Studies in Indian Art c12.s13.41

c12.s13.41

It is not surprising that an image which must have once adorned such a temple, was actually found by the late Pt. Radha Krishna in 1929 from the village named Junsuti, six miles off Mathurā on the road to Govardhana. It was sold to the Lucknow Museum and is now kept there. It is published here from photos found in the record of the late Panditji (Fig. 107). The back entry gives its ht. 2'-6". Balarāma is standing with a canopy of six serpent hoods and holds the 'musala' in his right hand and the 'hala' in his left, both the 'āyudhas' resting against his shoulders. He wears a very conspicuous turban, heavy earrings in cloven ears, a torque with single cylindrical bead and double wristlets. The upper body is nude and the lower is draped in a dhoti, its creased arrangement, triangular fold and the girdle being exactly similar to those on the ancient Yakṣha statues of the Śuṅga period. The image can not be later than the second century B. C., and must be regarded as the earliest representation of any Brāhmanical deity in the whole field of Hindu iconography. Its importance therefore cannot be exaggerated for throwing light on the most controversial question of the origins of iconographic art in India. The Bankipur Tīrthaṅkara image of the Maurya period and the Mathurā Balarāma image of the Śuṅga period together prove that the religious tradition of the land had allowed the shaping of the principal deities in human form for purposes of worship much earlier than is often conceived by archaeologists in relation to the question of the origin of the Buddha image.