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Vaikuṇṭha-Viśvarūpa Vol. III

41.  D. Ref.: 

DREIKOPFIGER VIṢṆU MIT LAKṢMĪ AUF GARUḌA

Stein: 69 x 45

4 Hande

Nordbhadranische, Lakṣmī-Dāmodara-Tempel, Lakṣmī-Nārāyaṇa Komplex, Chamba (Ravi-Tal), Himachal Pradesh.

41.1 DESCRIPTION

In size, style, and iconography, this relief corresponds closely to the description of No.37 in Baijnath (Kangra Valley). The chief difference lies in the treatment of the back-slab, which here, instead of being a plain rectangle, has a double flame-edged nimbus rising to a slight central peak behind both Viṣṇu and Lakṣmī, between reliefs depicting śikhara-shrines behind the raised mace and disk. The hands of Garuḍa here hold the amṛtakalaśa between the palms.

41.2 PRELIMINARY IDENTIFICATION

Three-faced VIṢṆU on Garuḍa with Lakṣmī, in the local style of the Western Himalaya of about the 13th century.

Nr. 41: Chamba

Lakṣmī-Dāmodara-Tempel

Visnu, Laksmi-Damodara-Tempel, Chamba, Himachal Pradesh

42. D.Ref.:

Messing: H. 117

4 Hande

Sanktumikone, Hari-Rai-Tempel, Chamba (Ravi-Tal), Himachal Pradesh

42.1 DESCRIPTION

This "bronze" (brass) image was stolen in the 1970s and recovered by police in Bombay, after which it was photographed by the Archaeological Survey of India and published (Sadashiv Gorakshkar, Bulletin of the Prince of Wales Museum of Western India 11 (1971): 33ff.). Under present-day circumstances it is impossible to see or photograph it in the Hari Rai temple in Chamba without its ritual trappings. Nor has the image ever been photographed without the black eye-outlines which radically alter the original facial expression: beneath the paint, the eyes as depicted in the metal are of course smaller, and half-closed in contemplation. This would originally have produced the striking contrast between the serenity of the central face and the ferocity of the animal side-faces, which is so marked a feature of the 8th-century Kashmiri Viṣṇu with three heads from Bejbehara (above, No.05).

There is no doubt that the iconography, and to a lesser degree also the style, of this four-faced Viṣṇu image (the fourth face of Kapila on the back is a masterpiece of krodhaṛsi iconography) stems from Kashmir. The style is a combination of influences, chiefly of Kashmiri stone and metal sculpture of the 9th century, along with local elements developed in wood and metal at Brahmapura and Chatradhi on the Budhal tributary of the Ravi to the east of Chamba between the 8th and 9th centuries (see below, Nos.50, 51). There is considerable stylization, especially in the treatment of the animal-faces, which have all the abstract modelling of surface volumes that is such a powerful feature of the Śakti-Devī doorframe at Chatradhi (for which I suggest a 9th-century date: below, No.51). Since this quality of abstract form as a genre is not seen developing to the same degree in Kashmiri stone or metal sculpture, the origins of it might well lie as much in the medium itself, and In wood-carving as a technique, as in the relative inaccessibility of the upper reaches of the Ravi: although damaged and worn, the smaller side-faces of the three-headed Viṣṇu on the left-hand jamb of the 7th-century Lakṣaṇā-Devī doorframe at Brahmapura show a similar tendency to reduce the animal profiles to the rounded volumes of masks; in the 8th century, the Bejbehara stone sculpture of three-headed Viṣṇu in Kashmir (above, No.05) shows a far greater attempt at resisting the slide into abstraction, and more retention of post-Gupta 'realism': in the depiction of the lion and boar faces. Both before and after the introduction of the four-faced Vaikuṇṭha iconography from Kashmir in the 9th century, the valleys of the Ravi-Budhal and the Jhelum witnessed two different developments of post-Gupta North Indian style; these were to merge into a more or less uniform "Pahari" style only with the decline of the North Indian aesthetic itself, from about the 12th century onward (see Nos.10, 16, 18, 19, and 29-32), coinciding with the collapse of indigenous political control of the Yamunā and Ganges plains.

The iconography of this image is that of the Kashmiri Vaikuṇṭha of the mid-9th century, and as such need not be treated further here.

42.2 PRELIMINARY IDENTIFICATION

Four-faced Vaikuṇṭha of Kashmiri type, produced in the Chamba area (Ravi Valley) in the second half of the 9th century.

