CACrown ArchivesThe cinema collection
Menu
Research dossier · General Reference

Kasaya (clothing)

robe worn by fully-ordained Buddhist monks and nuns, pieced out of discarded clothing

Cross-disciplinary reference desk with index cards, atlas, dictionary and catalogue
General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJun 28, 2026
Entity authorityQ504779
Source-derived summary

Kāṣāya are the robes of fully ordained Buddhist monks and nuns, named after a brown or saffron dye. In Sanskrit and Pali, these robes are also given the more general term cīvara, which references the robes without regard to color.

Origin and construction

Buddhist kāṣāya are said to have originated in ancient India as a set of robes for monks who followed the teachings of Gautama Buddha. A notable variant has a pattern reminiscent of an Asian rice field. Original kāṣāya were constructed of discarded fabric. These were stitched together to form three rectangular pieces of cloth, which were then fitted over the body in a specific manner. The three main pieces of cloth are the antarvāsa, the uttarāsaṅga, and the saṃghāti. Together they form the "triple robe," or ticīvara. The ticīvara is described more fully in the Theravāda Vinaya.

Antarvāsa (Antaravāsaka)

The antarvāsa is the inner robe covering the lower body.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Kasaya (clothing)” is robe worn by fully-ordained Buddhist monks and nuns, pieced out of discarded clothing. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Kasaya, clothing and robe, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA concise reference frame for defining the subject, testing terminology and identifying the institution closest to the evidence. The current 152-word lead offers orientation but no explicit four-digit date, so chronology should not be assumed. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. For this dossier, Kasaya, clothing and robe is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “robe worn by fully-ordained Buddhist monks and nuns, pieced out of discarded clothing” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 28, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q504779. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference.

Critical limits

The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

Best used for
  • Subject orientation
  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
Verify next

The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Kasaya (clothing)”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Kasaya (clothing) primary sources, Kasaya (clothing) archive and Kasaya research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Kasaya (clothing)”?
  2. Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
  3. What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
Subject index

Search terms from this dossier

Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Kasaya (clothing)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.