Water Ewer for Rituals (Kundika)

Known as kundika in Sanskrit, this distinctively shaped vessel served to purify a sacred space and to invoke a deity. In Korean Buddhist art, it appears primarily as an attribute of the Bodhisattva Avalokitesvara (Gwaneum in Korean). By the 1100s, however, the kundika was used as aristocrats’ fancy water container for everyday use.