[INDOLOGY] Tīrthaṅkara w/ ūrdhvatilaka?

[jacob at fabularasa.dk]

Dear list,

I recently came upon a series of Indian snakes and ladders (gyān caupaṛ) 
charts in a private collection in Germany. I am puzzled by the fact that 
some of them appear to show Jaina tīrthaṅkaras painted with ūrdhvatilaka 
marks (which, to my knowledge, are not connected with Jainism).

The attached example is colophoned as being from "Bhāvāpurī Pālīthānā" 
(allegedly a Jaina dharamshala near Palitana, Gujarat) and apparently 
shows the tīrthaṅkara Neminātha with an ūrdhvatilaka mark on his 
forehead. To add to my confusion, the inscriptions on the chart clearly 
indicate a Vaiṣṇava orientation.

According to the buyer's source, the game used to be played by Brahmin 
pujaris working in or around Jaina temple grounds. While there is some 
possibility that the game chart is a fake produced solely for the 
antiques market, I would be very interested if anybody could enlighten 
me as to what might be going on here.

Kind regards,
Jacob

Jacob Schmidt-Madsen
PhD Fellow (Indology)
Department of Cross-Cultural and Regional Studies
University of Copenhagen
Denmark
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