Citipati, Buddhist Lord of the Cemetery
Citipati, Lord of the Cemetery, is a Tibetan Buddhist figure which loosely represents intertwined male and female skeletons. These two androgynous figures which together form Citipati are considered to be guardians of cemeteries and are honored by semiannual ritualistic dances. As Citipati is comprised of the two halves of the human body, man and woman, the figure is also said to symbolize the counterparts of the human life cyle, birth and death.