To What God Shall We Render Homage in the Temple at Modhera

PRAJÑÅDHARAESSAYS ON

ASIAN ART, HISTORY, EPIGRAPHY AND CULTUREin Honour of

Gouriswar Bhattacharya

Edited by

Gerd J.R. Mevissenand

Arundhati Banerji

2009Kaveri Books

New Delhi - 110 002

To What God Shall We Render Homage 18in the Temple at Modhera?

K. MANKODI

Kasmai devåya havi¹å vidhema?“To what God shall we offer our oblations?”

�gveda X.121

Introduction

When the �gvedic seeker posed the question, “to which one of the many gods offerings should be made?”,awareness was growing that a unity could be found behind the seeming multiplicity of divinities, and thatthe total attention of the devotee must be directed towards that One God. The poet was seeking to grasp thetrue nature of that god. This quest for the true understanding of the nature of Divinity always remained atthe heart of religious thinking, at least during the early period of Hinduism.

In this paper the “Sun” temple at Modhera in Gujarat will be reconsidered, and the question will beasked – what god could have been honoured in that temple? Was it simply the Sun god, as has always beenbelieved, or was it in fact a composite deity, a blend of deities, someone in whom the god ˜iva also waspresent along with S÷rya?

The Background

Most of the famous monuments of India that define the extent and standards of architecture and sculpturewere discovered in the nineteenth century. The explorers and archaeologists who discovered them identifiedthem and their attribution to particular deities. In many instances the attribution proposed by these earlierexplorers has continued down to our own time. But during one hundred years our understanding of thereligions has become deeper, the complex nature of the gods that was not quite so well known to the earliestexplorers is now clearer.

The Site and the Temple

Modhera (Plate 18.1) in northern Gujarat has received much attention ever since it was brought to light inthe early nineteenth century. Colonel M. Monier-Williams, who appears to have been the first to notice itin the course of his duties as Surveyor General,1 recorded his observations in his report in 1809. ThereafterA.K. Forbes (1878: 195-196; Gujarati translation, 1922: 140, 353-354) also briefly described it. NeitherCol. Monier-Williams nor Forbes mentioned the temple’s dedication; but by then the temple itself hadceased to be in worship.

178 Prajñådhara – Essays in Honour of Gouriswar Bhattacharya

James Burgess and Henry Cousens (1903: 71-81) for the first time surveyed the temple closely. Theynoted the presence of the images of the solar deities, or the Ådityas, outside and inside, as well as thefragmentary pedestal with a seven-horse chariot resting on the floor of an underground chamber below thesanctum, and definitively attributed the temple to the Sun god. Percy Brown (1956: 120-121) recognized itas a major example of the North Indian style, and attempted a conjectural reconstruction of its vanishedupper parts (ibid.: pl. CVII, fig. 2). M.A. Dhaky (1961: 28-37) determined its relative position in WesternIndia and dated it to about AD 1025. Wibke Lobo has authored an entire book, The Sun-Temple at Modhera(1982), in which she has described fully the architecture and iconography of the entire site. There are manyother papers, all of which indicate the importance attached to the monument.

The numerous images of the Ådityas, both on the outer walls of the sanctum and within the hall, immedi-ately attract attention. On the sanctum’s outer walls, the Ådityas are represented on the two faces of the prati-rathas or corners of the bhadras or principal offsets, that is, a total of the group of twelve on the sanctum’sthree sides (Plate 18.2). Within the closed hall and the sanctum again, all the twelve are represented in nichesat the corners on the side walls. On the doorframe of the hall, the solar divinities are represented. And, aswas already noted by Burgess and Cousens (1903: 75), inside the sanctum there is the fragmentary pedestalof the cult image, with the Sun god’s seven-horsed chariot. Modhera’s temple, therefore, has always beenconsidered without any question as a Sun temple, which would appear to be a logical conclusion.

The Need for a Deeper Look

Certainly, the Sun god is prominent at Modhera. But on the other hand, its architecture and statuary bothpossess features that are unmistakably ̃ aiva as well as solar. They prompt the question whether the templewas really of the Sun alone, or perhaps it was built for a deity who had a richer and more complex characterthan has ever been suspected – synthesizing the Sun god with ˜iva, a synthesis that is already well knownin Hinduism, both Puranic and Tantric.

Firstly, the temple’s major statuary on the walls consists of an identical number of deities of both solarand ̃ aiva pantheons to whom equal importance is given – the twelve Ådityas, and twelve ̃ aiva goddesses,the twelve Gaurïs (Dvåda¸agaurï), who are the forms of ˜iva’s consort, Umå or Pårvatï.

Secondly, a form of Bhairava, an aspect of ̃ iva, exceptional in its iconography, with three faces, threearms and three legs, is represented in company with the Gaurïs on the ma½∙apa wall; it is so singular thatits inclusion on this temple must have been intentional.

Thirdly, the only surviving doorway, of the g÷∙hama½∙apa, has the Sun god combined with Brahmå,Vi¹½u and ˜iva, and this in its own way reflects Modhera’s multipolarity.

Fourthly, the central niche on the lintel of that doorway (lalå¶abimba), which customarily shoulddisplay the temple’s presiding deity, has ˜iva, not S÷rya.

An attempt will be made here to understand the true nature of Modhera, that accounts for the presenceof both solar and ãiva elements in the same locus. It can be shown that the temple was for a deity morecomplex, more “synthetic”, than S÷rya alone, call him solar ˜iva, or ãiva S÷rya. Just like the other blendssuch as Hari-Hara, who combined Vi¹½u and ˜iva within one form, and Ardhanårï¸vara, the union of ˜ivaand Pårvatï, S÷rya and ̃ iva too were embodied into one form that combined the nature of these two separatedeities.

K. Mankodi: To What God Shall We Render Homage in the Temple at Modhera ? 179

Fig. 1: Modhera, plan of the temple. After Burgess & Cousens 1903: pl. XLVIII.

Brief Description

Modhera is located about one hundred and twentykilometres to the north-west of Ahmedabad in districtMahesana. The temple is too well known to need along introduction. Built in the first quarter of the ele-venth century by the Solanki king Bhïmadeva I, it isan excellent example of the architecture of its period.

The temple is the nucleus of a large complex,which faces the east. It stands on the left bank of theriver Pushmavati, on a high platform of bricks. Onesees first a large rectangular tank with elegant steps,with small shrines placed at regular intervals along acomplex and pleasing arrangement of stairs. Beyondthe tank is an open pillared hall or ra¼gama½∙apa. Atora½a or ornamental gateway, and then the templeitself, come next.

The temple has an entrance porch on two col-umns, a square closed hall or g÷∙hama½∙apa withprojecting blind windows on its two sides, and asanctum. The sanctum is also square on plan and hasan inner circumambulatory passage, and its outerwalls have projecting blind windows on three sides.The structure overall forms an oblong shape, that iscomposed by two squares placed side by side.

The walls of both sanctum and hall are treated identically, with a total of twelve deities on each, as seenin Fig. 1. Encircling both the ma½∙apa and the sanctum are ten other images, the eight Regents of the Di-rections or Dikpålas and two other personages.

The twelve principal images on the sanctum and the ma½∙apa are treated in the same way. They areplaced in panels that are large enough for these nearly life-size divine images, flanked by smaller figures inthe four corners.

Modhera as a Sun Temple: The Twelve Ådityas on the Sanctum Walls

Although the image of the presiding deity was never found intact, Modhera’s association with S÷rya hasnever been in doubt since the time James Burgess and Henry Cousens reported it; therefore, it will sufficeto enumerate only briefly those features that reveal its solar dedication. Images of the twelve Ådityas areplaced on the pratirathas on the sanctum’s walls (Fig. 2), as also at fixed points inside the ma½∙apa. TheÅdityas are represented as usual, standing erect frontally on their seven-horse chariots, with lotuses in theirtwo hands, and adorned with the dress typical of solar deities (high boots, armour-plate, high crown). Andfinally, the fragmentary pedestal of the lost main image which is still lying in the underground chamberbelow the shrine has the representations of the seven horses of the solar chariot.


Fig. 2: Modhera, chart showing the positionsof the Ådityas and Gaurïs.

The Ådityas, namely Dhåt¡, Mitra, Aryaman,ãkra, Varu½a, Aº¸a, Bhaga, Vivasvat, P÷¹an, Sa-vit¡, Tva¹¶¡ and Vi¹½u, are the twelve manifestationsof the one Sun god himself in his movement throughthe twelve months of the year. They are always re-presented as a group, and have the same attributes asthe Sun god.

The pedestal of the cult image still remains inthe centre of the – subterranean – sanctum, with theseven prancing horses of S÷rya’s chariot on its front.The form of the cult image and the attributes in itshands will perhaps never be known.

Modhera’s temple thus honours the Sun, but theSun god constitutes only a half of the principal sta-tuary. The builders planned it in such a way thatwhile one half of the structure reflects twelve formsof S÷rya, the other half reflects an equal number ofãiva goddesses. Surely they planned intentionally.

Modhera as a ãiva Temple: The Twelve Gaurïson the Ma½∙apa’s Walls

If the statuary on the shrine’s walls is unequivocallysolar, that on the walls of the hall is decidedly ̃ aiva.And the Dikpålas embrace as it were both hall and

sanctum within one and the same larger, comprehensive scheme (thus emphasizing the bipolar nature of thetemple in their own way). For, on the ma½∙apa’s walls, at the pratirathas, are the figures of twelve god-desses, who belong without any doubt to the ãiva pantheon, and who may safely be identified as theTwelve Gaurïs, the Dvåda¸agaurïs.2

The Gaurïs are a group of twelve ̃ aiva goddesses, forms of ̃ iva’s consort Umå, and her other aspects.They are Umå, Pårvatï, Gaurï, Lalitå, ˜riyå, K¡¹½å, Måhe¸varï, Rambhå, Såvitrï, Trikha½∙å, Totalå andTripurå.

The Myth of Gaurï

The myth of the penance that Pårvatï or Gaurï performed in order to be reunited with ˜iva after her self-immolation in her father’s sacrificial fire is well known: Pårvatï in her earlier birth was the daughter ofDak¹a Prajåpati, called Satï, the “True”, or “Virtuous”. Because she chose ˜iva, the naked wanderer of theburning grounds, who shunned civilization, keeping the company of snakes and wild beasts, she was dis-owned by her father. When Dak¹a performed a sacrifice, Satï went uninvited, was insulted, and threw herselfinto the sacrificial altar. Reborn as the daughter of Himålaya, the Snowy Mountain, Satï performed theterrible “austerities of the five fires” (pañcågnitapasyå), standing surrounded by four fire altars, looking up


at the sun as the fifth fire burning in the sky, and was finally reunited with ˜iva. In ancient Indian per-ception, thus, Gaurï was a powerful symbol of the conjugal aspirations of women, their devotion to thehusband, desire for his long life, through all of which they found their own fulfilment.

The Gaurïs on the Modhera Temple

Most scholars writing about Modhera have taken into account only the Ådityas and have ignored the Devïs.It is therefore necessary to consider briefly the Gaurïs as they appear here, so that the character of the templemay stand out with greater sharpness.

