Indian Art: A History of Indian Art from the Earliest Times up to the Third Century A.D. c16.60

c16.60

Thus, there are some well-marked stages in the evolution of the early Indian clay-figurines. Firstly, there is a religious female type with symbols and elements of decoration rooted in the tradition of the Mother Goddess. This was followed by a type drawn entirely from life, portraying figures of charming men and women in poses of dance and movement. The change was due to artistic causes as well as religious changes. Motifs, originally religious, of seated and standing types, were adopted for ordinary figures. The variety in the case of female figurines consists either in her pose or in the object—a fan, a mirror or a flower—held in her hand. Such specimens abound at Mathurā and Kosam. Their facial forms as well as ornaments and drapery are related to well-known types of Śuṅga sculpture. An oft-recurring specimen shows a young woman feeding a parrot or playing with that bird as her favourite pastime¹, of which the Mathurā school of sculpture preserves several beautiful specimens.