Nr. 42: Chamba

Hari-Rai-Tempel

Vaikuntha, Hari-Rai-Tempel, Chamba, Himachal Pradesh

43. D. Ref.:

Stein:

Votivshrein, Chamba, Himachal Pradesh

Nr. 43: Chamba

Votivschrein

44. D. Ref.:

Nr. 44: Chamba

45. D. Ref.:

stein: 58 x 41 x 10

Swai (Swaim), Hemgiri Churah tehsil, Chamba District (Ravi-Tal), Himachal Pradesh [BhS Chamba]

45.1 DESCRIPTION

This remarkable late image depicts Viṣṇu seated on the back of anthropomorphic Garuḍa, who supports the god's feet on the palms of his raised hands while the weapon-personifications stand upon his outstretched wings. The stele is trilobate in shape, providing a halo around the head of Viṣṇu, and a second nimbus enclosing his body and the remaining figures. The style is a very localized version of the generalised "Pahari" aesthetic; the iconography is basically Kashmiri, but it has been partly forgotten and misunderstood. In terms of the general developments in Vaikuṇṭha iconography observed throughout the Western Himalaya it cannot reasonably be considered older than the 13th century. It provides an excellent example of the indigenous artist's attempt to understand and depict a deity belonging to an extinct tradition; the North Indian aesthetic and iconography were no longer living forces when this sculpture was made.

Viṣṇu wears a version of the triple-crescent crown of Kashmir, within which rises a high coiffure of Jaṭās, the long rolled locks of hair characteristic of ascetics and iconographically a hallmark of Śiva. The side-faces of Narasiṃha and Varāha, scarcely distinguishable from each other, project from the level of the headband, well above the face god, so that they appear as attachments to the crown; this upward displacement of the animal profiles can be seen beginning already in the 7th-century woodcarving of three-headed Viṣṇu on the left-hand door jamb of the Lakṣaṇā temple at Bharmaur, and can therefore be regarded as a local interpretation of the North Indian (originally Mathuran) concept of multi-headedness (in which the extra heads emerge from the angle between neck and shoulder) which was peculiar to the Ravi-Budhal valley from the 7th century onward, and which both pre-dated and survived the better known Kashmiri convention of placing the heads adjacent to the central face. The face of Viṣṇu is elongated, with correspondingly high arching brows and long staring eyes stretching back to the tips of the ears; the length of the nose and ears, and the depth of the lower lip continue this elongation. The vertical third eye, like the hairstyle a characteristic of Śiva, appears in the centre of the forehead. Voluminous ringlets cascade in layers below the side-faces to the shoulders. The front arms rest on the thighs -- Viṣṇu is seated in pralambapāda with his knees played -- and the hands hold what appear to be the disk fright) and conch (1eft). The 'disk' is in fact a victim of the thorough iconographical misunderstanding from which this image results: it is essentially a combination of the circular lotus, which Viṣṇu conventionally holds by its stalk in this hand, and the spoked disk or cakra which in the later sculpture of Himachal sometimes occurs with only four spokes in the form of a cross, as here and. for example, also at Nirth (see No.24) in the 10th century. The conch, too, has lost its semblance to the real object by having its spiral markings reduced to a series of superimposed rings, so that it now rather resembles a fir-cone. The trirekha on the throat has similarly been misunderstood and reduced to two thick bands encircling the neck like ornaments rather than folds of flesh, below which two very similar plain necklaces appear, followed by two more pearl-strings. The upavīta traversing the torso is doubled and curves just above the waistband of the dhotī which is shown above the knees. The vanamālā is omitted altogether. The rear arms are stretched -- with the elasticity of limb typical of the local style -- down to the very margins of the stele, nearly to the level of the feet, where they rest upon the heads of two diminutive female (figures, each holding a cāmara hanging down from one hand, and a ribbed mace in the other. These accompanying figures are clearly derived, imprecisely and without iconographical understanding, from figures of Gadādevī; Cakrapuruṣa, as one might expect in view of the confused cakra-padma attribute, does not appear.

In contrast to the attenuated anatomy of the god he carries, Garuḍa is a bulky, dwarf-like figure, his hands raised like those of a Kashmiri caryatid to support the feet of his master. The face, with round bulging eyes, a thick continuous eyebrow, a diamond-shaped beak in place of his nose, and festoons of hair, comes close to resembling an asura, which again is typical of the "Pahari" representations of Garuḍa in general. A lotus is placed flat on his head, He has neck-bands and necklaces similar to those worn by Viṣṇu, and a string of chunky beads worn like an upavīta and slung under his belly, which conceals any lower garment. The thick short legs are striped with plumage, and terminate in three enormous toes with pointed claws. The wings, descending from behind the raised arms, are scaly with feathers that are rounded rather than leaf-shaped, as in the Kashmiri tradition. His figure is framed in a ribbed band, perhaps representing a garland.

The low pedestal has lotus-petals on the upper margin, and a simple pointed pattern on the lower.

45.2 PRELIMINARY IDENTIFICATION

Viṣṇu as Garuḍa-mounted Vaikuṇṭha, without Lakṣmī; made in the Chamba Valley in the 13th or 14th century.