The complete group of all the twelve Gaurïs is rather rarely seen at one place. On Modhera’s ma½∙apa,all the twelve were represented (Fig. 2), of which one has been totally obliterated, and another has sufferedto a great extent. They are four-armed, standing in a graceful posture in the centre of a panel, flanked aboveand below by other seated or standing figures.

The natural hands of the Gaurïs, wherever they are preserved, always carry the same attributes andshow the same mudrå, namely, the varadamudrå, sometimes combined with an ak¹amålå (in which case itshould be designated as the varadåk¹amudrå) in the right hand, and a kama½∙alu or pitcher for sacred waterin the left. The upper pair of hands bears other attributes expressive of piety.

• Gaurï 1, on the left side of the entrance to the hall and facing the east, has the varadåk¹amudrå, that is,the right hand is in the varadamudrå with a rosary suspended from the stretched fingers, a spear and anoose. The fourth hand is broken, but it must have held a kama½∙alu or vessel for sacred water (Plate18.3).

• Gaurï 2 has the same varadåk¹amudrå, a trident, a bell, while the lower left hand is broken (Plate 18.4).• Gaurï 3 has the original right hand broken, the upper right holds the broken shaft of some object, the

upper left hand is broken, and the attribute in the original left hand, which should normally be akama½∙alu, is no longer identifiable (Plate 18.5).

• Gaurï 4, on the right side of the screen on the ma½∙apa’s south wall, has both her lower hands de-stroyed; the two upper hands hold a lotus bud and a lotus flower (Plate 18.6).

• Gaurï 5, on the left side of the screen, is missing.• Gaurï 6, on the back wall of the ma½∙apa, has varadåk¹amålå, trident, lotus, and while the upper left

arm itself is not preserved, the lotus flower that the goddess must have borne is still visible; the lowerleft hand is destroyed. On her right is a bull, her våhana (Lobo 1982: pl. 147).

The following six goddesses are placed on the right or north side of the ma½∙apa, in exactly the same posi-tions as the first six.

• Gauri 7, on the same position as Gaurï 6, but on the right or north wall of the ma½∙apa, has her lowerright hand broken, and her other three hands hold the shaft of an a¼ku¸a, perhaps a noose, and akama½∙alu (Plate 18.7).

• Gaurï 8 shows the varadåk¹amudrå, thunderbolt, banner and kama½∙alu (Plate 18.8).• Gauri 9’s original right hand shows a simple varada gesture without the customary ak¹amålå or rosary.

The other three hands have the shaft of some object, a lotus and a kama½∙alu (Plate 18.9).


• Gaurï 10 holds the varadåk¹amudrå, trident and snake, while the lower left is missing (Plate 18.10).• Three of the hands of Gaurï 11 are broken, but in the upper left is a kha¶vå¼ga (femur bone crowned

by a human skull) (Plate 18.11).• Gaurï 12 is badly damaged, and no attributes can be detected (Lobo 1982: pl. 155).

That these goddesses form one group is unmistakable. They have a distinctly ãiva character. Theirattributes and the features such as the ja¶å and the rosary in their hands are indicative of piety, asceticism,and purity. It is thus that the Dvåda¸agaurïs are also described in the text on iconography from Western Indiacomposed during the mediaeval period, called the Aparåjitap¡cchå, or “Questions of (King) Aparåjita”.

The Gaurïs in the Aparåjitap¡cchå

Now, there is no single standard account of the iconography of the Twelve Gaurïs applicable to all theirimages. It may be relevant to reproduce in brief an account of the twelve Gaurïs as given in the Aparåjita-p¡cchå of Bhuvanadeva in Chapter XX. This is an iconographic text compiled at the Solanki capital ofAnhilwad Patan in the first part of the twelfth century. In nineteen verses, the author describes first theiconometry and then the forms of the twelve goddesses. They are four-armed, with three eyes, wearingvarious ornaments and seated on their mount, the iguana. Their names are given in verse 6 as Umå, Pårvatï,Gaurï, Lalitå, ̃ riyå, K¡¹½å, Hemavatï, Rambhå, Såvitrï, Tri¹a½∙å (˜rïkha½∙å), Totalå (Utpalå), and Tripurå.From verse 8 to 19, the objects in the hands and the other attributes of the individual goddesses are taken up:

• Umå bears the rosary, lotus, mirror and kama½∙alu.• Pårvatï: rosary, ˜iva, Ga½e¸a, kama½∙alu; fire altars on either side.• Gaurï: rosary, abhaya, lotus, kama½∙alu.• Lalitå: trident/spear, rosary, vï½å, kama½∙alu.• ˜riyå: rosary, lotus, abhaya, varada.• K¡¹½å: rosary, hands folded at the heart, kama½∙alu; five fires.• Måhe¸varï (in the list above, her name is Hemavatï): lotus and mirror.• Rambhå: kama½∙alu, rosary, thunderbolt, goad (she is on an elephant).• Såvitrï: rosary, manuscript, lotus, kama½∙alu; four faces (this last is not noted by Lobo 1982).• Tri¹a½∙å: rosary, thunderbolt, spear, kama½∙alu.• Totalå: rosary, staff, shield, fly-whisk; fair complexion.• Tripurå: noose, goad, abhaya, varada.

About ̃ riyå, it is stated that she is to be worshipped by householders, and about Såvitrï, that those whoperform Vedic sacrifices (¸rotriya) should worship her. Although such specifics are of little relevance iniconographical terms, they may throw light on the “prehistory”, so to say, of these goddesses: They mayindicate that these goddesses, who presided over wealth and sacred learning, may have been amalgamatedinto the group of twelve.

Gaurï worship was an important cult for women, the goddesses being propitiated for the woman’s con-tinued state of being married, that is, for the longevity of the husband, and many independent images areavailable. The twelve Gaurïs were worshipped together as a group, but sometimes also individually, some


among them – Umå, Pårvatï, Gaurï and Lalitå – being relatively more popular than the rest. The form ofeach of the twelve goddesses is described in the iconographic texts. They are to be distinguished from eachother from the attributes in their four hands.

The number of the goddesses on the outer walls of the ma½∙apa of the Modhera temple correspondsexactly to that of the Gaurïs, and their forms generally to the Aparåjitap¡cchå. At Modhera, the twelve arean integral part of the iconographic scheme in the same way as are the Ådityas. The sculptures of both thegroups of deities are of the same size, their attendants are represented in the same manner, and the designof the subsidiary panels that flank them is exactly the same for both. Clearly, the builder of Modhera gaveequal importance to the ãiva goddesses as to the manifestations of the Sun god, and this fact surely mustbe significant for the dedication of the temple as a whole.

Surely, therefore, the presence of the Gaurïs on the temple here could not have been a matter of chance,but was quite deliberate – the builders chose those images for the walls that reflect the nature of the princi-pal deity of the shrine. And this deity evidently was one who synthesized in himself both solar and ãivacharacters.

Wibke Lobo has described the twelve goddesses individually, called by her “Devïs”. She comparedthem (1982: 80-88) with the twelve Gaurïs described in the Aparåjitap¡cchå and identified them as such.Kamal Giri and Karuna Giri (1991) followed up with an article in Hindi along similar lines. Strangely,however, no one posed the question – why are all these twelve ãiva goddesses parading here in strengthon a temple that is supposedly built for S÷rya ?

Gaurïs in the Queen’s Stepwell at Patan

The number of the Gaurïs as twelve was fixed in the mediaeval period, and individual images are found atmany places in western, central and eastern India, but the complete group of all the twelve is not to be metwith at many places. In the stepwell built by queen Udayamatï at Patan, the capital of the Solankis, onlythirty-five kilometres to the north of Modhera and built some fifty years later, there are fifteen comparablesculptures. They are in the attitude of performing penance, and all bear the rosary combined with the vara-damudrå and the kama½∙alu in their natural hands. Their two upper hands have varying objects, such as abunch of sacred grass, a li¼ga, Ga½e¸a or another rosary or a lotus. In some instances the five fire pits arealso present.

The ãiva Goddesses at Chittorgarh

While images of the Gaurïs exist at many sites, a number of them at one place together, with their namesalso inscribed under them, are known from the Kïrti Stambha at Chittorgarh erected by Mahårå½å Kumbha-kar½a in the fifteenth century. On an upper storey there are as many as twenty-seven figures of standingfour-armed goddesses, carved close together in the narrow space available on the three walls of the central“column” of the tower around which the staircase winds. All are, or were originally, engraved with theirnames; among them occur the twelve Gaurïs, who are thus identifiable either from the labels, or from theiriconography, and often from both. As many as twelve out of the twenty-seven are standing on the iguana,which is Gaurï’s own distinctive mount, while the remaining goddesses have lions, birds, or have no mount.The names of the Gaurïs are not exactly identical to the “standard” twelve, but the forms all have ̃ aiva traits


and a definite suggestion of asceticism. Indeed, the fact that there are twenty-seven goddesses together, withone or two common names but with different forms, is significant – that the group of twelve is fixed, butindividual members may vary.

The Pañcalïlå Goddesses in the Aparåjitap¡cchå

A group of five goddesses is mentioned in the Aparåjitap¡cchå, whose names all begin with the letter la-,and who together are known as the Pañcalïlayådevïs. They are Lïlayå, Lïlå, Lïlå¼gï, Lalitå and Lïlåvatï. Asdescribed in Aparåjitap¡cchå 22.20 (cited by Dubey 1987: 336, and fn. 832), they are four-armed, and theobjects in their hands are as follows:

• Lïlayå: rosary-lotus-lotus-kama½∙alu;• Lïlå: rosary-lotus-manuscript-kama½∙alu;• Lïlå¼gï: rosary-noose-lotus-kama½∙alu;• Lalitå: rosary-vajra-a¼ku¸a-kama½∙alu; and• Lïlåvatï: rosary-noose-goad-kama½∙alu.

Thus, the five Pañcalïlå (or Pañcalïlayå) goddesses all bear the rosary and kama½∙alu in their two natu-ral hands, as do all those goddesses at Modhera whose natural hands are intact. It will be seen that at leastfour out of the five names are to be found among the goddesses of Chittor, and one of them, Lïlåvatï hasidentical attributes. It could, therefore, be argued that five of the Modhera goddesses are the Pañcalïlådevïs.

Lal Mani Dubey, who has written a book on the Aparåjitap¡cchå, has referred to some sculptures onthe Lak¹ma½a temple at Khajuraho as being representations of the Pañcalïlå goddesses, and has cited theauthority of Krishna Deva in support. But, as Dubey (1987: 336) himself remarks, the Pañcalïlayådevïs arerather obscure or minor goddesses, whose images are to be seen rarely, if at all. Besides, if the Pañcalïlå-devïs were represented on the walls of our temple, they would have formed an independent group of just thefive, and would not have formed part of some other, and larger, group of twelve, unless they were inherentlymembers of that larger group as well. The five Lïlådevïs are described in the same chapter of the Aparåjita-p¡cchå, which enumerates the Twelve Gaurïs. One must also remember that the Lak¹ma½a temple likeModhera was built when architecture was at its peak and all the elements of their structure and sculpturewere perfectly planned. It is, therefore, hard to be convinced of the identification proposed by Dubey thatthe Pañcalïlå goddesses could have been portrayed as major statuary on a temple as prominent as Modhera.

