南诏大理国史料传世不多，对于治史者而言，文献无所征是相当棘手问题。幸而南诏大理国建寺造像甚多，图像写史的内客相当丰富，其中2部宗教绘画手卷流传至今，一是《南诏图传》，二是大理国《张胜温画梵像》。前者描摹诸佛、菩萨、梵天和国主法相，是以静态图像为中心的对称式组合；后者则更侧重于叙述故事——以连贯情节与动态场景来铺叙观音七化与南诏开国的历史，也就是东南亚南天密教观音佛王信仰传入南诏，并逐渐为王室所信奉的过程。2部画卷曾引起了海峡两岸学者们的重点研究，对深入探索南诏大理国民族宗教文化具有相当重大的意义。%There aren't many historical materials from Nanzhao and Dali kingdoms, which is a big problem to the historians. Fortunately, a lot of temples with many historical pictures were built in Nanzhao and Dali kingdoms, and two of those religious pictures have been kept till today:one is Nanzhao Illustrations and the other one is Buddhism Pictures from Zhang. The former one portrays many Buddhas, Bodhisattvas, Brahma and kings, which is a symmetrical combination made up by static images;while the latter one tells the story about Avalokitesvara's seven changes and the establishment of Nanzhao kingdom, that is, how the belief of Nantian Esoteric Buddhism Avalokitesvara in southeast Asia was brought into Nanzhao and gradually adopted by the royal families in Nanzhao. The two paintings have been tentatively studied by the scholars from both sides of Taiwan straits, which is very significant to the religious culture study in Nanzhao.
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