convents, in which images and stūpas were used and ceremonies were held in his honor. Presently, opinion among scholars is divided as to whether Ānanda's cult among bhikkhunīs was an expression of their dependence on male monastic tradition, or the opposite, an expression of their legitimacy and independence. Pāli Vinaya texts attribute the design of the Buddhist monk's robe to Ānanda. As Buddhism prospered, more laypeople started to donate expensive cloth for robes, which put the monks at risk for theft. To decrease its commercial value, monks therefore cut up the cloth offered, before they sew a robe from it. The Buddha asked Ānanda to think of a model for a Buddhist robe, made from small pieces of cloth. Ānanda designed a standard robe model, based on the rice fields of Magadha, which were divided in sections by banks of earth. Another tradition that is connected to Ānanda is paritta recitation. Theravāda Buddhists explain that the custom of sprinkling water during paritta chanting originates in Ānanda's visit to Vesālī, when he recited the Ratana Sutta and sprinkled water from his alms bowl. A third tradition sometimes attributed to Ānanda is the use of Bodhi trees in Buddhism. It is described in the text Kāliṅgabodhi Jātaka that Ānanda planted a Bodhi tree as a symbol of the Buddha's enlightenment, to give people the chance to pay their respects to the Buddha. This tree and shrine came to be known as the Ānanda Bodhi Tree, said to have grown from a seed from the original Bodhi Tree under which the Buddha is depicted to have attained enlightenment. Many of this type of Bodhi Tree shrines in Southeast Asia were erected following this example. Presently, the Ānanda Bodhi Tree is sometimes identified with a tree at the ruins of Jetavana, Sāvatthi, based on the records of Faxian. In art Between 1856 and 1858 Richard Wagner wrote a draft for an opera libretto based on the legend about Ānanda and the low-caste girl Prakṛti. He left only a fragmentary prose sketch of a work to be called Die Sieger, but the topic inspired his later opera Parsifal. Furthermore, the draft was used by composer Jonathan Harvey in his 2007 opera Wagner Dream. In Wagner's version of the legend, which he based on orientalist Eugène Burnouf's translations, the magical spell of Prakṛti's mother does not work on Ānanda, and Prakṛti turns to the Buddha to