This canopy would have been placed over the head of a statue of the Jina (Mahavira), the founder of Jainism. Originally it was part of a set that included a rectangular wall hanging (chod) that provided an ornamental backdrop to the sculpture in a home shrine. The canopy is embroidered with symbols of the fourteen propitious dreams of Mahavira's two mothers and the eight auspicious signs of Jainism. Dilys E. Blum, from The Fine Art of Textiles: The Collections of the Philadelphia Museum of Art (1997), p. 132.