Indian Art: A History of Indian Art from the Earliest Times up to the Third Century A.D. c16.57

c16.57

We have also a corresponding male type produced in similar clay and technique, but its faces show foreign ethnic features. A short beard is indicated by indentation marks on a peaked chin, and there is a bicornate turban on the head. The cheek-bones are prominent. In a few cases we see a beard-mask, a conical head-gear, and drapery covering the lower body in the *tahmad* style. These male heads are as numerous as the female figurines; the male type, however, is confined to Mathurā as of strictly local character, since no specimens have been traced outside that region up to now. [Fig. 237]. It seems that it appeared later than the female type, about first century B.C. The influx of the Kshahārāta Śakas in the population of Mathurā seems to have induced the local potters to copy those faces in clay for the delectation of their clientele. That became a traditional feature of the Indian potter's art in subsequent periods also. A trial dig at Mathurā can alone settle the question regarding the relative chronology of these two early types of male and female figurines of the Jamna valley.