N. P. Joshi (1996: 44) has debated Lobo’s identification of the goddesses of Modhera with the Gaurïs.His grounds are the posture of the Modhera goddesses; the absence of Ga½e¸a, the li¼ga or Skanda, the firesand the iguana; and the presence in one sculpture of a bull, which is not the mount of any one of the twelveGaurïs. But these objections are not insurmountable.

Joshi’s first objection against the identification of the twelve Modhera goddesses with the Gaurïs is thatthey are not standing in the rigid frontal samabha¼ga pose appropriate to someone practicing penance. It istrue that this is the posture of the majority of the images of Pårvatï performing the “five fires” penance,particularly from central India. But the objects in the goddesses’ hands, the matted hair, etc., also areadequate for her portrayal in an ascetic role.


Other sculptures of Pårvatï standing with graceful bends, or even seated, are known. In an eighth cen-tury sculpture from Roda in north Gujarat Pårvatï is in a seated posture (Shah 1960: fig. 68). In the RankiVav stepwell at Patan there is one where she is standing at ease, and she also wears ornaments, including acrown, rather than the ascetic’s matted hair (Mankodi 1991: 119, fig. 74). K.B. Dave (1963: 347) also men-tions Pårvatï in lalitåsana (lotus-li¼ga-Ga½e¸a-kama½∙alu) in the Kålikåmåtå temple at the Vadodara gateof Dabhoi and a twelve-armed Pårvatï standing in a graceful, relaxed pose in the Rajputana Museum atAjmer.

Pårvatï in penance is an archetype of the woman undergoing austerities, but her portrayal in a gracefulposture is by no means incompatible with the goddess’ representation. For, after all, her fiery penance isonly one episode in the myth in her incarnation as pining for a reunion with ˜iva, and not the whole of hermyth. As one out of the total of twelve goddesses, it is not at all inconceivable for her to be portrayed in onemanner in central India and in a different manner in Gujarat.

As to Ga½e¸a and the li¼ga, these two, and sometimes also Skanda, are the distinctive attributes ofPårvatï, as the second member of the group of twelve Gaurïs, according to the Aparåjitap¡cchå, and they areplaced in the palms of her upper hands in the mediaeval period. But this manner of representing them maybe a result of the stylization of sculpture; the earlier and more natural way is to represent them on the steleforming the background of her image – conveying as it were that ˜iva is the object of Pårvatï’s contem-plation. Shah (1960: fig. 72) illustrates ˜iva and Ga½e¸a on two lotuses in the hands of Pårvatï on an eighthcentury sculpture from Roda – their earliest occurrence. At Modhera too, they are present, as flanking someof the goddesses at the level of their shoulders, but they are not placed directly in their hands (Lobo 1982:figs. 144, 146). ˜iva and Ga½e¸a/Skanda on the background slab have been illustrated by Joshi himself(1996: figs. 18, 21, 23, 24, 29).

In the iconography of the goddess in Gujarat, the fire altars and the iguana are quite often dispensedwith. In the Ranki Vav stepwell at Patan, the iguana is represented in some four out of the fifteen images.In central Indian images, on the other hand, they are almost invariably present. Similarly, the four fires inthe midst of which the goddess performs her austerities – and which identify her as being “Tapasvinï”Pårvatï, properly so called – also are often omitted in Patan, and in other images from Gujarat.

N.P. Joshi’s final argument is that a bull, the mount of ˜iva, is at the feet of one of the goddesses ofModhera. According to him, she cannot be a Gaurï, and therefore, by extension, the remaining eleven cannotbe either. However, the presence of the bull here would not really militate against her being Gaurï: Sinceone of them is named Måhe¸varï in the Aparåjitap¡cchå, the bull mount of ˜iva, that is to say Mahe¸vara,is not such an anomaly after all. Dave (1963: 348) also has noted a goddess on the wall of the Nïlaka½¶hatemple at Sunak only sixty kilometres to the east of Modhera, with a bull at her feet, and has identified heras Pårvatï. (However, I could not locate this at the site.)

The goddesses at Modhera thus form a homogeneous group. All of them bear the same attributes ofascetics in their natural hands, so far as they are intact, and others compatible with this character in theirsuperior hands; they are in the company of ãiva figures on either side of the panels. And the twelve god-desses match the twelve Ådityas on the sanctum. All things considered, therefore, the identification ofModhera’s Devïs with the Gaurïs has a persuasive force, though Lobo seems to have suggested it only withsome hesitation – and has not followed up its implications for understanding the temple as a whole at all.


˜iva as Bhairava in the Company of the Gaurïs

All around the temple, on the walls of both sanctum and hall, are the eight Dikpålas or regents of thequarters (and two more unusual images), Indra, Yama, Varu½a and Kubera in the main directions, and Ï¸åna,Agni, Nir¡ti and Våyu in the intermediate quarters. The series of the Dikpålas begins in the south-east cornerof the ma½∙apa, and after encircling the entire temple ends in the north-east. We may refer the reader toLobo (1982: 71-80), omitting a detailed description here.

“Atiriktå¼ga” Bhairava on the Ma½∙apa Wall

At the end of the series of the Dikpålas, after the figure of Ï¸åna on the north-eastern side, there occurs avery unusual image, which has generated discussion (Plates 18.12, 18.13). It is in the north-east corner,facing the east, and represents a god with three heads, three arms, and three legs, having an extra rightarm and an extra left leg. From his odd figure as well as from his attributes he appears to be a ãiva deity.The “natural” right hand holds – or, more correctly, wields – what looks like a sword; though now only itshilt remains in the closed fist, the blade, which was detached from the body, having been destroyed. Theextra right arm holds – rather supports, on two of the fingers bent inwards – a double-curved dagger, witha ridge running along the entire curvature.3 The solitary left hand is lowered, and holds a skull cup.

Burgess and Cousens (1903: 77) noted that the villagers called this figure as Kåla Bhairava, and hadbeen anointing it with red vermilion. Lobo (1982: 76-80) has discussed its iconography. She considered thetwo existing views about the identity of this personage: Kåla Bhairava (local villagers), and Agni (Burgessand Cousens 1903: 77, Sankalia 1941: 122, and Agrawala 1955: 184). She then considered Siva’s aspect asMårta½∙a-Bhairava, and Jvara (personification of “Fever”), mentioned in the Vi¹½udharmottarapurå½a,settling finally in favour of Jvara (p. 80)4:

“It is difficult to say, whether the Modhera sculpture might represent Jvara. According to the Vi¹½u-dharmottara-Purå½a the number of heads, arms, and legs corresponds exactly to the iconography of thisgod, the same as the ja¶åmuku¶a. But the attributes and, especially, the dancing position of the SouthIndian Jvara figures known up to now [which are discussed by Lobo earlier in her book] are not foundat Modhera. Nevertheless, sword, knife and skull-bowl could be easily associated with his aspect as afighting god, though they may point also to Bhairava.

There remains the doubt, whether the Modhera sculpture represents ˜iva as Bhairava or as Jvara. Theinterpretation as Jvara seems to be the more convincing one, though he is a rarity in northern India.”

Now, the introduction of “Fever” personified seems to be an improbable idea – on a temple that issupposed to honour the Sun god, with all his connotations (radiator of health, god of light and day, dispellerof darkness and illness). As we know very well – with the exception of a goddess like ˜ïtalå, who is wor-shipped in order to ward off the sickness of smallpox – hardly any disease is represented in such a personi-fied manner, on the same scale as that of divine images, in the art of north India. Personified Fever wouldtherefore be out of place in the orderly and explicit statuary at Modhera.

Maruti Nandan Prasad Tiwari and Kamal Giri proposed to identify the sculpture as a blend of S÷rya,Agni and Våyu, but with great hesitation (1985; also 1998: 327-329, fig. 3).

We must therefore try again to understand better the nature of this personage.


Given his surplus limbs – three heads, three arms, and three legs – the personage is more likely to be˜iva as Atiriktå¼ga Bhairava, “Bhairava with surplus limbs”, than any one else. Atiriktå¼ga, also calledTripåda Bhairava, “Bhairava with three legs”, is an aspect of ˜iva. Now, there is a large number of Bhai-ravas, usually counted as sixty-four; they are organized into eight groups of eight each, and Atiriktå¼ga isthe leader of one of these groups. If our sculpture is identified as Atiriktå¼ga Bhairava, not only are itssupernumerary limbs accounted for, but it is also consistent with the ãiva element that may be said topervade Modhera.5

Comparable Images from Barwa Sagar, Kiradu and Kaner ki Putli

Though relatively rare, Atiriktå¼ga Bhairava is by no means unique to Modhera. Comparable sculptures areindeed known, from the Jarai Math at Barwa Sagar between Jhansi and Khajuraho, Kiradu to the north ofModhera, and from Kaner ki Putli near Bijolia, to the east, the last two in Rajasthan.

The one at Barwa Sagar of the ninth century is in a wall recess just above the vedïbandha, on the west-ern side. The figure has three heads and three legs, but there is a full complement of four arms, not three asat Modhera and Kaner ki Putli; the attributes in the hands of this rather small figure (less than thirty cm orone foot high) are damaged; clockwise from bottom right they are varadamudrå (or varadåk¹amudrå), theshaft of what must have been a trident, a mirror (?, according to Trivedi 1990: 171, fig. 193, a flower), andkama½∙alu. The kama½∙alu alone is clear. The faces also have suffered, but none of them is ferocious; if theupper left hand indeed has a mirror and not a flower, then the left face might be the feminine Umå face, butone cannot be sure. The bull mount is besides him.

Kiradu, published by R.C. Agrawala (1954), is late, with a record of VS 1516, corresponding to AD1459-60 (Lobo 1982: 78 erroneously writes 1573-74) that even records his name as Tripådam÷rti. He haseight arms, and Agrawala enumerated a dagger, ∙amaru, sword and skull among the objects. The figure israther small in size, only about forty centimetres or 1’ 5” high, and, though not identical to Modhera, itsthree legs and two of the attributes in the hands relate the two.

