The Development of Hindu Iconography c13.35

Language: English

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The text first refers to the preparation of the image (*i.e.*, the model, evidently made of wax, though not expressly said so here) complete with all the details, according to the *navatāla* measurement; then instructions are given about the placing of wax-tubes on its back, shoulders and the neck or crown and besmearing it with refined clay in three layers. Rules for the preparation of the clay are given in detail and it is needless to say that they are very different from those mentioned in the *Hayaśīrṣa Pañcarātra*. The clay coatings should be made in regular intervals and be carefully dried up in the shade. The textual injunction to be noted is that the amount of wax used to prepare the model should be weighed in the very beginning by the wise artist (*sikthakaṃ tolayedādāvarccālagnam vicakṣaṇaḥ*). Then the particular metal out of which the casting is to be done should be measured according to certain proportions; if the image is to be made of brass or copper, the metal should weigh ten times (or eight times according to a variant reading), if of silver, twelve times, and if of gold, sixteen times, the weight of the wax model, according to the specific gravity of the metals. Then the measured metal should be encased in a cocoanut shaped earthen crucible (*nārikelākṛtiṃ mūṣām*), and the wax from the clay-coated mould should be melted away by heating the image in fire. The crucible with the metal within ought to be so heated that the latter may form a liquid mass;

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then after puncturing the top of the crucible with an iron rod, the whole molten metal should be carefully poured down the mouth of the tube. When the molten metal has congealed after cooling down, the clay coating should be broken up very carefully. Any superfluous metal and tubes adhering to the fully fashioned metal image should be filed away with a cāraṇa (a file?), and lastly the whole should be brightly polished (paścādujvalatāṃ nayet). When this is all done in the manner prescribed above, the king should instal it on an auspicious day according to the usual rites and should offer daily worship to it.¹ Saraswati remarks that the above text ‘does not say whether the model would have to be made of solid wax or with an inner core.’ But a perusal of the text will show that it does seem to refer to solid casting which was the general rule in case of small images. In the case of bigger images, the method of hollow casting seems to have been followed in consideration of their cost and weight. Several of the earliest big metal images of India, the Mahāsthān Mañjuśrī and the Sultanganj Buddha mentioned above, exhibit a core still sticking tightly to their inside. From this it seems that the wax model was worked over an inner compound probably consisting of charred husk, finely rubbed clay, thoroughly carded cotton and powdered salt—the same ingredients that were used in the preparation of the clay for applying to the outside of the wax mould.

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Another edited text on metal casting is found in a section of the Śilparatna of Śrīkumāra who flourished in the 16th century A.D.; it may be noted here. It consists of twenty-two verses incorporated in the second chapter (verses 32-53) of the printed edition of Śilparatna, Part II, by T. Ganapati Sastri. The text, though corrupt, seems to lay down details which are concerned with hollow casting. The first verse (Madhūcchiṣṭena nirmāya sakalaṃ niṣkalaṃ tu vā | Baddhvā mṛdā dṛḍhaṃ śuṣkamadhūcchiṣṭaṃ bahiḥ srjet) and verses 42ff. speak of a process in which the inside of the image remains hollow after the wax inside and the wax outside are melted away by heat. The last verse (No. 53, viz., *Ghanam cellohajam vimbam madhucchiṣṭena kevalaḥ | Kṛtvā mṛllepanādīni pūrvavat kramataścaret*) does nothing but refer to the casting of *ghana*, i.e., solid images. That metal images cast hollow were made is fully proved by writers on Smṛti works like Manu and others who refer to such images heated from within which an adulterer would have to embrace as a sort of punishment. The Ṛgvedic passage *sūrmyam suṣirāmiva* (VIII. 69, 12), though not referring to an image of the god meant for worship, seems also to refer to the practice of hollow casting.