme Dorje (1646-1714) and Min-ling Lochen Dharmashri 1654-1718).

Jeff Watt 4-2000

Related Items
Thematic Sets
Tradition: Kagyu Deity Paintings
Collection of Rubin Museum of Art: Painting Gallery 8
Buddhist Deity: Vajrayogini Main Page
Buddhist Deity: Deities (Female)
Buddhist Deity: Vajrayogini, Krodha Kali
Subject: Ladies with Beards