The third representation of Atiriktå¼ga or Tripåda Bhairava is between the two Cåhamåna sites ofBijolia and Menal in the Bhilwara district of Rajasthan, and is datable to the late eleventh century. In the re-cords of the Archaeological Survey of India the site is called Khadipur or Khadipura, but the nearest villageis Sukhpura.6

The temple where this Bhairava is to be seen is on the bank of a small spring, in a grove of the flower-ing Kaner or oleander trees, Sanskrit karavïra. It bears the charming name of Kaner ki Putli, “Oleander-Flower Dolls”. The figure of Tripåda Bhairava is on the northern wall. The temple and its striking sculpturewere described by D.R. Bhandarkar in PRASWI 1904-05: 54:

“About four miles west of Bijolia, near the village of Brindavana, are the remains of a temple calledKaneri-ki-putali. The temple faces the west, and, on the dedicatory block, is a seated image of Siva withtwo hands, one bearing a club and the other a citron. Above, over the frieze, is Natesa in the centre withGanapati to his immediate right and Brahma beyond, and with a male figure, with four hands, to hisimmediate left and Vishnu further on at the end. The doorway is of the Bijolia style. Inside the shrineis a linga, which is now not worshipped. The principal niches of the exterior are all empty. On the northface of the temple is a standing male figure with three faces, three hands – two right and one left – one


right bearing a rosary of beads, and the two so held together as to form an English O, and three legs,one left and two right, one behind the other, the front one broken off. A figure of almost exactly thisdescription occurs also on the walls of the celebrated Surya temple at Modhera. The sikhara has nocentral spire; the lowermost small spires only are carved, those above are left uncarved.”

Bhandarkar did not publish any photographs of the temple or the image in his report, and the temple and thesculpture have remained largely unknown.7 Our Plate 18.14 illustrates this singularly interesting sculpture.The figure is set in a recessed part on the kapilï, standing with a gentle bend of the body. The lowered righthand is in the varadåk¹amudrå. The left hand is held near the chest with the open palm supporting a smallshallow vessel that in all likelihood is a skull cup, and into this dips the tip of the slender middle finger ofthe right hand. It is this certainly unusual dual hand pose or mudrå that was quaintly described by Bhandar-kar as being “so held together as to form an English O”. The third leg of the figure is broken off at the knee,but the toes of the foot, resting on the floor, have survived. The central face has largely peeled off, and nothird eye can be made out on it or on any of the other two faces. The three heads all have ja¶ås. Bhandarkarcorrectly noted the similarities with Modhera, and this image should therefore be identified as ˜iva’s Ati-riktå¼ga Bhairava aspect.

˜iva on the Uttara¼ga at Modhera

In mediaeval temples, the central niche (lalå¶abimba) on the door lintel or on the uttara¼ga customarily dis-plays an image of the presiding deity of the shrine in a prominent position. On our temple the image in thecentral niche of the uttara¼ga on the ma½∙apa doorway has ̃ iva, not S÷rya, as would be expected on a Suntemple, the niches on either side of ˜iva housing Brahmå and Vi¹½u. Lobo did observe this (apparent) ano-maly: “It is surprising that ˜iva, instead of the Sun-god, is depicted in the central niche. As the texts pre-scribe, the divinity to which the temple is dedicated (adhinåyaka) should be shown here. But on this lintelthe Sun-god plays an unimportant part” (1982: 19-20). She did not give any more thought to the significanceof something that reveals the very nature of the temple itself. Unfortunately, though Brahmå and Vi¹½u inthe left and right side niches are still identifiable, the central ˜iva is now much damaged.

Solar-ãiva Blend in the Textual Tradition

Since very early times, two deities were seen as blending, to result in a new and more complete entity: ˜ivaand his consort coalesced into Ardhanårï¸vara; Hari-Hara synthesized the two supreme gods Vi¹½u and ̃ iva,with very distinct characters, into one. Similarly, S÷rya and ̃ iva were also combined resulting into the con-ception of a new deity who amalgamated the characteristics of these two independent gods.

S÷rya, and the other planetary deities, the Grahas, are associated with ˜iva in the Purå½as such as theMatsya and the Agni, and in the Tantras such as the ˜åradåtilaka. In the Matsyapurå½a, which, as de Mall-mann already noted (see below), is free from Tantric influence, ̃ iva and S÷rya are identified in chapters 55and 93. Matsyapurå½a 55.6: “Umå-Mahe¸vara [that is, the Lord of Umå = ̃ iva] should be worshipped underthe names of S÷rya, because there is no difference between Umåpati and Ravi” (Umåmahe¸vara-syårcåmarcayet s÷ryanåmabhiµ/ Umåpate raver vå’pi na bhedå d¡¸yate kvacit) (de Mallmann 1963: 95). Havingenumerated the solar names or epithets by which ˜iva is to be invoked, the text adds (55.16), “Homageshould be offered to him who bears a noose, a goad, a trident, a lotus, a skull cup, a serpent, the moon anda bow” (namo’stu på¸å¼ku¸a-¸÷lapadmakapålasarpendudhanurdharåya) (ibid.). Here, while seven out of


the eight attributes are those of ˜iva, the lotus is S÷rya’s emblem. Again, the chapter on the “Pacificationof the Nine Planets” (“Navagrahahoma-¸åntividhånam”, Matsyapurå½a 93), enumerates the tutelary deitiesof the Navagrahas – and, significantly, the presiding deity of S÷rya as a Graha is ˜iva.8 Similarly, also, themuch earlier Jaiminïya G¡hyas÷tra 2.9: “He should know that the Sun represents the god ˜iva”.

De Mallmann devoted an entire chapter (1963: 95-107, chapter IV) to ˜iva-S÷rya. In the Agnipurå½athat synthetic god is Mårta½∙a-Bhairava – call it a Solar ˜iva, or if you like, a ãiva S÷rya. The nameMårta½∙a-Bhairava occurs in the Agnipurå½a in chapter 301.14-15: “Ï¸åna, who is Ravi in the beloved’shalf, is of red complexion, and bears a noose and a goad. The god, bearer of a rosary and a skull cup, has akha¶vå¼ga, a lotus, a disc, and a spear; he has four faces. He has a lotus seat, or pedestal, in, or on, ‘the solarcircle’. His four faces present a terrifying appearance (bhairava) and are provided with three eyes” (ibid.:97). As is well known, the phrase “Beloved’s half” (våmårdha), in the Indian tradition, denotes a man’s leftside, or the feminine side, that is the side where a man’s wife is when the couple is together.

As de Mallmann further observes (1963: 98), the number of eyes of this composite god Mårta½∙a-Bhairava – twelve, three on each of his four faces – has a symbolism at the same time ̃ aiva as well as solar.If the three eyes characterize the four “terrifying” faces of the synthetic deity, whose one half is Bhairava,the number twelve on the other hand is intimately linked to the mythology of the other half, Mårta½∙a. Forit corresponds to the twelve months, each of which is presided over by an Åditya, an aspect of S÷rya in thecourse of his passage through the twelve signs of the zodiac.

In the ˜åradåtilakatantra (XIV, 71) too this blended divinity is named as Mårta½∙a-Bhairava (Avalon1933: 592).

Thus, on the one hand, S÷rya and ˜iva combined together in one are known from both Tantric andnon-Tantric texts, and some of them give his name as Mårta½∙a-Bhairava. And, on the other hand, sculp-tures since a relatively early period, in which the two gods have coalesced – which are free of any Tantricinfluence – also exist, whatever may have been the name given to that synthetic god. In other words, thePuranic and Tantric traditions both perceived shared traits between S÷rya and ̃ iva, and their unionwas not an esoteric concept that the Tantric tradition introduced at a later date.

But before considering the sculptures in which the two are blended together, we may make a briefdigression, in order to emphasize the S÷rya-˜iva connection since very early times from another angle.

The Dikpålas or Regents of the Quarters may be placed in various ways on temple walls. They mayoccupy the four corners of a temple as a whole, or of only the sanctum, or two of them may be on the wallsof the kapilï junction between the sanctum and its porch (as here at Modhera).

Scholars have sometimes commented on the absence of any fixed order on early monuments, that theRegents’ precise directions were not determined and that therefore not only could they be placed in anydirection at will, but they could even be replaced by other divinities who are not Dikpålas. Thus, while inthe standard list of the eight, Ï¸åna, a form of ̃ iva, protects the north-east, in the early eighth century Dåne-båbå temple at Amrol near Gwalior it is S÷rya who takes the place of Ï¸åna.

R.D. Trivedi, who has discussed this temple, commented on this seeming anomaly (1990: 88, fig. 54;see also pp. 39, 43). Ajay Mitra Shastri (1969: 162, fn. 2), citing the Manusm¡ti 5.96, also commented onthe “great deal of difference in the enumeration of the guardians of different quarters” in this early text. But


again, the difference may be more apparent than real. The Manusm¡ti, which has preserved a much oldertradition, actually supports the substitution between Ï¸åna and S÷rya, for in its lists of the guardians of thedirections (5.96 and 7.4) it names Arka, who is S÷rya under another name, instead of Ï¸åna. This is inperfect accord with the Matsyapurå½a’s declaration: “there is no difference between ˜iva and S÷rya”,Umåpate raver vå’pi na bhedå d¡¸yate kvacit. The builder of Dånebåbå’s shrine was staying true to a tra-dition authenticated by no less a revered sage than Manu himself!

To give another example, in an eighth century ˜iva temple at Batesara near Gwalior Aja Ekapådatakes the place of Ï¸åna as the Dikpala of the same north-eastern quarter (Plate 18.15). This too should notsurprise us: for after all, Aja Ekapåda is one of the Eleven Rudras – and Ï¸åna as a form of ˜iva also isnone other but Rudra-˜iva!

Early temples – and texts – being closer to the Vedic tradition reflect early mythology more faithfully,and links between divinities must have been more transparent to their authors than they are to us.

S÷rya-˜iva Blend: Sculptural Examples

We may now consider some representations where the Sun god and ˜iva are blended into one form.

R.C. Agrawala (1954, 1955, 1958) has brought to light some sculptures of the tenth and eleventh cen-turies that exemplify the blend of S÷rya and ˜iva. One of these is in the niche on the rear or western face ofa subsidiary shrine in the Sås-Bah÷ pañcåyatana temple at Nagda, near the famous temple of Eklingji,twenty-five kilometres to the north of Udaipur (Plate 18.16). The four-armed god is seated in padmåsana.The attributes of S÷rya in this image are the lotuses in his front hands raised up to the chest, his armour orbreastplate, the high boots, and the tall crown of the sovereign of the sky. ˜iva’s attributes are the tridentand the kha¶vå¼ga in the two rear hands; the yogic posture of padmåsana may also be here counted as ̃ iva’sdistinctive trait as the great yogï. By introducing this posture even when the god wears his stiff boots, thesculptor obviously was trying to balance the features of the two divinities.

Another sculpture, from Rang Patan in the Jhalawar district, in the State Museum at Jhalawar (acc. no.90), has six arms; it has suffered damage, but the surviving attributes are of S÷rya and ˜iva. And the thirdone mentioned by Agrawala is from Atru at the eastern extreme of the state, on its border with Malwa. Thetwo rear hands hold a trident and a snake; both the natural hands are missing, but the armour on the chest,and S÷rya’s surviving attendant Pi¼gala by his side, provide proof of the image’s solar character.

In addition to these three sculptures, published by Agrawala, we may now mention an unpublishedtenth century example from Gangobhi, near the well-known temples of Baroli, on the river Chambal, inChittorgarh district. The site itself was submerged in the Pratap Sagar reservoir that was built after India’sIndependence, but some carvings collected from there are in the government museum at Kota. Another onecomes from Hinglajgarh in Malwa in Madhya Pradesh and is preserved in the Indore Museum. All suchimages when taken together present undeniable evidence of the representation of the union of ˜iva andS÷rya since early times.

