No caption is visible because the top right side of the page is badly torn.

Bedecked in jewellery, a large figure wearing a kind of tilaka on his forehead sits in the lotus position under an arch. Either side of him are two smaller figures with their hands raised in respect.

They are worshippers. The one on the left holds a cotton broom under his armpit. He is probably a monk, shown as a representative of the monastic community. The one on the right could represent the lay community. Other smaller figures are musicians and dancers.

This is the standard representation of a Jina in the heaven where he is reborn before his final incarnation on earth. In that final life, he gains omniscience and becomes a Jina. For the the 24th Jina, Mahāvīra, this heaven is known as Puṣpottara.

The long protruding eye is a typical feature of western Indian painting. Its origin is unclear.

Other visual elements

The page is quite badly torn along the top right and down the left-hand side. The bottom of the right margin contains the number 1. This is the folio number.

The original paper has been pasted onto a new base. As with many Kalpa-sūtra manuscripts, there is a clear intention to make the manuscript a valuable and remarkable object in itself. This aim is signalled by the:

• use of gold in the paintings, margins and ornamental motifs
• decorated border with blue floral motifs
• three diamonds filled with gold ink and surrounded by blue ornamental motifs, the central one resembling a square in a red box of two lines.

The three golden diamonds along the central horizontal plane are symbolic reminders of the way in which manuscripts were bound at one time. Strings through one or more holes in the paper were used to thread together the loose folios so the reader could turn them over easily. The shapes are in the places where the holes would once have been.

Three diamonds mean a verso side.

Script

The elaborate script is Jaina Devanāgarī, which is here like calligraphy. It is used for writing numerous Indian languages, here Ardhamāgadhī Prakrit.

There are a few notable features of this script, which:

• is an old type in the way the sounds e and o are notated when used with a consonant, known as pṛṣṭhamātrā script
• contains red vertical lines that mark out verse divisions, with a single line dividing a verse in two while double lines are found at the end of the verse.

The lines in smaller script above and below the main text and in the margins are explanations in Sanskrit of phrases found in the central part. The two small parallel lines like slanted = after the words are meant to separate the explanations.