Arts asiatiques - Année 1986 - Volume 41 - Numéro 1 - Pages 89-95The musée Guimet has bought recently a stone from Nepal depicting the Hindu god Visnu, standing between Laksmî and Garuda. Four arms are appearing on the god. As on many of his representations in Nepal, the position of his two upper attributes, the wheel and the club, are not canonical and inverted. The cult of the expansions (vyûha) of Visnu is present in Kâthmandu Valley. The iconography of the musée Guimet stone corresponds with the Çrîdhara vyûha aspect. This special representation seems however more a local tradition than a special worship to Çrîdhara in Nepal. The style of the sculpture is closed to some pieces of the X th. century but three details are unusual in this context : the special shape of the central fleuron of the diadem of the goddess, her snake torque armlets and the three lotus of the bottom of the stone. All these elements are popular during the XII th. century and it would be reasonnable to date this Visnu sculpture of that period. 7 pages Source : Persée ; Ministère de la jeunesse, de l’éducation nationale et de la recherche, Direction de l’enseignement supérieur, Sous-direction des bibliothèques et de la documentation.