As for the later or “Tantric” conception of the blend of S÷rya and ˜iva, a sculpture from Manda in thenorthern part of Bangladesh is known since long; it was first identified as Mårta½∙a-Bhairava, by KshitishChandra Sarkar.9 It has ten arms, four of them being broken. The two front hands (broken) bear full-blown


lotuses of S÷rya; some of the other remaining hands hold a cobra, a kettledrum, a nïlotpala, a kha¶vå¼ga, atrident and a spear. The god has three visible faces with ja¶åmuku¶as. There are flames behind the heads; thefaces have three eyes each, and one of the side faces also has a long beard and full rows of teeth or fangs.He is shod in tall boots typical of the Sun god, is riding on a chariot of seven horses, and is attended uponby his usual companions, Aru½a, P¡thvï (or Mahå¸vetå), U¹å, Pratyu¹å, Da½∙ï and Pi¼gala. He stands uprightin a frontal posture, and a dagger is stuck against his waist. All these details, and the flames or rays behindthe heads, illustrate the god’s solar nature; the cobra, the kha¶vå¼ga, the kettledrum, the trident, the spear,the triple heads with matted hair, the beard, and the gaping mouth are obviously ãiva features.

Sarkar cited in his paper (1933: 246) the Matsyapurå½a stanza about there being no difference between˜iva and S÷rya (Umåpate raver vå’pi na bhedå d¡¸yate kvacit), as well as the dhyånamantra of Mårta½∙a-Bhairava from the ˜åradåtilakatantra, and identified the sculpture as Mårta½∙a-Bhairava.

If the sculpture of Solar ˜iva considered above comes from Varendra (or Manda) in the distant easternpart of undivided India, another comes from the Airåvate¸vara (= Råjaråje¸vara) temple built by Råjaråja IICð®a in the twelfth century at Darasuram, deep down in Tamil Nadu in the South. It is a three-headed andeight-armed deity standing frontally, with the following attributes clockwise from the natural right hand:lotus, goad, dagger, and rosary (right) || noose, raised hand, mace, skull (left). All the three heads wearkara½∙a crowns.

Françoise L’Hernault, who has published it (1987: 84-86, ph. 33), proposed that it represents Mårta½∙a-Bhairava, citing in support the ˜åradåtilakatantra, the Ï¸åna¸iva-gurudevapaddhati, and the Tantrasåra-sa¼graha, all of which speak of a deity who is called either Mårta½∙a-Bhairava or simply S÷rya. The godas described in these texts has four heads and eight hands, with a lotus, goad, disc, rosary, noose, kha¶vå¼ga,lance, and skull cup in the hands. Four out of the eight attributes given by the texts are the same as those inthe hands of the Darasuram image.

R. Nagaswamy has also examined this sculpture, on three separate occasions (his interpretation differseach time); we learn from him that there is even more textual evidence, besides that cited by L’Hernault, thatthe conception of Mårta½∙a-Bhairava was known in South India.10 Nagaswamy has quoted the Kåmikågama,Uttarabhåga pp. 148-149, which speaks of an “alternative manner” (anyaprakåra) of worshipping Bhåskara,or S÷rya, as Bhairava. The god has a distorted (vik¡ta) face, he is situated on the lotus of the (devotee’s)heart with his ãkti, and has four faces. As to the attributes in his hands, Nagaswamy’s two citations in twoof his articles have different readings. As paraphrased or translated in both the articles, the attributes arepadma, abhaya, varada, ak¹amålå, kapåla, på¸a, a¼ku¸a and kha¶vå¼ga. But as the relevant stanzas arereproduced in those articles, the same passage has a slight – yet significant – difference: As quoted in Facets(2003: 103), it reads: “... abhayakaram” etc., that is, the hand is in the abhayamudrå, etc., thus a total ofonly seven attributes in the eight hands. But the same passage in the article in the Journal (1999: 40) has“... abhayavaram” etc., that is, the abhaya and varadamudrås (besides the other mudrås, of course). In thefirst case, only seven attributes in the hands of the four-faced and eight-armed god result. Clearly, the pas-sage as given in the first reference (2003: 103) is erroneous. (In fact, there are numerous misprints in theSanskrit citations in both the papers on this important subject.)

The image at Darasuram is of more than ordinary interest in other respects as well. Its proper left sidehas a fully developed female breast; and the entire left leg down to the ankle is draped by a neatly pleated


garment, as would be proper on a female figure. In this way the sculptor made the bisexual character of thedeity distinctly clear: the right side is male, the left feminine. Confronted by this cross-configuration (˜iva-S÷rya that is at the same time male-female), L’Hernault sought to explain it as an “accidental image”, acapricious creation, resulting from the ˜åradåtilaka’s description of ˜iva’s body as having Mårta½∙a in the“beloved’s half” (vallabhårdha), that is, the feminine half, of an androgynous figure.11

Referring to the political and cultural contacts between Påla Bengal and the Cð®a South, and the pre-sence of priests from Bengal in the Tamil country, Nagaswamy explains the carving of the Mårta½∙a-Bhairava at Darasuram, as well as other S÷rya sculptures in the Påla fashion on the gopuras of Chidamba-ram by suggesting that a sculpture such as that from Varendra might have inspired a Cð®a artist to representthe blend of the Sun god and ˜iva at Darasuram. Nagaswamy in his papers mentioned above refers to hisrecent discovery of the name “Mårta½∙a” painted on the sculpture in Grantha characters; if the record is ofthe same period as the sculpture, then this puts any questions about the correct identification to rest.

As further confirmation of the S÷rya-˜iva synthesis, de Mallmann presented an imaginative interpre-tation of the well-known Navagrahacakra of the tenth century from Khiching in Orissa.12 It is a stone disc,or wheel, standing on its rim, with twelve spokes radiating from its hub. In the hub is a god with four armsand possibly three heads, seated on a lotus. The twelve spokes are attached to the broad circular rim, whichis divided into nine compartments each of which contains a Graha or Planet. Flames emerge from the outerside of the rim, indicating the fiery, therefore solar, nature of the disc. De Mallmann suggested that thisNavagrahacakra is an illustration of Agnipurå½a 301.14-15, the ̃ åradåtilaka’s dhyånamantra and the Nårå-ya½ïya’s commentary about Mårta½∙a-Bhairava. If this is correct, the sculpture from Khiching is not just asimple Navagrahacakra, but a solar-ãiva ma½∙ala. In this ma½∙ala, the twelve solar deities or Ådityas andthe Navagrahas radiate from ˜iva in the centre; it demonstrates that there existed in the tenth century a cultin which “a ãiva god was integrated with the solar system” (de Mallmann 1963: 104).

S÷rya-˜iva Blend Reflected in Temples

If the arguments given above are justified, then Modhera’s temple illustrates a synthesis of ˜iva and S÷rya.But is Modhera a unique example, or are there any others, which may appear to us to be devoted to only theone or the other of these deities, but which in fact are dedicated to both?

Cynthia Packert Atherton (1997: 21) discusses the statuary on the S÷rya temple No. 1 of the eighthcentury at Osian. On encountering S÷rya in the principal rear or western niche of this ãiva temple, shewonders: “The question of why S÷rya is occasionally included in this sequence of manifestly ̃ aiva imageryis unclear. In at least one much later tenth-century example from the Udaipur area, the ˜iva-S÷rya con-nection is made overt but is nevertheless unusual. See M.W. Meister, ‘The Solar ˜iva Temple at Tusa’”.13

Again, at a sacred spot marking a stage on the old road from Baroli to Chittorgarh is a shrine ofJoganiåmåtå (Yoginï as Mother Goddess). There is also a ˜iva shrine here of the eighth century (Mankodi1995). Sculpture on its walls is restricted to three large panels, Bhairava, S÷rya and ̃ iva-Pårvatï’s marriage.The cult object in the shrine is a li¼ga, the two side niches also have ãiva deities, but that in the rear wallis S÷rya: the solar-ãiva assimilation is clear enough here as well.

Elsewhere, too, the connection is clearly established. Thus, the Kå¸ï-Vi¸ve¸vara temple at Lakkundi inKarnataka is a twin temple where ˜iva and S÷rya in their separate but complementary shrines face each


other (Cousens 1926: 47, pl. XXIII; Dhaky 1996: 97-100); at Modhera, ˜iva and S÷rya are united into oneshrine.

S÷rya’s Seven-horse Chariot on the Pedestal in the Sanctum

The lower part of the pedestal of the image in the sanctum was lying on the floor when Burgess and Cousenswrote, and is still in the same position. Only the lowest part, 1.18 m x 44 cm (as measured by Lobo), re-mains, and shows seven prancing horses of the chariot of the Sun god (Lobo 1982: fig. 60).

The representation of the seven-horsed chariot on the base of the main image may appear to militateagainst the ̃ aiva presence in the temple. But the Mårta½∙a-Bhairava from Varendra also has the seven-horsechariot on the face of the pedestal, while the rest of the image has ãiva as well as Solar features. In otherwords, if the pedestal alone had survived of Varendra’s (Manda’s) Mårta½∙a-Bhairava, it too would havebeen taken to be from just another S÷rya image. Again, at Modhera itself, the eight figures on the g÷∙ha-ma½∙apa’s doorframes are in fact not those of S÷rya alone, but are synthetic representations, S÷rya com-bining either with ̃ iva, Vi¹½u, or Brahmå. They too ride on four- or seven-horse chariots – yet the attributesof their hands reveal the bipolar character of each (Lobo 1982: pls. 223, 224, etc.).14

The Link between ˜iva and the Sun: Time as Kåla, “Devourer”

But surely there is a difference between the amalgamations Hari-Hara, Ardhanårï¸vara, S÷rya-Nåråya½a, andHari-Hara-Pitåmah=Årka on the one hand and Mårta½∙a-Bhairava on the other. The first two reconcile twodeities of contrasting natures: The range of Vi¹½u’s traits (sovereignty/affinity with kings and householders/preserver of the world, etc.) is opposed to ˜iva’s traits (yogï/renouncer/rejection of civilization’s ways/wanderer/destroyer, etc.); in the blended personality of Hari-Hara this incompatibility is sought to be re-solved. As to Ardhanårï¸vara, ˜iva and his consort come together as two opposing poles. In the case ofS÷rya-Nåråya½a the original (solar) nature of the individual components is highlighted. And finally, whenthe four major deities Vi¹½u, ˜iva, Brahmå and S÷rya are represented (in later art) in one form, that is arather bald theological statement about the unity of the four major deities of the Hindu pantheon.

But the Sun god and ̃ iva appear to have no traits, in common or in contrast between them, that can linkthem together.

