Indian Art: A History of Indian Art from the Earliest Times up to the Third Century A.D. c11.135

c11.135

On the round drum (*Aṇḍa-phalaka*) are carved four smaller *Dharma Charkas* and Four Noble Animals (*Mahā Ājāneya Paśu*), viz. Elephant, Bull, Lion and Horse. The four animals have a long tradition from the Indus Valley right up to our own times and over a wide area covering India, Ceylon, Burma, Siam and Tibet. They are depicted marching in a file on a prismatic seal of the Indus Valley from Mohenjo-daro, on the moon stones in Ceylon belonging to the Gupta period, in a Rajasthani Painting of the 18th century preserved in National Museum and on a *Kanthā* cloth from Bengal (19 century) now in the Bhārat Kalā Bhavan. In the Buddhist conception of the Anavatapta Lake they are the guardians of four outlets which are the source of four great rivers. The Vālmīki Rāmāyaṇa includes them amongst auspicious objects assembled for the coronation of Rāma and Keśavadāsa (17th century) places them on the four portals of Rāma’s palace. We have been able to trace about 40 references to them both in art and literature and there may be still more showing that they formed part of popular consciousness and the belief in their sacred character belonged to the Buddhists, Jainas and Hindus alike. The four smaller *Chakras* on the abacus face the four cardinal points and we find their true interpretation as the wheel of a Chakravartī king rolling in four directions upto the ends of the earth. Indeed, the four-fold pattern of creation as vitalised by the principle of Dharma of an ideal Chakravartī king is exemplified in the eight representations on the drum.