The first Buddha images were made in the Swat Valley and the Peshawar Valley, the areas where the Kushans had already established their workshops, probably less than 100 years before this bronze was cast. Anthropomorphic iconography and refined metalworking techniques were gifts of the Greeks, which determined how both Buddhism and Hinduism came to be represented.

Published: O. Bopearachchi, C. Landes, C. Sachs, De l’Indus à l’Oxus. Archéologie de l’Asie Centrale, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Montpellier, 2003, no. 216