Therefore, the question to ask is: At what point in the Indian religious experience were the natures ofthe Sun and ˜iva understood to meet to prompt their synthesis, in the Purå½as, Tantras, in temples andsculptures? What made the compilers of the ̃ åradåtilakatantra and the Matsya- and Agnipurå½as to declareso emphatically that there is “an absence of distinction” between S÷rya and ˜iva – “Umåpate raver vå’pina bhedå d¡¸yate kvacit ”? For, to say that there is an absence of distinction is the same as saying that theyare identical, when viewed in a certain perspective. The feeling must have existed that at the core of theirconcepts at some point the Sun god and ˜iva stood as one and the same.

˜iva and S÷rya may be said to meet in terms of the Indian concept of Kåla, or Time – Time not in thesense of the sequential relations between events, the duration between events, as we normally think of it.Time or Kåla is to be seen here, not as the neutral medium in which events occur, a “carrier” as it were, ofevents, but as an active agent that ceaselessly devours, consumes all things, Time not just “passing”, “flow-ing”, but as k¹aya, consuming – Time as Death, or Kåla.


As far as ˜iva is concerned the connection with death, devouring, and destruction is readily apparent.˜iva is the Destroyer, as Brahmå is the Creator and Vi¹½u the Preserver; ˜iva is the one god into whom theuniverse dissolves itself at the end of every cosmic age. Kåla, Mahåkåla, “Time”, “the Great Devourer”,and Bhairava, “Terrible”, are his principal names.

The Sun’s connection with Kåla in the sense of the measure, or marker, of “neutral” time, is also self-evident: “the Sun divides time into day and night” (ahoråtre vibhajate s÷ryo månu¹adaivike; Månava-dharma¸åstra I.65); “the sun (and moon) support or uphold Time” (ye dve kålaº viddhataµ; Kålidåsa). Butthe Sun’s connection with Time as a cause or instrument of diminishing, waning, time as devourer is notreadily evident, the suggestion even militating against our idea of all that he stands for. The Sun is ever-pre-sent in our experience as the giver of light, day-maker, he who kindles-quickens-nourishes Life; he is calledupon to drive away illness and disease – if anything, it is as germinator and stimulator that one thinks of theSun, hardly as the agent of wasting and diminishing.

But in Vedic and Puranic mythology as it has come down to us there survive memories of the Sun god’spossible connections, deep in religious prehistory, with just this phenomenon of waning (k¹aya) and dying.

S÷rya, also called Vivasvat, has two wives, Råjñï and Nik¹ubhå (their names are sometimes Sanjñå andChåyå); he has twin companions, U¹å and Pratyu¹å, morning and evening twilights; twin attendants Da½∙ïand Pi¼gala, who keep an account of everything that man does (S÷rya as the eye in the sky watches overeverything). And he has two sons who are called the A¸vinïkumåras.15

This solar symmetry does not rest here. For S÷rya fathered other children, two sons and one daughter,from each of his two consorts. His wife Råjñï bore him Manu Vaivasvata, Yama ˜råddhadeva (¸råddha =ceremony to honour the dead), and a daughter Yamï; and from Nik¹ubhå were born Manu Såvar½i, ̃ ani andTapatï.

This paternal bond, between the Sun and the pair of Yama-Yamï on the one hand, and the Sun and thepair of the Manus on the other, is a bewildering fact. For, Yama and Yamï were the first “mortals”, first manand woman to know Death. And the Manus were the progenitors of the human race, they were the first menin their respective cycles or Manvantaras, “Manu Ages or Spans”; they are the archetypal ancestors of Man.

Ironically, the offspring of the god of Light and Life themselves dwell in the world of the departed, inthe ancestral realm, beyond the threshold of life.

One may wonder, with de Mallmann (1963: 95), that the association of S÷rya and ˜iva suggests aTantric influence; yet the Matsyapurå½a, which provides evidence of an identification of the two in its chap-ters 55 and 93, is by no means a Tantric work, as she was aware. The true reason must be that this is notsome “mystic” Tantric trait at all; it is founded in a deep realization that the two gods are intrinsicallyconnected with the same phenomenon, of devouring, destruction, death: “Kåla”. Tantric traditionmerely rephrased in its own terms an ancient perception.16 Marie-Thérèse de Mallmann – scholar’s scholar –perhaps for once was mistaken into seeing Mårta½∙a-Bhairava as a later Tantric introduction into Hinduism.

The Solanki Kings’ Devotion to ˜iva

Like most other rulers, the Solankis patronized all the major gods of the Hindu, and even Jaina, pantheons,but their family’s patron deity was ˜iva. All the great ˜iva temples of Gujarat – Somanåtha on the western


coast of Saurashtra, the Rudra Mahålaya at Sidhpur on the Sarasvati river, the Sahasrali¼ga reservoir atAnhilwad Patan – are associated with one or another Solanki king, and ̃ iva, as Bhavånïpati, “Lord of Bha-vånï”, that is Pårvatï, is invoked first in their inscribed records.

The chronicles also often refer to their ãiva faith and to the building of temples for ˜iva. The earlyking M÷laråja is believed to have built the original shrine of Rudra Mahåkåla (Rudra Mahålaya) at SidhpurPatan. Merutu¼ga (1304 AD) in the Prabandhacintåma½i records that M÷laråja went on a pilgrimage toSome¸varapattana (Somanåtha) every Monday, the day sacred to ˜iva, the Lord of Soma or the Moon(“Somanåtha”). He also built the Hå¶ake¸vara (“Golden” li¼ga) temple at Vadnagar in eastern Gujarat. TheRadhanpur grant of Bhïma I of VS 1086/AD 1029 says that after worshipping Bhavånïpati (˜iva), he granteda village. Another grant of (V)S 1093/AD 1036 records that he gave land after worshipping the “Lord ofBhavånï”. According to the Sunak grant of Kar½a the king gave some land after worshipping the Lord ofBhavånï in VS 1148/AD 1091. Mayanalladevï, mother of Kar½a’s son Jayasiºha, got the pilgrim tax onSomanåtha abolished. Siddharåja Jayasiºha himself rebuilt the temple of Rudra Mahåkåla at Sidhpur andthe Sahasrali¼ga (“1,000 li¼ga”) reservoir at Anhilwad Patan.

Even Kumårapåla, in spite of his leanings towards Jainism, did not give up the traditional ãiva faith;he founded or repaired ˜iva temples, and his inscriptions usually begin with obeisance to ˜iva.17

*The solar gods and the ãiva Devïs, the deities in the positions of the protectors of the directions: largepanels plaster the walls on all sides and each is surrounded by still more figures; others are on the wallsinside. Yet, when early archaeologists visited Modhera over a hundred years ago, they saw one solitary godreceiving worship. He was singled out from amongst all the others because the simple villagers knew thathe was closest to the heart of the temple – as do those of today: Our last illustration, Plate 18.17 with freshhomage at Bhairava’s feet, was taken only on 13 December 2005.

*In the Purå½as and the Tantras, Mårta½∙a-Bhairava is an abstract concept. This was given form in distantplaces – Gujarat, Rajasthan, Bengal, Tamil Nadu. But one builder went further, to shape that concept withunusual daring: He made the temple itself as a composite, in which one moiety is the Sun’s – the other, of˜iva.18

All photos are by the author unless otherwise noted.

Notes

1. Cited in Burgess & Cousens 1903: 71-72. This military official was not the same as Professor Monier Monier-Williams, Boden Professor of Sanskrit at Oxford, the celebrated compiler of the Sanskrit dictionary, who wasactive in the 1880s.

2. Lobo 1982: 59, 61, 80-88. Wibke Lobo described all the twelve goddesses (“Devïs”) individually, and identifiedthem with the Twelve Gaurïs. But she stopped at this, not following up with the vital implications for thededication of the temple itself.

3. It is by no means clear whether the dagger was intentionally placed in this way, or whether this manner of placingit is a concession to the presence of the end of the long sword that extends right up to the tip of the upper hand.

4. Also G. Bhattacharya, in a recent article, identified the figure as “Jvaradeva” (Bhattacharya 2005: 394-395, fig. 3).


5. Atiriktå¼ga Bhairava is a well established form in religious and iconographical literature. Curiously, Liebert (1976:29) lists “Atiraktå¼ga”-Bhairava, and translates it as “the exceedingly red-bodied Bh.”; but, since the onlyreference he provides is to Gopinatha Rao’s account of Atiriktå¼ga (1916, pl. 43); clearly “Atiraktå¼ga” for “Ati-riktå¼ga” must be due to an oversight. (True, the Bhairavas are by and large red-complexioned, in keeping withtheir violent destructive nature, therefore, if (hypothetically) an epithet such as “Atiraktå¼ga”, in the sense of deepred complexioned, were indeed to occur in some text, that would also in itself not be incorrect.)

6. Khadipura seems to be mentioned under its old name Khadu»vara in the well-known Bijolia rock inscription ofVS 1226/AD 1170; see Vyas 1952: 101.

7. Recently, a paper, in rather bare outline, by Kanwar Singh (2003) has been published. Kanwar Singh takes thefigure as being Jvara, or Fever personified. This writer presented a paper on Kaner ki Putli at a seminar organizedby the Institute of Rajasthan Studies in Udaipur in July 2002.

8. We recall that the tutelary deity on the lalå¶abimba at Modhera is ˜iva!

9. Sarkar 1930 and 1933 (cited by Huntington 1984: 273). Sarkar reported the image as having been “recovered froma locality in the land of Varendra” (1933: 243), that is North Bengal, without specifying any particular site; deMallmann (1963: 104), however, refers to the findspot as Manda, evidently on the basis of the writings of J.N. Ba-nerjea, etc., which she quotes. [According to Mukhlesur Rahman’s authoritative Sculpture in the Varendra Re-search Museum: A Descriptive Catalogue (Rajshahi: Varendra Research Museum, 1998: 269, no. 670, pl. 251)the findspot is Karkoch, Malda Dist., West Bengal. Peculiarly, all publications between Sarkar 1933 and Rahman1998 dealing with the sculpture refer to the findspot as Manda (which is located in Naogaon Dist., Rajshahi Div.,Bangladesh). For references to sixteen publications between 1930 and 2002 see the forthcoming Sculptures inBangladesh, eds. Enamul Haque & Adalbert J. Gail, Dhaka, 2008: cat. 114. GM, Editor.]

10. There is also a fourth publication (1977) by him, which is a paper in Tamil, cited by L’Hernault (1987: 84, fn. 5).At first, in his Tantric Cult of South India (1982: 209), Nagaswamy proposed that the image represented Devï asParå¸akti Tripurå. But later, in an article (1999: 39, pl. 3.1), he identified the sculpture as Mårta½∙a-Bhairava.Then, in the chapter “Chidambaram and Bengal” in his own book (2003: 98-111) he has reconfirmed the identity,on the basis as much of the attributes as of the name “Mårta½∙a” painted in red ochre in the Grantha script asrecorded by him (see especially pp. 102-104). Both these last papers are essentially identical, but with a fewchanges between them.