Nr. 45: Svai / Svaim

BhS Chamba

Vaikuntha, Swai, Hemgiri, Chamba Distt., Himachal Pradesh

46. D. Ref.:

Stein: 68 x 31 x 11

6(?) Hande

Koh, Chamba tehsil (Ravi-Tal), Himachal Pradesh [BhS Chambal]

46.1 DESCRIPTION

This appears to he one of the earliest surviving images in Himachal of three-headed Viṣṇu accompanied by Lakṣmī and riding on anthropomorphic Garuḍa. The style clearly derives from Kashmir, but the sculpture represents a point of departure for a number of later Himachal images, of similar iconography but in the local style of the hill-country (see Nos.37 from Baijnath, 41 from Chamba, 28 from Naggar, 31 drom Dasal. in the Kangra, Ravi and Vyas Valleys). As this sculpture is so manifestly a copy of a Kashmiri original made in the Chamba area, it can be assumed that this iconographic type spread from there to the Kangra and Vyas valleys in the course of the 11th to 13th centuries.

The piece is unfortunately eroded and badly damaged; in its present form it consists of two fragments, recovered at different times from Koh and now joined together. The arms and attributes of Viṣṇu on the right-hand side are missing.

Viṣṇu is seated in lalitāsana above anthropomorphic Garuḍa, the right leg hanging down, the ankle and instep of the left foot resting on Garuḍa's head. Lakṣmī stands on his left, leaning against his arm.

The crown of Viṣṇu is the triple-peaked type with a thick jewelled headband. The profiles of Narasiṃha (right) and Varāha (left) emerge horizontally and well clear of the shoulders from the sides of the central face. They are large, clearly differentiated animal profiles, copied from an imported Kashmiri original; they are not derived from the more abstract local style of the Ravi Valley which is seen in the Chetradhi doorframe (No.51) and the Hari Rai metal image (No.42).

The ear-rings are small circular kuṇḍalas of floral design. The upavīta hangs straight down the left side of the torso: its lower curve is lost because the fracture-line occurs at waist-level. The vanamālā is omitted. The right hands and arms are lost. On the left, the rearmost arm is raised behind Lakṣmī's head, and the hand can be seen holding the mace upright. The second left hand is placed, in a most tender gesture, on the back of her head. A third arm extends downward behind Lakṣmī and the hand is seen at the edge of the stele near the feet, resting on what may be a diminutive seated figure.

Lakṣmī stands on a small projection, perhaps intended to be a lotus, protruding from behind Garuḍa's left shoulder. She stands in a relaxed posture with her weight on the right leg and the left ankle crossed over the right. Her arms are damaged, but the left appears to have been lowered, the right raised in the abhayamudrā. She appears to wear anklets, armlets, bracelets, a single jewelled necklace, and a low pointed tiara of the kind worn by the Gandharan city-goddesses (Tyche; nagaradevtā); long hair, or more probably a cloth head-covering, falls to her shoulders. A long, thick rolled vanamālā of Kashmiri type passes through the crook of her left arm and loops across her ankles. Her head and shoulders are turned slightly toward Viṣṇu, near his Varāha-head, and on a level with the god's central face. She is intended to be seen as leaning back against the outstretched left arms of Viṣṇu. The half-standing, half-leaning posture recalls the position of Pārvatī adjacent to multi-headed Śiva in the 4th-century image from Rang Mahal in the Bikaner museum.

The stocky but well proportioned figure of Garuḍa, has a low crown. The face is nearly obliterated, but traces of the large round eyes and the beak-like nose can be detected. He wears a simple necklace, armlets and bracelets, and a long upavīta. He is a two-armed figure, without the extra pair of hands that were added in later images to support the feet of Viṣṇu, His left hand supports an amṛta-kalaśa in front of his chest, while the right hand steadies it at the side; this gesture re-occurs in the later image at Baijnath (no.37). His legs are birdlike, tapering to three claws. Behind him, his feathers, in the shape of leaves, curve downwards to the base, and also upwards to support the god and goddess above him.

The base has a pot-like form, the neck of which represents the seed-case of a lotus whose petals hang down around the bulbous lower part.

46.2 PRELIMINARY IDENTIFICATION

The image represents three-headed VIṢṆU (since the original which inspired it was almost certainly an icon from Kashmir, the four-headed Vaikuṇṭha is probably intended) in Kashmiri style, seated on anthropomorphic Garuḍa with Lakṣmī standing at his side. It was made in the Ravi Valley near Chamba in about the 10th century, and represents the arrival there of a Kashmiri icon-type which later spread to the Kangra and Vyas valleys, where it was made in the indigenous style up to the 14th century and probably later.

Nr. 46: Koh

BhS Chamba

Visnu, Koh, Chamba, Tehsil, Himachal Pradesh

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