Refine your search

The results of your search are listed below alongside the search terms you entered on the previous page. You can refine your search by amending any of the parameters in the form and resubmitting it.

Select all Deselect all Add selection to lightbox
Large Small
Thumbnails per page
Kumari - Literally 'virgin', a young girl who is regarded as the incarnation of the Hindu goddess Taleju; remains only in her divine state until she has lost the first drop of blood, either by a wound or her first menstruation; at any given time there are several Kumaris in the cities of the Kathmandu Valley. The Kumari is chosen from the Shakya caste of the Nepalese Newari community.
Kumari - Literally 'virgin', a young girl who is regarded as the incarnation of the Hindu goddess Taleju; remains only in her divine state until she has lost the first drop of blood, either by a wound or her first menstruation; at any given time there are several Kumaris in the cities of the Kathmandu Valley. The Kumari is chosen from the Shakya caste of the Nepalese Newari community.
Kumari - Literally 'virgin', a young girl who is regarded as the incarnation of the Hindu goddess Taleju; remains only in her divine state until she has lost the first drop of blood, either by a wound or her first menstruation; at any given time there are several Kumaris in the cities of the Kathmandu Valley. The Kumari is chosen from the Shakya caste of the Nepalese Newari community.
Kumari - Literally 'virgin', a young girl who is regarded as the incarnation of the Hindu goddess Taleju; remains only in her divine state until she has lost the first drop of blood, either by a wound or her first menstruation; at any given time there are several Kumaris in the cities of the Kathmandu Valley. The Kumari is chosen from the Shakya caste of the Nepalese Newari community.
The Cakrasaṃvara Tantra, Chinese: 胜乐金刚 shènglè jīngāng; Tibetan: Korlo Demchog Gyud (Tibetan: འཁོར་ལོ་སྡོམ་པ / བདེ་མཆོག; Wylie: Khor lo sdom pa / bde mchog gi rgyud) is considered to be of the mother class of the Anuttara Yoga Tantra in the Indo-Tibetan Vajrayana Buddhist tradition.<br/><br/> The central deity of the mandala, a heruka known as Saṃvara (variants: Saṃvara & Saṃbara) or simply as Śrī Heruka, is one of the principal iṣṭha-devatā, or meditational deities of the Sarma schools of Tibetan Buddhism.<br/><br/> Saṃvara is typically depicted with a blue-coloured body, four faces, and twelve arms, and embracing his consort Vajravarahi (in Chinese 金刚亥母 jīngāng hàimǔ) in the yab-yum position. Other forms of the deity are also known, with varying numbers of limbs. Saṃvara and consort are not to be thought of as two different entities, as an ordinary husband and wife are two different people; in reality, their divine embrace is a metaphor for the union of great bliss and emptiness, which are one and the same essence.
The date of construction of the Svayambhunath stupa, its origins steeped in myth, is unknown. According to the inscriptions on an ancient and damaged stone tablet at Svayambhunath, King Vrishadeva (ca. 400 CE) was the first to build a place of worship on the site. His grandson, King Manadeva I (ca. 464-505) may have made some additions.<br/><br/>The Muslim invasion of 1349 undid all the pious building work, the marauding Muslim warriors dismantling every kafir (infidel) sanctuary that they came across. An inscription at Svayambhunath records the date of the Muslim invasion as 20 November 1349, in all probability a very accurate account. After the raids Svayambhunath was restored, and most of the buildings seen today are from the post-invasion period.<br/><br/>Swayambhunath (Devnagari: स्वयम्भूनाथ स्तुप) is an ancient religious complex atop a hill in the Kathmandu Valley, west of Kathmandu city. It is also known as the Monkey Temple as there are holy monkeys living in parts of the temple in the north-west. The Tibetan name for the site means 'Sublime Trees' (Wylie:Phags.pa Shing.kun), for the many varieties of trees found on the hill.<br/><br/>For the Buddhist Newars in whose mythological history and origin myth as well as day-to-day religious practice, Swayambhunath occupies a central position, it is probably the most sacred among Buddhist pilgrimage sites. For Tibetans and followers of Tibetan Buddhism, it is second only to Bodhnath.