11. L’Hernault 1987: 84-86, ph. 33. In his earlier Tamil article of 1977 Nagaswamy had identified this same sculptureas Ardhanårï¸vara, which L’Hernault has controverted. — In a different context D.C. Sircar (1971: 228) took thesesame stanzas of the Agni-purå½a and ̃ åradåtilakatantra as denoting “a combination of ̃ iva (Ardhanårï¸vara) andS÷rya (Sun-god) and [that] seems to be given the name Mårta½∙a-Bhairava”. Similar remarks are to be found alsoin his “Tantrasårådh¡ta Dhyånamålå” (1972-73: 275-276, and also 192-194). But this, in effect, would be, not aharmonious blend of two gods, but a medley of three, namely ˜iva, Pårvatï, and S÷rya; Sircar’s suggestion musttherefore be turned down.

12. De Mallmann 1963: 102-104. See Banerjea 1948: 100, pl. XIV; and 1956: 445, pl. XXX, fig. 1.

13. Atherton 1997: 21, fn. 1. The paper she is referring to has a slightly different title (Meister 1978). It is obviousthat Atherton has not considered a synthetic S÷rya-˜iva concept such as Mårta½∙a-Bhairava.

14. Lobo writes (1982: 105) about the reliefs of “the Sun-god” on the doorjambs: “To the bhadra fields of the fourframed niches on each doorjamb images of the Sun-god are attached. S÷rya is shown here in his characteristic formbut in addition to his own attributes he carries those of ˜iva or Vi¹½u or Brahmå. It may be startling that on atemple dedicated to the Sun-god he appears in a syncretistic form at such an important place as is the entrancedoorframe. This can be explained not only by the tendency of amalgamation of the various sects in the medievalperiod, but also by the fact that the Hindu ritual inherently is syncretistic.”


15. The names of the consorts may differ, sometimes U¹å may be counted among his wives, etc., the principle ofpairing of the members of his entourage holds.

16. There is no assertion being made here about the antiquity of the Tantric tradition. See Srivastava 1987: 166: “... theTantric tradition of sådhanå has a great antiquity going back to the Vedic and even earlier ages”.

17. For all these references, see Ray 1973, II: 948-996, passim. Siddharåja Jayasiºha’s buildings are listed in theBombay Gazetteer I: 180, fn. 2, as cited ibid.: 973. See also Dhaky 1961: 19, and passim.

18. Gonda 1996: 142: “... notwithstanding the endless diversity of Indian religious life, notwithstanding the co-exist-ence of a few great religious currents and many sects and denominations, the conception of the fundamental unityof all aspects and manifestations of the divine is not lost and the quest for that unity has, also in the classicalperiod, left an impress ...”.

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XXVI (1941-42): 84-112.

Plate 18.1: General view of the Modhera temple.

Plate 18.2: Modhera temple, south wall.

Plate 18.3: Modhera, Gaurï 1. Plate 18.4: Modhera, Gaurï 2. Plate 18.5: Modhera, Gaurï 3.

Plate 18.6: Modhera, Gaurï 4. Plate 18.7: Modhera, Gaurï 7. Plate 18.8: Modhera, Gaurï 8.

Plate 18.9: Modhera, Gaurï9. After Lobo 1982: pl. 152.

Plate 18.10: Modhera, Gaurï 10.

Plate 18.12: Modhera, “Atiriktå¼ga Bhairava”.

Plate 18.13: Modhera, detail ofPlate 18.12.

Plate 18.11: Modhera, Gaurï 11.

Plate 18.14: Kaner ki Putli, “Atiriktå¼ga Bhairava”.

Plate 18.15: Batesara (Gwalior), Aja Ekapåda.

Plate 18.16: Nagda, Udaipur, Sås-Bah÷ temple, ãiva S÷rya.

Plate 18.17: Modhera, “Atiriktå¼ga Bhairava” with fresh offerings.

Contents

VOLUME I

Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiEditorial Remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiiBibliography of Gouriswar Bhattacharya’s Publications (1971-2008) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xvList of Plates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xxviiList of Figures, Illustrations, Tables and Maps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xliiList of Contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xlv

Section I: Gandhåra

1. Ya¸odharå’s Dreams ANNA MARIA QUAGLIOTTI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

2. The Water Tank from Gandhara MONIKA ZIN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

3. The Pious Donation of Wells in Gandhara HARRY FALK . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

4. Two Stamps with the Bodhigarbhålaºkåralak¹a Dhåra½ï from Afghanistan and Some Further Remarks on the Classification of Objects with the ye dharmå Formula

INGO STRAUCH . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

Section II: Northern India, Central India, Nepal

5. S÷rya Worship in Vraja in Ancient Times with Special Reference to a Rare Ku¹å½a Lintel of a S÷rya Temple

VINAY KUMAR GUPTA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59

6. The Formation of Temple Ritual in the Gupta Period: p÷jå and pañcamahåyajñaMICHAEL WILLIS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66

7. Mapping Masrur’s Iconography MICHAEL W. MEISTER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89

8. The Kashmir Connection of the Vaiku½¶ha Image of Khajuraho DEVANGANA DESAI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95

9. Va¶uke¸vara – A Våma-Bhairava Sculpture in the Lucknow MuseumR. NAGASWAMY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99

viii Prajñådhara – Essays in Honour of Gouriswar Bhattacharya

10. The Identification of a Sculpture of M¡tyuºjaya/Am¡te¸a and Am¡talak¹mï in the ‘Royal Bath’ in Patan (Nepal)

GUDRUN BÜHNEMANN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107

11. Almora Copper Plate of Abhaya Candra, ãka 1296 (AD 1374)MAHESHWAR P. JOSHI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114

12. Omkareshvar Mandhata and Transplantation of Temples AMAR NATH KHANNA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119

13. Recasting the Architectural Landscape: The Late 12th– Early 13th-Century Ghurid Annexations of Northern India

ALKA PATEL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122

14. Umrao Jan Ada: Her carte-de-visite JOACHIM K. BAUTZE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137

Section III: Western India

15. Coins of the City-State of Måhi¹matï DEVENDRA HANDA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149

16. Buddhism in Rajasthan – Its Evolution and Devolution NAYAN ANANDA CHAKRABORTY & SANGEETA CHAKRABORTY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158

17. Some Early tora½a Representations from the Maharashtra Caves PARUL PANDYA DHAR . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169

18. To What God Shall We Render Homage in the Temple at Modhera?K. MANKODI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177

Section IV: Southern India

19. Råk¹asas and puru¹am¡gas in the South-Western Corner of the Airåvate¸vara Temple at DarasuramCORINNA WESSELS-MEVISSEN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201

20. A Rare ãiva Icon at Lepåk¹i PIERRE-SYLVAIN FILLIOZAT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 216

21. Two Kålåmukha Temples in Haveri District (Jakka½åcårigu∙i in Karnå¶aka) VASUNDHARA FILLIOZAT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223

22. Girijå-kalyå½a Friezes in the Temple Art of the Gow∙as of Yelaha¼ka ANILA VERGHESE & ANNA L. DALLAPICCOLA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236

23. Genealogical History of the Nåyakas of Vël÷r, South India, and their Patronage to Art and Architecture (c. AD 1500-1604)

U.S. MOORTI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242

Plates (Sections I-IV)

Contents ix

VOLUME II

Section V: Eastern India and Bangladesh

24. Mahåmåy÷rï and Jå¼gulï as Attendants of Prajñåpåramitå. Investigation of an unusual iconographicfeature based on Bihari A¹¶asåhasrikå Prajñåpåramitå manuscripts from the 11th century

EVA ALLINGER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253

25. Illustrating the Perfection of Wisdom: The use of the Vessantara Jåtaka in a manuscript of the A¹¶asåhasrikå Prajñåpåramitå S÷tra

JINAH KIM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261

26. The Vi¹½u Image from Sarisadah in the Indian Museum, Kolkata CLAUDINE BAUTZE-PICRON . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273

27. Further Observations on Some Unusual Aspects of a Recently Acquired Påla Masterpiece in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art

STEPHEN MARKEL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281

28. Some S÷rya Images of the Påla-Sena Period in the National Museum of Pakistan, Karachi IBRAHIM SHAH . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 288

29. A Note on Some Interesting Sculptures in the Koch Bihar Palace Museum BIMAL BANDYOPADHYAY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 294

30. Jaina Cult in Ancient Bengal – The Tutelary Couple of Deopara ISABELL JOHNE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 299

31. Dedicatory Inscriptions of the Time of Mahendrapåla: A Fresh Appraisal RAJAT SANYAL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 302

32. Re-Reading Two Copper Plate Inscriptions of Gopåla II, Year 4 RYOSUKE FURUI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 319

33. Re-Visioning the State Apparatus in Samata¶a (Mid-7th to mid-11th Century AD) SHAHNAJ HUSNE JAHAN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 331

34. Economy of Samata¶a in the Early Medieval Period: A Brief Overview SUCHANDRA GHOSH . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 352

35. A Note on an Important Coin Collection of the Bengal Sul¶åns in the Bode-Museum, BerlinSUTAPA SINHA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 359

36. Incarnation Revived: Three Temple Sculptures from Mallabh÷ma SHARMILA SAHA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 367

37. A Note on the Mañjuvara Mañju¸rï Image at the Khiching Museum, Orissa RAJASRI MUKHOPADHYAY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 374

38. New Light on the Ådi-Bhañjas of Khijji¼gako¶¶a and Other Minor Ruling Families ofTheir Times in Orissa (An Epigraphical Perspective)

SNIGHDA TRIPATHY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 381

x Prajñådhara – Essays in Honour of Gouriswar Bhattacharya

Section VI: Pan-Indian Issues

39. Dikpålas and Grahas at Paharpur in Context of Contemporaneous Pan-Indian Temple ImageryGERD J.R. MEVISSEN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 393

40. Icons of tripåda Deities in Indian ArtARUNDHATI BANERJI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 407

41. Revisiting the “V¡¹a/Nandi” Issue PRATAPADITYA PAL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 413

42. A Five-headed Wooden Elephant: A Case StudyN.P. JOSHI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 418

43. Jala Mandirs, Tïrtha-Pa¶as and Cosmic Islands: Creating, Replicating and Representing Landscape in Jaina Art and Architecture

JULIA A.B. HEGEWALD . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 422

44. Hegel and the Trim÷rti ADALBERT J. GAIL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 438

45. Can Guided Tours Make Sense of World Heritage? N. JAMES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 441

Section VII: Southeast Asia, Central Asia, Tibet

46. A Recently Discovered S÷rya Image from Thailand PETER SKILLING . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 455

47. S÷rya’s Någas, Candra’s Square Seat and the Mounted Bull with Two Guardians – Iconographical notes on two Khmer illustrated stela inscriptions

ARLO GRIFFITHS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 466

48. Indo-Tibetan Influences in Banners from Dunhuang CHHAYA BHATTACHARYA-HAESNER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 479

49. “Indra’s Visit” TIANSHU ZHU . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 491

50. Wall Paintings in the Arhat Chapel of the Monastery at Zhwa lu, Tibet: Notes on Iconography and Style

HELMUT F. NEUMANN & HEIDI A. NEUMANN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 510

51. Iconographical Suppositions in Connection with a Thangka Series Made in the Qianlong PeriodBÉLA KELÉNYI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 515

Plates (Sections V-VII)

