Painting Set: Dalai Lama Incarnations (Lhasa)

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Dalai Lama Incarnations Sets

Subjects & Topics:
- Description (below)
- Dalai Lama Incarnations (Lhasa) Set 2
- See HAR #44415
- Kings of Tibet & Suryagupta Tara Set
- Kadam Legbam Painting Set
- Confusions
- Others....

Video: A Kadam Legbam & Kings Painting Set (HAR on Patreon)

Jeff Watt, 3-2026

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This incomplete painting set is composed of six paintings that were previously believed to belong to two separate sets, labeled Kadam Legbam Painting Set and Kings of Tibet & Suryagupta Tara Set. However, upon re-examination, the composition, iconography and style of all six paintings suggests they were all made as part of a single set of the Dalai Lama's previous incarnations by a currently unknown master artist.

The identical composition of the six paintings is clear evidence that they are a set. They all have one central figure, five figures at the top and three figures at the bottom. Regarding style, the paintings all share detailed landscape features, subtle shading for the clouds, flowers and faces of the main figures, and fine gold brushwork for the intricate textile patterns.

We are able to identify this as a Dalai Lama incarnation set despite the lack of a Dalai Lama central figure because of Kache Gonpawa #3314446. This Kashmiri teacher, in combination with the two kings from the Kadam Legbam: Lha'i Gyalpo and Gewa'i Pel and the two Tibetan Kings: Trisong Detsen and Ralpachen, only occurs in one kind of set: Dalai Lama previous incarnations.

The source text for this specific list of pre-incarnations of the Dalai Lamas is the lineage supplication prayer titled Sarasvati's Lute (dbyangs can rgyud mang ma), written by the Fifth Dalai Lama Ngawang Lobzang Gyatso in 1680. This prayer greatly expands the list of pre-incarnations by adding all the pre-incarnations of Dromton included in the Kadam Legbam, who are mostly Indian kings. The prayer also adds many Tibetan kings of the Yarlung dynasty from the time of Nyatri Tsenpo down to Ralpachen. Several more Indian and Tibetan teachers are included as well for a total of 78 pre-incarnations. Only several of these are selected when painting sets are commissioned. See HAR #94399, and Painting Set: Dalai Lama, Annotated (Kazi Lhazo) for other examples of this long incarnation lineage.

Additionally, we can identify these paintings as a set because just below the top right corner, all the paintings have one of the Twenty-One Taras in the Suryagupta system. For the Avalokiteshvara #77106, it is Tara ‘Very Heroic’, who is the first of the Twenty-One Taras, which means this is likely the first painting in the set. There are also minor iconographic deviations of the twenty-one Taras in each painting.

Furthermore, these paintings are a set because at the top left corner, they all depict two teachers per painting. These are lineage holders of the Lamrim teachings, according to a Gelugpa numbering system which absorbed the lineage from the Kadampa school. The first painting #77106 begins the lineage with Sakyamuni Buddha on the top left. With the 21 Taras and the Lamrim teachers we may be able to estimate how many paintings are in this set, and how many are missing.

The rest of the iconographic program of this set is complex and not yet fully understood. The figures at the top center, and the three figures at the bottom vary between Buddhist deities, Indian teachers and Tibetan teachers.

Nick Dharmadi, 3-2026 [updated 5-2026]

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Bibliography:

Revue d'Etudes Tibetain No.38, edited by Daniel A. Hirshberg, Derek F. Maher & Tsering Wangchuk. "Recounting the Fifth Dalai Lama’s Rebirth Lineage" by Nancy G. Lin. February 2017.