Studies in Indian Art c13.s1.45

c13.s1.45

The halo in the images of the Kushāṇa period (1st-3rd century) is quite plain marked only by an edge of scallops (Sanskrit *hastinakha*). This halo becomes elaborate in the Gupta period as seen in the famous Buddha images from Mathura and Sarnath. The essential element in the decoration of the Gupta halo is a lotus flower. Kālidāsa makes specific reference to this kind of halo styling it as *padmātapatra-chhāyā-maṇḍala* (*Raghuvamśa*, IV, 5). In comparing the halo of his ideal hero Raghu with a lotus parasol the poet imagines that invisible Lakshmī held a lotus-parasol on the head of the king, this cast a shadow, and the shadow was the halo itself resembling a lotus.¹ A lotus parasol reflects itself in the lotus halo.