List of Contributors

Mag. Eva ALLINGER, Member of the National Research Network, “The cultural History of the Western Himalaya fromthe 8th Century”, Institute of Art History, University of Vienna. Mailing address: A 1090 Wien, Kolingasse13/1/12, Austria, <[email protected]>, <[email protected]>

Dr. Bimal BANDYOPADHYAY, Superintending Archaeologist, Archaeological Survey of India, Kolkata Circle, C.G.O.Complex (4th Floor), Block-DF, Sector-1, Salt Lake City, Kolkata 700 064, India, <[email protected]>

Dr. Arundhati BANERJI, Superintending Archaeologist (Publications), Archaeological Survey of India, Janpath, NewDelhi - 110 011, India, <[email protected]>, <[email protected]>

Priv.-Doz. Dr. habil. Joachim K. BAUTZE, Gastprofessor für Kunstgeschichte Südasiens, Freie Universität Berlin,Kunsthistorisches Institut, Abteilung Südasien, Koenigin-Luise-Str. 34a, D-14195 Berlin, Germany, <[email protected]>

Prof. Dr. Claudine BAUTZE-PICRON, Chargée de recherche, C.N.R.S., Paris; Chargée de cours, Université Libre deBruxelles. Mailing address: Kantstr. 78, D-10627 Berlin, Germany, <[email protected]>

Dr. Chhaya BHATTACHARYA-HAESNER, Independent Researcher, Keithstrasse 15, D-10787 Berlin, Germany, <[email protected]>

Prof. Dr. Gudrun BÜHNEMANN, University of Wisconsin, Department of Languages & Cultures of Asia, 1240 VanHise Hall, 1220 Linden Drive, Madison, Wisconsin 53706, USA, <[email protected]>

Mr. Nayan Ananda CHAKRABORTY & Dr. Sangeeta CHAKRABORTY, Dholavira Excavation (Report Writing)Section, Archaeological Survey of India, Purana Qila, New Delhi 110 001, India, <[email protected]>

Prof. Dr. A.L. DALLAPICCOLA, Honorary Professor, University of Edinburgh, 4, Sydney Terrace, Edinburgh, EH76SL, Scotland, U.K., <[email protected]>

Dr. Devangana DESAI, Former Vice-President, The Asiatic Society of Mumbai. Mailing address: Shanti 1/30, 19Pedder Road, Mumbai 400 026, India, <[email protected]>, <djdesai2001@yahoo. com>

Dr. Parul Pandya DHAR, Assistant Professor (History of Art), National Museum Institute, National Museum, Janpath,New Delhi 110 011, India, <[email protected]>

Prof. Dr. Harry FALK, Freie Universität Berlin, Institut für die Sprachen und Kulturen Südasiens, Königin-Luise-Str.27, D-14195 Berlin, Germany, <[email protected]>

Dr. Pierre-Sylvain FILLIOZAT, Membre de l’Academie des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres, 13, Rue Rambuteau, 75004Paris, France, <[email protected]>, <[email protected]>, <[email protected]>

Dr. Vasundhara FILLIOZAT, Independent Researcher, 125, Vivekananda Road Cross, Yadavagiri, Mysore 570 020,Karnataka, India, <[email protected]>, <[email protected]>

xlvi Prajñådhara – Essays in Honour of Gouriswar Bhattacharya

Dr. Ryosuke FURUI, Associate Professor, Institute of Oriental Culture, University of Tokyo, Hongo 7-3-1, Bunkyo-Ku,Tokyo 113-0033, Japan, <[email protected]>, <[email protected]>

Prof. i.R. Dr. Adalbert J. GAIL, Freie Universität Berlin, Kunsthistorisches Institut, Abteilung Südasien. Mailingaddress: Hagenstr. 35a, D-14193 Berlin, Germany, <[email protected]>

Dr. Suchandra GHOSH, Reader, Department of Ancient Indian History & Culture, University of Calcutta; 1/3, GopalChandra Bose Lane, Kolkata 700 050, India, <[email protected]>

Prof. Dr. Arlo GRIFFITHS, Chair of Sanskrit, Kern Institute, Leiden University; Directeur d’études, Southeast AsianHistory, Ecole française d’Extrême-Orient (Jakarta); Jl. Ampera III no. 26, Kemang, Jakarta Selatan 12550, Indo-nesia, <[email protected]>

Mr. Vinay Kumar GUPTA, M.A., National Museum Institute, New Delhi. Mailing address: H. No. 50, Indrapuri,Dhauli Piyau, Mathura U.P. 281 001, India, <[email protected]>

Dr. Devendra HANDA, # 1401, Pushpac Complex, Sector 49 B, Chandigarh 160 047, India, <[email protected]>

Dr. Julia A.B. HEGEWALD, Art History and Visual Studies, Mansfield Cooper Building, The University of Manchester,Oxford Road, Manchester M13 9PL, Great Britain, <[email protected]>

Dr. Shahnaj Husne JAHAN, Assistant Professor, University of Liberal Arts Bangladesh, House 56, Road 4/ADhanmondi R/A (Satmosjid Road), Dhaka-1209, Bangladesh, <[email protected]>

Dr. Nicholas JAMES, Director, PNL James Management & Interpretation of Historical Resources, 59, Mawson Road,Cambridge, England, <[email protected]>

Mrs. Isabell JOHNE, M.A., Independent Researcher, Gondekerstr. 16, D-12437 Berlin, Germany, <[email protected]>

Prof. Dr. Maheshwar P. JOSHI, Professor & Head, Department of History (Retd.), Kumaun University, Nainital.Mailing address: ˜rï Mallikå Kuñja, Malla Joshi Khola, Almora, Uttarakhand, India, <[email protected]>, <[email protected]>

Dr. N.P. JOSHI, Hon. Acharya, Jñåna-Pravåha, Centre for Cultural Studies & Research, South of Samne Ghat, Varanasi- 221 005, India, <[email protected]>

Mr. Béla KELÉNYI, Curator of the Tibetan-Nepalese Collection, Ferenc Hopp Museum of Eastern Asiatic Arts,H-1115, Budapest, Thallóczy L. u. 26, Hungary, <[email protected]>

Mr. Amar Nath KHANNA, Senior Technical Officer (Retired), Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts. Mailingaddress: G-26, Sarita Vihar, New Delhi -110 076, India, <[email protected]>

Dr. Jinah KIM, Assistant Professor of South Asian Art, Dept. History of Art, B#351801, Vanderbilt University, Nash-ville, TN 37235-1801, USA, <[email protected]>

Dr. Kirit MANKODI, Project for Indian Cultural Studies, Franco-Indian Pharmaceutical Pvt. Ltd., 20, Dr. E. MosesRoad, Mumbai 400 011, India, <[email protected]>, <[email protected]>

Dr. Stephen MARKEL, The Harry and Yvonne Lenart Curator and Department Head of South and Southeast Asian Art,Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 5905 Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90036-4504, USA, <[email protected]>

Prof. Dr. Michael W. MEISTER, W. Norman Brown Professor of South Asian Studies, University of Pennsylvania,Jaffe History of Art Building, 3405 Woodland Walk, Philadelphia PA 19104-6208, USA, <[email protected]>

List of Contributors xlvii

Dipl.-Ing. Gerd J.R. MEVISSEN, M.A., Independent Researcher, Erasmusstr. 17, D-10553 Berlin, Germany, <[email protected]>

Dr. U.S. MOORTI, Joint Director, Center for Art & Archaeology, American Institute of Indian Studies, Plot No. 22,Sector-32, Institutional Area, Gurgaon - 122 001 (Haryana State), India, <[email protected]>

Mrs. Rajasri MUKHOPADHYAY, M.A., Research Fellow, The Asiatic Society, Kolkata, and Guest Lecturer, Departmentof Islamic History and Culture, University of Calcutta. Mailing address: 29, Parasar Road, Kolkata - 700 029,India, < [email protected]>

Dr. R. NAGASWAMY, Tamil Arts Academy, 11, 22nd Cross Street, Besantnagar, Chennai, 600090, India, <[email protected]>

Dr. Helmut F. NEUMANN & Mrs. Heidi A. NEUMANN, Independent Researchers, Spitzackerstrasse 24, CH-4103 Bott-mingen, Switzerland, <[email protected]>, <[email protected]>

Dr. Pratapaditya PAL, General Editor, Marg Publications, Mumbai. Mailing address: 10582 Cheviot Drive, LosAngeles, CA 90064, USA, <[email protected]>

Dr. Alka PATEL, Department of Art History, 85 Humanities Instructional Building, University of California, Irvine,CA 92697-2785, USA, <[email protected]>

Prof. Dr. Anna Maria QUAGLIOTTI, Associate professor for Indian and Southeast Asian Art History and Archaeology,Univeristà di Napoli “L’Orientale”. Mailing address: Via Panama, 124, 00198 Roma, Italy, <[email protected]>

Ms. Sharmila SAHA, M.Sc., Cataloguer, State Archaeological Museum, Government of West Bengal, Kolkata. Mailingaddress: Basak House (Top Floor), 3, Princep Street, Kolkata 700 072, India, <[email protected]>

Mr. Rajat SANYAL, M.Sc., Guest Lecturer, Department of Archaeology, University of Calcutta, Alipur Campus, 1,Refomatory Street (7th Floor), Kolkata 700 027, India, <[email protected]>

Dr. Ibrahim SHAH, Associate Professor & Chairman, Department of Cultural Heritage and Tourism Management,Hazara University, Garden Campus, Mansehra, NWFP, Pakistan, <[email protected]>

Dr. Sutapa SINHA, Reader, Department of Islamic History and Culture, University of Calcutta, Alipur Campus, Kolkata700 027, India, <[email protected]>

Dr. Peter SKILLING, Maître de conférences, Ecole française d’Extrême-Orient, EFEO - Sirindhorn AnthropologyCentre, 20, Boromarachachonani Road, Taling Chan, Banglok 10170, Thailand, <[email protected]>

Dr. Ingo STRAUCH, Research Associate, Institut für die Sprachen und Kulturen Südasiens, Freie Universität Berlin,Königin-Luise-Str. 34 A, D-14195 Berlin, Germany, <[email protected]>

Dr. Snigdha TRIPATHY, Plot No. 1480, Gauda Munda Chhak, Bhubaneswar, Orissa.

Dr. Anila VERGHESE, Principal, Sophia College for Women, Bhulabhai Desai Road, Mumbai 400 026, India, <[email protected]>

Dr. Corinna WESSELS-MEVISSEN, Independent Researcher, Quitzowstr. 126, D-10559 Berlin, Germany, <[email protected]>

Dr. Michael WILLIS, Department of Asia, The British Museum, London WC1B 3DG, Great Britain, <[email protected]>

Dr. Tianshu ZHU, Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology, FSH, University of Macau, Taipa, Macau, China,<[email protected]>

Prof. Dr. Monika ZIN, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, Institut für Indologie und Tibetologie, Department fürAsienstudien, Ludwigstr. 31, D-80539 München, Germany, <[email protected]>

Documents

To What God Shall We Render Homage in the Temple at Modhera