The Copper Coloured Palace: Iconography of the Nyingma School of Tibetan Buddhism, by Adelheid Herrmann-Pfandt

The book includes more than 2000 photographs most of which were taken by the author herself in various monasteries and nunneries of the rÑiṅ ma school in India and Nepal and by Elke Hessel in Tibet. Over hundred images provided from other sources have been added. As far as possible, the iconography of the deities and maṇḍalas has been verified through written sources, among them thelarge rÑiṅ ma text collections of the Rin chen gter mdzod and the rÑiṅ ma rgyud ’bum.

In seven chapters on the iconography of Buddhas, the systems of peaceful and wrathful deities, Padmasambhava, the eight most important cycles of meditation deities (bKa’ brgyad), the protective deities and the teachers, the book describes, on the one hand, the peculiarities of the rÑiṅ ma school, but also, on the other hand, the parts of its iconography it shares with the other schools.

Heavy book, about 6 kg!